For a few years, I’ve heard some rumblings and complaints from various quarters about feeling excluded from technology groups, digital humanities groups, and other like-minded organizations. And in the past couple of days, the topic has come up again, in a number of different discussions. It has gotten me thinking a lot about siloed outreach and information, as well as what sorts of efforts I, and my fellow GLAMazons, should be doing to ease some of the feelings of alienation some potential technologists experience when trying to navigate their way into our DH “family”.
Regarding those feelings of exclusivity by GLAM folks, Dan Cohen tweeted about his surprise that people felt excluded from the Digital Humanities. He was reacting to this article from William Pannapacker, Pannapacker at MLA: Digital Humanities Triumphant?
The digital humanities have some internal tensions, such as the occasional divide between builders and theorizers, and coders and non-coders. But the field, as a whole, seems to be developing an in-group, out-group dynamic that threatens to replicate the culture of Big Theory back in the 80s and 90s, which was alienating to so many people. It’s perceptible in the universe of Twitter: We read it, but we do not participate. It’s the cool-kids’ table.
So, the digital humanities seem more exclusive, more cliquish, than they did even one year ago.
I don’t blame Dan, Dave Lester (to whom I complained about this a year ago. Sorry Dave – I remember how appalled you looked and I felt very guilty), and others for being prickly about the article and this topic. They’ve really tried very hard to make digital humanities meetups available to all, regardless of background and I applaud their efforts and those of all of the other organizers of the various THATCamps and DH events. I want to stress that these events are important,useful, exhilarating, and move conversations forward and reach a wide range of digital humanists, including academics, developers, and museum, library, and archive staff. Unfortunately, Pannapacker’s complaint is something I have heard over and over again by many established and well-respected GLAM professionals for the past 2-3 years, ever since cultural heritage technologists began to really gain a foothold in academia and in our institutions. My concern here is that the conversation is trapped in a fishbowl and we’re not serving the rest of our professional communities. We forward our conversations, but what about the rest of the memory institution?
Clearly something is going on, despite the best efforts of the “cliques” to invite new folks into the fold, as it were. I remember feeling rather ostracized myself, despite being moderately well-connected to the movers and shakers. I think the core cause of my own perception may also be the cause of many others’ feelings as well, so I present one possible little bandage that might help. Ready?
Stop using Twitter as the vehicle for outreach.
Ok, so that was a really reductionist view of what I think might be a major factor. But to unpack that statement somewhat, there’s a large community of potential new technologists who aren’t sure where to start. They’re not on Twitter or on the DH feeds or academic journals; they’re still on listservs and email lists and blogs and bulletin boards, and the case has yet to be made to them that they should join these other avenues of information. They’re on subject-specific listservs, like RCAAM (museum registrars), museum-ed (museum educators), and various other library and archives lists. Just to keep on listservs for a moment, I track Museum-L and RC-AAM pretty closely. The last time I heard about a THATCamp or other digital technology event on one of these listservs, it was… uh… so long ago I either don’t remember or they’ve never been posted there (a search for “THATCamp” on the museum-ed archives turned up nothing).
My point here is that there’s a very large audience who really want to be involved, who aren’t hearing about anything until after the fact, because the events are only being shared through word-of-mouth (for which Twitter serves as a vehicle) or through DH-specific resources. As a result, people assume a certain cliquishness, that you have to be one of the “cool kids” in order to even know about these things. Add in the academic factor (e.g. the historic tensions between the boots-on-the-ground GLAMs and academics), and you have a community of folks feeling alienated, assuming that the digital humanities is only an ivory tower thing.
I really hope I’m not coming across as blaming anyone here. I myself have been absolutely lousy this past year with engagement, and it’s something I plan to actively work on. Call it a New Year’s Resolution: I will endeavor to help non-technical GLAMs understand the importance of digital humanities and help them understand DH is relevant to their interests and work. But we all need to identify target audiences beyond “people studying digital humanities and those who work in archives, libraries, and museums.” The former is easy to get. The latter three are fractured and diverse and still need an assist to join us.
