It is time to address the Public Communication of DH
This introduction addresses two facets of the communication of Digital Humanities (DH) that have framed this special edition of DHQ. I begin by discussing a number of articles about DH that have relatively recently appeared in mainstream newspapers. I then observe that a number of these articles not only show an impoverished understanding of the field’s frame of reference but also misrepresent various aspects of it, for example, its interrelationship with the Humanities. Given that many academic publications on the question "what is DH?" have appeared in recent years, yet DH is, nonetheless, misrepresented in this way, I propose that the field must look again at the communication of its activities "in the round." Now that DH is arguably moving from the margins to the mainstream I propose that the time has come to address what we might call the "Public Communication of DH" so that we can better communicate to the general public and academics working in other disciplines what it is that we do. As the nature of DH’s relationship to the Humanities is one that is frequently misrepresented in the mainstream media I propose that this would be an important area for endeavours in the "Public Communication of DH" to address and explore as early as possible. The articles included in this special edition enrich and expand ongoing conversations about the nature of this relationship. In doing so they make available a wealth of case studies, arguments and insights that can, in due course, be drawn on to further the "Public Communication of DH."
Is science communication its own field
The present comment examines to what extent science communication has attained the status of an academic discipline and a distinct research field, as opposed to the common view that science communication is merely a sub-discipline of media studies, sociology of science or history of science. Against this background, the authors of this comment chart the progress science communication has made as an emerging subject over the last 50 years in terms of a number of measures. Although discussions are still ongoing about the elements that must be present to constitute a legitimate disciplinary field, we show here that science communication meets four key elements that constitute an analytical framework to classify academic disciplines: the presence of a community; a history of inquiry; a mode of inquiry that defines how data is collected; and the existence of a communications network.
The Bastille: A History of a Symbol of Despotism and Freedom
This book is both an analysis of the Bastille as cultural paradigm and a case study on the history of French political culture. It examines in particular the storming and subsequent fall of the Bastille in Paris on July 14, 1789 and how it came to represent the cornerstone of the French Revolution, becoming a symbol of the repression of the Old Regime. Lusebrink and Reichardt use this semiotic reading of the Bastille to reveal how historical symbols are generated; what these symbols’ functions are in the collective memory of societies; and how they are used by social, political, and ideological groups.

To facilitate the symbolic nature of the investigation, this analysis of the evolving signification of the Bastille moves from the French Revolution to the nineteenth century to contemporary history. The narrative also shifts from France to other cultural arenas, like the modern European colonial sphere, where the overthrow of the Bastille acquired radical new signification in the decolonization period of the 1940s and 1950s. The Bastille demonstrates the potency of the interdisciplinary historical research that has characterized the end of this century, combining quantitative and qualitative approaches, and taking its methodological tools from history, sociology, linguistics, and cultural and literary studies.