Melanie Hubbard April 18, 2014

Melanie HubbardApril 18, 2014

The following presentation concerns the implementation of digital humanities services in Loyola Marymount University’s William H. Hannon Library.

EXPLORE DIGITAL HUMANITIES

“Digital humanities most clearly represents the spirit that animated the ancient foundations at Alexandria, Pergamum, and Memphis, the great monastic libraries of the Middle Ages, and even the first research libraries of the German Enlightenment. It is obsessed with varieties of representation, the organization of knowledge, the technology of communication and dissemination, and the production of useful tools for scholarly inquiry.”


LIBRARIES & DIGITAL HUMANITIES

(Ramsay, 2010)

EXPLORE DIGITAL HUMANITIES | What is DH?


humanitiesscholarship

presentationsynthesis

analysis+computing{researchpedagogy

DIGITAL HUMANITIES IS…

facilitated byacademic departmentdigital humanities center library

{location

singletranscontinentalinternational

{conducted by individual

group{inherently

interdisciplinary &methodological

{

scope{largesmallvarying complexity

DIGITAL HUMANITIES IS…


topic modeling{identifying thematic structures}text mining{analysis of data in natural language}

data visualization{data abstracted into a visual representation}

geographical information systems {captures, alters, manages and displays geographic data}

collaboration{shared projects in digital environments}

presentation{articulating and displaying DH scholarship}

ASPECTS OF DIGITAL HUMANITIES


TimeMapper

TOOL EXAMPLE: GIS


TOOL EXAMPLE: TEXTUAL ANALYSIS

Voyant


PROJECT EXAMPLE: TEXTUAL ANALYSIS

(Fry, 2009)benfry.com/traces


managing and curating digital assets

preserving digital assets and resources

creating digital project best practices

using and promoting the use of social media

performing digital resource instruction

teaching use and evaluation of digital resources

promoting access to and use of primary sources

incorporating and teaching emerging technologies

focusing on usability, findability and searchability

disseminating digital scholarly content

THE DH/LIBRARY INTERSECTIONdesigning digital resources

analyzing and visualizing data

digital preservation

digitizing media

planning digital projects

developing and managing websites

designing metadata schemas

encoding metadata

working with rights management

classifying and organizing data

EXPLORE DIGITAL HUMANITIES | Why Libraries?

(Galina Russell, 2011 ) (Shower, 2012) (Vandegrift, 2012)

EXPLORE DIGITAL HUMANITIES | DH Landscape


A FEW BASIC OBSERVATIONS

approximately 35 DH academic programs in the US and numerous DH courses peppered throughout curricula

discussion concerning the digital humanities landscape often focuses on DH centers

DH is most often associated with larger universities and research libraries

liberal arts colleges with DH centers include Hamilton College, Occidental College and Whittier College

digital humanities centers {supports various DH needs on a larger scale, i.e. programing and TEI encoding; may or may not be linked with libraries}

suite of services {a predetermined set of services}

ad hoc {services that come about as needed}


FRAMEWORK OF SERVICES

Misgivings: liberal arts colleges have less funding, less support and less infrastructure

Advantages:shallower administrative hierarchies, less institutional inertia, innovate relatively rapidly and at lower cost

more collegiality across disciplines and divisions, and between faculty and staff members, easier to build coalitions and to organize project teams

plays a greater pedagogical role by engaging students in interdisciplinary studies and active and collaborative learning


(Alexander & Frost Davis, 2012) (Pannapacker, 2013)

DH IN LIBERAL ARTS UNIVERSITIES AND COLLEGES

EXPLORE DIGITAL HUMANITIES | DH Services @ LMU

EXPLORE DIGITAL HUMANITIES | DH Services

DH facilitation in the library would offer “distinctive services that enable[s] learners to feed their curiosity” through unique digital means, “develop their ideas” through the use of digital analysis and presentation tools, and, through the presence of various DH online projects, “inspire others” on the LMU campus and beyond.

Providing DH services and facilitating DH endeavors would “[foster] intellectual and cultural collaborations throughout LMU and the broader scholarly community, and among library peers.”

Learning DH skills contributes to a student’s ability to “identify, locate, evaluate, and effectively and responsibly use and share information,” thus DH contributes to the Hannon Library’s efforts to “increase students’ information literacy proficiencies.”

RELATIONSHIP TO THE HANNON LIBRARY’S 2013-2020 STRATEGIC PLAN


Facilitating and participating in digital humanities practices is a form of stewardship of “digital collections in support of academic excellence.”

