Materials Library @ King’s

September 8, 2009 at 4:06 pm · Filed under education

One of the more interesting research groups here at King’s. They do research into the materiality of flesh!

Materials Library is an interdisciplinary collaborative team that make objects, events and exhibitions that foreground materiality. We are also engaged in both scientific research and artistic practices that explore the senso-aesthetics of materials.

At the heart of all we do is the creation, curation and development of the physical space that is The Materials Library; a resource, laboratory, studio, workshop, and play pen for the material minded. A home to some of the most wondrous matter on earth, The Materials Library contains an ongoing collection of material-objects that foreground the materiality of stuff (link).

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Winning Grants to support Postgraduate Study from the Voluntary Sector (by Luke Blaxill)

August 28, 2009 at 10:09 am · Filed under education

Our aim at Gradfunding is to help postgraduate students of any nationality, academic background, or subject area fund any aspect of their studies- be it living expenses, fees, or research, travel, and conference costs. We are an advisory agency which specialises in winning grants from the voluntary sector (e.g. charities, foundations, and trusts). The voluntary sector in the UK is large, and generous, and there are thousands of bodies with grant-making power totalling millions who are prepared to consider student applicants (thanks to Luke Blaxill for the link)

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New Group: Social Software in the Digital Humanities

June 1, 2009 at 2:25 pm · Filed under Virtual Reseach Environments, collaboration, e-science, education, social media, technology, tools, web2.0

(This new group on Arts-humanities.net may be of interest to punters.  It is primarily focussed upon ’social software’ theory, techniques, and applications within the Digital Humanities.  As it is a new group, we are more than open about its skippering within the choppy Web 2 sea).

The aim of this group is to critically discuss and share thoughts about the use of social software applications, techniques, and principles within the Digital Humanities. Join this group here http://www.arts-humanities.net/deliberative_humanism_social_…

For the purpose of this group, the Digital Humanities is defied as the application of computational methods and associated tools to address specific humanities research problems. Distinct from general computing approaches, the banner term ‘Digital Humanities’ is an ‘attitude towards computing’ that is embedded within the research concerns of the disciplines and sub-fields that make up the humanities. The methods employed in the field may be used to uncover new knowledge about corpora or to visualise research data in such a way as to uncover additional insights and meaning. Succinctly the Digital Humanities (or Humanities Computing) is about structuring, analysing and communicating humanistic knowledge in a critical way using computing technology.

And as in many fields, the social and participatory architectural frameworks associated with ’social software’ is increasing a part of the Digital Humanities. Social software is usually web-based and is a way for researchers to share data and research-labour that comprises of a series of debates about tool, socio-technical design, and concept choice. Social software may be one way to open up new styles of collaboration in the Digital Humanities between software developers, humanists, and audiences. Join in the conversation!

*Suggested topics may include*:

*Collaborative labour arrangements for researchers (collaborative work functions)

*Maintaining on-line communities

*APIs, web services, and mash-ups

*Trends in the blogosphere

*New Social Software Applications

*Community annotation and tagging

*Computer mediated communication

*Service oriented architecture

*Governance (bottom-up or top Down)

*Work-flow analysis

*Designing Research Deliberation

(This images; utilising a matrix approach to critically understanding Web 2.0 design can be found at the medienpaedagogik blog at: http://medienpaedagogik.kaywa.com/social-software/index.html )

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New Resource: British Literary Manuscripts Online c.1660-1900

June 1, 2009 at 9:32 am · Filed under digital humanities, education, eresearch, humanities computing

(This new resource from the a private company Gale-Cengage Learning looks promising; at least according to the populist blurb in the Telegraph via the Melbourne Age.  Strange how the article fails to mention that it was a homophobic ’scandal’  and fails to do justice to the true nature of Wild’s and Bosie’s relationship.  There is a self-reflective lenz that we probably need to reflect upon before we judge this tit-bit of history).

OSCAR Wilde’s clandestine relationship with the young Lord Alfred Douglas resulted in scandal and his eventual imprisonment. Now, the original letters laying bare the playwright’s love for the young “Bosie” are to be made available to the public for the first time.

The handwritten intimate correspondence is among 600,000 pages of British literary manuscripts and original documentation being put online — along with such items as early drafts of Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities, manuscripts by Robert Burns and Walter Scott and letters written by Charlotte Bronte.

In one letter to Bosie, dated 1894, Wilde writes: “My own dear boy — It’s really absurd — I can’t live without you … London is a desert without your dainty feet … but I have no words for how I love you — Oscar.” (link)

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What is technological determinism?

