It may appear futile to try and give a definite answer to such a question. It is impossible to isolate the many activities of the humanities in a single definition which would suit all cases. However, the magnitude of the problem is no excuse for refusing to reflect on the nature and goals of the human sciences. Besides, it seems to me that the advent of computer technology in society in general and in the academic world in particular makes it imperative to pause and reflect on why we do what we do as scholars in the humanities.

The aim of the humanities might be tentatively described as the study of man as a social and cultural being both in history and in the present. Through this approach, the humanities aim to throw light on nothing less than the human condition.

Our modern world seems to be shaped primarily by the technological development. However, it may well be true that in many essential ways we are shaped as human beings by intellectual and cultural traditions and patterns of social interaction. Disciplines like history, philosophy, religion, literature, language and art are constantly evaluating our past as well as present cultural manifestations in order to find and preserve these human connections.

To anyone not familiar with the variety of the humanities, and even to people who are actively engaged in the field, the many disciplines of the humanities may present a bewildering picture of manifold and unrelated activities. Actually one of the greatest pleasures of working with computer applications in the humanities is the stimulating cooperation with many quite different user groups. Each user brings to the computer a reflection of a distinct discipline with its own traditions, methods and research goals, and most often a high degree of personal involvement.

Many attempts have been made to define and group the many and varied humanist disci-plines. Some have stressed the time dimension, i.e., the distinction between historical studies and contemporary studies. Others have made the research material itself the basis for a distinc-tion; this point of view has given rise to descriptions like the visual arts and the behavioral disciplines. It may also be relevant for our purposes to suggest subgroupings that have a bearing on the computer processing techniques to be utilized in the various disciplines.

The use of oral and written language material is essential in a number of disciplines in the humanities (cf. the somewhat old-fashioned term philological studies).

Texts can be the basis for studies of structure in itself (linguistics) or of contents, as in the disciplines of history, philosophy, literature and theology. Other disciplines are concerned with the study of the relation between language and content or the use of language to form attitudes and influence behavior (pragmatics). It is apparent, then, that natural language processing, both text-based and otherwise, is at the core of computing in the humanities.

Equally important is the fact that many disciplines study the cultural, practical as well as artistic, productions of earlier generations. Such material constitutes the primary sources of a whole range of disciplines: archaeology, ethnology and art history.

Thus there are many humanist disciplines that would benefit from computer methods for processing information relating to different classes of objects. Among other things, facilities should be available for storing information relating to the objects, preferably in connection with a representation of the objects themselves in a suitable computer, accessible format. In the object-based disciplines, comprehensive scientific archives regularly describe the source materials. Methods for handling archive information in the humanities are therefore of vital importance to humanists.

Because of the size of, and detailed information in, the primary source material and the intrinsic nature of humanistic research, which e.g. means perennially asking new questions of primary sources,sources of humanist research will not become outdated as is often the case in other sciences. Therefore it is a fundamental requirement that the humanist researcher has easy access to his/her primary sources and the result of other researchers' analyses. It is also of the utmost importance to have the relevant sources prepared in such a way that new methodology and technical facilities can be utilized.

The preparation of a specific research material for a given task has normally been costly, time consuming and has often involved travelling to the repositories of the materials.

Easy access to a variety of primary source materials, referential information and the research results of others, will therefore make the work of researchers in the humanities much easier and, presumably, more effective.

Among all the characteristics of the humanities which we might discern, there is one which is of clear and immediate relevance here: The iterative nature of the study of the source materials. Historical records, literary, religious and philosophical texts, works of art and archaeological finds are studied over and over again.

In many disciplines this repetitive use of the sources is quite necessary in order to attain two of the basic goals of the humanities: to regain and constantly assess anew the history of civilization, including earlier research, through perennial primary research: and to share in as genuine a manner as possible the results of research with interested or putatively interested audiences. We do not overlook the fact that the research activity in itself also constitutes an integral part of the culture in which it is conducted, both as a social fact in itself and because such research may result in new ways of understanding the past and the present.

The above may seem like a Sunday sermon, as the Norwegian saying goes. It is doubt-ful whether researchers view their day-to-day activities in such a long perspective. Neverthe-less, as a starting point for assessing computer-based humanities research it seems necessary to state as clearly as possible the ultimate goals of the research.

We must keep in mind that to us the computer is a means and not an end. Let this be the yardstick against which we judge computer activities. According to the views I have expressed so far, all use of computers must contribute in some way or another to gaining more insight into the characteristics of human beings as individuals and as members of communities. Com-puter use must be recognized as a way of reaching the goals of the humanities.

