Masters Program in Digital Studies: ‘The digital age is yours’

The Masters Program in Digital Studies is particularly distinctive for enabling students with backgrounds in the arts and humanities to develop data analysis and coding skills—including Python, JavaScript, HTML and SQL—and to apply them to humanities projects. In formats suited to students’ professional goals, the program advances research and writing acumen while fostering new insights about what it means to be human in our digital age.

“It was super exciting,” said Digital Studies alum Jose Hernandez, AM’23, a digital humanities technology specialist at Florida State University’s Research Computing Center, who was a history major as an undergraduate. “In this program I realized that it’s not impossible for a humanities professional to move to highly technical fields and projects.”

Hernandez helps create digital humanities curriculum and workshops at the University of Puerto Rico and is working on a quantum computing project with the University of Rhode Island.

“If it weren’t for the Digital Studies program, none of this would have been a possibility,” he added. “It’s really tough for people in the humanities to gain these skills, and UChicago provides you access to this knowledge. If you’re in history or English or linguistics, you can study here and learn the tools you need. The digital age is yours.”

Academic rigor and personalized support

Students in the Arts & Humanities master’s programs have enjoyed the flexibility to take classes across fields of study at UChicago. Feng said that the space for electives has helped guide her toward a new career in art and cultural institutions and museums, especially as she is applying to jobs and internships.  

“For me, this program is not only a platform for me to equip myself with technical skills,” she said, “but also a place for me to actually think about how I can benefit the community or society with what I learn. I really like that aspect of my studies. I think that’s transformative.”