Introduction to Starting and Sustaining DH Centers

Introduction to Starting and Sustaining DH Centers

Siemens
Lynne

University of Victoria, Canada
siemensl@uvic.ca

2014-12-19T13:50:00Z

Paul Arthur, University of Western Sidney

Locked Bag 1797
Penrith NSW 2751
Australia
Paul Arthur

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Pre-Conference Workshop and Tutorial (Round 2)

DH centres
research centres
collaboration
interdisciplinary

digital humanities - institutional support
project design
organization
management
digital humanities - facilities
interdisciplinary collaboration
English

Digital his growing in scale from a series of projects undertaken by a couple of individuals to institutionally based organizations, with larger budgets and mandates, beyond other factors. How can a group of interested researchers, academic staff, librarians, and other invested stakeholders work together to create such a centre? This half-day workshop will address this question by exploring issues related to scaling operations from the individual to a centre, determining the appropriate organizational model, developing the plan that situates the DH centre in the academic institution’s and other stakeholders’ mandates, communicating to administration to gain support and resources, structuring memorandums of understanding between partners, and other issues. It builds on centerNet’s initiatives to support centre startups with information and tools, which include the DHCenterStartUp listserv and resources page (http://digitalhumanities.org/centernet/resources-for-starting-and-sustaining-dh-centers/
). It also complements community building courses offered at the Digital Humanities Summer Institute (dhsi.org) and at its training network partners.

Workshop Leader

Dr. Lynne Siemens, associate professor, School of Public Administration, University of Victoria and centerNet’s Coordinator for Center Startups.

Lynne Siemens
is an associate professor at the University of Victoria. Her interests include academic entrepreneurship, collaboration, and teamwork with a focus on understanding methods and processes to facilitate collaborative research across distances, disciplines, and organizational boundaries. Beyond publishing in these areas, she has taught workshops in project management at the University of Victoria’s Digital Humanities Summer Institute and the University of Leipzig’s European Summer School for Culture and Technology, and she serves as a management advisor for Implementing New Knowledge Environments (INKE), a Major Collaborative Research Initiative project. Dr. Siemens is also centerNet’s Coordinator for Center Startups and coordinates the DHCenterStartUp listserv and the resources for starting DH centers webpage.

Co-Sponsors
CenterNet is an international network of digital humanities centers. Part of its mandate is to support the development of centers at a variety of institutions by sharing information, resources, and expertise.
Digital Humanities Summer Institute is an environment for discussing and learning about new computing technologies and how they are influencing teaching, research, dissemination, creation, and preservation in different disciplines, via a community-based approach. It also offers courses in project planning, team, centre, and community building.
Contact Information
Lynne Siemens
School of Public Administration
University of Victoria
Victoria, British Columbia, Canada
V8W 2Y2
(250) 721-8069
siemensl@uvic.ca

Target Audience and Expected Number of Participants

The target audience is individuals interested in starting a digital humanities center at their institution. Expected number of participants is 15 to 20. (These numbers are in line with previous offerings of similar workshops/talks.)

Intended Length and Format of Workshop

The workshop will be a half-day with a combination of lecture and discussion. No special technical requirements or equipment is needed.