PurposeWith the development of data mining technology, diverse and broader domain knowledge can be extracted automatically. However, the research on applying knowledge mapping and data visualization techniques to genealogical data is limited. This paper aims to fill this research gap by providing a systematic framework and process guidance for practitioners seeking to uncover hidden knowledge from genealogy.Design/methodology/approachBased on a literature review of genealogy's current knowledge reasoning research, the authors constructed an integrated framework for knowledge inference and visualization application using a knowledge graph. Additionally, the authors applied this framework in a case study using “Manchu Clan Genealogy” as the data source.FindingsThe case study shows that the proposed framework can effectively decompose and reconstruct genealogy. It demonstrates the reasoning, discovery, and web visualization application process of implicit information in genealogy. It enhances the effective utilization of Manchu genealogy resources by highlighting the intricate relationships among people, places, and time entities.Originality/valueThis study proposed a framework for genealogy knowledge reasoning and visual analysis utilizing a knowledge graph, including five dimensions: the target layer, the resource layer, the data layer, the inference layer, and the application layer. It helps to gather the scattered genealogy information and establish a data network with semantic correlations while establishing reasoning rules to enable inference discovery and visualization of hidden relationships.

PurposeThis paper aims to construct a spatio-temporal emotional framework (STEF) for digital humanities from a quantitative perspective, applying knowledge extraction and mining technology to promote innovation of humanities research paradigm and method.Design/methodology/approachThe proposed STEF uses methods of information extraction, sentiment analysis and geographic information system to achieve knowledge extraction and mining. STEF integrates time, space and emotional elements to visualize the spatial and temporal evolution of emotions, which thus enriches the analytical paradigm in digital humanities.FindingsThe case study shows that STEF can effectively extract knowledge from unstructured texts in the field of Chinese Qing Dynasty novels. First, STEF introduces the knowledge extraction tools – MARKUS and DocuSky – to profile character entities and perform plots extraction. Second, STEF extracts the characters' emotional evolutionary trajectory from the temporal and spatial perspective. Finally, the study draws a spatio-temporal emotional path figure of the leading characters and integrates the corresponding plots to analyze the causes of emotion fluctuations.Originality/valueThe STEF is constructed based on the “spatio-temporal narrative theory” and “emotional narrative theory”. It is the first framework to integrate elements of time, space and emotion to analyze the emotional evolution trajectories of characters in novels. The execuability and operability of the framework is also verified with a case novel to suggest a new path for quantitative analysis of other novels.