James Smithies is Professor of Digital Humanities and Director of the Humanities and Social Sciences Digital Research Hub at The Australian National University. Previously, he was Professor of Digital Humanities at King’s College London and the founding director of King’s Digital Lab.

A sweeping view of how our digital age unfolds from the long history of modernity with all its tensions of determinism versus contingency, and Western universalism versus global multiplicity. Smithies’s astonishingly broad, detailed, and interlaced knowledge of computation, philosophy, and history undergirds a powerful guiding message. Alan Liu, Distinguished Professor of English, University of California, Santa BarbaraDigital Modernity is an essential guide for anyone seeking to understand not just what digital technologies do but how they are deeply entangled in modernity’s contested pasts and what they mean for our collective futures.Katherine Bode, Professor of Digital Literary Studies, Australian National UniversityThe great contribution of James Smithies is to learn and to bridge the digital revolution and the tradition of critical theory and sociology. This is pioneering work, full of insight and provocation, addressing both text and context, opening up the pathways of understanding.Peter Beilharz, Emeritus Professor of Sociology, La Trobe University

• Introduction: Technology and History 1 Digital Modernities 2 Computational Blueprints 3 The Digital Modern 4 The Public Sphere 5 Colonialism and Power 6 Race, Technology, and History 7 Into the Engine Room of History 8 Emergent Infrastructure 9 Industrialized Cognition Conclusion: The Future of Digital Modernity

James Smithies is Professor of Digital Humanities and Director of the Humanities and Social Sciences Digital Research Hub at The Australian National University. Previously, he was Professor of Digital Humanities at King’s College London and the founding director of King’s Digital Lab.

A sweeping view of how our digital age unfolds from the long history of modernity with all its tensions of determinism versus contingency, and Western universalism versus global multiplicity. Smithies’s astonishingly broad, detailed, and interlaced knowledge of computation, philosophy, and history undergirds a powerful guiding message. Alan Liu, Distinguished Professor of English, University of California, Santa BarbaraDigital Modernity is an essential guide for anyone seeking to understand not just what digital technologies do but how they are deeply entangled in modernity’s contested pasts and what they mean for our collective futures.Katherine Bode, Professor of Digital Literary Studies, Australian National UniversityThe great contribution of James Smithies is to learn and to bridge the digital revolution and the tradition of critical theory and sociology. This is pioneering work, full of insight and provocation, addressing both text and context, opening up the pathways of understanding.Peter Beilharz, Emeritus Professor of Sociology, La Trobe University

• Introduction: Technology and History 1 Digital Modernities 2 Computational Blueprints 3 The Digital Modern 4 The Public Sphere 5 Colonialism and Power 6 Race, Technology, and History 7 Into the Engine Room of History 8 Emergent Infrastructure 9 Industrialized Cognition Conclusion: The Future of Digital Modernity

James Smithies is Professor of Digital Humanities and Director of the Humanities and Social Sciences Digital Research Hub at The Australian National University. Previously, he was Professor of Digital Humanities at King’s College London and the founding director of King’s Digital Lab.

A sweeping view of how our digital age unfolds from the long history of modernity with all its tensions of determinism versus contingency, and Western universalism versus global multiplicity. Smithies’s astonishingly broad, detailed, and interlaced knowledge of computation, philosophy, and history undergirds a powerful guiding message. Alan Liu, Distinguished Professor of English, University of California, Santa BarbaraDigital Modernity is an essential guide for anyone seeking to understand not just what digital technologies do but how they are deeply entangled in modernity’s contested pasts and what they mean for our collective futures.Katherine Bode, Professor of Digital Literary Studies, Australian National UniversityThe great contribution of James Smithies is to learn and to bridge the digital revolution and the tradition of critical theory and sociology. This is pioneering work, full of insight and provocation, addressing both text and context, opening up the pathways of understanding.Peter Beilharz, Emeritus Professor of Sociology, La Trobe University

• Introduction: Technology and History 1 Digital Modernities 2 Computational Blueprints 3 The Digital Modern 4 The Public Sphere 5 Colonialism and Power 6 Race, Technology, and History 7 Into the Engine Room of History 8 Emergent Infrastructure 9 Industrialized Cognition Conclusion: The Future of Digital Modernity