There will always be people who feel excluded, as they’re trying to find their feet and not know where to start. And, sure, lots of us are friends and go out to bars and meetups together, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone ever actively exclude anyone from the group. So of course it’s somewhat unfair to have the “clique” charge leveled at a particular group. Regardless, if enough people seem to feel that way, it’s worth analyzing why we keep getting that complaint. And given the number of times I’ve heard it in the past few years, it’s enough to keep me thinking about it and what I, and our clique, could be doing better.
I apologize if I’ve ruffled any feathers, but this is something that I’ve been worrying on for a while now, and I really welcome any debate and discussion that arises; it may be that I’m completely wrong here and looking at it from the prism of someone working in the GLAM trenches who can’t always be connected 24/7. But that may be the very reason why I think my perspective here is a valid one, and representative of something that’s actually happening.
~edited to add: First off, I want to thank everyone who has taken the time to comment here and on Twitter. There’ve been a lot of fantastic discussions flying around today, from this, to “rock-stardom” to the vagueness of “digital humanities” as a term to donuts. Second, I especially want to thank Sheila Brennan for quickly putting up a sort of how-to guide for understanding and getting involved with digital humanities. Do check out her post, Getting to know DH if you work in cultural heritage. Lots of suggestions about points of entry into DH meetups and resources.
Third, if anyone would be willing to serve as a sort of mentor for answering questions from DH/GLAM/Technologist newbies, please fill out this poll. I’d like to make a list available either here on Musematic or on the Media and Technology website.
January 9th, 2011 02:20
I started drafting a reply on Twitter, but as it was turning into several tweets, thought I might as well just write a comment.
I agree that inclusion doesn’t happen by default, it has to be worked at. I deliberately set out to try and attract GLAM types to THATCamp Canberra, and I know other THATCamp organisers have done the same. This is also something that worries me as we move in Australia to the establishment of a DH association (see http://discontents.com.au/shoebox/digital-humanities/inside-the-big-tent).
But as an Australian non-acad/GLAM institutional fringe dweller I can’t say I’ve felt excluded by DH ‘cliques’, quite the contrary in fact. I feel very much welcomed and accepted and am extremely grateful for support and encouragement of the DH Twitter community. Likewise THATCamp has provided me with a new sense of professional identity.
I can understand why people might be reluctant to join what seems like an ongoing conversation, but in the end you just have to jump in. I have had many conversations with GLAM folk encouraging them to join in the Twitter fun, but I can’t prove to them how valuable it will be, it’s something they have to experience themselves.
I was struck by Pannapacker’s ‘We read it, but we do not participate’ comment. Well that’s a choice you make. Participate or don’t, but if you don’t it seems a bit unfair to start talking about cliques.
January 9th, 2011 02:38
Thanks so much for your response. While I fully agree that there is some effort that needs to be performed by those who might be interested in the topics DH covers, what I’m trying to get at is that they often really don’t know where to start, but they know the conversation applies to them. “Digital Humanities” itself is something of a loaded term (if I recall some articles and conversations correctly) that sounds very “academic” and, thus, they don’t qualify (erroneous, but that’s what I’ve heard from some folks).
But like I said, I think it’s pretty rare that there’s active exclusion. I, too, have been welcomed with open arms, once I actually found my way into the fold. But it did take a long time to get there and, frankly, feeling a bit sore that I kept missing out on topics I was interested in until I finally just tackled Dave Lester and pestered him for some insider info. Sure, it’s dumb, but if you’re not sure where the starting line is, it’s hard to get in the race.
I’m really grateful for my friendships and experiences with the DH crowd, and I’ve noticed that the vast majority are very welcoming. As a result, it’s something of a mission of mine to evangelize to the lower-tech or new-tech crowd of my local GLAMs and bring them in. Or, at least, point them to the starting line.
