Mellon funds regional THATcamp coordination/training

In 2008, the Center for History and New Media at George Mason created THATCamp—The Humanities and Technology Camp—a yearly user-generated “unconference.” Organized on a shoestring and driven by participant interests, the new style of academic conference attracted a wide range of interest, and it spawned numerous locally-organized regional THATCamps in 2009, including recent events in Austin, TX, Pullman, WA, Columbus, OH, Los Angeles, CA, and East Lansing, MI. In coming months, additional THATCamps are planned for Paris, Toronto, London, Seattle, and other cities around the world.

Until now, the skeleton crew at CHNM (Jeremy Boggs, Dan Cohen, and Tom Scheinfeldt) has worked diligently to meet the many requests for assistance  from prospective organizers. With the announcement of a major grant from the Mellon Foundation, CHNM will finally be able to give local organizers and the regional THATCamp network the attention they deserve.

CHNM’s aim with the new funding is not to alter the essential bootstrap nature of THATCamp or the grassroots character of the regional events. None of the Mellon funding will be directed toward CHNM’s own Fairfax camp, and regional THATCamps will continue to be locally conceived, organized, and financed. Instead the program aims simply to make it easier for regional THATCamps to be established and run and to provide new supports for training aspiring digital humanists.

“Bridging Cultures:” new NEH initiative for 2011-2012

UO humanities scholars who want to be ahead of the curve in planning research activities that the NEH might fund should be aware that the agency’s next big push is themed “Bridging Cultures.” NEH Chairman Jim Leach announced the initiative last week during his 2011-2012 budget presentation to the House Appropriations Committee.

The Bridging Cultures Initiative is meant “to help American citizens gain a deeper understanding of our own rich and varied cultural heritage, as well as the history and culture of other nations.” The NEH will fund pilot projects with “cultural bridging themes,” but also, through its existing grant programs (e.g. Fellowships), will support other projects in which cultural bridging is a core component.

UO was on Jim Leach’s Civility Tour itinerary in February, but a DC blizzard forced his last-minute cancellation. A pdf of his statement to the Appropriations Committee is available here.

Day of Digital Humanities 3/18

On this Day of Digital Humanities, here are some choice definitions of the chimera offered by participants in the past two years’ DoDH:

Humanism and its universe, digitally. -Guyda Armstrong, University of Manchester, UK

Bringing digital computing technologies to bear in humanities-based modes of inquiry, and/or bringing humanities-based modes of inquiry to bear in digital computing technologies. -Kathleen Fitzpatrick, Pomona College, USA

I like to define it as injecting a little humanity into the machine. Bad metaphor? How about: applying the lens of the social sciences to computing science, and using computing methods in humanities research. But really, “Digital Humanities” just makes me think its practitioners are the first scholars to accept their cyborg-selves. -Eric Forcier, University of Alberta, Canada

APRU Education & Research Technology Forum, 5/26-28 @USC

USC is hosting the Association of Pacific Rim Universities’ Education and Research Technology (ERT) Forum on  5/26-28, 2010.

The Call for Proposals for the ERT Forum is open through 5 pm PT, March 24, 2010. Topics for presentation panels at the ERT Forum include:

• Using mobile computing in teaching and learning
• Supporting research with new and emerging technologies
• Enhancing distance learning for the new millennium
• Developing 21st-century literacies among students and faculty
• Creating innovative learning spaces on campus and in the virtual world

Faculty researchers may submit individual or collaborative proposals. More details here:
http://www.usc.edu/its/apru/index.html

Google Digital Humanities Research Awards [updated 2011]

2011 update: Google now funds faculty research at this website:
http://research.google.com/university/relations/research_awards.html
. The annual deadlines are February 1 and August 1 (See Funding links as well). There is currently no special ‘digital humanities’ focus.

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Original post 3/16/10:

Google Research is reaching out to DH researchers for their 4/15/10 Research Awards deadline. The proposal process is unusually  simple for the award level (up to $50,000). UO Digital Scholars who are working on innovative digital programs and tools in Literature,  Linguistics, History, Classics, Philosophy, Sociology, Archaeology, or Anthropology should consider applying.