Over the years many humanities' scholars have expressed fears that the introduction of computational methods in the humanities will alienate the researchers from their primary research objects and channel research interests and funding in directions of study that lend themselves easily to the use of computers.

As many of us know, there is in the humanities' a strong "tactile" tradition, so to speak. Humanities scholars often want to touchand inspect directly their objects of study rather than be left with information about the object, or as is now becoming more and more technologically possible, a replica or picture in digital form of the material under investigation.

This is a fear that must be respected and recognized as real. On a more general level this is an instance of the claim that the use of computer technology should always be adapted to the humanities and not vice versa. In passing, I would here like to mention that in the description of the objectives of our Centre in Bergen, there is a warning relating to this point: The Centre should always cater for a sensible use of computers in the humanities. This implies that there is also a non-sensical use of computers in our field. My experience, covering some 20 years of activities in humanities computing, clearly tells me that this is a piece of advice that should always be kept in mind.

Personally, I feel that as information technology develops further, and as we get a higher degree of computer literacy in our fields, this fear may be substantially alleviated. The rapidly increasing possibilities of customizing the various uses of IT and making the scholarly applica-tions tailor-made, so to speak, will guarantee that also humanities scholars will be in the position to make IT an instrument to fill their particular needs.

Research in the humanities will, as mentioned earlier, be iterative, intensive and aim at a qualitativerather than quantitative analysis. For this reason a verbatim and otherwise detailed representation of the sources is often a sine qua non.

Hence aggregation and editing of primary source materials are not common. In a series of humanist disciplines, however, quantitative and statistical methods are in general use e.g. in history and language studies, and before the advent of computers this was a most laborious task.

A final, but prominent feature of the nature of humanities research singled out here is the close connection between researchand communication that one sees in the humanities.

In most domains of the sciences it will be difficult to mediate new research results in a direct form to an extra-mural audience. Humanities research on the other hand lends itself very easily to communication to the outside world.

For this reason and also because it is a primary goal of the humanities to convey empathy and insight in what it means to be a human being, it is important to emphasize the role of communication of research in our disciplines.

Some years ago in a situation where researchers in the humanities in Scandinavia felt acutely threatened by other and more directly applicable fields of research a small book about the contents and values of research in the humanities appeared in Denmark. The title of the book was "Til Glëden" - "To Joy". To me this title conveys much of what we want the humanities to mean, both to scholars and to readers.

In the following passage I hope to show how the use of information technology may help the humanists better to fulfil their important role in society.

2. INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY IN PROFESSIONAL HUMANIST WORK

In the course of the last 25 years, the liberal arts have also to an increasing extent taken into use electronic tools and technical aids for professional work and research. In Norway this development started in the late 1960's in pioneering milieus which desired to make use of the central computer systems at the universities. A considerable effort was laid down in creative and innovative work aimed at making use of the computers, which were little more than elect-ronic counting machines at that point, for the representation, storage and analysis of complex textual source material.

During the time that has elapsed, we have seen important changes in many respects. The counting machines have become modern computers and an increasing amount of computer work in industry, public administration and research has been concerned with text rather than numbers.

The combination of digital processing power, telecommunications and new possibilities for storing and representing information, has laid the foundation for a new field of research and service: information technology.

The development of inexpensive, powerful personal computers with commercially availa-ble software for handling text and other information is now making computer technology into a common research tool in the humanist disciplines. In the course of the 1990's all staff mem-bers at universities and colleges will probably have their own personal computer.

Besides, a majority of researchers and professionals will also have access to local equipment to prepare information for computer use, such as scanners for automatic reading, and printers for text and pictures - with good printing quality, and more and more often in colour.

At most institutions the staff will also communicate via electronic networks. They will have access to joint data bases and specialized equipment, and will be able to pick up infor-mation locally, nationwide and from abroad.

The development of what is known as multimedia technology over the past ten years, makes it now possible to prepare research material in a combination of sound and still and motion pictures together with the traditional data of text, numbers and animation. In addition to the computer the multimedia technology demands accessories for picking up, storing and presenting sound, pictures and motion pictures.

Through modern high capacity storage media the researchers will also gain access to background information and literature from their own work places. (It may be mentioned that the entire Greek literature has already been available for a number of years on an optical disc, in this case a CD-ROM, a record suitable for the distribution of text, sound, graphics and still pictures). The availability of machinery as well as of software is rapidly improving, and puts great demands on the users to choose the right product for the task at hand, and also to work in such a manner that the professional work can be carried on with as small a break as possible if machinery and software are later updated.