January 9th, 2011 07:38
Absolutely, just not sure that Pannapacker’s ‘cliquish’ quip is a great starting point. I suppose it feels like it’s a bit of a rock/hard-place situation. I’ve had many painful discussions attempting to defend Twitter against charges that it was all trivial and self-indulgent, and now it seems it’s also elitist!
Ok, so in the DH tradition of doing stuff, how do we improve communication with the GLAM sector? And who, I suppose, is the ‘we’? Perhaps it’s the responsibility of us hybrid types to put more effort into building the necessary bridges (as you are!).
The ACH Outreach Committee has already created DHAnswers, which seems like a useful starting point for anyone wondering what DH can do for them.
Moar THATCamps! If I can organise one, anyone can. As well as standalone THATCamps, what about more THATCamps to coincide with GLAM sector conferences (like THATCamp Austin did with the SAA).
Share more examples? Part of the point of my own http://labs.nma.gov.au is to expose some DH techniques and questions in the museum context. But of course there’s also many opportunities to intervene in existing forums and community sites. For example, I’ve posted DH stuff to Museum3 and ArchivesLive.
I think the only way to get over the ‘but I don’t qualify’ problem is to show people that they do. And yes Twitter is not enough, but it’s not the problem either.
January 9th, 2011 11:40
Thanks for this. It is very helpful for me, since I am organizing a THATCamp that immediately precedes Museums and the Web 2011 and want to get word out to the GLAM constituency (though Museums and the Web is most likely to be keyed in to the DH community already).
It is certainly true that outside of the DH community, twitter is virtually useless right now for getting out a message. To choose a scholarly field I’m relatively familiar with, I know of only one US-based historian of 20th century Germany on Twitter. Not going to get much impact that way. But I hope that people don’t take away the message that they should stop using Twitter as a means of communication. I’d say that the democratization of discussion that Twitter enables has been very beneficial for digital humanities. IMHO we want to guide well-respected GLAM professionals to join that conversation, i.e. find ways to inform non-initiates that this new channel exists and is useful to join. This is one case where I think the DH community has simply recognized the utility of a new medium before the rest of academe. (There was a recent interesting article on Twitter as a way station to a reemergence of a more effective RSS, which I can’t remember the link for off the top of my head, but which I think is germane.)
Pannapacker’s article is written from the perspective of the academy rather than the GLAM community, so your observations are clearly not just a GLAM thing. And while he counts as influential in the academy mostly because he’s had a long-running column in the Chronicle rather than representing the leadership in the field, I can understand why it’s galling to be depicted as an exclusive club by someone with stature in the academy while so many talented practitioners in DH have had to forge their own alternative careers, sometimes with diminished status within the academy (though Pannapacker acknowledges this). Some of the people who have been most welcoming to me in the DH community have been most aggrieved by his descriptions of cliquishness and exclusion. But while I don’t agree with how Pannapacker personalized the DH divide (e.g. “cool kids table”) and doubt that Big Theory is an apt comparison, I also don’t think that his concerns expressed in the last paragraph that smaller institutions may not be able to keep up with DH innovations are unwarranted. It’s hard not to envy what’s possible at Maryland, Virginia, or George Mason that isn’t possible at most schools. But it’s also doubtful that DH is going to scale up to make most schools like those places.
I also think that the concentration of DH talent at a few institutions is one of the things that creates an image of cliquishness. Tim’s right that ultimately it’s up to non-Dhers to simply join the conversation, not stay on the sidelines. But I can also see why someone not already part of the conversation would wonder where they fit in, even though DHers as individuals are indeed inclusive.
January 9th, 2011 11:49
Like @wragge, I found it hard to make my response here tweet-able; thankfully, current technologies offer us more than one way to communicate. I know I’m preaching to the choir, here: but it’s exactly the multiple, changing, new ways of working–both specific “tools” and ways of thinking–that make (or ought to make) DH appealing to wide, multiple audiences. Perian Sully’s on the right track: if many people repeatedly express that DH is cliquish, while others see multiple routes into the conversation, what else could be going on?
