Scholarship in the Digital Age (Bibliography)

September 30, 2008 at 1:41 pm · Filed under digital humanities, e-science, eresearch

A usuful resource from Christine Borgman’s book (bibliography…link)

“Scholars in all fields now have access to an unprecedented wealth of online information, tools, and services. The Internet lies at the core of an information infrastructure for distributed, data-intensive, and collaborative research. Although much attention has been paid to the new technologies making this possible, from digitized books to sensor networks, it is the underlying social and policy changes that will have the most lasting effect on the scholarly enterprise. In Scholarship in the Digital Age, Christine Borgman explores the technical, social, legal, and economic aspects of the kind of infrastructure that we should be building for scholarly research in the twenty-first century.

Borgman describes the roles that information technology plays at every stage in the life cycle of a research project and contrasts these new capabilities with the relatively stable system of scholarly communication, which remains based on publishing in journals, books, and conference proceedings. No framework for the impending “data deluge” exists comparable to that for publishing. Analyzing scholarly practices in the sciences, social sciences, and humanities, Borgman compares each discipline’s approach to infrastructure issues. In the process, she challenges the many stakeholders in the scholarly infrastructure–scholars, publishers, libraries, funding agencies, and others–to look beyond their own domains to address the interaction of technical, legal, economic, social, political, and disciplinary concerns. Scholarship in the Digital Age will provoke a stimulating conversation among all who depend on a rich and robust scholarly environment.” - The MIT Press

All references cited in the book are provided for here for quick citation look-up and access to cited Web sites.

Comments

Cow GirL!

September 23, 2008 at 5:36 pm · Filed under gadfly

Comments

Open Access and Research Conference 2008

September 22, 2008 at 10:57 am · Filed under digital humanities, e-science, humanities computing, open access

STAMFORD PLAZA HOTEL, BRISBANE, QUEENSLAND 24-25 SEPTEMBER

The way we create and disseminate knowledge has undergone profound change over the last ten years. The capacity of ICT and the rise of a rich text, highly interactive, user generated and socially active Internet (Web 2.0) has seen linear models of knowledge production giving way to more diffuse open ended and serendipitous knowledge processes.

As a response we have seen a worldwide move towards establishing frameworks in which we can optimise access to and reuse of research especially that which is publicly funded. This has been supported by the development of open access repositories, new publishing tools and models and more strategic management of copyright at the individual and institutional level (link).

Comments

Fedora Commons Hat Check

September 19, 2008 at 3:19 pm · Filed under digital humanities, humanities computing

HatCheck is a quarterly newsletter published by Fedora Commons by and for communities of Fedora users, developers, vendors and decision makers provided to facilitate the exchange of news, events, information and achievements. Your comments and content are most welcome! Please reply with your news for the December 9, 2008 issue of HatCheck.

Read the rest of this entry »

Comments

Digitiation Programme Officer JISC Collections / JISC Executive

September 19, 2008 at 2:36 pm · Filed under digital humanities, humanities computing

Salary: £28,000 to £32,800 depending on experience

Based in: Central London

JISC Collections negotiates agreements for and acquires online content to support education and research. The key ambition in establishing JISC Collections is to widen accessibility to online resources, to save the academic sector time and money, and to improve management of licensing by the sector.

JISC Collections is undertaking two projects in association with the JISC Digitisation Programme and requires a programme manager to support these projects and ensure that their successful delivery.

You will be required to:

- Support projects funded under the JISC Digitisation Programme’s Enriching Digital Resources call and ensure their successful delivery

- Obtain copyright clearances for content and data delivered via the JISC - funded Vision of Britain project

- Manage specific JISC Collections projects, with special attention to those involving the licensing of digital content

- As part of the JISC e-Content team to report back on project and programme management and share related information

You will need an understanding of the issues related to the digitisation of scholarly resources, such as data capture, resource discovery, rights clearance and usability. In addition an understanding of the issues related to the procurement and provision of online information resources in particular negotiation and licensing.

For a full copy of the job description please visit our web site at http://www.jisc-collections.ac.uk or email Liam Earney at L.Earney@jisc.ac.uk

Closing date for applications Monday 29th September

Comments

Opening soon: a digital library for Europe

September 19, 2008 at 10:05 am · Filed under digital humanities, humanities computing

Europe’s cultural diversity in books, music, paintings, photographs, and
films open to all citizens at the click of a mouse via one portal – this
dream of a European Digital Library could become reality this autumn.
However, further efforts by the EU Member States are needed, said the
Commission today in a new Communication on making available digital
versions of works from cultural institutions all over Europe.
Digitisation of cultural works can give Europeans access to material
from museums, libraries and archives abroad without having to travel or
turn hundreds of pages to find a piece of information. Europe’s
libraries alone contain more than 2.5 billion books, but only about 1%
of archival material is available in digital form. The Commission
therefore called on Member States to do more to make digitised works
available online for Europeans to browse them digitally, for study, work
or leisure. The Commission itself will provide some € 120 million in
2009-2010 for improving online access to Europe’s cultural heritage.

