Category: dh+lib review

Conveners of the Sixth Annual Conference on Digital Humanities and Digital History, have released their call for proposals. The Conference, to take place in March 2024, will be held at the Luxembourg Centre for Contemporary and Digital History (C2DH) with hybrid options, and is organized in collaboration with the German Historical Institute Washington (GHI), the Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media (RRCHNM), and the German Institute for Japanese Studies (DIJ) Tokyo. From the call:

Epistemic virtues refer to the skills and attitudes that certain discourse communities consider exemplary, if not obligatory, for the production, transmission, or acquisition of knowledge in a specific field. In the normative tradition of philosophy of science, epistemic values and virtues refer to ideal-typical definitions of what makes “good science” and how scientific evidence and arguments can be legitimated. Epistemic values such as “objectivity,” “truthfulness,” “impartiality,” “reproducibility,” or “accuracy” have been central to the invention of modern science. In addition to this normative tradition, sociologists and anthropologists of knowledge have emphasized the phenomenological dimension of doing science. To them, epistemic norms or values are internalized by scientists through the learning and perfection of scientific practices. Knowledge production in this sense is always situational, embedded in its own historicity and spatial rootedness. These practices make and define the “scientific self” of different epistemic communities.

Digital knowledge practices in the field of humanities are currently characterized by a hybridity between analog epistemic traditions and new digital “interferences,” mingling qualitative and quantitative approaches, “close” and “distant” reading of sources as data. This type of research is characterized by a workflow that seems more experimental, uncertain, and collaborative than in the past. Where different disciplinary cultures or communities of practice meet, knowledge production is characterized by the crucial role of go-betweens, by partially diverging interests, and often by unchecked power differentials. We hold that it is especially in these situations of creative uncertainty that epistemic virtues can provide orientation. These virtues mold the scientific self and are labeled “epistemic” because of their perceived relevance to the pursuit of hermeneutics, helping to connect past and present knowledge practices. Based on the hypothesis that “the digital” has produced new epistemic values and virtues to characterize the production, dissemination, and access to knowledge worldwide – such as “sharing,” “collaboration,” “participation,” “transparency,” “openness,” “sustainability,” “traceability,” or “FAIRness” (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable) – this conference aims at:

1. describing and analyzing concrete manifestations of such new values or virtues in digital humanities / history research or teaching practices;
2. promoting critical reflection on the importance and role of such norms, values, and virtues in our contemporary political economy of digital knowledge production;
3. arguing for an ethical consideration of DH infrastructures, tools, data, and publication platforms by exploring the concepts of epistemic inequalities and injustice.

In the past years, several scholars have criticized the DH community for overdoing the rhetoric of newness and overstating the revolutionary potential of digital technologies for the production, dissemination and appropriation of information or knowledge. Scholars like Amanda Fricker, Monica Berger, Walter D. Mignolo, Michael Gordin, or Alan Liu have instead highlighted the epistemic inequalities inscribed into large digital knowledge infrastructures, questioned the universalist assumptions underpinning the epistemic spaces of knowledge productions in the Western world. They have criticized the “Scientific Babel” of English language dominance and problematized the focus on predatory publishing and the platform capitalism of open access publishing. These critiques underscore the perpetuation of epistemic colonialism through index- and citation-regimes that systematically disfavor the discoverability, visibility, and therefore recognition of scholarship from the Global South.

The conference thus aims at going beyond the philosophical discussion of the hermeneutic dimension of epistemic values and virtues by enlarging the scope to the political and ethical dimensions of knowledge production, dissemination, and critical appropriation in the digital knowledge economy.

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Possible conference topics include (but are by no means limited to):

• Best practices of “applications” (or making explicit) of epistemic values / virtues in DH research and / or inscription of such values into the design of digital tools & infrastructures;
• Data colonialism, the digital divide between “northern uploaders” and “southern downloaders,” and emerging power asymmetries inside the Global South;
• Linguistic exclusions (linguistic prejudices of search algorithms, dominance of English language in ranking & citation indexes; colonized ontologies, etc.);
• Critical infrastructures as socio-technical systems and “infrastructural inequalities” in terms of access, ownership, and sustainability;
• Situated knowledge practices in DH in the Global South and indigenous “epistemic spaces” of knowledge production and sharing;
• Hybridity and messiness of data and knowledge practices and their impact on transparency, traceability, and accountability of research outputs;
• Political economy of the Web / Internet as place of “digital sovereignty” and impact of platform capitalism on research topics and practices;
• Questions of inequality and gender equity in digital labor and the growing impact of AI on job market and labor profiles;
• New forms and formats of collaborative practices and interactional expertise in digital history & humanities reflecting ideas of “shared authority” and collective authorship;
• Changes or adjustments regarding cultures of academic reputation and career paths in the (Digital) Humanities.

Proposals are due December 1, 2023.

