Trusting Computation in Digital Humanities Research.

Research in the humanities typically involves studying specific and potentially subjective interpretations of (historical) sources, whilst the computational tools and techniques used to support such questions aim at providing generic and objective methods to process large volumes of data. We claim that the success of a digital humanities project depends on the extent it succeeds in making an appropriate match of the specific with the generic, and the subjective with the objective. Trust in the outcome of a digital humanities study should be informed by a proper understanding of this match, but involves a non-trivial fit for use assessment.