The Commission today confirmed its commitment to help Member States
bring their valuable cultural content online. In 2009-2010 € 69 million
from the EU’s research programme <http://cordis.europa.eu/fp7/> will go
to digitisation activities and the development of digital libraries. In
the same period, Europe’s Competitiveness and Innovation Programme
<http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/activities/ict_psp/index_en.htm>
will allocate about € 50 million to improve access to Europe’s cultural
content. However, the total cost of digitising five million books in
Europe’s libraries is already estimated at approximately € 225 million,
not including objects like manuscripts or paintings. Realising the
vision of a European Digital Library (Europeana) needs substantial
investment from national institutions, but at present most countries
only provide small scale, fragmented funding for digitisation. The
Commission today called on Member States to raise digitisation
capacities to make their collections available for Europe’s citizens,
team up with the private sector, and address the following priorities:

* More *funding* needs to be allocated to digitisation, along with
plans for how much material will be digitised.
* Most countries still lack methods, technologies and experience for
the *preservation* of digital material, vital so that content
remains accessible to future generations.
* *Common standards* need to be implemented to make different
information sources and databases compatible for and usable by the
European Digital Library (/Europeana/).

For more information see:
http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/activities/digital_libraries/index_en.htm

Comments

Companion to Digital Literary Studies (2008)

September 18, 2008 at 2:06 pm · Filed under digital humanities, humanities computing

We are delighted to announce that the Companion to Digital Literary
Studies (2008) is now freely available online at at
<http://www.digitalhumanities.org/companion/DLS/>.

The online version of the text is hosted by the Alliance of Digital
Humanities Organizations and is made freely available through the
generosity of our publisher, Blackwell Publishing.

With all best wishes,

Susan Schreibman and Ray Siemens, Editors

Comments

Stanford Humanities Center: 2009-10 Fellowship Opportunities

September 18, 2008 at 10:13 am · Filed under web2.0

Announcement of Faculty Fellowships

at the Stanford Humanities Center

We would appreciate if you would share this information with colleagues who may be interested:

The online application for 2009-2010 faculty fellowships at the Stanford Humanities Center is now available. Fellows are in residence at the Center during the regular academic year (September to June) and participate in the Center’s intellectual life, sharing ideas and work in progress with a diverse community of scholars from across the spectrum of academic fields and ranks.

Applicants must have a PhD and will normally be at least three years beyond receipt of the degree by the start of the fellowship term. Fellows are awarded stipends of up to $60,000. In addition, a housing and moving allowance of up to $15,000 is offered, dependent upon need.

Please visit http://shc.stanford.edu/fellowships/about.htm for complete information.

How to Apply

For the online application and more information, please see our website:

http://shc.stanford.edu/fellowships/about.htm

email: shc-fellowships@stanford.edu

phone: (650) 723-3054

External Faculty Fellowships

Open to scholars from humanities departments as traditionally defined and to other scholars seriously interested in humanistic issues.

Fellowship term: September 2009 - June 2010

Online application deadline: October 15, 2008

Digital Humanities Fellowship

Open to scholars whose research projects are critically shaped by information technology. Projects should be oriented to producing new research outcomes rather than focusing primarily on the creation of archives or software. Appropriate projects will approach significant questions in humanistic study with the aid of new research tools or methodologies.

Fellowship term: September 2009 - June 2010

Online application deadline: October 15, 2008

Arts Practitioner/Writer Fellowship

The Stanford Humanities Center and the Stanford Institute for Creativity and the Arts (SiCa) intend to offer one residential fellowship to an arts practitioner who is also a writer, scholar, or critic pursuing a research project in the arts. The recipient will be in residence with other fellows at the Humanities Center and will be affiliated with one of three SiCa centers. Arts inquiries may be addressed sica@stanford.edu.

Fellowship term: September 2008 - June 2009

Online application deadline: December 1, 2008

Comments

Under the Southern Cross

September 10, 2008 at 7:27 pm · Filed under events

The Weston Room, Maughan Library & Information Services Centre, Chancery Lane

Tuesday 9 September - Saturday 13 December 2008
9.30-17.00, Monday to Saturday

>From classical antiquity Europeans speculated on the existence of a continent in the Southern Hemisphere and imagined what it might contain. The voyages of men like Abel Tasman in the seventeenth century began to replace speculation and fancy with facts, while the voyages of Cook in the following century laid the foundations for the eventual settlement of the newly-discovered southern lands of Australia and New Zealand. This exhibition explores the experiences of the early European settlers as they began new lives under unfamiliar skies filled with strange constellations, such as the Southern Cross, and the effect they had upon their new homelands.

