Teaching TEI to undergraduates: A case study in a digital humanities curriculum

ABSTRACT

This case study describes two iterations of a Digital Humanities (DH) “Studio” course on scholarly text encoding as a model for a DH curriculum at a small liberal arts college. Designed to accompany a three-credit humanities course, the one-credit DH Studios are taught by library faculty. The paired courses share a final project—a digital edition of a short work of literature encoded in the Text Encoding Initiative. The DH Studio creates a methodology-focused environment for students to practice information and digital literacies.     

Against the grain: Reading for the challenges of collaborative digital humanities pedagogy

ABSTRACT

This article provides a critical review of the past five years of literature in digital humanities pedagogy and faculty-librarian collaboration, commingled with reflections on personal practice, which extend findings from the literature. Faculty-librarian partnerships in DH pedagogy reflect a rapidly evolving area of engagement calling for expertise in teaching, subject knowledge, scholarly communication, digital technologies, and DH research methodologies. Although there is a rapidly expanding body of literature on these partnerships, the challenges of the work tend to be minimized. This article expands upon commonly encountered difficulties, and it points to potential solutions and best practices.     

Beyond the one-shot: Intensive workshops as a platform for engaging the library in digital humanities

ABSTRACT

This article explores how librarian participation as instructors in week-long intensive classes—a common workshop format in digital humanities (DH)—can advance a variety of library objectives, while also uniquely supporting the DH community. Intensive workshops fall between the one-shot session and credit course formats more commonly found in library instruction. Drawing on case studies from Geographic Information Systems (GIS) instruction at DH institutes at the University of California Berkeley and Purdue University, the authors explore the origins of librarian involvement, course topics, pedagogy, and library services. Based on their instruction experiences in the DH summer institutes and student surveys, the authors argue that intensive instruction workshops provide a good potential platform for library involvement in DH.     

From service to synergy: Embedding librarians in a digital humanities project

ABSTRACT

Definitions of the term digital humanities vary, and its place in the academic library is still being explored. Yet exploration is indeed taking place, at large research institutions as well as, increasingly, at smaller colleges and undergraduate libraries. This article details an innovative digital humanities project carried out at an institution of 2,300 undergraduates, where a creative institutional partnership was the key to its success. The project has provided an outstanding opportunity to address the ACRL Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education, while embracing the growing trend on many campuses to showcase student research.     

Process and collaboration: Assessing digital humanities work through an embedded lens

ABSTRACT

To assess the implications of supporting and participating in a digital humanities project team as embedded subject librarians, those involved must examine the dynamic of the group responsible for the work and the processes or infrastructure employed to support this work. Using the Critical Incident Technique (CIT) method with interview questions based on the American Historical Association's “Career Diversity Five Skills,” this case study interviews respondents involved in “‘A Shaky Truce’: Starkville Civil Rights Struggles, 1960–1980,” a digital public history project created in 2015 by a team of subject librarians, history graduate students, history faculty, and undergraduates.     

Shifting expectations: Revisiting core concepts of academic librarianship in undergraduate classes with a digital humanities focus

ABSTRACT

This article explores best practices for supporting digital humanities (DH) activity and pedagogy in the undergraduate classroom on campuses without a DH center in the library. By examining specific aspects of librarians' curricular engagements, with a particular focus on reference and instructional activity, we discuss how reenvisioning these services aids in the development of effective support for both faculty and students engaged in DH. An included case study illustrates how redefining “traditional” librarian liaison roles and shifting expectations of faculty from one-shot instruction sessions to embedded librarianship models can be put into practice in undergraduate classrooms with a DH focus. The article concludes with a discussion of the librarian as digital humanist and how this role can positively impact undergraduate curricula.     

Community-Enhanced Repository for Engaged Scholarship: A case study on supporting digital humanities research

ABSTRACT

Building digital curation and sustainability into digital humanities project development is challenging, and engaging digital humanities researchers fully as partners in curation practices with the library is even more so. How can we represent the longevity and sustainability of digital humanities research projects as a shared responsibility between faculty and student researchers and library staff? Northeastern University Libraries Digital Scholarship Group has designed a series of tools and workflows to ease the burden of sustainable development, support community engagement with digital materials, and enable the library and its partners to work together to build sustainable digital projects.     

Interorganizational collaboration and community building for the preservation of state government digital information: Lessons from NDIIPP state partnership initiative

As a part of the National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program (NDIIPP), the Library of Congress (LC), partnering with the Center for Technology in Government (CTG), launched an effort in 2005 to integrate state governmental entities into the national network to preserve born-digital information that is both significant and at risk of loss. The main theme that emerged from the efforts of LC, CTG, and the state and federal digital preservation community was the importance of partnership efforts and collaborative strategies for the preservation of state government digital information. Based on the findings of the initiative, this paper discusses challenges and opportunities regarding interorganizational collaboration and community building for digital preservation of state government information. Following the community of practice framework, it is recommended that a “state government digital information preservation community” be developed to facilitate collaboration across agencies and knowledge professionals in state governments.     

Conversation as a model to build the relationship among libraries,digital humanities,and campus leadership

ABSTRACT

By committing to two conversation-based concepts, David Lankes's Mission for New Librarians and the “Scholarship as Conversation” Information Literacy Frame, Bethel University's Library has established a leadership role in advocating and implementing digital humanities at a midsized liberal arts institution. Aligning the services and strategy of the Bethel University Digital Library (BUDL), Bethel's institutional repository, with the lessons learned and relationships built through these conversations with administration, faculty, and staff has resulted in successful outcomes for the communication and implementation of innovative digital library and digital humanities initiatives.     