The development of information technology has also led to the fact that liberal arts institutions are making it their objective to create a unified information architecture in which administrative and subject-related computer processes are connected, and where the total information basis of the institution (in the form of text, numbers, pictures and video material) is made available for all employees at their work stations.

There is already a technological basis for the development which is sketchily described above, and the technology is also to a certain extent standardized. The challenge ahead will be to use the technology in such a way that it can promote the objectives of humanist researchthrough adaptations to the material and characteristics of the various humanist disciplines.

3 THE NORWEGIAN COMPUTING CENTRE FOR THE HUMANITIES

In the previous part of my talk I have given an outline of the development of computer use in the humanities since the late 60's.

The Norwegian Computing Centre for the Humanities played an important role in the development described above, and not least in shaping the infrastructure of cooperation in this field. The pioneering work in the late 1960's of the computer forefathers in the humanities was carried out mainly at the universities of Oslo and Bergen. This work put the Research Council for the Humanities under a certain pressure to view computer applications in the humanities as an area in need of special attention from the council.

As early as 1969, therefore, a Board of Computer Applications in the Humanities was given the task of assessing applications for research grants, arranging introductory courses, and initiating consultative services to computer-oriented scholars. The Board's activities soon became so diverse and time-consuming that the Council for the Humanities in 1971 decided to establish a national computing centre for the humanities that could take over those activities and promote the further use of computers. Most of all one hoped that the centre would create an infrastructure of computer science that would cover the scattered research communities in the humanities in Norway. From the outset it was decided that the centre's user groups should include both the universities and the considerable user groups outside of the universities, such as museums, archives, and cultural organizations.

The Norwegian Computing Centre for the Humanities was established in 1972, at the University of Bergen, first as a temporary project, and then, from 1978, as a permanent institution. At about the same time the Norwegian Social Science Data Services Centre was established at the same university, after a prehistory much like that of the humanities centre.

Located at the University of Bergen, the Centre serves the whole country. A formal agreement provides access to the computing and other facilities of the University.

The purpose of the Centre is to facilitate the sensible use of computers in research and development work within the humanities. Individual researchers, academic departments and cultural organizations are encouraged and helped in the use of computers. In cooperation with other research institutions, the Centre seeks to develop new computing methods with a view to making the institutions more independent.

While seeking to coordinate many computer projects, the Centre also tries to meet the need for national computer services.

The board of the Centre comprises representatives of the humanities, computer science and representatives from the cultural field, appointed by the Council for Research in the Humanities. In 1990 the Centre's staff counted 15 people permanently employed (administra-tion, executive officers, computing officers, engineers), and some temporary workers. The Council for Research in the Humanities finances the Centre (budget NOK 4,4 million in 1991). Some of the services (including paid commissions) attract income from external sources (2,1 million NOK).

Up until the early 1980's the Centre relied heavily on the computer facilities of the University of Bergen, but today the bulk of the computer work of the Centre is done on locally networked computers and a wide variety of special equipment and software, e.g. in the fields of multimedia, desktop publishing and electronic information services.

The Centre is in principle open to research within all branches of the humanities both at the universities and elsewhere. This means that the Centre cooperates regularly with resear-chers from academic archives and museums, and such institutions as the Norwegian Cultural Council. The most central user groups, however, are the universities and other institutions of advanced learning, primarily the Arts Faculties and their computing sections.

As the Centre serves the whole field of the humanities, it needs to concentrate on tasks that can benefit as many disciplines as possible. To increase the development of programs and methods, the Centre has gradually reduced project assistance to individual researchers.

As a supplement to the development work of the Centre's computing officers, temporary research positions have been connected to the Centre. These positions have so far been in computational linguistics, the use of statistics in archaeology, automated archive information, ADP methods for museums, and multimedia-based language learning.

The Centre's main activities are:

Courses in humanities computing are today given at all universities. Some universities offer courses at many levels which may be included in the ordinary study programs. At the University of Bergen, moreover, there has for some time been a study programme in com-putational linguistics and at the University of Oslo there has recently been established a Department of informatics for the humanities. Both at the university departments and in the humanities organizations outside the universities there is today a wide range of computer projects, some of which are so specialized and advanced in their application of computers that they are in many respects self-sufficient in relation to computer services from local and central bodies.

