Beyond the Page: Open-Access & Open-Source Digital Literary Archives

For notes on this session & my participation in others, see: [twitter.com/wscotth].

I would like to propose a session on Digital Literary Archives.

Who should be involved in the design & development of the digital literary archive at the college / university level? Authors . . . Readers . . . Librarians . . . Scholars . . . Publishers . . . Editors . . . Students . . . Programmers . . . Booksellers? Can we imagine an open-access & open-source model for the digital literary archive, one that would build opportunities for collaborative research, creativity, authorship, and publication?

For my contribution to ThatCAMP, I would like to explore new directions for my research, publication, and teaching that are converging in dynamic ways. The changing roles for digital archives define the nexus of that convergence. I recently led the NEH Digital Archives Workshop for the University of Denver’s Digital Humanities Institute [portfolio.du.edu/pc/port?page=2&uid=2185] and will be presenting a related paper in November at the “Reconfiguring Authorship” conference at the University of Ghent [www.rap.ugent.be/node/26]. I have also co-authored (with faculty colleagues at the Penrose Library, Peggy Keeran and Jennifer Bowers) a book chapter in a forthcoming MLA volume, Teaching Early Modern Literature from the Archives. And I am the founding editor of two electronic, peer-reviewed, MLA-indexed and EBSCO-distributed journals, Appositions: Studies in Renaissance / Early Modern Literature & Culture; and Reconfigurations: A Journal for Poetics & Poetry / Literature & Culture. These experiences have led me to new questions about collaborative research, teaching, and publishing, which I have recently addressed in a journal article, “WYSIWYG Poetics: Reconfiguring the Fields for Creative Writers and Scholars,” in the Journal of Electronic Publishing (Fall, 2011): [dx.doi.org/10.3998/3336451.0014.204].

How might digital literary archives facilitate new forms and fields of knowledge within and beyond academia? How might such non-conformist DH projects engender new relationships within, across, and beyond Departments and Divisions?