Where is cultural criticism in the digital humanities ?

As the cue for a thesis I wish to offer about the future of the digital humanities, I start by confessing to a lie I inserted in the last paragraph of the mission statement of 4Humanities. 4Humanities is an initiative I helped cofound with other digital humanists in November 2010 to advocate for the humanities at a time when economic retrenchment has accelerated a long-term decline in the perceived value of the humanities.1 It serves as a platform for advocacy statements and campaigns, international news on the state of the humanities, showcase examples of humanities work, “student voices” for the humanities, and other ways of speaking up publicly for the humanities. But unlike other humanities advocacy campaigns—for example, those of the National Humanities Alliance in the United States or the Defend the Arts and Humanities and Humanities and Social Sciences Matter initiatives in the United Kingdom—it has a special premise. As emblematized in the motto on its website, 4Humanities is “powered by the digital humanities community.” The idea is that in today’s world of networked communications the digital humanities have a special role to play in helping the humanities reach out.