For these and other reasons the role of a national centre like ours is constantly changing.

As is the case in other countries humanists in Norway are taking to the computer at an accelerating speed. In some places the uses of computer technology is truly sophisticated and competent. Today more software and machinery is also commercially available.

The general situation sketched above has given rise to two conflicting views regarding the raison d'àtre of our Centre. One view assumes that the humanities are now so advanced in their use of computer technology that there is no longer any need for a national service and development centre. The other view is that the spiralling development in the use of computers also gives rise to new needs for services and development work, and continuous technological surveillance. New needs for assistance tend to pop up as soon as the academic milieus have mastered their basic computer tasks. Hence the needs are growing rather than subsiding. Users acquiring new levels of competence seem to need assistance on a more advanced level. Daily work at the Centre proves that the latter description is clearly the correct one.

In order to single out the goals of its professional work in the 90's, the Centre in 1990 staged a comprehensive process of strategic planning in which counsellors from the Technical University of Norway also took part. As a result of the planning process which involved all of the staff of the Centre, a Strategic Plan for 1991-1995 was completed earlier this year.

The plan calls for a concentration in the following four fields:

4.1. Information Services

As the Centre is a fairly small institution it has over the years been a challenging task to direct the services of the Centre such as to achieve the greatest possible spin-off effect on the various user groups.

One way of obtaining this has been to put great emphasis on information services. From the outset the Centre has issued its own journal Humanistiske Data which has been photo-typeset and later prepared by desktop publishing methods in the Centre itself. The journal has a circulation of some 900 copies (250 abroad). We have made it a point to prepare substantial summaries in English in order to communicate the contents of the journal to non-Nordic readers. The same procedure is being used in the Annual Report of the Centre. A ques-tionnaire sent to our Nordic readers revealed that Humanistiske Data is highly rated also because it is the only specialized source for information on humanities IT-usage in the Nordic countries.

At present we are therefore looking at ways to strengthen the editorial ties with the other Nordic countries. It seems to be the case that our activities in the information field do not stop at the borders, so we ought to find ways of establishing concerted and coordinated information services by joint participation of all Nordic countries.

Humanistiske Data appears 3 times a year with a total of approx. 500 pages. The strategy for the future development of Humanistiske Data will be to make the journal less "dull", more journalistic in content also by directing longer, specialized articles to an on-line electronic article service.

ICAME Journal is published by the International Computer Archive of Modern English run by the Centre in cooperation with a board of international linguists. This journal is issued once a year in connection with the annual meeting of ICAME (12 meetings so far). The journal, edited by prof. Stig Johansson, Dept. of English and American Studies, The Univer-sity of Oslo, concentrates on research in the fields of English corpus linguistics and is for one thing highly appreciated for its systematic compilation of bibliographies relating to this field of research. I will return to ICAME shortly.

Some years ago when we became fully aware of the great potential of the new optical media in humanities research, we started a newsletter called OLUFF (optical media in educa-tion, research and mediation). This newsletter has a circulation of 400 and is a great success. The aim of the newsletter is to give updated information on technological developments and applications of optical media and multimedia particularly in the humanities. On the subscription list are the names of all the major computer companies in Norway, consultant services, the computing sections of offshore and onshore industries, governmental bodies and, not to forget, a number of humanities scholars. As you may imagine, the success of OLUFF also outside of the humanities has been somewhat troublesome. Why should the humanities cater for the information needs of government and industry? We have not yet been able to increase the subscription from the humanities sector to our satisfaction, but we think that as the use of optical storage media and multimedia is rapidly increasing in the humanities, we will soon have a more natural balance of readership between "us" and the outside world.

The great success of OLUFF outside the humanities is also interesting because it clearly shows that we in the humanities' sector are on a par with the level of knowledge of technology in other fields.

For a number of years the Centre has also been a daily user of electronic information services both for personal use (E-mail) and for collecting and distributing information relating to IT in the humanities. One of our staff specializing in this field has also recently established a series of Centre-based electronic services. By a coordinated use of local SUN computers and university central IBM facilities there has been established an ICAME file server where users from all over the world can access text-data and programs distributed by the ICAME organization.

News from the Centre is offered on this server, and information from the Centre, nor-mally issued in print, is duplicated in an electronic form.

We think that the time has come to stage a major information campaign on the uses of electronic services in the humanities in Norway. To this end we have prepared a manual covering the practical uses of electronic services both nationally and internationally.

