Abstract Submission Deadline: September 30, 2022
Abstract Acceptance: October 31, 2022
Articles Submission: February 15, 2023 (issue 1) or July 15, 2023 (issue 2)
Prospective Publication: June 2023 (issue 1) and December 2023 (issue 2)
magazén | International Journal for Digital and Public Humanities is accepting proposals to its 2023 volume, which shall devote two semestral issues of the Journal (June and December) to the concept of ‘relations’ and how these relations are implemented, operationalised and analysed as interdependencies, links, and connections in practices of Digital and Public Humanities scholarship. Be it through the construction of simple relational databases or by means of complex correlations of data, materials, immaterial aspects, and publics, the interdisciplinary field of Digital and Public Humanities truly strives on building relationships. Far from shutting themselves up in a lonesome ivory tower, scholars in this domain are prone to bridging experiences between different disciplines, interconnecting with diverse audiences for research and dissemination purposes, and linking computational models to cultural manifestations. Relations maintain a very humanistic character, as they form the immaterial structure onto which human societies are based. Indeed, transferred into a technological setting, the principle of relationship-building can be found as the core feature of interconnected data, authority files, user-centred design, usability, user-experience, audience interaction, and many more aspects that became an integral part of Digital and Public Humanities.
The very act of building relations or putting things into relationship – be they technology and culture, scholars and audiences, data and materials – thus form the backbone of scholarly projects that came to define this research field. In Digital Textual Scholarship scholars can see the text as a hub, whose relations point in many directions. They can explore, formalise, visualise, and process its connections with paratexts, other texts, physical documents, places, people, concepts as well as with readers. In Digital and Public History it is possible to establish connections between sources, events, place, dates, or people, through a database, a network analysis map, or more generally the semantic web. In Public History also the relationship between the research and its public is crucial: the active or passive participation of the audience can affect questions, methodology and research outcomes in many different ways. Relations between archaeological contexts and spaces are key factors to decipher and investigate stratigraphic sequences and past landscapes in virtual reconstructions (i.e. extended matrix approach, archeoBIM, etc.) and GIS studies (i.e. viewshed analysis, least-cost path analysis, etc.). At the same time, the integration of different remote sensing techniques and expertises often provide significant results. In Digital and Public Art History subjects may address the connection between GLAM studies and the creative industries sector as well as the artistic productions, considering: the relation between public space and art historical environment, including different techniques of virtual reconstruction (3D modelling, gaming, VR360), the implementation of digital collections adopting the IIIF framework (iconography, diagnosis, descriptions), and multimedia solutions for data collection and accessibility. The implication of digital technologies in the preservation, management and interpretation of historical, cultural, and archaeological contexts is a way to make knowledge more accessible for different audiences. The engagement of society in participatory ways highlights the importance of creating dialogue, cohesion, identity, and sustainable development.
Hence, for its 2023 volume magazén is set to examine in two semestral issues the concept of “Relations” as an intrinsic characteristic of Digital and Public Humanities. Scholars are particularly invited to submit contributions that span from theoretical debates to methodological reflections, also comprising the examination of particular case studies from the heterogeneous domains of Digital and Public History, Art History, Archaeology, Cultural Heritage and Textual Scholarship. Eventually, magazén’s volume 2023 will draw particular attention to the public aspects of such endeavours, given that successful research projects hold firm to the principle of audience involvement from their very inception, rather than having public interaction just as a late side-effect of scholarly work.
Click here for more information about the CFP. All materials should be sent by September 30, 2022, via the submission portal on the editorial platform of our academic publisher Edizioni Ca’ Foscari. Notice of selection will be given to authors within four weeks from the submission deadline.