Moreover, because digitized Archives and Special Collection materials will no doubt be incorporated in LMU DH projects, DH services will “increase access to archival and other local collections through digitization and metadata.”

Supporting DH endeavors within and outside of the Hannon Library “promote[s] the research and creative output of LMU students and faculty in innovative, creative ways.”

Finally, as a result of the library’s participation in digital humanities practices, “the library will act as a cultural and intellectual hub that [will connect] LMU with communities off campus.”

RELATIONSHIP TO THE HANNON LIBRARY’S 2013-2020 STRATEGIC PLAN (con’t)


assisting faculty with the DH pedagogical needs, i.e. design of DH course elements

providing digital humanities reference consultations

digital humanities collection development

DH classroom instruction, i.e. teaching out of the box tools, i.e. Timemapper, Voyager, MALLET, Wordpress

maintaining of DH tools/software on library computers

student & faculty DH project consultation, i.e. data management, tool recommendations, best practices, metadata schema design

building and maintaining Explore DH website, including the creation of DH tool tutorials

SERVICES TO BE OFFERED

Explore Digital Humanities website



SERVICES SCALABILITY

(Vinopal & McCormick, 2013)


LIBRARY: Expressed interest on the part of librarians and staff members

FACULTY: Dermot Ryan (English), Kirstin Noreen (Art History), Jane Brucker (Fine Arts), Molly Youngkin (English), Stephen Shepherd (English), Courtney Spikes (History), Annemarie Pérez (Chicano Studies)

USER NEEDS ASSESSMENT

EXPLORE DIGITAL HUMANITIES | DH Assessment

To support faculty digital humanities needs be it for teaching or for their own scholarship

To support students in their digital humanities scholarship

To facilitate innovative and creative forms of scholarship

To create a stronger partnership between the various humanities departments and the library

To elevate the library’s own digital scholarship, i.e. an increased awareness of the digital library and the scholarship put toward the digital library

GOALS OF THE SERVICE


Faculty who incorporate DH in their teaching will see the library as a resource for their DH pedagogical needs.

Faculty will consistently use the library for the DH aspects of their scholarship.

Students will be able to demonstrate DH skills and knowledge in their humanities studies.

Students will know how to use the library to gain DH skills and for accessing DH tools.

The library’s offering of DH services will elevate its own digital presence, i.e. digital library collections.

OUTCOMES OF THE SERVICE


Faculty: pedagogy, individual projects and information resources, as models for their own digital humanities projects

Undergraduate & Graduate Students: class projects, information resources, existing projects as models for their own DH work

Outside Researchers: information resources, to learn about scholarship at LMU, existing projects as models for their own DH work

PRIMARY SERVICE USERS


Digital Humanities Librarian:

primary responsibility is DH services, facilitation and operations

has a strong grasp of trends both in the humanities and digital humanities, significant experience in humanities research and has an aptitude for technology

will provide instruction, reference and some technical support to DH scholars

PRIMARY SERVICE PROVIDERS


Reference Librarians: may lead library instruction concerning the use of certain DH related tools

Archives and Special Collections Librarians: A&SC librarians may teach the history of the book classes, provide reference assistance to DH scholars, and supply scans of primary source materials

Digital Librarian: provide expertise concerning the management of digital assets

Metadata Librarian: will assist in the creation of metadata best practices and metadata schemas

Information Technology Services: may be called upon for technical assistance support and to assist in the implementation of new technologies

PRIMARY SERVICE PROVIDERS (con’t)


Internal Stakeholders: librarians, library staff, and library embedded ITS personnel

External Stakeholders: faculty, undergraduate and graduate students, University Staff, in particular ITS department as a whole and the Web, New Media and Design department, outside of LMU researchers, and the digital humanities community

KEY STAKEHOLDERS


STRENGTHS: state-of-the-art instruction roomsarchives and special collections materials established digital library program numerous digitized objects in the digital librarya new strategic plan with goals and objectives that align with DHa core group of library oriented faculty members a university community that encourages interdisciplinary and

interdepartmental partnerships

WEAKNESSES: no single library staff member to lead this effortcompete with other library instruction time

SWOT ANALYSIS


OPPORTUNITIES: librarians learn new skills library and academic department collaborationsfoster interdisciplinary relationships on campus present LMU scholarship to a global community new ways to encourage and teach information literacy

THREATS: lack of interest on the part of facultyinability to sustain infrastructure proves to be inadequate cannot institute quickly enough to keep interest