Thus the humanities scholars today may become members of both a national, interna-tional and global university for fact-finding purposes, information sharing and collaboration in research. In our country we already see how electronic services are beginning to reshape the traditional working habits of humanities scholars.

4.2. Documentation of Research

Sometimes one gets the feeling that it is the researcher's sacred right not to tell what he or she is doing. It is at any rate becoming generally accepted that current research is not docu-mented and mediated well enough. To remedy this situation somewhat we have managed at the Centre to establish two national databases documenting current research. One of them documents all research funded by the Norwegian Research Council for Science and the Humanities. There is also a specialized service concentrating on documenting humanities research on a national level. Besides offering a continuously updated database for the humanities, the latter also makes catalogues of research in progress in specific fields, does contracted documentation work in particular sectors of research and communicates information from this data base to both professionals in the media and others who need research information.

Our long-range goal is to make the Bergen data bases the focal point for information on current research in Norway.

4.3. Courses, Seminars and Conferences

As a supplement to the information services mentioned above, we also run a series of courses, seminars and conferences on various aspects of IT-use in the humanities. A few examples:

In November 1990 we arranged the first national conference on "The Electronic Book", which attracted an audience of some 180 people. New technology also shapes new patterns of collaboration. This conference was arranged in cooperation with the Norwegian Institute for the Graphic Industries and the Norwegian Publishers' Association's Committee for Electronic Publishing. The conference which included a suite of guest speakers from a number of other countries clearly demonstrated how new alliances of cooperation are needed if one is to exploit the advantages of new information technologies in mediating our cultural heritage.

In February of this year we arranged an "International Seminar on Current Research Documentation" with speakers from 12 countries. The seminar showed how the world of electronic information is becoming united and how facilities are developed to create a European network of research information.

During the spring and early autumn of this year we have also arranged multimedia seminars at the universities of Trondheim, Tromsõ, Bergen and Oslo. In June we staged the first national seminar on text encoding methods and programs in Bergen. With a strong view to presenting activities going on within the international project "The text encoding initiative" which aims at international text coding standards.

Multimedia and digital pattern analysis technologies was the topics of a Nordic con-ference on information technology in October 91 called "The Digital Picture". This conference was planned as a major presentation of digital and analog techniques now at hand for the analysis and presentation of the pictorial arts. Here also we managed to collect a selection of highly rated international speakers. At the same time we wanted to impart to the participants relevant research work done at non-humanistic institutions e.g. at the Bergen IBM Scientific Centre. This conference was attended by some 200 people.

In November we co-organized the biannual Nordic Conference on Computational Linguistics and in the same month we also shared responsibility with the Norwegian Cultural Council and the National Museum Organization for the arrangement of a National Conference on Preservation of Photographic Collections and the use of new technology.

As a supplement to these activities the staff of the Centre regularly participates as speakers at national, Nordic and international conferences on a variety of topics related to computer technology in the humanities.

4.4. Consultation Services

A considerable amount of the time of the senior computing officers of the Centre is directed towards giving advisory services to different user groups. The services include infor-mation on computer equipment and specialized input and output devices, eg. in connection with configurating multimedia work stations. Moreover, information is given on computer methods and different kinds of software, research data that are available and on research milieus relevant in connection with particular project work.

As a specialized service the Centre also functions as a national coordinator for Norwegian museums of art and cultural history. Work at the Centre on museum computer applications started in the early 1970's with a series of pilot studies. Later the Centre took part in the national museum organization's work on national guidelines for museum documentation. On the basis of these recommendations a general programme package for the registration of objects, photos and works of art was made in the mid- 1980's. Today a total of 90 museums make use of the museum software. This coordinated use of standards and programs has now paved the way for a new development project to update the software in use (and developing parallel software for Macintosh machines). Provisions will be made also to include multimedia aspects by e.g. offering software for building combined referential and pictorial databases.

Moreover the database system will be designed in such a way as to include data on all types of primary source materials to be found in museum collections (e.g. texts, manuscripts, pictures, video, film footage and sound recordings).

When working with cultural institutions, the Centre has traditionally created "compu-terized islands" within the organization by computerizing isolated activities within the working domain of the institution at hand. Now the Centre often finds that the institutions are asking for totally integrated information systems that cut across administrative, financial, curatorial and administrative purposes. This is to say that these institutions want to design and imple-ment systems which can handle the total information load within the framework of one integrated system. Such requirements for integrated systems present new challenges for the Centre which traditionally has been concentrating on the collection side of the work of the institutions.

