History 222 - Data

What is data? How has it been created, used, and stored in human history? What forms have humans invented in order to circulate and share it with others? And what values have societies invested in data? Challenging the idea that data is value neutral and historically static, this course will explore these questions through a history of the politics of information and its technological manifestations in societies mainly, but not exclusively located in the landmass that came to be called Europe and in the north Atlantic world. A recurring theme in the course will be the relationship between the claims that people make to political power; and the accounts that they give of how data should be created, circulated, interpreted, and controlled. How has this relationship changed over time, and how has it been inflected by changes in the nature of politics and new technological developments?