THATCamp New England, MCN NE SIG: Museum Computer Network Northeast Special Interest Group, NERDS: Northeast Regional Digital Scholarship Group, and NERCOMP: The Northeast Regional Computing Program. In one way or another (unconference, forum, peer group, or program), these groups serve the northeastern regional community engaged in digital scholarship, technologies, humanities, projects, and practices in an effort to better facilitate pedagogy, academic research, and curation.
I propose an informal session to discuss how these groups might better interact/learn from each other and, by so doing; strengthen the northeastern regional digital scholarship community. A community relatively small in geographic terms, but very strong in resources and activity. Let’s make the Northeast more of a hub of digital scholarship than it already is!
5 comments
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Lincoln Mullen
October 18, 2011 at 11:43 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment
I’m in!
Shane Landrum
October 18, 2011 at 12:48 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment
I do agree that there needs to be more ongoing regional connection in New England. Regrettably, I’m not going to be able to attend THATCamp New England because of the American Studies Association’s conference in Baltimore this weekend, so I’ll add my 2 cents here.
In 8 years of Ph.D. school in New England, all three of the standing organizations mentioned here have been completely opaque to me. I’m not a museum professional, so MCN NE SIG hasn’t been something I’ve looked into; I know NERCOMP exists, but not much more than that; and all the material I can find about NERDS is behind the Facebook wall.
I’m guessing that part of what’s going on here is that the line between staff and grad-students/faculty is very solid in New England, alt-ac notwithstanding. None of my faculty mentors has ever suggested to me that I might want to know more about any of these groups. Is that a problem? I’m not sure, but I suspect that more outreach from those organizations to humanities grad students might be in order.
I’d happily volunteer Digital Humanities in Boston and Beyond blog as a venue for some of this organizing if that would help; I’ve recently put out a call for editors and would love to hear from people who attend this session.
Robin Wheelwright Ness
October 18, 2011 at 1:23 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment
Thank you, Shane, for your comments and link to your blog. I’ve attended two Museum Computer Network conferences and the inaugural MCN NE SIG meeting, which was held at the MFA in Boston this past July. Although, museums play the strongest role, the MCN conference/SIG programming is also geared to those working in libraries and archives. NERDS is a regional initiative currently underway. The steering committee meet at Yale in the spring, but we are still in the organizational stages.
I agree that humanities grad student outreach is something that all of the groups should consider. A fellow brown public humanities grad student is attending on Saturday, and I will ask for her feedback on this topic.
Patsy Baudoin
October 18, 2011 at 9:33 pm (UTC -5) Link to this comment
I’m in, too.
Courtney
October 19, 2011 at 10:26 am (UTC -5) Link to this comment
Me too!