Affiliate Group Spotlight: Digital Humanities

By Seth Bernstein, NRU Higher School of Economics; Natalia Ermolaev, Princeton U; Philip Gleissner, Princeton U; Andrew Janco, University of Connecticut; Jessie Labov, Ohio State U. 

This article was originally published in the June 2016 edition of NewsNet

The ASEEES Executive Committee has recently approved a new Affiliate Group in the Digital Humanities (“Slavic DH”). This decision formalizes a nascent community that began a conversation at the 2015 ASEEES convention about DH practices and networks within the field. For the last year we have been reaching out to scholars in Slavic and Eurasian studies who have long been working at the intersection of computing and the humanities, and to those who are curious about what DH could mean in the Slavic context. 

The goal of our Affiliate Group is primarily to advance a community of practice around digitally-inclined scholarship and research projects, with a strong focus on the teaching, curation, and preservation thereof in Slavic,  East European and Eurasian Studies. It focuses on those disciplines in the humanities that have recently begun to include digitally-based practices, but also aims to connect humanists with their social scientist colleagues who have a longer history with these methodologies and approaches. By presenting ongoing debates about DH, delving into specific cultural contexts, and maintaining a critical consciousness about the role of DH in the future of the humanities, we hope to contribute to the broader intellectual trajectory of Slavic and Eurasian Studies.

In brief, Digital Humanities’ goals are to:

  • enable collaboration between students, scholars, librarians, archivists, and IT specialists in order to carry out DH projects;
  • collect and curate DH projects produced by Slavists;
  • mentor and advise students/junior colleagues in Slavic who have an interest in DH practices;
  • raise the visibility of DH in Slavic, East European and Eurasian Studies to encourage awareness and acceptance of these practices in our field;
  • connect DH scholars in North American Slavic Studies with relevant colleagues and projects around the world;
  • provide support for colleagues in Slavic, East European and Eurasian Studies at institutions without strong resources in DH;
  • represent Slavic, East European and Eurasian Studies in the larger field of Digital Humanities, raising awareness and visibility among non-Slavists about DH projects and resources in our field.

 

2016 ASEEES Sessions

We have put together a series of seven panels that aims to foster a debate about digital humanities throughout the upcoming ASEEES convention. The following seven DH sessions have been accepted for the 48th Annual ASEEES Convention, November 17-20, 2016 at the Marriott Wardman Park in Washington, D.C.:

  • DH 1: Platforms for Digital Scholarship (Fri, November 18, 10:00 to 11:45am)

  • DH 2: The Researcher-Librarian Interface in Digital East European Studies (Fri, November 18, 1:45 to 3:30pm)

  • DH 3: Seeing Through Data: How Does Digital Humanities Change Our View of Culture? (Fri, November 18, 3:45 to 5:30pm)

  • DH 4: Computational Poetics: Digital Approaches to the Analysis of Rhyme, Meter, and Text Length (Sat, November 19, 8:00 to 9:45am)

  • DH 5: Locating Text and Image in the Digital Humanities (Sat, November 19, 10:00 to 11:45am)

  • DH 6: Digital Humanities in and out of the Classroom (Sat, November 19, 1:45 to 3:30pm)

  • DH 7: Mapping and GIS in the Slavic and Eurasian Humanities (Sun, November 20, 12:00 to 1:45pm) 

Slavic DH THATCamp 

On Thursday morning before the start of the convention our group is hosting a THATCamp (The Humanities and Technology Camp, http://www.thatcamp.org), a half-day informal workshop that will bring together Slavists and other scholars working in all different areas of the digital humanities, as well as those who are curious to learn more about these methodologies. There will be a basic introduction session for those completely new to DH, as well as more advanced breakout sessions in specific areas. 

THATCamp will be held Thursday, November 17, at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel in DC. The session runs from 9am-12pm and will be followed by lunch. Interested participants should register by September 15, 2016 by visiting:  http://aseees2016.thatcamp.org/register/

More information about the Affiliate Group, projects, panels and workshops can be found on our website, www.slavic-dh.org.

Slavic DH Officers (AY2015-2016)

  • Seth Bernstein, Higher School of Economics, Moscow

  • Natalia Ermolaev, Princeton University

  • Philip Gleissner, Princeton University

  • Andrew Janco, University of Connecticut

  • Jessie Labov, Ohio State University

Advisory Board

  • David Birnbaum, University of Pittsburgh

  • Eliot Borenstein, New York University

  • Marijeta Božović, Yale University

  • Quinn Dombrowski, University of California, Berkeley

  • Ann Komaromi, University of Toronto

  • Ilya Kukulin, Higher School of Economics, Moscow

  • Margarita Nafpaktitis, University of California, Los Angeles

  • Joan Neuberger, University of Texas at Austin

  • Kelly O’Neill, Harvard University

  • Ellen Rutten, University of Amsterdam

  • Toma Tasovac, Belgrade Centre for Digital Humanities

  • Dirk Uffelmann, University of Passau

 

Seth Bernstein is a  Research Fellow at The International Centre for the History and Sociology of World War II and Its Consequences NRU Higher School of Economics (Russia); Natalia Ermolaev is the Digital Humanities Project Manager at Princeton U; Philip Gleissner is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures at  Princeton U; Andrew Janco is a University Postdoctoral Fellow in the Human Rights Institute at the University of Connecticut and Jessie Labov is an Associate Professor in the Department of Slavic  and East European Languages and Cultures at Ohio State U.