GIS and the humanities: Presenting a path to digital scholarship with the Story Map app

ABSTRACT

Working collaboratively, a scholarly resources librarian and a subject liaison librarian at a small, public liberal arts college have created a GIS story mapping workshop for fellow information professionals. Using GIS, the librarians are bridging the gap between humanities and sciences in a liberal arts environment. The librarians' experience of being introduced to GIS and creating training for others enabled them to support their library's data services and digital scholarship initiatives. By helping connect the humanities with science and technology using story maps, librarians can create a neutral environment for learners to conduct interdisciplinary research and develop spatial literacy.     

The Embedded Science Librarian: Partner in Curriculum Design and Delivery

ABSTRACT

Information literacy is essential for success in undergraduate science programs, but teaching faculty are generally ill-prepared or unwilling to provide intentional support in their courses. Librarians are uniquely qualified to help. In this article, the author presents one example of a faculty–librarian collaboration in which the science librarian is embedded in a first-year, undergraduate course in nanoscience, both as a codesigner of the curriculum and a member of the teaching team. She traces her progress from new appointee to faculty partner, and describes the unique, electronic-journal project they designed to promote the development of information and academic literacies.     

Librarians and Undergraduate Thesis Support: An Annotated Bibliography

This article surveys the available literature to explore the assistance librarians can provide to undergraduate thesis writers. The article begins with a discussion of undergraduate thesis requirements, then presents an annotated bibliography of scholarship on librarians'; work with thesis writers, and concludes with issues to consider for librarians planning to provide instruction and support to undergraduate thesis writers.     

Reading in the digital age: A case study in faculty and librarian collaboration

ABSTRACT

This article describes a collaborative partnership of two librarians and an English professor who created a unit for a senior capstone seminar on “The Digital Turn in English Studies.” After reading Charlotte Perkins Gilman's “The Yellow Wallpaper” in both print and digitized versions, students completed a survey on reading preferences and provided feedback on an experimental eTextReader allowing for annotation. Students also did blog postings providing a fuller picture of attitudes toward digital texts. We situate quantitative and qualitative findings in three contexts: the field of digital humanities, reading in the digital age, and tool development.     

Building Community: Partnering with Students and Faculty to Design a Library Exhibition Space

ABSTRACT

An academic library's space has traditionally operated as a repository, but with the proliferation of new media and interactive technologies, libraries now also serve as incubators of ideas. Architecture students at Auburn University recently took part in renovating the design library. With the librarian acting as client, they were asked to investigate diverse materials and design methods to create a dynamic and interactive exhibition wall which would showcase the creation of new knowledge and facilitate the dissemination of new information. This article discusses how the plug-in wall acted as a catalyst for the school's renewed communal investment in the library.     

Information Literacy in Music History: Fostering Success in Teaching and Learning

ABSTRACT

The article describes the collaborative process between the authors in adapting course assignments in undergraduate music history courses to demonstrate actual learning of content and information literacy skills. Although the inclusion of the information literacy standards is an important step in developing critical thinking skills, other factors impede students to perform well such as lack of knowledge on how to structure a research paper or not understanding how to properly cite the information. By monitoring student performance, the faculty and instruction librarian can make changes to improve student learning and the acquisition of critical thinking skills.     

Claiming expertise from betwixt and between: Digital humanities librarians,emotional labor,and genre theory

ABSTRACT

Librarians' liminal (intermediate) position within academia situates us to make unique contributions to digital humanities (DH). In this article, we use genre theory, feminist theory, and theories of emotional labor to explore the importance of discourse mediation and affective labor to DH and the interplay between these areas and academic structural inequality. By claiming our expertise and making explicit work that is often not visible, we can advocate for new and varied roles for librarians in digital humanities. Our analysis is informed by both theory and practice, and it takes a dialogic approach that depends upon the interactions between the two.     

Integration of arts and humanities in medicine to develop well-rounded physicians: the roles of health sciences librarians

Over the past ten years, there has been a growing interest in integrating arts and humanities in medicine to increase learners'' empathy and resilience; improve personal well-being, communication, and observational skills; enhance self-reflection; and promote professionalism. These desired skills and qualities are becoming increasingly important for the physicians of tomorrow. Parallel to curricular interventions of integrating arts and humanities to medical education, there has been an increasing research interest in investigating the impact of such interventions on medical students with respect to improving and sustaining students'' empathy as they progress in their medical education and develop their professional identity. Research has yielded interesting findings on the types and effect of the interventions in the medical curriculum. The Association of the American Medical Colleges (AAMC), recognizing the unique and unrealized role of arts and humanities in preparing and equipping physicians for twenty-first-century challenges, proposed seven recommendations for advancing arts and humanities integration into medical education to improve the education, practice, and well-being of physicians and physician learners across the spectrum of medical education. Institutional initiatives of arts and humanities integration in the medical curriculum in response to the AAMC''s recommendations afford health sciences librarians expansive opportunities and a new landscape of playing an important role in these initiatives. With their diverse educational background in arts, humanities, social sciences, and many other disciplines and fields, health sciences librarians are poised for meaningful contributions to their institutional goals in developing a humanistic, compassionate workforce of future physicians.     

The Literature on Academic Integrity and Graduate Students: Issues,Solutions, and the Case for a Librarian Role

SUMMARY

Graduate and professional school students face a variety of academic integrity issues and are sometimes academically dishonest. The author surveys the literature of the last decade on graduate student academic integrity, including plagiarism, cheating, falsification, and authorship conflicts, focusing on empirical studies in multiple disciplines, studies that portray issues arising in individual disciplines, and solutions suggested. The author proposes that librarians who serve, teach, and consult with graduate students should develop their instructional role in this area. By becoming aware of the chief academic integrity problems and the subject-discipline related concerns, they can better assist graduate students in the context of information literacy and collaborate with faculty on training and other solutions.