Lab Session: Digital Humanities

             Lab Session: Digital Humanities

This blog is a reflection on my learning activities assigned by Prof. Dr. Dilip Barad as part of the Digital Humanities course. The main theme of the task was to think about the question, “Can a computer write poetry?” based on the ideas of Oscar Schwartz. Along with this, I worked with different digital tools that connect literature with technology.

In this blog, I Share my experience of attempting a test to recognize whether a poem was composed by a human or generated by a computer, exploring the CLiC Dickens Project and Activity Book, and working with Voyant Tools such as Cirrus, Links, Dreamscape, and Phrases. Through these activities, I wish to reflect not only on what I learned but also on how these tools have influenced my way of understanding literature and creativity. The goal of this blog is to record my personal as well as academic development and to highlight how digital methods can enhance the study of traditional literature.

Background Reading Click here

1. Understand how once we used to debate on if machines can write poems.

2. Take a test - Was this poem written by a human or a computer?

3. CLic Activity Book - Study material site

4. Voyant - the activity will be explained in the lab

1. Understand how once we used to debate on if machines can write poems.

In this Activity At first, it seemed strange to even imagine a computer writing something as emotional as poetry. Traditionally, we think of poetry as an expression of human feelings, imagination, and culture. However, this activity helped me understand that technology has advanced so much that machines can now generate poems that sometimes appear similar to human creations. Reading about this debate encouraged me to reflect on the difference between technical skill and true creativity. It made me question whether poetry is defined by emotions and personal experience, or by the structure and beauty of language itself.

2.Take a test - Was this poem written by a human or a computer?

Taking the test to identify whether a poem was written by a human or a computer was both challenging and enjoyable. Some poems created by machines looked very natural, while others lacked depth and personal touch. This experience taught me to read more carefully, noticing the subtle differences in tone, imagery, and emotion. I realized that while machines can imitate patterns, human poetry often carries lived experience and emotional weight that technology cannot fully reproduce.

3. CLic Activity Book - Study material site

https://clic.bham.ac.uk/

The CLiC Project (clic.bham.ac.uk), created at the University of Birmingham, has transformed the way we study literature. It provides access to a large digital collection of texts, mainly novels from the nineteenth century, and enables readers to carry out advanced linguistic searches. This tool makes it possible to trace patterns, themes, and expressions across entire works or multiple novels, offering fresh insights into language and style.

Experience and Learning Outcomes

When I first tried the CLiC Dickens Project activity, I couldn’t understand how to get meaningful results from the texts. At first, I tried on my own, but I couldn’t make anything.

Then I  take help from ChatGPT. I asked step-by-step questions and learned how to enter search words, check word patterns, and analyze the results properly. Following the instructions carefully, I slowly started understanding how the tool works. I could see how words and phrases are used repeatedly in Dickens’ works and how their meanings change in different contexts.

It was a new and interesting way to study literature, and I felt proud to finish the project. Overall, it was challenging but very useful for study Literature.

 4. Voyant Tool

 

Voyant Tools is a free, web-based text analysis tool that helps explore and visualize texts. It creates word clouds, frequency charts, and keyword contexts, making patterns and themes easier to notice. Simple to use, it supports students and researchers in studying language, style, and ideas in new ways.

Experience with Voyant Tools

Using Voyant Tools was a highly engaging and insightful experience. The platform transformed the way I approached text analysis by making it more interactive and visually appealing. After uploading a text, the first thing I noticed was the word cloud, which displayed the most frequently used terms in varying sizes. Words such as concordance, corpus, examples, Dickens, and novels stood out clearly, helping me to recognize the main ideas without much effort.

Beyond the word cloud, the Mandala and DreamScape visualizations revealed interesting connections between terms. For instance, I could see how words like activity, figure, and search were linked to the broader theme of the text. The scatterplot tool was especially useful because it showed how certain words appeared together, such as Jane with Austen and Dickens with activity. These collocations made it easy to understand how authors and themes were grouped within the material. Overall, the tool gave me a fresh perspective on analyzing language.

Learning Outcomes

From this activity, I learned that linguistic analysis can go beyond close reading and statistics. Voyant Tools demonstrated how visualizations can make complex data simple and accessible. It trained me to identify central themes quickly, to spot patterns of repetition, and to notice how words form meaningful associations across a text. It also helped me understand how visualization encourages a more exploratory, less rigid approach to language study. Most importantly, this activity showed that digital tools can complement traditional literary analysis, offering new perspectives that enrich interpretation.

Overall Learning Reflection 

Integration of Traditional and Digital Methods – The experience highlighted the value of combining close reading with digital analysis. Using visualizations, concordances, and word patterns enhanced my interpretative skills and provided new perspectives on language, style, and themes in literature.

Understanding the Role of Technology in Literature – I gained insight into how machines and digital tools, like CLiC and Voyant, can support literary study. From exploring whether computers can write poems to visualizing text patterns, I learned that technology can complement human creativity without replacing it.

Overall, this lab activity offered a comprehensive introduction to the possibilities of Digital Humanities. It demonstrated how technology can enhance literary analysis, providing new methods to explore text, themes, and stylistic patterns. The exercises encouraged critical thinking, attention to detail, and an appreciation of both human creativity and computational analysis. Ultimately, the experience strengthened my technical skills, interpretative abilities, and understanding of the evolving relationship between literature and digital tools, showing that modern literary study is enriched when traditional methods are combined with innovative technologies.