Digital Heritage and Societal Development

• Main Authors: Edward Sankowski, Betty Jean Harris
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Publishing House of the University of Agriculture in Krakow 2020-06-01
• Series: Acta Scientiarum Polonorum. Formatio Circumiectus
• Subjects: ict; history of computers; progress; environment; justice; democracy
• Online Access: http://acta.urk.edu.pl/Digital-Heritage-and-Societal-Development,122018,0,2.html

Aim of the study: Aim of study. In their book, Digital Heritage, Karol Król and Józef Hernik have made a unique and major contribution to the history of digital technology, and, coupled with that, to identifying the significance of “digital heritage” for societal development, in particular in relation to developmental improvements in environmental processes. The aim of this article is to identify some main scientific, technological, and logical features of the book’s account of what digital heritage is as part of environmental processes. Material and methods: Methods. The methodology used in this article is mainly examination of the text of the book, and study of that text’s relationship with extra-textual societal phenomena as environmental processes. Results and conclusions: Results. There are many logical inter-relations described in this paper among the Krol/Hernik text and environmentally relevant resources in the development studies literature. There are also many logical inter-relations described in this paper among the Krol/Hernik text and certain social science accounts of environmental processes and democracy (in relation to development or progress). Conclusions. Some conclusions in the article are the following. This article concludes that the book is history of technology, but that at the same time the book’s text necessarily expresses concern with the present status of digital heritage, and particularly the role of digital heritage in future-centered societal development (in relation to environmental processes).