New modes of interdisciplinary, tech-enabled research and production drive us to collaborate across an array of boundaries in the digital humanities.  It is no longer unusual for a scholar to lead a tight-knit, interdepartmental research group or function as part of an ad-hoc team that may include faculty colleagues, graduate students, designers, programmers, systems administrators, and librarians or other instructional technology and information specialists.  This is a good thing, and (in my experience) the most productive and interesting collaborations are grounded in a kind of professional and intellectual egalitarianism, or openness to the contributions of all team members.  But not all of the social boundaries inherent in digital humanities project-work can or should be ignored. 

University policies about intellectual property and open source impinge differently on the rights and responsibilities of faculty, students, and staff members.  These groups may have differing career trajectories and intellectual agendas, and their participation in projects is often understood and evaluated differently within their professions and disciplines. We may worry that acknowledging cultural and administrative distinctions in the academy will reify them — but, in fact, ignoring them can result in poor outcomes for digital humanities projects and personnel.  And woe to the increasing number of collaborators who fall into hybrid professional categories!  What do we need to establish at the outset of digital humanities projects in order to foster healthy collaborative work? How can we create collaborative teams in which all members’ contributions are acknowledged, respected, and appropriately rewarded?  And how can we open these potentially awkward conversations in a way that strengthens teams and permits the kind of fluidity and professional growth that should happen over the course of long-term digital humanities initiatives?

This is the big stuff!  I’ll have about six minutes.

Some of these issues emerge from my experience as a DH grad student, post-doc, member of UVA’s research faculty, and (most recently) administrator of a library department devoted to digital scholarship. I’ll also draw on some of the anonymous data (now being analyzed) from the “Graceful Degradation” survey I conducted this summer with Dot Porter of the Digital Humanities Observatory in Ireland. I’m posting this here on the chance it will garner some comments I can bring to MLA in December.  (And don’t be afraid to tell me I’m cracked.)

Finally, the panel will explore the question of how Bethany will manage to talk about this without getting herself into trouble.  Stay tuned for the next episode of “MLA Confessions!”

First announced at the Digital Humanities 2009 conference, the “Graceful Degradation” survey is now open at:

http://graceful-degradation.questionpro.com/

This is a survey of the digital humanities community — broadly conceived — on project management in times of transition and decline, and what we see as the causes and outcomes of those times. We invite participation by anyone who has worked on a digital project in or related to the humanities.

Decline is a pressing issue for digital scholarship because of the tendency of our projects to be open ended. One could argue that digital projects are, by nature, in a continual state of transition or decline. What happens when the funding runs out, or the original project staff move on or are replaced? What happens when intellectual property rests with a collaborator or an institution that does not wish to continue the work? How, individually and as a community, do we weather changes in technology, the patterns of academic research, the vagaries of our sponsoring institutions?

“Graceful Degradation” is being conducted by Bethany Nowviskie of the University of Virginia Scholars’ Lab in the United States and Dot Porter of the Digital Humanities Observatory in Ireland. The survey will run through September 2009, when initial results will be presented during a poster session at Digital Resources in the Humanities and Arts in Belfast. Full summary results will be presented and published in summer 2010. All responses are held confidential, unless specific permission to identify people and projects has been granted. Participants will have the option to grant this permission at the end of the survey.

We encourage your participation and look forward to sharing the results of the survey!

Please contact degrade.gracefully@gmail.com if you have any questions.