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Abstract The recent emergence of Computational Humanities is often regarded as a secession from Digital Humanities. The narrative of a schism is tempting, but inherently negative and unproductive. Instead, I propose to regard digital and Computational Humanities as heirs of two different traditions. From 2004 onwards, the Anglo-American Digital Humanities became the dominant current and mostly supplanted local European traditions. Although this has certainly been beneficial in some respects, Anglo-American and European academic traditions and institutional contexts differ substantially. The fundamental difference between digital and Computational Humanities is thus less one of digital vs. computational, but rather one of humanities vs. Geisteswissenschaften: Digital Humanities are in the former, Computational Humanities in the latter tradition. I therefore reject the notion of a schism and suggest regarding the emergence of Computational Humanities as a sign of renewed interest in the continental tradition of formal methods in the humanities.

Keywords Computational Humanities, Digital Humanities, History, Definition