Google is clearly aiming to attract proposals from faculty whose research would utilize the Google Books database, and result in digital tools and protocols that could be widely adopted by other researchers. For details, read on:

Steve Seitz: Reconstructing the World from Photos on the Internet

Save the date —  here’s a very worthwhile opportunity for anyone  interested in image management and innovative ways to use massive collections of digital images.  Many thanks to CIS, CAS, and AAA for hosting this session.

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http://www.cs.uoregon.edu/Activities/Public_Talks/20100408-Seitz.php

Distinguished Lecture Series: Reconstructing the World from Photos on the Internet

Author: Steven Seitz University of Washington and Google

Date: April 08, 2010

Time: 15:30 – reception to follow

Location: 177 Lawrence Hall

Host: Andrzej Proskurowski

Abstract

There’s a big difference between looking at a photograph of a place and being there. But what if you had access to a database of every possible image of that place and could conjure up any view at will? With billions of photographs currently available online, the Internet is beginning to resemble such a database, capturing our world’s sites from a huge number of vantage points and viewing conditions. For example, a Google image search for “notre dame” or “grand canyon” each return millions of photos, showing the sites from myriad viewpoints, different times of day and night, and changes in season, weather and decade.

This talk explores ways of transforming this massive, unorganized photo collection into 3D scene reconstructions and visualizations of the world’s sites, cities, and landscapes. After a brief recap of our work on Photo Tourism and Photosynth, I will focus on current efforts and newest results in the domains of city-scale 3D reconstruction and new visual interfaces for navigating photo collections.

Supporting the arts and humanities with e-science

Many thanks to Brian Westra for forwarding this readable op-ed.  Key points :

- All disciplines rely on core cyberinfrastructure
- Computational methods extend disciplines by fostering new subfields and interdisciplinary possibilities.
- Emerging research communities don’t need to develop new infrastructures. Plug into successful existing structures, get as much out of them as possible, and customize only if needed.

Thoughts?

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There’s a reason why certain tools become classics, almost indispensable for everyday life. Image courtesy Annette Gulick, stock.xchng

Supporting really useful general tools is often the best way to support specialists, says EGEE’s Danielle Venton.

The early days of the World Wide Web were primarily an exclusive, though not a closed, party. Its main attendees were elites in the physics and computer science communities.

Today, the bulk of the developed and developing world is involved. Every sector of society puts the Web to use: your local dance company, church and city council likely all have Web sites. Through these you can learn about and communicate with them in ways not possible before.

Similarly, managing data with e-Infrastructures (distributed computing systems and the like) was, like the Web, initially confined to specialized communities. Today, however, nearly all researchers, including those in the arts and humanities, can use distributed computing systems, and every year more do.

And, like the Web, it is making it possible for them to investigate their field in ways that were not conceived of, or not possible, before. MORE >>

NHA Data Shows Decline In Funding for Humanities Researchers

From the National Humanities Alliance News, 2/26/10

“The humanities continue to play a core role in higher education and student interest is strong, but to meet the demand, four-year colleges and universities are increasingly relying on a part-time, untenured workforce. Those are among the findings from the Humanities Departmental Survey, conducted by the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (AAAS) and a consortium of disciplinary associations. The survey, administered during the 2007-2008 academic year, includes data collected from English, foreign language, history, history of science, art history, linguistics, and religion departments at approximately 1,400 colleges and universities.

“The Humanities Indicators include data covering humanities education from primary school through the graduate level; the humanities workforce; humanities funding and research; and the humanities in civic life. Modeled after the National Science Board’s Science and Engineering Indicators, the Humanities Indicators serve as a resource to help scholars, policymakers, and the public assess the current state of the humanities.”

In The Landscape of Humanities Research and Funding, Alan Brinkley of Columbia University writes about the paucity of humanities research funding at the NEH, where the big chunk (32%) was as usual disbursed to state humanities agencies for public programs. This NEH funding pie chart from 2006 shows that just 13.3% of $138.3 million was allocated for individual and collaborative humanities researchers at IHEs and similar institutions.