In the spirit of unpacking the “don’t just tweet” response a but further: DH has, so far, just been a specialty sub-field, a place where scholars who share some questions and specialists knowledge have been working, and now have results that make people who haven’t been following the conversation sit up and take notice. But the “mainstream” (quick stand-in for an idea that, itself needs more unpacking and a better name) still thinks this is a specialty open to those who are interested, but not required for everyone to engage with.
Parallels to gender studies, anybody?? I have been at too many papers/panels/seminars where the response to questions along the lines of, “What are the gendered implications of your current research,” is too often, “Well, if you want to do a gendered study of [your favorite topic here], go ahead. My work deals with the economic consequences of this event.” And we all know that the economic consequences of anything are, of course, gender neutral.
Despite at least 40 years of exacting scholarship, gender remains a sub-field, a fundamental aspect of human social existence that scholars can choose to ignore if they want to.
And DH?? Technology is changing fundamentally the way scholars in all fields can work. I’ve been mulling over Tim Burke’s tweet from last week, which basically asks: won’t we all have to be doing DH? Does it need to be a separate intellectual entity?
http://twitter.com/#!/swarthmoreburke/status/22721633181499392
With such implications, and the attendant learning curve for people for whom learning new applications or hardware is daunting, not play (let’s not even talk about coding, here), it’s not surprising that many scholars perceive barriers to entry–not the least of which is their own trepidation about having to re-train from the ground up.
January 9th, 2011 12:20
Perian,
Thanks for your thoughtful post. This issue of who’s in and who’s out does keep arising and so I do think we all need to continue to address the problem. And I think the more that some folks want to define “digital humanities” the more ruffles that exercise can cause to divide rather than include, and let everyone do the fabulous work they are doing.
Recently at a meeting I attended with museum educators, they also mentioned the same kinds of things: not knowing where to start, how to get involved, et al. But, the bigger problem I observed was institutional. Meaning that even when educators are interested in doing digital-web-based projects and scholarship they need departmental and institutional buy-in for them to actively participate in those types of roles. Of course, this depends on each GLAM and each individual, but you see what I mean.
I also see some of the challenges of clique-ishness tied to professional practice as well. I’ll provide one personal example. When I first started in the museum field, I worked as a museum educator with an MA in American Studies. I was not readily accepted by the museum education community (even after years of experience) b/c I lacked a degree in Museum Ed and was not repsected for my content knowledge by the curators and historians at my organization because professionally I was an “educator.” I had to create my own professional space, or so I thought, and discovered later through digital networks that I was not the only one existing in these in-between places.
Now, I am employed by a DH center and I am very happy to be working with GLAM partners on various projects. I have made some great professional relationships via electronic networks and in-person meetings, and yet I still find that there is a bit of push back from non-muse-tech (to use another complicated label) GLAM professionals who identify me, and others like me in “DH”, as “outsiders” because we aren’t actively working in their field or aren’t actively participating in their listservs. Yes, we are in some sense. But, if I am trying to open a conversation, it sometimes feel like I cannot win. So, as the end user outreach coordinator for a GLAM-related open-source software project, I have pulled back from the listservs. We continue our outreach on the blog, twitter, at conferences, and meetings.
After that bit of spouting, I would like to hear what other options you think are appropriate ways for me or others like me to be more open and to reach out to GLAM professionals. Related to that, I should mention that I work at CHNM which is a non-profit center that has a limited budget. As much as we would like to attend regional museum association conferences and the many other professional conferences and meetings, we just don’t have the travel money. We rely on grant funds, like many museums do, and many of the funders allow for small bits of travel, so we have to make difficult choices.]
This will continue to be a challenge, and I know I certainly get lazy. I will also try to reach out in ways that I haven’t in the past for 2011.
January 9th, 2011 01:10
Posting this on behalf of Ben Brumfield:
I think you’ve hit the nail on the head, Perian. Twitter really has mechanics similar to word-of-mouth, and restricting invitations to Twitter is very similar to telling your friends and coworkers “party at my place on Saturday, everyone welcome” — the accidents of your social network will limit the attendees despite the “everyone welcome” part.
