Conference Agenda

Session format: Presentations and discussion in person (not hybrid or online)

Audience: The intended audience of this workshop are course instructors and programme managers for Digital Humanities and Social Sciences (DHSS) and Digital Humanities and Cultural Heritage (DHCH) programs; researchers working on DHSS/DHCH education; professionals interested in DHSS/DHCH program, courses, or modules.

Number of Participants: About 30 participants are expected to attend.

Technical requirements: Projector and computer

Description

In Nordic, Baltic, and other regions, many universities have developed and are maintaining programs in Digital Humanities and Social Sciences (DHSS/DHCH). The University of Gothenburg launched a Master in Digital Humanities in autumn 2017, followed by Uppsala University in 2019 and Linnaeus University in 2020. In Croatia, the BALADRIA summer school in Digital Humanities was first given in 2019, while the University of Helsinki has been offering a module in Digital Humanities for several years and is starting a master programme together with social sciences. Many more universities have come to offer courses in digital methods as a part of new or existing programs; other times DHSS/DHCH-related topics and perspectives are included as a part of established courses. This has led to a variety of approaches, areas of concentrations, and teaching material in DHSS/DHCH education. It has also led to instructors and administrators to encounter numerous challenges, whether pedagogical or infrastructural. As such, drawing on the now robust DHSS/DHCH educational community is imperative for learning from one another’s experiences and leveraging the scale of our endeavours to realize new learning opportunities for ourselves and our students.

This workshop will provide an opportunity for DHSS and DHCH educators to share their experiences; discuss existing programs, modules, courses, research, training, and development activities; reviews evaluation approaches; and reflect on lessons learned. The workshop will also engage in discussions on common areas of interest, in order to set the groundwork for concrete collaborative implementations (such as student exchanges or regular DHSS/DHCH pedagogy seminars). The primary audiences of this workshop are course instructors and programme managers in DHSS/DHCH programs as well as researchers working on education in this field.

The workshop focuses on higher education in DHSS/DHCH, aiming at pedagogical development and infrastructure building. With respect to the first goal – pedagogical development – the workshop participants share their DHSS teaching experiences, including discussions of strategies, tools, platforms, evaluations, outcomes, and problems. These participants will be recruited through an Open Call, with accepted applicants presenting their experiences in Session 3 (see Workshop Structure). The Open Call will be managed by the workshop organizers.

With respect to the workshop’s second goal – infrastructure building – the workshop will explore a series of initiatives intended to enable collaborative education among fellow universities with DHSS/DHCH programmes/courses/modules within DHNB and DARIAH-EU.

This workshop will allow voices from established and recent DHSS/DHCH programmes to learn from one another on issues related to education and discover opportunities for richer and more sustainable pedagogy within the field. In keeping with the spirit of DHNB, the workshop encourages participation by teachers, researchers, and developers bringing different perspectives, with the goal of translating their insights into actionable plans. The long-term goal of this is capacity building for collaboration among DHSS/DHCH programmes for more interdisciplinary and international learning in the field of DHSS/DHCH in the Nordic and Baltic regions, and beyond.

Workshop Structure

• Session 1: Welcome and introductions (15 min)

• Session 2: Presentation and discussion of submitted papers from Open Call (180 min)

• Session 3: Directed discussion emerging from the main session (45 min duration)

Call for proposals

Candidates are invited to submit their proposal for a 10-minute presentation. The presentations will be held in the workshop’s open period segment. The presentation should address a specific topic related to the workshop’s theme.

Proposals should be 300 words in length and are to be submitted to dh.edu.ws@lnu.se by 15 April 2024. Proposals will be reviewed by the workshop organizers. Presenters will be notified of acceptance the following week.

Workshop themes

• Collaborations/exchanges in digital humanities (DH) instruction

• Project-based/problem-based DH education

• Interdisciplinary/cross-disciplinary/cross-sectoral/international cooperation in DH education

• Existing programs, modules or individual courses in DH (e.g., design, target student groups, content, job market, evaluation, experiences, lessons-learned)

• Currently developed programs, modules or individual courses in DH (e.g., design choices, target student groups, resource management, related issues)

• Capacity building for student employability