Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles 28 November 2007

Collaborative multidisciplinary research networks

in the Humanities

How do you make them work?

Our experience

With nearly $1.5milllion funding awarded by academic and government agencies, private foundations and corporate partners in the last seven years, Metamedia (Shanks's lab and studio in Stanford Archaeology Center) and its affiliate Stanford Humanities Lab (co-directed by Shanks) have pioneered Web 2.0 technologies to facilitate collaborative research and authoring, innovative research networks, the cocreation of grass roots heritage and history, performance and project-based collaborative learning, personal tailor-fit information management solutions, as well as pluralist modes of publication. Projects include an international research network focused on the concepts of presence and mediation, simulation and virtuality through a convergence of performance art, archaeology and computer science (The Presence Project); a partnership with a global corporation to develop a multidisciplinary understanding of the future of mobile media design (DaimlerChrysler and Mobile Media 2015); a new digitally enabled network of scholars who want to explore the antiquarian tradition of early science in Europe and the Americas (AngloAmerican Antiquarians 1500-1820).

The Stanford Humanities Center (where Nicole is Technology Projects Manager) brings together scholars from across disciplinary boundaries to create a research hub of intellectual interaction, fostering inter-institutional and international collaborations. Humanities scholars coming through the Center have been increasingly interested in exploring how to work together collaboratively to tackle projects that are bigger than those that any individual scholar could take on alone. In 2004, the Center began development of the Humanities Research Network with the goal of leveraging the internet, World Wide Web, and communication technologies to extend the reach of that hub, enabling collaborative research over geographical distances. The pioneering work of the Humanities Center in this area has lead to a partnership with Academic Computing in the Stanford University Libraries to create secure online group workspace environments that will increase the feasibility and productivity of collaborative research.

In this talk, presented as a conversation, Michael and Nicole will share what they have learned about new opportunities for facilitating multidisciplinary research in the Humanities. They will address knowledge management and design, the integration of digital media, issues of extensible and scalable involvement, as well as future prospects - basically how to get people sharing and committed to the intellectual effervescence of multidisciplinary and collaborative research.

Four case studies in collaborative research

Building new cultures of reciprocity.

The new Humanities: think not of technology but of the design and management of knowledge.

Global Identities and the Beginning of HRN

Summary: Collegiality and Collaboration at a distance The internet has brought an explosion of new tools and modes of communication. Ubiquitous and inexpensive. How do we manage it?

Performing Presence - from the Live to the Simulated

A summary - [link]

The project site - [link]

Summary: Managing an extraordinarily diverse ecology of interest. The importance of the manager. A culture of reciprocity. Multiple outputs. Process and persistence.

Spatial History and a New Phase for the Collaborative Research Network

The project site is currently under development, but live at [link]

Summary: The researcher becomes the designer The researcher can become the designer of the experience of interaction over the internet and in person. The challenge is how to sustain this. Our models are Creative Commons and Wikipedia. Persistent, successful OS software projects require organizational structure and funding.

Anglo-American Antiquarians 1500-1820

Project outline - [link]

Summary: A classic case where the unique research voice will not suffice. Animating the archive. Extensibility.

An example of a technology of viewing and commentary - [link]

Key points

about collaborative research networks, digitally enabled

• collaborative research begins with sociality
  • social links complement and enhance scholarly collaboration - so enable and enrich them, make them fluid

• distinguish collegiality from collaboration (collegiality is a kind of pleasant "parallel play"; collaboration is cocreative)
  • collaboration does not mean consensus - dissent is good
  • enable such a diversity of voice

• think transdisciplinary
  • focus on themes and matters of common human concern
  • foster diverse ecologies of interest and expertise

• the Humanities are a rich storehouse of interest
  • consider the prospects of Archive 3.0 - animating the archive - [link]

• reciprocity - the importance of a creative commons
  • don't underestimate the motivational power of intellectual energy and effervesence
  • in an information economy value is not related to scarcity but ubiquity

• the importance of knowledge management
  • flat networks, no hierarchy - this secures stakeholder interest and commitment
  • the vital role of network manager - a houskeeper, keeping things straight, a nodal coordinator in the network
  • make pay-offs clear in a gift economy of reciprocity
  • be iterative, with rapid prototypes; enable agile adaptation of the project, even in basic mission and aims

• digital tools and environments
  • don't think technology, think design - knowledge design
  • think mixed realities - mediated interaction complementing face-to-face
  • digital media are "modes of engagement"
  • the importance of transparency - simple tasks should not be obscured by interface
  • elegance - tools and environments should be "good mannered" - not interupting the flow of research
  • extensibility and scaleability are key to commitment - make it easy to have 5 minutes of contribution affect the whole project
  • prime the system - don't expect empty pages to be filled
  • digital manifestation can secure the persistence of a project - people like this sense of presence

• embrace the elision of research, manifestation of process, publication, pedagogy, management
  • multiple customizable destinations
  • this can foster major commitment from research partners translating the project into their own interests

• embrace the diversity of style and product that comes with digital authoring
  • think of the rhetoric of new media - layout, imagery, style

• some basic functions
  • synchronous and asynchronous discussion
  • synchronous and asynchronous collaborative authoring/editing
  • linking
  • annotating
  • searching
  • filtering
  • tagging
  • layering

Related notes:

• Animating the archive - on the future of archives

• The idea of a Humanities Lab - labs and studios as a paradigm for Humanities research

• [link] - the mission of Michael's archaeological media lab

• Collaboration - practical notes on fostering collaboration

• [link] - how to design and use wikis and Web 2.0 technology