7.4.2Open Science in the Humanities

The terminology of ‘Open Science’ has been criticized as being exclusionary to non-STEM fields (Knöchelmann, 2019; Longley Arthur & Hearn, 2021; McLaughlin, 2017), especially from the Humanities. While the Dutch and German equivalents ‘wetenschap’ and ‘Wissenschaft’ are generally regarded as encompassing both STEM and non-STEM fields, the English term ‘science’ is often understood as excluding the Social Sciences and Humanities. ‘Open Research’ is sometimes used as a more inclusive alternative, for instance in the name of the European Open Access platform Open Research Europe.

Even though the ideas and proposals of the Open Science movement are relevant for the Arts and Humanities, it is important to take into account that publication patterns and research methods and cultures vary strongly between disciplines. For many disciplines in the Social Sciences, the debates around reproducibility and transparency are hugely important. The ‘replication crisis’ in psychology, for instance, has given rise to more open research practices (Engzell & Rohrer, 2021). For research in the Humanities, however, it is the subject of debate if replication is generally possible and relevant (de Rijcke & Penders, 2018; Peels & Bouter, 2018), especially in qualitative, phenomenological, critical theory or hermeneutic approaches (Longley Arthur & Hearn, 2021).

Knöchelmann (2019) indicates that some aspects of the Open Science agenda are already known in the Humanities (such as Open Access), but that other aspects of the Open Science movement have not found their way to the Humanities publication culture (such as the publishing of preprints). Similarly, Giglia (2019) indicates that the SSH have specific Open Science needs. The debates around Open Science and the Humanities are alive, mainly within the Digital Humanities community.