SWOT ANALYSIS

EXPLORE DIGITAL HUMANITIES | DH Marketing


MICAH VANDEGRIFT AND STEWART VARNER: “By understanding the kinds of work scholars on your campus are doing and being familiar with the work being done at the cutting edge of digital humanities you will be well positioned to make your library an integral part of the intellectual lives of your users.” (2013)

THEY SUGGEST:do not wait for their users to come to themget out in the communityattend events put on by the departments with whom the library will conduct or potentially conduct DH projectsspeak to faculty in person and join department listservs (2013)

RECOMMENDATIONS FROM THE DH FIELD


LMU.edu website: announcements on the LMU homepage

internal listserv: DH listserv for LMU faculty and students

external listserv: communicate with external listsers about LMU DH activities, i.e. DH+Lib listserv

demonstrations: demonstrations of current DH related tools, concepts and resources

workshops: host workshops that instruct faculty on how to use DH related tools

library subject liaison outreach: relay DH related information to subject liaisons respective humanities departments

posters: posters with Quick Response Code that links to the Explore Digital Humanities website will be displayed around campus

MARKETING METHODS

poster


library website


social media


bookmarks


buttons



JENNIFER VINOPAL AND MONICA MCCORMICK:

“[determine] success criteria, [evaluate] client satisfaction, identifying

what did and did not work, [calculate] staff hours spent on development

and support activities, [estimate] costs and possible efficiencies, and

[consider] next steps.” (2013)

RECOMMENDATIONS FROM THE DH FIELD


ADDITIONAL RECOMMENDATION

APPLY THE ASSOCIATION OF AMERICAN COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES’ INFORMATION LITERACY VALUE RUBRIC WHICH:

gauges a students ability to determine the information needed,

analyze that information and use that information effectively and

ethically.


IMPACT RUBRIC

EXPLORE DIGITAL HUMANITIES | Here and Now?


Offering digital humanities services will not make Loyola Marymount University a major DH institution. It will, however, put LMU on a long overdue academic and intellectual path.

There are many ways to do DH. It is up to every institution to develop their own DH approach and to define their own DH brand (Alexander & Frost Davis, 2012).

Faculty and librarians alike already conduct scholarship and research that falls within (or nearly falls within) the realm of digital humanities.

Digital humanities studies and scholarship provide another career path for humanities students both in and outside of academia.

THINGS TO KEEP IN MIND

Digital humanities is here to stay.

Libraries are leaders in the digital humanities field.

The William H. Hannon library strives to foster cultural and intellectual university endeavors.

The library is the most capable and qualified to lead, advance and sustain LMU’s digital humanities mission.

Because it is entirely possible.


WHY DIGITAL HUMANITIES @THE WILLIAM H. HANNON LIBRARY?


Alexander, B. & Frost Davis, R. (2013). Should liberal arts campuses do digital humanities? Process and products in the small college world. In Debates in the Digital Humanities.

Association of American Colleges and Universities. (n.d.). Information literacy VALUE rubric.

Frost Davis, R. (2012, August 16). Digital humanities and liberal education. National Institute for Technology in Liberal Education. Retrieved from http://blogs.nitle.org/2011/03/02/digital-humanities-and-liberal- educationFry, B. (2009). On the origin of species: the preservation of favoured traces. Retrieved April 16, 2014,

from http://benfry.com/tracesGalina Russell, I. (2011). The role of libraries in digital humanities. IFLA. Retrieved from http://conference. ifla.org/ifla77Pannapacker, W. (2013, February 18). Advice. The Chronicle of Higher Education. Retrieved from http://

chronicle.com/article/Stop-Calling-It-Digital/137325Ramsay, S. (2010, October 8). Care four the soul [Web log post]. Retrieved from http://stephenramsay.us/ text/2010/10/08/care-of-the-soul Showers, B. (2012, February 13). Does the library have a role to play in the digital humanities? JISC.

Retrieved from http://infteam.jiscinvolve.org/wp/2012 /02/23/ does-the-library-have-a- role-to-play- in-the-digital-humanitiesVandegrift, M. & Varner, S. (2013). Evolving in common: Creating mutually supportive relationships

between libraries and the digital humanities. Journal of Library Administration, 53(1), 67-78. doi: 10.1080/01930826.2013.756699Vinopal, J. & McCormick, M. (2013). Supporting digital scholarship in research libraries: Scalability and

sustainability. Journal of Library Administration, 53(1), 27-42. doi: 10.1080/01930826.2013.756689

REFERENCES

Melanie Hubbard April 18, 2014

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