I do feel that everyone is welcome (or at least welcomed) in the DH community, however. Although my own position as a part-time developer/hobbyist is even more fringey[*] than Tim’s, I’ve been astonished by how willing folks Pannapacker might consider elites have been to answer my questions, make suggestions, and otherwise include outsiders like myself in the conversation. However, I had to *find* the conversation first — and even needed to learn the magic passphrase “digital humanities”, which I suspect is still an unknown term to the majority of the people currently practicing DH.
So how do we[**] invite more people to this conversation? It’s been a subject discussed in the THATCamp organizers’ conference call, and I think we’re headed in the right direction. The question I’d propose is: “You’re organizing a regional THATCamp in your home town. How do you find participants?” How do you find the librarians, open-source developers, K-12 instructional technologists, county GIS DBAs, archivists, local historians, tech-savvy genealogists, museum staff, non-profit techies, and even academics — without relying on Twitter or any institutional connections you might have? How do you locate that isolated tech person working in a cultural institution, or the lone classics buff working at a software company?
I’m optimistic. You see, just as we can develop a set of steps for organizing a DH unconference, we can also develop a list of targets for outreach — a standard list that we can add to based on experience. Imagine checking outreach items off a list: “emailed local historical society (check), posted to ruby/python user group lists (check), contacted IT department of local college (check)”. Now imagine how much that might broaden the DH community.
I realize that even this suggestion for expansion is limited–given my background I focus on engaging people who are already tech-savvy–but it seems like something we can take action on.
* http://manuscripttranscription.blogspot.com/2007/06/money-current-situation.html
** It is a measure of how welcoming the DH community has been that I
find myself using “we” in this sentence.
January 9th, 2011 02:38
Speaking as yet another museum-based GLAM professional (a librarian doing social media in a museum setting), I have tremendous sympathy for Perian’s–and Tim’s and Sheila’s and … –perspectives here. While the DH community is an incredibly welcoming one, perhaps more so than any other group I’ve been a part of, in my experience it still remains a tough nut to crack to “outsiders,” especially to those of us who aren’t coming into the community from the academy. (I have a sense that the academics and grad students among us end up being bigger leaders in the DH community because they have more institutional support for–or at least fewer institutional barriers to–becoming active participants in the community, but that’s for another discussion.)
In my opinion, DH is best described as a community of practice than as a field or sub-field unto itself. Those who work within the digital humanities–whether they know it or not–far outstrip those who formally or informally study the field. In that way, it echoes my own experiences with (library staff vs. library science academics) or (museum employees vs. museum studies theorists). There are lots of people already engaged in the “doing,” and it’s important they get together in person or online to talk about the doing that they’re doing.
So as Ben asked above, how do those of us on the inside (and I call myself that by virtue of 1.) the welcoming and expansive nature of the digital humanities, and 2.) my sense that there’s a DH spectrum that runs from soft skills on one end to hard coding on the other and that while I am very much on the soft skills end, I’m at least on the spectrum) reach out to those that aren’t? In my opinion, it’s really the same thing that is always done in these cases: A.) go where your intended audience can be found (in this case, DHers who may not realize that’s what they are or that there are others like them) and B.) be intentional about it. As Tim points out, we “hybrid types” are ideally situated for this role: we presumably not only have access to the channels of communication within the DH field, but we have knowledge of our own (GLAM) fields and how they communicate with each other.
For instance, before THATCampVA, I shot a note to the communications person at the Virginia Association of Museums to ask her to send out the call for applicants to Virginia’s museum community. I also help organize a Virginia history conference and we have the same challenge–the academic networks work fine for the professors among us, but we have to be intentional about reaching out to the museum and library communities where they gather in order to invite their participation in the conference–otherwise, they don’t know about it, and why should they? But we believe they’d be interested, so we take the time to reach out.
So maybe what the DH community of practice needs is some folks who take it upon themselves to be intentional about outreach to other sympathetic communities, keeping the latter abreast of developments in the former?