4.5. Project Work

As mentioned at the outset of my presentation, the bulk of humanities research activities is based on textual material. From the start, the Centre has therefore specialized in computer applications in relation to language work, including computational linguistics, the development and use of text processing systems and tagging systems. Within this field we have over the years carried out a series of text- based projects. One of the major projects of this kind has been the Bergen Ibsen project. In this project, which has covered some 14 man-years, we have computerized all 27 of Ibsen's plays and a collection of his poems. Corrections have been made in the Centennial Edition and all 638,000 words have been grammatically marked. Homographs have also been separated. All contexts of the words have been subjected to inspection and modification so that every single passage can be meaningfully read in isolation. This means that we are now in the position to produce a comprehensive lemmatized concordan-ce of Ibsen's works of a very high quality (3200 pages), and that we may distribute electronic texts of different kinds for scholarly use. In addition, a comprehensive quotation lexicon may be made directly from the data base thus created. A publication programme is now in the making in cooperation with the Norwegian University Press.

International Computer Archive of Modern English (ICAME) is an interna-tional organization of linguists and information scientists working with English machine readable texts. The aim of the organization is to collect and distribute information on available English language material. The Centre is the distribution centre for the computerized English language text corpora and corpus related software. Today the language material comprise modern British, American, Indian and Australian texts as well as oral and historical text material. One of the corpora, the Lancaster-Oslo/Bergen (LOB) Corpus, has been completed in Bergen. In 1990 a total of 150 data sets have been distributed to researchers in 15 countries. The ICAME organization started in the late 70' as an experiment in international cooperation. The substantial demand for the corpora and the high degree of scholarly cooperation in this field clearly show that close international cooperation is possible even with a low degree of formal organization.

Worth mentioning here is also The Wittgenstein Archive at the University of Bergen. This national project was hosted by the Centre from 1984 onwards, but has now been set up as a separate archive at the University of Bergen.

The aim of the Wittgenstein Archive is to produce a complete computerized version of Ludvig Wittgenstein's 20,000 unpublished manuscript pages. Specialized software is also being developed for the presentation and analysis of the texts. Already in use is a sophisticated system for the detailed tagging of words, phrases and misspellings in the manuscripts, in order to preserve as much as possible of the information of the manuscript pages (also supra-segmental information). Both the texts and the analysis tools will be made available to researchers at the University of Bergen and visiting scholars. So far a total of approx. 3,000 pages have been transcribed. The project will be completed in 1995-96.

At the Centre there is also a Norwegian text archive aiming at collecting a variety of Norwegian text material for the use of literary scholars, linguists and others and for the preparation of wordlists of different kinds. In the future the Centre wants to put more energy into establishing a comprehensive holding of Norwegian texts also as a basis for developing systematized language material products for sale.

As mentioned earlier the Centre has over the years developed a series of programs to be used in projects of text collection, analysis and distribution.

At present the Centre is completing a programme package for text encoding intended for users who want to enter research information into the texts for use in subsequent analysis. In this field we also pay attention to international work within the framework of the Text Encod-ing Initiative.

4.5.1. Multimedia applications

On the basis of a detailed analysis of the direction of current computer developments and the computational needs of the humanities field the Centre has in its Strategic Plan for 1991-1995 focused on activities within the optical media and multimedia fields.

Recent development of multimedia information technologies with its possibilities of combined computerization of texts, numbers, graphics, pictures, sound, video and film seems to offer totally new ways of utilizing computer based technologies in humanities research and communication.

As a basic activity the Centre has made it a task to provide the humanities scholars with update information on information technology in this field and give examples of relevant applications in our field. The newsletter OLUFF is dedicated to this task.

Our first videodisc project was completed in 1985 with a production of a videodisc comprising museum material from some twenty institutions. Later we have made extensive tests and pilot studies of WORM discs, CD-ROMs and also familiarized ourselves with applications of CD-I technology. A CD-ROM production of ICAME material is in the pipeline.

For museum use we have developed a system called FotoMac for building pictorial databases also with a view to making pictorial collections more directly accessible to museum visitors.

At this point it may be of relevance to comment briefly on recent activities aiming at using IT to preserve and distribute more widely the very valuable heritage of old photos in Norway. As is the case in all countries, old photos and films are rapidly decaying because of intrinsic chemical processes, lack of adequate archiving facilities and so on. In Norway a strategic plan for the preservation of photographic materials is in the making. The execution of the plan will be based extensively on the use of modern information technology.

