Ethan Watrall (Associate Director of Matrix: Center for Digital Humanities and Social Sciences, Michigan State University) recently gave a talk at the HumLab at Umeå University in Sweden, in which he discusses MSU’s Cultural Heritage Informatics Initiative.
In “Methods and Models for Building Capacity in Digital Cultural Heritage,” Watrall differentiates the term “cultural heritage informatics” from “digital humanities,” and introduces both the fellowship program, which works with graduate students to build digital projects and skills, and the CHI Fieldschool, a 5-week summer program open to professionals working in cultural heritage. Watrall notes:
As with many other domains, cultural heritage is entering a new age in which information, computing, and communication technology is having an unavoidable impact on research, teaching, outreaching, and all aspects of scholarly communication. Increasingly, cultural heritage scholars and professionals who have not traditionally characterized themselves as being particularly digitally inclined are being asked to engage with issues, methods, models, and practices that are uniquely digital in nature. Unfortunately, while the need for innovative digital praxis exists, we are only starting to establish methods and models to build vital digital capacity among undergraduates, graduate students, and existing professionals and scholars.
Video of the talk is now available online (flash or HTML5).
