This chapter asks what it looks like when a discipline uses the power of big data to address its own biases. Drawing from the example of historical linguistics, it tells the story of a discipline that inherited Victorian metanarratives about the evolution of race, language, and history in the past. Historical linguistics is also, as a modern discipline, a place where applied quantitative measures have aided the process of recognizing and addressing inherited biases about empire and race. The chapter urges the experience of historical linguistics as a pattern for other disciplines, showing how text mining can become a tool capable of nuanced work when used together with traditional forms of cultural analysis.