On the Cultural History of Time Series Graphs

Szemes, Botond (2024) On the Cultural History of Time Series Graphs. Zeitschrift für digitale Geisteswissenschaften, 2024 (9). ISSN 2510-1358

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Abstract

Taking the insights from diagrammatology – rooting in German media and culture studies (Medienkulturwissenschaft) and semiology – as background, this essay seeks to answer the question of how the history of the visual representation of temporal processes can be captured, and how the emergence of the statistical time series graph has influenced our ideas about time, history, and stories. To this end, I will provide a cultural-historical overview that, beyond shedding light on the interrelationships between different discourses (e. g., economy, statistics, science, literature), can contribute to a critical examination of perhaps the most widespread type of diagram used today. This overview can be understood more as a proposal for discussion, aimed at encouraging methodological and historical reflections on digital humanities practices, rather than as a presentation of a closed topic.

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