All posts by jwbaker

James Baker is Director of Digital Humanities at the University of Southampton. James is a Software Sustainability Institute Fellow, a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, and holds degrees from the University of Southampton and latterly the University of Kent, where in 2010 he completed his doctoral research on the late-Georgian artist-engraver Isaac Cruikshank. James works at the intersection of history, cultural heritage, and digital technologies. He is currently working on a history of knowledge organisation in twentieth century Britain. In 2021, I begin a major new Arts and Humanities Research Council funded project 'Beyond Notability: Re-evaluating Women’s Work in Archaeology, History and Heritage, 1870 – 1950'. Previous externally funded research projects have focused on legacy descriptions of art objects ('Legacies of Catalogue Descriptions and Curatorial Voice: Opportunities for Digital Scholarship', Arts and Humanities Research Council), the preservation of intangible cultural heritage ('Coptic Culture Conservation Collective', British Council, and 'Heritage Repertoires for inclusive and sustainable development', British Academy), the born digital archival record ('Digital Forensics in the Historical Humanities', European Commission), and decolonial futures for museum collections ('Making African Connections: Decolonial Futures for Colonial Collections', Arts and Humanities Research Council). Prior to joining Southampton, James held positions of Senior Lecturer in Digital History and Archives at the University of Sussex and Director of the Sussex Humanities Lab, Digital Curator at the British Library, and Postdoctoral Fellow with the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art. He is a member of the Arts and Humanities Research Council Peer Review College, a convenor of the Institute of Historical Research Digital History seminar, a member of The Programming Historian Editorial Board and a Director of ProgHist Ltd (Company Number 12192946), and an International Advisory Board Member of British Art Studies.
Neuroscience

Should humanists follow neuroscience?

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“We humanists study humans. Every human has a brain. It therefore behooves us to keep abreast of developments in neuroscience”

***silence***

The study of caricature as a material, visual, imaginative, and lingustic form has led me to many weird and wonderful places (Soja’s ‘Thirdspace’ and concepts of intervisuality being two of the more memorable), but none have proven more interesting than my dabbling with neuroscience.

In spite of the sentiments quoted above, delivered as part of my introductory address to the Cradled in Caricature symposium, I am no biological determinist. Rather a suspicion of neurohumanities (and especially the neuroarthistory espoused by John Onians) has developed into a full-blown fascination with neuroscience.

Neuroscience is moving fast, and the discussions of what it can and can’t achieve are heating up. Raymond Tallis’ delightful Aping Mankind (2011) offers a useful starting point for anyone who has a natural caution for ‘SCIENTISTS FIND PART OF BRIAN WHICH MAKES PEOPLE RIOT!!’ headlines. Provocative, accessible, and exhaustive Tallis two-pronged attack on ‘Neuromania’ (neuroscience can and will prove anything and everything) and ‘Darwinitis’ (brains are part of evolution therefore human brains and animal brains function in the same way therefore humans (as animals) act purely on animal instincts dictated by the brain) is well timed. Indeed the efficacy of fMRI as a means of determining brain activity is beginning to come under serious scrutiny at precisely the same time as Iain Duncan Smith is developing UK government policy underpinned by a hugely problematic neuroscientific reading of child-rearing (something which the Centre for Parenting Culture Studies at the University of Kent has recently attacked – see Jennie Bristow on parenting and junk neuroscience). Today these tensions were once again in evidence as the Royal Society have felt the need to speak out against calls for neuroscientific evidence to be used in the courtroom.

Neuroscience then began for me as a potential means of understanding caricature (and indeed may still prove useful for that purpose) and developed into a device for better understanding the value of my own discipline. I study humans. And every human I study has a brain. Yet involving myself in the literature of neuroscience has made me understand my human subjects are not defined by their brains. And as there are scholars (such as A.S. Byatt) who are seeking to define human activity through the brains which allowed that activity to happen, it behooves me as a humanist to keep abreast of developments in neuroscience.

Interested in reading about neuroscience in your spare time? Neuroskeptic and Mind Hacks are good places to start.