Mapping the History of Knowledge: Text-Based Tools and Algorithms for Tracking the Development of Concepts

Mikhail Gronas, Anna Rumshisky
2017
We propose to map out the History of European thought over last three centuries using as a proxy the history of changes in 15 editions of Encyclopedia Britannica. Editors of each new edition had to build a new consensus on what to include and what to exclude, how much volume a subject deserves, and what are the relations between subjects. These decisions may be captured and analyzed by methods of natural language processing, network analysis, and information visualization, thus providing tools
more » ... or identification and analysis of various historical trends within and across domains of knowledge, such as discussion of theories and ideas, evolution of concepts, growth of reputations and such.
doi:10.17613/m66s8z fatcat:6cb4sprwcjgj5bpcx37q7smpvy