The Journal of Electronic Publishing invites proposals for their special issue, “On Gathering: Exploring Collective and Embodied Modes of Scholarly Communication and Publishing.” From the call:

When we think of scholarly communication, we’re usually thinking of something that can be shared independent of its creator(s). A book, a journal article, multimodal work, conference proceedings—the formal and disembodied aftereffects of a long process of thought, conversation, writing, and editing. Much harder to trace are the ephemeral steps that precede that formal work. And yet, those in-between steps are vital to the research process—so how can we make them more apparent in formal and informal publishing as well? Changes in scholarly communication have shifted the boundaries of where and how we share our work, and through which intermediaries. Still, even in more fluid forms of gray literature and digital publishing, which blurs some of the lines between polished work and work-in-progress, we typically think in terms of artifacts.

And yet, so much of our actual thinking takes place in spaces of indeterminacy and interpersonal connection. These momentary and provisional collectives—what Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing describes as “patchy assemblages”—spark new modes of working, thinking, and being together in higher education as well as sharing the outputs of such collaboration. What emerges from connection, engagement, amplification, thinking-together across disciplinary spaces and ways of knowing? How do we make manifest the relationship-oriented, process-oriented modes of working that shape scholarly thought? And, conversely, how are our thoughts and ideas circumscribed by the institutional, hierarchical, and publishing structures we have inherited, as well as the tools and technologies we work with?

Just as mushrooms spring up from the rot of the forest floor and return nutrients to depleted soil, perhaps something new might emerge in scholarly communication from the decomposing remnants of what came before. Drawing on this metaphor of the ecological functions of fungi, we encourage contributions that consider matters of interdependence, coalition building, and collective thriving in and beyond the university, even in less-than-pristine conditions.

For this special issue, we invite contributions that explore these questions, and that offer ideas for how we might continue to reimagine how we share research. How do we together create the conditions for this flourishing? How do we collectively foster the quiet attunement that predicates urgent action? Following Natalie Loveless and Carrie Smith, how might an attention to tempo—slowing down and observing at times, working with urgency at others—be a purposeful act of resistance? We invite submissions that imagine what the communication of scholarship might look like if organized around the collective flourishing of those who work, learn, and teach within its bounds. Experimentation with form or substance is welcome.

This special issue grows from the Inkcap Collective, an informal gathering of practitioners in and around higher education who share a frustration with the status quo and a hope that things can be better. We value curiosity and care, equity and mutual sustainability, messiness and beauty. The group is a space of abundance and overflow, where desires exceed institutional parameters. It is predicated on critical hope: a hope that does not overlook the challenges of our current social, economic, and environmental conditions. We believe that educational institutions can support research, exploration, teaching, and human development without falling into lockstep with market forces. Rather, higher education can be a space that resists these forces, that instead upholds values of curiosity, delight, and shared human flourishing.

For instance:

• Case studies of successful collaborations, gatherings, and process work in this area
• Evocative conceptual pieces that illustrate the themes of the CFP
• Speculative imaginings of multi-agential or plural scholarly communication futures
• Ideas for, or examples of, mutually beneficial partnerships that extend beyond the university and serve scholarly communication reform
• Pieces that extend and deepen the ecological metaphors presented here, in relation to scholarly communication and / or digital publishing collabs
• Materials that show process over product
• Analyses that illuminate the material and intellectual boundary work around scholarly communication
• Other topics welcome! Please contact the special issue editor, Katina Rogers, if you’d like to discuss other ideas prior to submitting [katina@katinarogers.com]

Proposal abstracts are due by December 15, 2023.

The Alliance of Digital Humanities Organizations (ADHO) has posted a call for proposals for Digital Humanities 2024: “Reinvention and Responsibility.” The DH2024 conference will be held August 6-9, 2024, at George Mason University in Arlington, Virginia, USA. From the call:

Reinvention is a call to act with creativity, compassion, and intentionality to better meet the needs of our communities, while responsibility asks us to address those inequities and injustices that the global pandemic has recast in increasingly sharp relief.

Recent years have forced us to reinvent ourselves as colleagues, collaborators, and educators in ways that have had both positive and negative impacts. We have learned how to rapidly move our work online, cope with the unexpected, and use tools in ways intended and not intended. While some of the lessons learned have been immediate, some of what we have experienced will take time to process. The theme of reinvention and responsibility encourages us to reflect on these experiences, acknowledge our responsibilities towards our Digital Humanities (DH) communities, and—with those reflections—take steps.

The CFP invites proposals that align with this theme, addressing topics such as:

• reinventing approaches to learning and accessibility
• ways to address global inequities in access to technology
• disaster recovery and lessons in DH sustainability
• responsible resource management and collaboration in DH
• the pandemic’s impact on DH labor
• DH training, learning, and mentoring in times of academic precarity

DH2024 will be a hybrid conference; attendees can fully participate online or in-person. Participation formats include posters, papers (short and long), panel sessions, workshops, and mini-conferences – which are defined as day-long gatherings that do not fit the workshop format (examples: a mini-conference could be a THATCamp, hackathon, maker fair, or a series of events at a local venue).

Submissions are due December 5, 2023, and can be made via https://www.conftool.pro/dh2024/.