May 23, 2009 at 9:06 pm · Filed under digital humanities, e-science, education, humanities computing, internet, web2.0

(Watch out…technological deterministic drones will attack your free will)!

Technological determinism is circulated, maintained, and advanced within the pre-existing hierarchies in the world in which we live. Determinism has its own political agendas, its own rules, its own contexts and hierarchies and antagonisms to an imagined ‘other’. Determinism utilises a proprietary language and culture and although it cloaks itself in ideas of interdisciplinarity, deterministic discourse discourages intellectual critique, dissent, and justifies itself with the high ground of capitalist practicality. Determinist rhetoric is only interested in other knowledge so that it can demonise it, remediate it, appropriate it, make it better, wrestle it out of the hands of the ‘elite’ and make it more ‘democratic’, more in touch with ‘the people’.

I wrote this some time ago (link).  A rather disturbing report I recently read on Web 2 and Education prompted me to re-visit this writing

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Press Release: Fedora Commons and DSpace Foundation Join Together to Create DuraSpace™ Organization

May 13, 2009 at 10:54 am · Filed under Virtual Reseach Environments, creative commons, digital humanities, digitisation, e-science, education, web2.0

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New Book: World Wide Web of Research

April 23, 2009 at 12:51 pm · Filed under books, digital humanities, digitisation, e-science, education, humanities computing

A new book will be released soon titled: World Wide Web of Reseach: Reshaping the Sciences and Humanities (Cambridge; the MIT Press). It is edited by Bill Dutton and Paul Jeffreys, both of Oxford. Dutton is Director of the Oxford Internet Institute (OII) whilst Paul Jeffreys is Director of IT at Oxford. I believe the book will be focussed upon the issues of eResearch in the Sciences and Humanities; very important issues for the Digital Humanities. The eResearch aganda primarily encapsulates data-reuse and research collaboration through such systems as VREs (Virtual Research Environments). We have a progamme in this field here at King’s called AHESSC (Arts and Humanities eScience Suport Centre). I look forward to the book; I tried to pre-order it on Amazon but with no luck. You can find Bill Dutton’s blog here..

(as researchers, perhaps we are spiders stuck in a web)

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Seminar on new forms of Doctorates

April 22, 2009 at 2:28 pm · Filed under digital humanities, education, eresearch, humanities computing

This seminar in London on new styles of PhDs will be of interest to educators and students within the Digital Humanities who are grappling with the question of how to include digital components within their work as part of the PhD assessment. As someone who started a practice-based PhD way back in 1998 and successfully completed it in 2003 ( minus a few limbs), I would not  recommend it unless you have an academically strong,  and socio-technically aware research environment.  Technology is neither good nor bad nor is it neutral; so the application of computing technology within a PhD is neither good not bad nor is it neutral.  Succinctly, some technologists may not always have your best interest in mind (and as the Digital Humanities is inherently inter-disciplinary; non-technologists may  have a superficial or negative understanding of research computing)  . A PhD is always an academic qualification and any innovation must always advance the nature of the qualification; not unwittingly undermine it. As a learning process for the Digital Humanities the inclusion of digital components within a PhD adds to its educational worth, not lessens it.  See  Arts-Humanities.net for details of the seminar…

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MA Digital Asset Management

April 15, 2009 at 11:03 am · Filed under digital humanities, education, eresearch, humanities computing

The Centre where I work at King’s, the Centre for eReseach, in conjunction with the Centre for Computing in the Humanities (CCH), is starting a new MA course this year in Digital Asset Management. Details of the new course are as follows:

The Programme will equip students with the necessary critical and reflective capacities, set within a thorough grounding in the theory and practice of digital curation. Students will also gain a great deal of practical
hands-on experience, working on real problems and digital collections throughout the course. If you wish to discuss it; feel free to send an email (link).

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HEFCE launches strategy for technology-enhanced learning

March 26, 2009 at 2:32 pm · Filed under education

Press Release:

HEFCE has today (March 26, 2009) published ‘Enhancing learning and teaching
through the use of technology – a revised approach to HEFCE’s strategy for
e-learning’ (HEFCE 2009/12). This revised approach follows an independent
review of the strategy and is designed to provide further support to higher
education institutions as they develop their own e-learning strategies.
Read the rest of this entry »

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NSF Fellowship Funding Avaliable

August 12, 2008 at 12:01 pm · Filed under digital humanities, e-science, education

The United States National Science Foundation (NSF) announced on July 29, 2008, that it is now accepting applications for its Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP). The purpose of this program is to ensure the vitality of the scientific and technological workforce in the United States and to reinforce its diversity. The program recognizes and supports outstanding graduate students in the relevant science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) disciplines who are pursuing research-based master’s and doctoral degrees.

