'Double blind' graph data analysis: a pedagogical experiment to discuss the intersubjectivity of network interpretation
Résumé
If network analysis is a method now very widely diffused in the field of digital humanities (Ahnert et al., 2020), often because the metaphor and lexical field of ‘network’ are very effective in describing the objects of study of the humanities, there is no definitive interpretation procedure. Indeed, describing a network entails the recontextualization of graph-theoretical elements (e.g., the “betweenness centrality” metric) into the language of the discipline (e.g., “knowledge brokers” or simply “bridges”) through a methodological “translation” (Grandjean and Jacomy, 2019). This hermeneutic process is subjective by nature, especially in the humanities where visual network analysis is often privileged, which may seem paradoxical considering that the method is supposed to objectify historical or literary sources (this is more generally true for all digital methods). Yet as Popper argued, descriptive statements necessarily draw their validity from “intersubjective agreement” (Freeman, 1973). How much agreement does network analysis offer?
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