Major historical collections of photos (from 1860 onwards) will be subjected to modern methods of conservation, re-photographed on 70 mm film and put on optical, analog or digital discs. By such means, we will be able to archive safely for all other than purely research purposes the original photos, and by way of multimedia systems be able to distribute the material in a compact form on discs to all interested parties (museums, local historical societies, schools etc.) Databases containing referential information about the most important collections will also be made available.

The technical and computational treatment of the collections will be done in Mo i Rana in Northern Norway. Here has recently been established a branch of the National Library of Norway, specializing in the treatment and storage of audiovisual material old and new. As this branch is made the deposit of all material covered by the new Deposit Act, we will here over the years build up huge collections of cultural and historic documents of all kinds of media. For the execution of its task the Rana Library will have to make extensive use of computers and optical storage technologies both for its in-house operations and the for the distribution of different kind of materials to the outside world.

Interactive language learning is also a field of priority at the Centre. Lately we have completed a collaborative project with a contracted researcher on developing a multi- media language training system for Italian.

On the basis of our experience we are now planning a major multimedia project in the field of teaching Norwegian as a second language. Within this project, to be carried out in conjunction with the Department for Norwegian as a Second Language, University of Bergen, and the University's Media Centre, we will make a videodisc on modern language usage. The videodisc will be designed so that communication situations and language levels will be tuned to the language needs of non-Norwegian speakers. The basic methodology and software for the educational part of the project has already been developed in the project mentioned before.

In the years to come the Centre aims at developing further its skills in the multimedia fields e.g. in relation to multimedia applications on Ibsen or multimedia projects where the aim is to mediate aspects of our cultural heritage by the means of new technology.

As the Centre in the future will be more extensively financed by external sources our choice of target fields will to a considerable degree depend on the paying ability of our cooperating partners.

5. THE USE OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AT NORWEGIAN UNIVERSITIES TODAY

The author has recently completed a study for the Norwegian Research Council on the present uses of computer technology in the humanities at the Norwegian universities. After a period in the 70's mainly dominated by pilot and feasibility studies, Norwegian scholars at the universities have in the 80's increased and considerably diversified their uses of computers in scholarly work. This development is mainly due to the advent and widespread use of personal computers. Initially used as text processing tools, PC's and Mac's are increasingly also being used in various stages of the research process. In the late 60's and in the 70's when scholars only had access to the mainframe computers of the universities, there was on the whole a very restricted selection of special equipment and methods and software for our uses. Today, however, there is a wide choice of off-the-shelf personal equipment and software that can be utilized to great advantage in the work process. Examples of this are various types of software for the processing and analysis of text, database systems for PC, software for automatic text searching and for desktop publishing. The dramatic price fall of peripherals, eg. OCR and scanning equipment, laser printers and equipment for voice and picture digitizing has made it possible for departments to gradually set up humanities IT-laboratories of their own.

In Norway some universities report that all faculties now have the possibility of acquiring their own personal computers and many also have access to networking facilities for electronic mail and to more powerful computer resources in the university or elsewhere at home or abroad. It goes without saying that this situation will pave the way for drastically new scho-larly behavior in the humanities in the future.

As a summary of the survey above, the following may be said of the most challenging tasks within humanities computing in the years to come:

5. 1. Computer assisted linguistic and literary studies

In Norway this is a major field for humanities computing. In the years ahead scholars will to an increasing degree employ IT-methods. There will be a growing need for specialized software and for exploiting the possibilities offered by multi-media methods eg. creating research and instruction tools based on hypermedia programmes. There also is a growing need to transfer to computer form the major national collections of systematized language materials and archives etc., which will demand sophisticated methods of OCR reading and scanning. A national centre for Norwegian terminology has already been set up. Interestingly many of the disciplines also want to make use of digital mapping systems eg. in history studies and archeology. Plans are also set in operation to gradually substitute the traditional analog language laboratories with digital ones based on multi-media technology. A series of multi-media projects (confer above) are now in the making to prepare training material for students and the wider public.

5. 2. Computational linguistics

At three of the four Norwegian universities there are departments specializing in compu-tational linguistics. Also projects are set up to utilize the competence gained in work on computer assisted translation. In my view, such projects should be strongly supported as this is a field where the humanities scholars could give a major contribution to the community at large.

5.3. History and archaeology

In both disciplines computers have long been used. In the field of history the principal aim has been to build extensive databases of nominative primary sources (censuses, parish records, etc.) and in archaeology to document collections of artifacts.

