Bleier / Sean M. Versioning Cultural Objects

Digital Approaches
1. Auflage 2020
ISBN: 978-3-7504-4828-5
Verlag: BoD - Books on Demand
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 0 - No protection

E-Book, Englisch, 216 Seiten

This volume approaches an understanding of the term versioning in the broadest sense, discussing ideas about how versions differ across forms of media, including text, image, and sound. Versions of cultural objects are identified, defined, articulated, and analysed through diverse mechanisms in different fields of research. The study of versions allows for the investigation of the creative processes behind the conception of works, a closer inspection of their socio-political contexts, and promotes investigation of their provenance and circulation. Chapters in this volume include discussion of what a "version" means in different fields, case studies implementing digital versioning techniques, conceptual models for representing versions digitally, and computational and management issues for digital projects.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Bleier, Roman

Sean M., Winslow

Leseproben

Towards a Model of (Variant) Readings Elisa Nury Versioning Cultural Objects: Digital Approaches, edited by Roman Bleier and Sean M. Winslow. Schriften des Instituts für Dokumentologie und Editorik 13. Books on Demand, 2019, 3–23. Abstract In scholarly editing, more particularly in the context of collating various versions of a text, the definition of a variant reading is crucial. Yet, despite its importance, the meaning of a variant reading is often reduced to a “difference.” The reason for such a vague definition is that what makes a variant can largely depend on the field of study: scholars of the Homeric oral tradition will consider different variants from scholars of medieval traditions or early printed texts, or from genetic critics. This contribution will focus on the modelling of a reading, arguing that formalizing this concept is necessary in order to define, and thus model, a variant. This article will also address digital representation of a reading by focusing on one implementation: the JSON data format used in conjunction with collation programs such as CollateX. What is a version? In textual criticism, the term version may specifically describe a major rewriting of a work, possibly by the author. Here, however, we will consider versions in a broader sense. The critical comparison–or collation–of different versions of one text is a necessary step during the preparation of a text-critical scholarly edition. Each version of the text is recorded in a document–or witness–and consists of readings, i.e., the particular word or words found at a given point in the text. In this context, a version is determined, amongst other characteristics, by the differences in the words found in the text, or variant readings. Variant readings are important since they provide valuable information regarding how versions are related to each other and how the text evolved through transmission. This article will focus on the modelling of readings, arguing that formalizing this concept is necessary to define, and model, variant readings. We will show how reading was a technical term that was used quite consistently through the ages, until it was defined with precision. Then we will establish the basis for a model by selecting important features of textual readings according to the previously examined definitions. These features, such as the textual content (or absence thereof), its size, and location in the text, will be discussed, raising various issues. This article will also address digital representation of a reading by focusing on one implementation: the JSON data format used in conjunction with collation programs such as CollateX. As we will see, the concept of variant readings may depend on the tradition of the text in consideration, and a variant in Homeric epic is different from a variant in a medieval tradition. The concept of variant is also dependent on the purpose of the comparison: a scholar attempting to reconstruct a stemma, or a linguist, may need to examine different variants. Therefore, a model of a reading should make it possible to distinguish different sets of variants depending on the context, and we will examine how the JSON implementation makes it possible with a few examples. Let us consider the example of figure 1, where four versions of a sentence are aligned. When comparing the sentences of A, B C,and D, some readings can be considered equivalent in all four sentences, such as The or upon; other readings are different and change the meaning of the sentence: the absence of the adjective bright in sentence B, the triplet star/sun/stars, and the verbs with different tense (shines and shone). Finally, some readings are different, but may not alter the sense of the sentence (such as worlde and world or sun and sunne). Readings are thus divided between equivalent readings and different readings, and among the different readings a set of readings may be considered significant variant readings (see figure 2). Figure 1: Readings. In the short collation extract of figure 1, there are four places where differences appear in the text. However, not all differences between readings are necessarily considered variant readings in any possible context. Scholarly opinions on this point range widely: from the view that every difference is a variant (Andrews) to considering only a limited number of “significant” differences to be variants, for instance, in the context of New Testament criticism, and therefore it is not enough to define a variant simply as a difference: The common or surface assumption is that any textual reading that differs in any way from another reading in the same unit of text is a “textual variant”, but this simplistic definition will not suffice. Actually, in NT textual criticism the term “textual variant” really means–and must mean–“significant” or “meaningful textual variant” (Epp 48). In fact, the concept of variance has evolved with time and according to several theories. Since the nineteenth century, many scholars contributed to the development of a method for the establishment of genealogical relationships between manuscripts: the so-called Lachmann method. Maas in particular focused on a specific category of differences: shared errors, or indicative errors, can be used as a guide in order to assess the witnesses of the text and determine their relationships into a stemma codicum, or genealogical tree of textual witnesses.1 Greg separated variant readings into accidental and substantial, following the idea that some differences (substantials) have more importance than others (accidentals): [W]e need to draw a distinction between the significant, or as I shall call them, substantive readings of the text, those namely that affect the author’s meaning or the essence of his expression, and others, such in general as spelling, punctuation, word-division, and the like, affecting mainly its formal presentation, which may be regarded as the accidents, or as I shall call them, accidentals of the text (Greg 21). In the twenty-first century, scholars started to compare textual variants to DNA mutations and applied concepts from evolutionary biology and phylogenetics to textual criticism (Barbrook et al.; Salemans; Heikkilä). Lastly, in opposition to the distinction between accidental and substantial variants, Andrews suggested a big data approach where every difference is a variant. With the introduction of Lachmann’s method, shared errors became the object of scholarly attention, and much work was done on the description and classification of the kind of errors committed by scribes who were copying manuscripts by hand. The cause of the error, as well as its conscious or unconscious character, is generally taken into account. Since the conscious modifications of scribal corrections were often attempts at improving or restoring the text, the terms innovation and secondary reading are frequently preferred to error. One of the most comprehensive review of errors was published by Havet, but other scholars have proposed other typologies of errors (Petti; Love; Reynolds and Wilson). These typologies often divide errors into four types: additions, omissions, substitutions and transpositions (Petti). When the scribe is consciously modifying the text, Petti (28–29) refers to scribal corrections as insertions, deletions and alterations instead of additions, omissions and substitutions. In parallel, many fields of study have offered their own definitions for variants according to their needs and their perspective on the text. From oral traditions such as Homeric epic to early printing, from medieval traditions to genetic criticism, from linguistics to phylogenetics, variants take many forms depending on the context: multiformity (Nagy), early or late states (Dane), variants at the sentence level (Cerquiglini), open variants, type-2 variants (Salemans), and so on. The task of proposing a model for variant readings which would be suitable in any of the possible contexts, seems at best challenging, if not impossible. Rather than dealing directly with variants, this article will focus on modelling readings, especially textual readings. Not all readings are variant readings, but variants are always readings which differ in some respect from one another (see figure 2). Once readings have been modelled, variant readings could be more easily modelled as a set of readings, with various criteria according to each discipline (V1, V2, V3). However, modelling those subsets will not be in the scope of this article. In order to propose a model for readings, we will first review the origins and usage of the term as well as its definitions in Section 1. The analysis of definitions will provide a first outline for a model, which will be discussed in Section 2. Figure 2: Readings, differences and variants. 1 Readings in context
Reading is a technical term that has long been used in the context of textual criticism and philology. It was already attested with Alexandrian critics: terminology included graphe (what is written), and anagnosis (what is read, a reading). The Latin equivalents are scriptura and the most common lectio (Montanari...