January 9th, 2011 02:49
I’ve found the responses to this question very enlightening so far. I do agree that DH tries to use open modes of communication, but that those modes might not be familiar to individuals outside the field — whether in traditional academic disciplines or in GLAM positions. We certainly need to do a better job of introducing these open technologies. When was the last time one of us to a minute to explain how an RSS reader works to a colleague who was unfamiliar with the technology?
I really like twitter for a number of reasons. First, I like it because it creates a space where we can quickly share materials without necessarily investing in framing them and reflecting them in public. Second, I like it because it’s a place where I can dip into the stream of conversation when I have time. Third, I like it because it is possible to funnel twitter into other modes of communication, such as Digital Humanities Now (http://digitalhumanitiesnow.org/), that can translate the pulse of a community into a single information point. I imagine that all of these points would make twitter attractive to the uninitiated, if we made these assets clear to them. But, of course, twitter is not the only option.
Beyond the technological questions, I’m fairly certain that we can learn something about outreach and dissemination from educational reform. Research clearly shows that pedagogical reform that is imposed from the top down does not meet with much success. Rather, successful reform requires an agent of enthusiasm and reform within each school who is working to change the culture in that individual place. That suggests that those outside academic departments and GLAM institutions, such as Sheila and I who work at CHNM, can really only play a support role for individual with in those organizations. We can give conference presentations and teach bootcamp sessions before THATCamp conferences, but if the participants in those sessions don’t go home and actively evangelize within their organizations, DH and DH methods will never truly penetrate into the wider space of humanities disciplines and cultural heritage institutions.
Finally, I would say that we in DH need to continue to focus on creating opportunities for novice learners to get their feet wet and to benefit from the lessons learned by those more experienced in the field. Mike Edson and I organized the Digital-JumpStart (http://digital-jumpstart.org/) session at AAM last year with just those things in mind. The session took a huge amount of planning, preparation, and publicity. I thought the session was a great success and the over-180 participants seemed to feel the same way, yet no one stepped up this year to continue the effort.
Digital-JumpStart might not be way to go, but we do need consider the ways we can help increase the number of people who are ready to try to bring digital methods to their own institutions.
January 9th, 2011 05:41
I’ve been a bit perplexed as I follow this post and responses. We are in a time where communication and information sharing is remarkable. If I think back to what it was like to write a PhD on the museum sector in the late 90s early 00s, I feel a bit ill.
While social media may not have reached every professional, it has provided a unique public forum for knowledge exchange. The value of the network has become apparent as audiences have become more used to, and savy about, the types of postings which can benefit others.
In many ways, I think that we are witnessing a changing phenomena, one where ones incentive to participate is reinforced by the feedback he/she receives from others, particularly from those who are not personally known.
As an academic who works very closely with the GLAM sector, I feel very encouraged by the number of people who contribute their thoughts and issues to public forums. I also feel that if you are interested in pursuing these types of connections, there is more information being shared today than any of us can read, disseminate and share on a daily basis. That’s why tools such as twitter are so important. We share the load of sharing.
Perhaps I’m a little blind to what the actual issue of this posting really is…
So I’ll finish with an example
Two years ago I decided that I would start training for amateur triathlons. I’m not athletic, have never competed in anything other than school events (several decades ago) and I had no existing community with which to discuss this issue.
Through multiple social media channels I discovered training programs, forums, current issues, exciting global events and began to follow them, often without participating as I didn’t feel I had anything to offer. Two years later I still don’t have much to offer but I do know where to go for information, who to follow for good knowledge sharing and which events are targeted for my age. I’ve also discovered that there are cliques and heroes within this field and I watch and listen without too much concern for whether I can participate.
The point is that if you are interested, the barriers to engagement have never been lower. Participation remains, both online and off, the domain of those who have something meaningful to contribute, but engagement, staying abreast of events and activities and getting to know those who exchange knowledge selflessly – that isn’t a difficult task.
Have I missed something?
