Pushing the Boundaries of Digital Philology

I am undertaking an independent study that seeks to push beyond the traditional boundaries of digital philology. This project was designed and is being executed in collaberation with PhD Candidate Davide Pafumi.

Key components of this study included:

Survival Analysis of Old English Lexicon: We adapted statistical techniques commonly used in demographic and medical research to analyze the “lifespans” of Old English words—examining patterns of lexical emergence, persistence, and disappearance across the corpus of Old English poetry. AI-Assisted Old English Lemmatizer: We testing the possibility of a new lemmatization tool tailored to Old English, using the poetric corpus of Old English, the Clark Hall Dictionary, and custom inflectional patterns. Digital Collation of Cædmon’s Hymn: We are using digital collation technology, through textual communities, to collate the manuscript witnesses of Cædmon’s Hymn, investigating ways to visualize textual variation computationally. AI Spelling Relaxer: Davide will work on an AI-powered tool to “relax” Middle English spelling variations, enhancing the readability of texts and improving computational search and analysis. Data Sonification: We will experiment with transforming linguistic data from the Canterbury Tales into sound, exploring how auditory representations of philological patterns might offer new insights into textual structure and lexical change.

Together, these experiments reflect our broader goal of integrating computational methods with traditional philological rigor. This work not only advances the digital study of medieval English but also opens new possibilities for representing and interacting with linguistic data in ways that challenge the boundaries of textual scholarship.