New South Wales was originally conceived as a penal colony to deal with Britain’s problem of overcrowded prisons; against the expectations of many, it became a functioning society. The colonial settlements of South Australia and New Zealand, on the other hand, were largely modelled on the mother country. In both Australia and New Zealand the experience of colonial settlement had a colossal - though in some ways differing - impact on the indigenous populations. As the exhibition reveals, disease, displacement and conflict with settlers were the results, leading in the case of the Tasmanian Aborigines to their practical annihilation.

The same spirit of curiosity that had led the Dutch and the British to explore the Southern Hemisphere was soon turned by the early settlers to the exploration of their new homes. In the exhibition we look at the early explorers of the Australian interior and their motivations. Australia and New Zealand offered scope for scientific exploration and we look at how their unique flora and fauna were viewed by naturalists and what impact that European settlement had on this wildlife.

The majority of items on display are from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office Historical Collection, which was transferred on permanent loan to King’s in 2007.

Access to the exhibition is free. On arrival at the Maughan Library, please follow the signs to the Weston Room. Please note that visitors who are not registered members of the Maughan Library are required to complete an exhibition ticket on arrival at the Library. Further details are available on the Special Collections web pages, where you will also find a guide to the exhibition.

http://www.kcl.ac.uk/iss/library/spec/exhib/

Comments

Postdoctoral Fellow in Early Modern Textual Studies and Digital Humanities (2009-11)

September 10, 2008 at 7:24 pm · Filed under digital humanities, humanities computing

The Electronic Textual Cultures Laboratory  (ETCL) [URL: < http://etcl.uvic.ca/ >] at the University of Victoria has an exciting two-year postdoctoral opportunity for a candidate with a background in early modern literary and textual studies, expertise in computing, and an interest in the digital humanities field.

The postdoctoral fellow will be key in the development of a professional reading environment designed to respond to the needs of those working with early modern books and manuscripts. Source material for this work will be derived from our work on the Devonshire Manuscript (BL Add MS 17,492) and our ongoing work with professional reading environments in number of related projects.

The successful candidate will have skills and aptitudes in early modern research, textual studies, and scholarly editing in a digital humanities context, including training or demonstrated experience working with TEI XML and digital editions. Organizational skills are essential. Interest and aptitude in research planning and management would be an asset. The ability to work in concert with our existing team is a critical requirement.

Examples of technologies employed in related ETCL projects are as follows: TEI P5; XML, XSLT, XSL and XHTML encoding; XQuery; eXist XML databases; JavaScript; Ruby on Rails; PHP; CSS; and web-based SQL database projects using PostgresSQL and mySQL. Experience in some or all of these areas would be an asset, but is not a requirement, though aptitude with digital tools is required.

Our current team members pride themselves on a passionate interest in both the humanities and their computation engagement. Our ideal candidate is someone with similar passions who can introduce the team to new ideas and provide new perspectives on existing digital humanities issues.

Salary for this position is competitive in the Canadian context, and is governed in part by SSHRC practices; combined with a local supplement, the annual salary for this position is expected to be $52,000, inclusive of benefits and travel allowances.

Applications, comprising a brief cover letter, CV, and the names and contact information for three referees, may be sent electronically to <etcl.apply@gmail.com>.  Applications will be received and reviewed until the position is filled; the position can begin as early as January 2009.

Comments

Nature: Big Data

September 4, 2008 at 12:04 pm · Filed under e-science

The journal Nature has just come out with its latest issue, which includes a special section on “Big Data” — the flood of scientific data and its implications for science and for scholarly communication. It includes several superb articles, and a brief commentary that I’ve written on data curation issues. Readers interested in cyberinfrastructure, e-science or data curation and management will find much of value here. The special section is available for public access at present (the site says it will be open for two weeks), and can be found at:

http://www.nature.com/news/specials/bigdata/index.html

Comments

Winners Portable Film Festival

September 2, 2008 at 9:32 am · Filed under art, media, mobile

After a month of deliberation, fandom, and some pretty abject name calling, Portable is proud to announce the winners of its 2008 festival, chosen by the likes of you!

Specially designed robots, working an algorhythm between total views, total ratings, and overall rating for each film, have worked night and day in front of one of those Good Will Hunting-style whiteboards with intimidating looking equations on it to work out the following…

Congratulations (and free stuff) goes out to (link)

Comments