Should humanities students learn to code? I think yes. But I want to make clear that by saying yes, I am not arguing that they must learn to code, nor am I saying that coding is a necessary skill in order to have a successful career in the humanities. Rather, I believe that one’s humanities education can simply be enhanced by learning how to cross the bridge between natural and artificial languages.
My opinions on this question are largely based on personal experience. Up until the spring of 2020, I had no coding experience, and frankly, I did not see a reason why I should. Most of my academic interests lie in the biological sciences, so sitting in front of a blank screen endlessly inputing very specific strings of letters seemed quite dull to me, compared to drawing colorful anatomical diagrams or giving alcohol to fruit flies in lab.
However, spring term of 2020, I took an introduction to statistics course where I had my first encounter with coding in R studio. R is a coding language made specifically for statistics, for example:
<pre>
MnGroundwater <- read.csv("MnGroundwater.csv")
ggplot(MnGroundwater, aes(x=Lead))
+geom_histogram(bins=20, color = "white")
</pre>With the appropriate data, this R command produces a histogram like this.
While I admit that my patience was tested on multiple counts, I came out of the class with a new sense of appreciation for pretty much anything computer-related. I started to notice things that I never would have thought twice about before–for example, websites with complex layouts or when Excel would do instantaneous calculations for me.
Computers should not be black boxes but rather understood as engines for creating powerful and persuasive models of the world around us.
Matthew Kirschenbaum, “Hello Worlds (why humanities students should learn to program),” May 23, 2010
Although I have only skimmed the surface of the world of coding, I can already see how being familiar with coding would enhance my education in the biological sciences by being able to analyze quantitative information better using R or present my research neatly using CSS.
Likewise, I think that familiarity with coding will only do good for a person in the humanities, especially in this day of age where the divide between artificial language and natural language seem to be diminishing. Thus, for humanities students, I think coding should be viewed more as a useful skill, rather than as a necessary prerequisite, that could open doors to opportunities that are only available in the digital world.
Hi Alyssa! I like how you talked about your personal experience with coding and how learning programming enhanced your knowledge about the biological sciences. It shows how technology is being increasingly integrated into many different fields of study
Hey Alyssa. Great post. The part when you said you didn’t see any reason to learn to code before spring of 2020 caught my attention. Given that you’re involved with biological sciences, it would seem coding was irrelevant. But when you started describing the uses of coding in R for histograms and such, the uses of coding made more sense.
Hi Alyssa, I thought you made a lot of really good points in this post! I agree with you that coding should not be necessary or required for humanities majors, but it still is helpful. This reminded me of our debate in class over creative freedom. If a humanities student learns coding and is able to produce digital projects, they have more freedom to create exactly what they’d like and envision. It was also interesting that you brought in other fields besides the humanities. I think learning to code is really important in the STEM field in general.
Hey Alyssa, I really agree with how trying out coding gives a greater appreciation for all things computer-related! I remember struggling a lot with some pretty basic code, which then made me feel utterly amazed at how people have coded all the complex stuff that we use today. It’s cool how a little foray into coding can put things into perspective just like how humanities often help people discover new lenses to look at the world with.