January 9th, 2011 06:29
An interesting and thoughtful post, thank you.
One simple technique I think has worked reasonably well for the UK GLAM community (as represented on the Museums Computer Group) is a continual effort to take the really interesting or potentially important conversations on twitter back to the MCG email list (http://bit.ly/990pcB). The on-list conversation doesn’t always take off, but at least non-tweeters know it’s happening.
January 9th, 2011 09:45
Nicely done for starting the conversation Perian, and a very interesting and relevant topic. I have been thinking about this a lot as I have pretty much the same issue here at times with people feeling excluded from social media. We have been working hard over the past five years or so to show staff how to incorporate web and social media into their already crowded jobs using the mantra of working 20% different, not 20% more. I did some early work which you can find at this blog post: http://web1.australianmuseum.net.au/BlogPost/Audience-Research-Blog/How-do-I-incorporate-the-web-into-my-daily-work-practices
Given that however, I strongly believe that we are responsible for our own professional development and if folk feel excluded then they are partly to blame. Let me give you an example. At a recent event I attended there turned out to be rather active Twitter backchannel having interesting conversations that were broadcast (and only involved about five tweeters). Two different responses – one person complaining loudly to everyone about being excluded, another person who quietly came up to me at one of the breaks and said while they are a Twitter-naysayer/skeptic they quickly decided that they need to sign up and become part of the conversation, and so they did and haven’t looked back since!
I guess my point here is that what we actually need is top develop a culture that combines helping, encouraging, and above all an enabling one for staff to find their own purpose for these tools. This world isn’t going to go away and I confidently predict the end of listservs sooner rather than later as new and younger colleagues (as well as us switched on oldies!) start to penetrate these groups. I also tell all and sundry that I’m giving email a max of two-three years before it’s gone (and just look at our teenagers who never use email and their grandparents who have had to establish Facebook accounts just to communicate with them and are taking to this in droves).
BTW Sheila’s point is very well made. It often is an institutional problem and if there’s no leadership (and people at the ground level just doing stuff) then that is indeed a problem in itself. For those organisations I suggest you do what we did: establish a social media “skunk group” that has the imprimatur of the Director and just gets on with things in the digital world and progressively invites staff in to participate when they have the need for it and feel they’re ready. Plus – they see what fun we have and want to be a part of that. Which brings me to another problems I see in museums – we often take ourselves so seriously. Stephen Heppell, the noted digital educator and thinker said recently that “The next ten years are the most fun we’re going to have in our jobs”. This applies very nicely to museum work I believe!
So my final parting bit of advice to people when asked about this stuff and complain about being excluded is don’t try to explain it, just embrace it and, above all, enjoy it!
(Here’s a bit of background to what we’ve been doing at the Museum if anyone is interested: http://web1.australianmuseum.net.au/BlogPost/Audience-Research-Blog/Natural-history-specimens-as-social-media-stars-Mr-Blobby) and happy to chat to anyone who wants more info.
January 9th, 2011 10:14
Should have also mentioned that we’re doing an AAM session on this very topic: Tuesday May 24 2.15-3pm (Web 2.0 and organisational change).
I also noticed that AAM has some great 101 sessions on Twitter, blogging etc. Perhaps colleagues who are feeling a bit left out could sign up for one! More here: http://www.aam-us.org/am11/
January 10th, 2011 04:10
The debates here are interesting but they lack focus upon specific projects. My only comment is make good work who ever may employ you. There is nothing stopping you. Have a glass of water and just make good work! Many of the greatest writers of the 20th Century and the greatest historians weren’t employed as professional either in the academy or elsewhere. And some of them were unloved as well!
January 10th, 2011 10:35
I find this discussion a bit perplexing. I’m a person with ready access to the DH in-crowd (I think) but in the past couple of years, I’ve steadily been opting out of DH-related conferences and events because I feel like they are highly focused and aren’t pertinent to my work as a mostly non-digital cultural professional. I agree strongly with Eric Johnson that DH in GLAMs is a community of practice, and as such, I question who it might appropriately extend to. There’s a difference between a sense that people feel ought to feel welcome and a sense that DH work and events should be reaching more diverse members of the GLAM field. I feel reasonably well-informed about what happens at various digital GLAM events, and I feel that they belong to someone else.
