Abstract:

To consider why distant reading works is already to invite a certain kind of misunderstanding. Readers of this essay are likely to infer from its title that I mean to discuss the theories of Franco Moretti or to defend research in cultural analytics against criticism from skeptics. Neither of those is my focus. The argument of this essay is in some ways narrower, in that I largely set aside polemical debates over "digital humanities" or the role of computation in criticism, but it is also broader, in that I hope to draw readers' attention to a set of issues and concerns with a very wide application. My goal is to articulate a guiding theory that explains why and under what conditions distant reading works as a viable method for making true statements about the cultural past.

摘要：

考虑为什么远距离阅读有效已经引起了某种误解。这篇文章的读者可能会从它的标题推断出我的意思是讨论佛朗哥莫雷蒂的理论或捍卫文化分析研究免受怀疑论者的批评。这些都不是我的重点。这篇文章的论点在某些方面比较狭窄，因为我主要搁置了关于“数字人文”或计算在批评中的作用的争论，但它也更广泛，因为我希望引起读者的注意具有广泛应用的问题和关注点。我的目标是阐述一个指导理论，解释为什么以及在什么条件下远距离阅读可以作为对文化历史做出真实陈述的可行方法。