Digital humanities, as the article argues, is the next frontier for academic research in terms of theory, themes, 'case studies' as well as insitutional support for the same. Perhaps the frontier has already started to become the new 'normal''. Archives and ethnography are no different and archive ethnography as a method as well as field is constantly engaging with the digital humanities ( websites, digital tools, virtual installations, virtual ethnography, etc. ) Therefore, drawing upon last week's readings, the assertion put forward by the author, tha digital humanities itself is a deeply racialized construct, one that is fundamentally built on the assumption of a 'normal reality' at the expense of other realities and experiences being marginalized or silenced is deeply vital to the practice of archive ethnography itself. As the field ( and social sciences and humanities in general) increasingly move towards engaging with the digital realms as repositories of information, archives, methods and tools, there needs to be a concerted effort towards applying the theories and insights of power and race that have defined ethnographic field work and archival research to digital humanities itself, thereby drawing connections, interrogations and engagements between these various disciplines, including African American studies as argued in the article. The "recovery of technology" needs be applied at different levels and instances. The silenced should be voiced, the singular deconstructed for the plural, the centre shifted towards decentered centers and assumptions of the 'natural' pushed towards the engagements with the constructs.
The primary argument that the author puts forward in the essay is two fold:
1. There needs to be a concerted effort to draw connections between African American studies and digital humanities in order to reveal the politics of race and power that constructs the tools of the former as well as the entire itself. Digital humanities, without such interrogation and engagement, would essentially be a "white" driven field, one that is built on the assumption of a 'natural reality' that is predominantly built on the predominance of the white experience at the expense or marginalization of all others.
2. If efforts are made to build these engagements and connections, then it could lead to a 'revitilzation' of the discipline itself, where the experiences of the marginalized are centered, racial power dynamics exposed and the deconstruction of the assumed 'natural' that defines digital humanities can take place. Therefore a 'technology of recovery' is required, where digital spaces that have been shut off to the black experience and agency can be reclaimed and re-engaged by considering "the intersections between the digital and blackness" (pg 2)