I also get many emails and calls from museum friends, mostly older folks, who are curious about technology and ask me if they should attend MW, MCN, or other digital conferences to learn more. I often tell them that the people at these events are fabulous but that the sessions and conversations may be oriented in directions that are not useful to them. I’m interested in finding places for “bridging” conversations that are more substantive than 101 how-to sessions, but I’m not sure where those can or should live. We need some kind of non-profit-focused SXSW, a place that really embraces the business, techie, cultural, and educational sides of our work, where everyone can crossover with ease and delight.
January 12th, 2011 03:49
Wow. Fantastic discussion. A very quick response. I tend to agree with the people who defend DH, its use of Twitter, and its outreach efforts to GLAM communities in general, but here’s the thing: If you say there are people who feel excluded or are just plain unaware that can be reached via RCAAM, museum-ed, Museum-L, then we should reach them there. At the very least, I’ll make sure THATCamp starts posting invitations to all its events there. Thanks! Tom
January 13th, 2011 06:02
This indeed has been a great conversation. As someone who served as the publicity chair for MCN for a few years, I might also suggest we do some self-reflection as the GLAM community. How do we form our own cliques that keep DH out? RCAAM? VRA? can’t post to the list unless you are a paid member. Drop your membership and you’re booted off the list (and as much as I’d like to be contributing to conversations, as a student there are only so many professional orgs I can pony up for). I can also attest to the incredible amount of work it is to maintain dozens of listserv subscriptions (even open ones) just to post messages widely. Sure, for closed lists there are workarounds, but they just add to the burden. (And I will say, especially for RCAAM, there is a value to the thin veil of “privacy” it offers. Discussions about sensitive repatriation issues, donors, etc. would be hard to pull off in the bright light of open access. I’ve actually been surprised at the limited amount of tech talk there – discussions on crates seems to far outweigh discussions about metadata, etc.). I’d say if you are subscribed to a list and a member of multiple communities, it is as much YOUR responsibility to cross-post as it is for the host community.
On occasion there are calls to close MCN-L to non-members (membership on the list is about 2-3x paid members), but I think keeping it open makes it much easier for colleagues from associated areas to post to the list. However, this might be a good place to ask: What is the future of MCN-L (if Lynda’s predictions hold) or MCN’s communication channels in general? Despite some early flag planting, I don’t think we’re making effective use of Twitter, Facebook, etc. as we could be.
January 23rd, 2011 02:55
Nina: Your comments about MCN conferences are interesting. MCN is an incredibly welcoming, non-clique, mentoring organization, and the MCN conferences offer amazing learning and networking opportunities. They definitely “embrace the business, techie, cultural, and educational sides of our work.” But you’re right: the traditional session format could be shaken up. (It’s based in part on the need of many speakers to present at a proper session in order to get funding from their employers to attend). The SxSW or THATcamp formats would be welcome inspirations. I’ll make sure the message gets through.
While I’m at it, I’ll throw in my own recent personal experience with social media and the clique phenomenon. With a twist. A colleague recommended a professional listserv to me – and recommended me to the monitored listserv. How’s that for old-fashioned? It’s an amazing listserv, involves an enormous and varied “clique” of professionals who, despite being the top players in their industry, and superbly if not scarily articulate, are just plain nice people. Always happy to help. I’ve been contacted off-list with specific advice from people in positions I would never have dreamed of being able to approach. The listserv has nothing to do with GLAMs or DH, but with the future of reading and publishing, but it is incredibly enlightening and that reflects in my own work. I don’t think this could have happened on Twitter. And I don’t see this kind of deep, lengthy, thoughtful, and provocative discussion dying out in a year or two. I think that each medium has its own value, and that each adds, rather than replaces, a ripple in the pond.