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Big Data Analytics and "Silk Road" Heritage in Inner Asia: Directions and Discrepancies

  • Annie CHAN (Department of Asian Studies at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich)
  • Published : 2025.12.31
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Abstract

Today, "Silk Road" stands as a most enduring and extensive geospatial initiative for aggregating and scaling data across vast regions. For over a century and a half, it has driven the pursuit and study of connectivities across Eurasia. This article examines the formation and implications of a rapidly expanding "Silk Road" datascape transformed by the proliferation of big data analytics and artificial intelligence. It assesses "Silk Road" as a unique milieu of knowledge production, intricately linked to Inner Asia's growing concern with the hegemony and security of data as both "commodity" and "discourse." The impact of policies and strategies shaping data provenance, governance, ethics, and infrastructure on empirical research is evaluated within the context of the broader academic discourse on the efficacy of big data, particularly in the domains of archaeology and cultural heritage.

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