Fracture or Continuum?

Decades after historians first began using computers, the discipline is still debating the role of technology in disciplinary scholarship. Should historians think of digital technology in terms of its ability to fracture scholarship into fundamentally new forms? Or should they think of it as a continuum of digital practices grafted onto existing models? I will illustrate these two approaches using examples from my own research, including an article in a print journal, a self-published blog post, and a digital dissertation. These examples will help concretize an often-abstract debate over what is gained and lost by approaching digital scholarship as a fracture versus a continuum. I will discuss my work from the perspective of an early-career scholar and self-identified digital historian.