UPDATE March 17, 2020: We are postponing the remainder of this semester’s Digital Research Commons activities until further notice. This applies to all scheduled events as well as DRC open hours. We will continue to monitor COVID19 developments and adjust our service and program offerings accordingly.

University of Houston Libraries Digital Research Commons will host several events during the spring 2020 semester, including a workshop on digital project management, scholarly publishing clinics, and a text mining series.

Text Mining Lecture I: Algorithmic Thinking: How to do Literary Theory with Statistics
Tuesday, March 17, 12:00 – 1:30 p.m.
Dr. Claude Willan, University Libraries

The recent, extended contretemps that began with Nan Da’s article in Critical Inquiry and spilled over onto social media and a panoply of journals drew combatants from opposite sides of worrisome trends in the literary academy. Among the more alarming was how scanty a vocabulary the scholars arguing with one another about the validity of what Da termed “computational literary studies” held in common. In this talk, I offer one such common vocabulary.

At their best, both groups laid (or lay) claim to a preoccupation with how to apprehend aesthetic qualities of a text under the aegis of a more or less attenuated formalism. I connect the priorities of literary digital humanists to those of their skeptics by considering operations like topic modeling as heuristic devices with an uncanny resemblance to literary-theoretical schemas of the early- and mid- 20th century, using Tristram Shandy as a workbench and test bed.

All are welcome to this talk, which is intended for seasoned digital humanists and newcomers to the field alike, as well as anyone interested in text mining, digital humanities, literary theory, and eighteenth-century literature.

Scholarly Publishing Clinics
Fridays beginning March 20 through May 8, 12:00 – 1:30 p.m.
Taylor Davis-Van Atta, University Libraries

Have questions about the scholarly publishing process? Bring them to the Digital Research Commons for a friendly consultation. Topics might include but are not limited to:

• The rights you have over your journal articles, book chapters, and monographs, and strategies for retaining those rights
• Making your publications available open access – the free, legal, and safe way
• Use of your previously published materials in your thesis or dissertation
• Understanding an agreement with your publisher and how to negotiate to obtain the desired rights for publications

Digital Project Management Workshop: How to Keep Your Head above Water during a Digital Project
Monday, March 23, 2:30 – 4:00 p.m.
Dr. Kristina Neumann, CLASS and Dr. Peggy Lindner, College of Technology

We will discuss how to build and manage an evolving project and team, as well as keep communication open between the humanities and STEM. Attendees should be prepared to brainstorm with others through several guided exercises.

Text Mining Workshop I
Tuesday, March 24, 12:00 – 1:30 p.m.
Dr. Claude Willan

An introductory level workshop to text mining. Attendees are encouraged to bring their own laptops.

Text Mining Workshop II
Tuesday, March 31, 12:00 – 1:30 p.m.
Dr. Claude Willan

An intermediate level workshop to text mining. Attendees are encouraged to bring their own laptops.

Text Mining Lecture II: Data Acquisition and Analysis in the Study of Digital News in Africa
Thursday, April 2, 12:00 – 1:30 p.m.
Dr. Dani Madrid-Morales, CLASS

Digital media, from blogs to newspaper websites, are fast becoming the preferred source of news in most African countries. However, very few resources are available to systematically collect and analyze content from these news sources on the continent. This session will discuss some of the epistemological issues associated with the lack of full-text databases that include African digital media, and introduce an alternative workflow that uses open source resources to acquire and analyze online news text data.

Text Mining Colloquium
Thursday, April 9, 12:00 – 1:30 p.m.
Dr. Claude Willan

The cluster of text mining events concludes with a colloquium. Four to six presenters will talk briefly about their work before a general and informal conversation brings presenters together with a moderator and audience members. If you have a text-mining project underway, then we would like to hear from you. Ideally, we are looking for 7-8 minute presentations on works-in-progress that you are eager to share and talk about. Please send a brief description (no more than 150 words) to Dr. Claude Willan by March 29th.