GRFPs are intended for individuals in the early stages of their graduate study. All applicants are expected to have adequate preparation to begin graduate level study and research by Summer or Fall of 2009. In most cases, this will be demonstrated by a bachelor’s degree earned prior to Fall 2009. Applicants may pursue graduate study at an institution in the United States or affiliate with a foreign institution that grants a graduate degree. Prospective Fellows are responsible for all logistical arrangements required for affiliation with the foreign institution including living arrangements and securing any necessary passports or visas.

NSF expects to award 900-1,600 Graduate Research Fellowships under this program solicitation pending availability of funds. All awards will be for a maximum of three years usable over a 5-year period. The anticipated award date is late March 2009.

To learn more about NSF’s fellowships, including eligibility and how to register, please visit our website, www.oup.org, and select the “NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program” article from our “What’s New” section.

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New MA in Digital Assett Management at King’s College; London

April 4, 2008 at 3:11 pm · Filed under digital humanities, e-science, education, eresearch, humanities computing

This is the new MA offered by the Centre of eResearch and the Centre for Computing in the Humanities here at King’s.

The Centre for e-Research (CeRch) in collaboration with the Centre for Computing in the Humanities (CCH) is proposing to establish an MA in Digital Asset Management (MADAM). The goal of MADAM is to address what is seen as a major gap in education and training at postgraduate level in an increasingly important area of library, archival and curatorial activity, namely the management of digital resources.

Within the cultural heritage sector, there has been an increasing amount of activity over several years in the creation of digital resources, either by creating digital facsimiles of existing cultural artifacts, or by creating new (‘born digital’) resources. In government, both local and central, and in commerce and industry, more and more of the information created in the normal course of activity is in electronic form, whether as web publications, email, or documents in word-processed, spreadsheet or PDF formats.

There are important considerations of curatorial and technical standards that arise throughout the ‘digital resource life-cycle’, from creation through management and dissemination to long-term preservation. These considerations and this life-cycle are the core subject matter of the proposed new MA programme in Digital Asset Management.

The new programme will be able to take advantage of activities and areas of expertise in which King’s College London has international standing, and will offer imaginative intellectual and practical training in areas that are of major and growing importance in contemporary society. The intention is to develop a programme that is strongly inter-disciplinary. At the outset, the focus will be on resources across the humanities disciplines but over time the course will be expanded to cover the social sciences, medicine and the biomedical sciences.

Further details about the programme and how to register will be available shortly. To express an interest in the course and for an outline of the core module, please email Lydia.horstman@kcl.ac.uk

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Developing the UK’s e-infrastructure for science and innovation

October 12, 2007 at 1:01 am · Filed under collaboration, creative commons, digital humanities, e-science, education, humanities computing, internet, open source, technology, tools, web2.0

Produced by the Office of Science and Innovation (OSI) e-Infrastructure Working Group, the report – Developing the UK’s e-infrastructure for science and innovation - sets out the requirements for a national e-infrastructure to help ensure the UK maintains and indeed enhances its global standing in science and innovation in an increasingly competitive world (link)

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Report: After the AHDS: the end of national support?

September 18, 2007 at 12:48 am · Filed under digital humanities, e-science, education, humanities computing, web2.0

A panel discussion at the opening of the recent Digital Resources in the Humanities and Arts conference at Dartington College of the Arts posed the question what happens after the end of the Arts and Humanities Data Service (AHDS); is this the end of national support?

The Arts and Humanities Data Service is a national service with the primary role to preserve, curate, and provide access to the digital output of the humanities in the UK. The Service is also active in the enhancement and promotion of digital scholarship in the UK as well as internationally. After eleven years of service, the AHDS recently lost its funding from the JISC (Joint Information Services Committee) and the AHRC (Arts and Humanities Research Council). The Service will cease to exist in its present form in March of 2008.

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eIUS: e-Infrastructure Use Cases and Service Usage Models

August 29, 2007 at 8:52 pm · Filed under collaboration, digital humanities, e-science, education, humanities computing, web2.0

The UK is entering a period in which online collaborative environments, distributed computing and data resources, advanced analytical tools, together with support and training, are becoming readily available for researchers in all disciplines. Within some subject areas, for example, high-energy physics and bioinformatics, e-infrastructure already underpins everyday work; whilst other subject areas are still investigating the applicability of existing resources for their research and making recommendations for future development. The deployment of e-infrastructure, whether within institutions, nationally or internationally, has the potential to increase the pace, impact, and efficiency of research both within and across disciplines (link).

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