cfp.english.upenn.edu

MLA Workshop: Get Started in Digital Humanities with Help from DHCommons
Thursday, 3 January 2013, 8:30am-12:30pm

At the 2012 MLA, conference attendees packed many sessions on the digital humanities (DH), reflecting the growing interest in this domain. Yet many newcomers to digital humanities lack opportunities to connect with the DH community, get help from experienced practitioners with conceptualizing and launching a project, or begin building the skills they need to realize their projects. This four-hour preconvention workshop welcomes language and literature scholars who wish to learn about, start, or join digital scholarly projects for research and/or teaching.

Representatives of major digital humanities projects and initiatives will share their expertise on project design, outline available resources and opportunities,and lead small-group training sessions on DH technologies and skills. Experts will come from projects such as 18th Connect, Hypercities, Neatline, NINES, Scalar, TAPoR, and the Women Writers Project, as well as theAssociation for Computers and the Humanities and the NEH's Office of Digital Humanities. You can learn more about our experts at http://dhcommons.org/mla2013-experts. Workshop participants will leave with a plan for getting started in the digital humanities and a resource for connecting to scholars and projects in their disciplines.

To that end, this four-hour preconvention workshop welcomes scholars who wish to pursue or join digital scholarly projects but do not have institutional infrastructure to support them. The workshop will build on the model developed for and tested at the 2012 MLA Convention in Seattle. DHCommons (http://www.dhcommons.org), which was launched at that event, connects innovative scholars with mentors and opportunities for collaboration, and increases the community of participants for established projects and centers.

When and where: This workshop will be held 8:30am-12:30pm on the first day of the MLA Convention (Thursday, January 3rd, 2013). It will be hosted at Northeastern University (www.northeastern.edu), blocks from the convention center.

Sponsors: The workshop is co-sponsored by centerNet, the Northeastern University Centers for Digital Humanities and Computational Social Science, and the National Institute for Technology in Liberal Education (NITLE)

Organizers: Ronald R. Bernier (Wentworth Institute of Technology), Ryan Cordell (Northeastern University), Rebecca Frost Davis (NITLE), Christopher Dickman (St. Louis University), Quinn Dombrowski (UC Berkeley), Laura Mandell (Texas A&M University), Paul Schacht (SUNY Geneseo), Lisa Spiro (NITLE)

Application Process
Scholars will apply in advance for the 2013 workshop using the form at http://dhcommons.org/mla2013. Applications should either 1.) outline a digital project the scholar would like to undertake or 2.) suggest the type of project on which he or she would be interested in collaborating. The workshop aims to help new digital humanists find exciting work; thus applications will not require scholars to have a fully-developed project idea. The DHCommons Board—with the help of NITLE and centerNet—will select up to 50 scholars from the pool of applicants.

Application and Deadlines
Review of applications will begin on October 1, 2012. The review board will consider applications and accept participants on a rolling basis until the workshop is full. Those whose applications were received by October 1 will be notified by October 16, 2012.