dh-explore

name	dh-explore
description	Digital humanities research discovery — research question development, digital archive search, primary source criticism, corpus assembly, literature review, and research framework mapping. Produces venue-specific framework diagrams showing recommended methods (topic modeling, NER, sentiment analysis, close reading) and paper structure for NLP/AI venues, DH journals, traditional humanities journals, or specific target publishers. Use when starting a DH project, building a corpus, or planning a research methodology.
metadata	{"version":"1.1.0","last_updated":"2026-05-29","status":"active","data_access_level":"redacted","task_type":"open-ended","related_skills":["dh-write","dh-refs","dh-pipeline"]}

dh-explore — Research & Discovery

What This Skill Does

dh-explore guides you from an initial DH idea to a fully developed research framework, including:

• A refined, dual-framed research question (interpretive claim + methodological contribution)
• A methodology blueprint matched to your corpus and question
• A Corpus Manifest with primary sources assessed for OCR quality and provenance
• An annotated bibliography spanning both humanities and computational DH literature
• A Research Question Brief ready to hand off to dh-write

Who It's For

• Researchers at any stage — undergraduate to faculty
• Projects anywhere on the DH methodology spectrum (close reading to large-scale text mining)
• Particularly strong for projects involving digitized historical materials and noisy OCR text

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Modes and Trigger Keywords

Mode	Trigger	What Happens
full	/dh-explore or /dh-explore full	Complete pipeline: intake → socratic → methodology → archives → literature → corpus → synthesis → RQ → framework
quick-brief	/dh-explore quick-brief	Fast path: intake → RQ refinement only; ~15 min
socratic	/dh-explore socratic	Guided dialogue to discover your research question
archive-survey	/dh-explore archive-survey	Archive identification and evaluation only
methodology-guide	/dh-explore methodology-guide	Method selection and OCR quality assessment only
lit-review-humanities	/dh-explore lit-review-humanities	Humanities literature search and annotated bibliography
lit-review-technical	/dh-explore lit-review-technical	Computational DH literature review
framework	/dh-explore framework	Research framework map: given an RQ, build method diagram + venue-specific paper structure

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Mode Routing

When this skill is invoked, do the following:

1. Always start with intake: Read agents/intake_agent.md and execute it to configure the session.

2. After intake, route by mode:

   • full → Read and execute agents in order: socratic_mentor_agent.md → methodology_advisor_agent.md → digital_archive_agent.md → primary_source_agent.md → corpus_builder_agent.md → humanities_literature_agent.md → technical_literature_agent.md → cross_domain_synthesis_agent.md → research_question_agent.md → framework_architect_agent.md
   • quick-brief → Read and execute: research_question_agent.md only (after intake)
   • socratic → Read and execute: socratic_mentor_agent.md → research_question_agent.md
   • archive-survey → Read and execute: digital_archive_agent.md → primary_source_agent.md → corpus_builder_agent.md
   • methodology-guide → Read and execute: methodology_advisor_agent.md
   • lit-review-humanities → Read and execute: humanities_literature_agent.md
   • lit-review-technical → Read and execute: technical_literature_agent.md
   • framework → Read and execute: framework_architect_agent.md (requires RQ — ask if not present; can run standalone or after any other mode)

3. If upstream materials are detected (blocks labeled ## Research Question Brief, ## Corpus Manifest, ## Methodology Blueprint): skip agents that would produce what's already present; use the existing materials as input to agents further down the chain.

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Shared References

Before beginning, load these shared resources:

• Read: ../shared/references/dh_methodology_spectrum.md
• Read: ../shared/references/intent_clarification_protocol.md
• Read: ../shared/references/anti_leakage_protocol.md

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Handoff Output

On completion of full mode, produce a dh-explore Output Package containing:

## Research Question Brief       ← for dh-write intake
## Methodology Blueprint         ← for dh-write methodology_writer_agent
## Corpus Manifest               ← for dh-write and dh-pipeline
## Literature Review Brief — Humanities
## Literature Review Brief — Technical
## Research Framework
## Research Framework Map        ← NEW: Mermaid diagram + venue-specific paper structure

dh-write's intake agent detects this package and auto-populates the writing session. Save or paste this package when starting /dh-write.

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The Canonical Use Case

This skill was built around a project working with 19th-century abolitionist newspapers from Chronicling America — digitized historical text with 75–85% OCR accuracy. If your project involves:

• Noisy OCR text from historical digitization
• Primary source provenance questions
• The tension between computational pattern-finding and historical interpretation

...then you are using this skill for exactly the purpose it was designed for.

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Exemplar DH Projects Referenced in This Skill

• "Mining for the Meanings of a Murder: The Impact of OCR Quality on the Use of Digitized Historical Newspapers" — DHQ — OCR quality and text mining methodology
• "Machine Reading the Primeros Libros" — DHQ vol.10 no.4 — Colonial archive digitization
• "How Network Analysis Uncovers International Networks of Smuggling History" — Cultural Analytics 2023 — Historical network analysis
• "The Generative Dissensus of Reading the Feminist Novel, 1995-2020" — Cultural Analytics — Computational + close reading synthesis
• "Slow, Painful and Expensive: Current Challenges in Text-Mining Corpus Construction" — DHQ 19/3 — Corpus construction reality