Introducing "Sustaining DH"

Approximately a year following the conclusion of our first NEH Research and Development Grant, the Visual Media Workshop team (with Dr. Alison Langmead at the helm) is embarking on its second NEH-funded project.

As some of you may recall, the first grant was dedicated to running an extensive case study of Images of Medieval Art and Architecture (http://www.medart.pitt.edu/), an early manifestation of a digital humanities project. The grant culminated in the creation of a website entitled The Socio-Technical Sustainability Roadmap (STSR) (www.sustainingdh.net), a resource for project managers interested in assessing the status and potential sustainability solutions for their digital projects. 

With the second NEH grant, we (Dr. Langmead, Chelsea Gunn, and Aisling Quigley) will take the STSR "on the road," running facilitated workshops at carefully-selected universities across the United States (Georgia, Pennsylvania, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, and Utah). These two-day workshops will incorporate three major sections: 

  1. A Project Survey (considering the scope, longevity, and sustainability priorities of the project at hand)
  2. An assessment of Staffing and Technologies (considering the socio-technical infrastructure of the project)
  3. An exploration of potential Digital Sustainability Plans (incorporating the NDSA levels of Preservation, file formats and metadata, permissions and data integrity, etc.) 

As part of this grant, we have also proposed specific mechanisms for engaging with workshop participants and other interested individuals beyond the in-person workshops, offering virtual "office hours," for example, and other resources throughout the granting period. 

More details on all of these activities will follow in the coming months!