Both fields are presently developing converging strategies to utilize digital maps and geographic information systems - in archaeology eg. in research and administration of sites of cultural heritage. Researchers in these fields claim that the use of such systems will not only provide new means of documentation but in themselves add new dimensions to the data at hand.

In history it is argued e.g. that the possibility of studying historical events in time and space simultaneously will also yield a new type of data. An example of this is the new possibility of mapping of historical data with geographic information in order to study how epidemics spread. Another - and not so gloomy - example is taken from the field of studies of marriage and dating in historical times. In Norway with an abundance of high mountains and deep fjords digital mapping systems combined with historical sources might well bring out very interesting new insights!

5 4. Musicology

As we all know, both the production and perception of music is increasingly based on electronic equipment. To musicologists the situation presents new challenges. In order to study contemporary music the researchers also have to be well versed in new technology. In addition, students demand to be trained in the analysis and production of digitally based music. In Norway the various departments of musicology together with the Association of Norwegian Composers have recently decided to establish a centre for technologically based musicology. The aim is to share the burden of staggering research costs and the production of an electronic communication system for the combined and concerted use of resources used in the nodes of the system. The kind of networking here may in the future also be the model for networking within other disciplines.

5 5. Art history

The visual arts in Norway are newcomers into the IT-field. One reason for this is that only lately has computer technology developed in the direction of primary interest to this field. Work on the documentation of art objects has on the other hand been been possible for a long time. But methods and equipment for entering, storing, analyzing and presenting pictures of art and art history objects, are of fairly recent date.

It is expected that the major developments in image technology and multi-media more generally will attract scholars to this field in growing numbers. In Bergen, work is being carried out in cooperation with the IBM research centre to analyze works of art (e.g. stylistically) by computers. Also a series of projects are under way where the aim is to make art history and art historical and related material available on optical discs both as a tool for computer-based instruction and for mediating art to the public at large.

As this to day is a field where developments are made in major strides, steps should be taken to relate closely to international activities. This point goes for almost all the fields described above: International cooperation and sharing is a necessity in order to cope with or even better stay ahead of the developments in our fields.

6. CONCLUDING REMARKS

In this presentation of the work of the Centre emphasis has been put on present and future activities of our organization. As we all know, the humanities cover a vast field. Each discipline has so many challenging tasks in relation to computerization that it might need a development centre like ours of its own. Therefore the Centre tries to isolate areas of activities where our work can have an effect on larger user groups.

The recent development of computer usage in the humanities will inevitably change the work patterns of humanities research, education and communication. At least in Norway, all staff at research and other professional institutions within the humanities will mostly likely have access to computer equipment in the mid-90's. In many cases they will also have access to network systems and specialized equipment.

This means that patterns of information acquisition will change along with methods for analyzing research material and the presentation of results to students, colleagues and the world at large. For one thing the influx of students well trained in computer methods from previous education will necessarily bring about radical changes in the ways the humanities are taught. It seems to be the case that the humanities scholars who do not keep abreast of computer methods in their research and theory will be in for serious trouble in their relation to computer literate students.

Patterns of behavior will also change in other respects. For one thing computer activities call for cooperation and team work. This seems to be particularly true of the field of multi-media. Applications in multimedia presupposes a series of skills that can only be found in the combined activities of many performers: specialists in the subject material, designers, programme specialists, video-/film producers and in some cases also a lawyer to see to the judicial side of the enterprise.

Also the wider use of computers in the humanities makes it necessary to create a new understanding of the need for technological investments in the humanities sector. This means that the humanities can no longer tolerate the "pen and pencil" image that is still partly asso-ciated with our field. Today's humanists have strong claims to make towards the adminis-trative bodies. It has long been a truth above discussion that the sciences need laboratories and costly equipment. Today the humanities have an equally strong claim to make, as it is evident that new IT is perfectly suited to our research and communication needs.

To prepare the ground for substantially higher levels of financial investments in the humanities will not be an easy task. For one thing it means that needs for continuous reinvest-ments must be recognized as a natural consequence of introducing computer equipment in scholarly work.

However, the concentration on mundane administrative matters like the above mentioned must not make the humanities scholars so obsessed with technology that we forget the almost trite, but still true statement that technology is a means and not an end in itself.

Our aim should always be to make sensible use of information technology so that technology can help us study at greater depth the true and diversified nature and behavior of human beings as individuals and members of society. If the technology will permit us to concentrate even more than before on our primary objectives, then there certainly is a place for technology in the humanities.