Part I


Part I

4 Summary of the project

4.a Activities implemented (1997-1998)

The organization of a large international conference is under way. The meeting will be in Bergen on September 25-28, 1998 and has the title "The Future of the Humanities in the Digital Age: Problems and Perspectives for Humanities Education and Research". A preliminary announcement will be sent out at the beginning of April. A grant has been obtained from the Norwegian ministry for Education. This event is being co-organized with the SOCRATES ODL project EUROLITERATURE (http://www.euroliterature.uib.no/) and is co-sponsored by AHC, ALLC, CHArt, CRE, EACL, EAIE, EDEN, ELSNET, HUMANITIES, Norwegian Council of Universities, Norwegian Ministry of Education, Norwegian National Library, SIU, SOCRATES, TRANSCULT, and the University of Bergen.

March 26, 1998: Presentation of ACO*HUM at the conference Bringing Information Technology to Education (BITE), Maastricht.

March 9, 1998: Presentation of ACO*HUM at the conference Making it work: Internationalization of higher education in a European perspective, arranged by the Center for International University Cooperation (SIU), Norwegian Council of Universities.

November 20-22, 1997: Participation at the EAIE conference in Barcelona.

November 1-2, 1997: Policy symposium in Granada (http://www.hd.uib.no/AcoHum/polsym97/minutes.html). A new working group Computing for Non-European Languages was installed (http://www.hd.uib.no/AcoHum/nel/). A new working group on Formal Methods in the Humanities was installed (http://www.hd.uib.no/AcoHum/fm/).

October 15-16, 1997: Active participation at 1st European Thematic Network Forum, Dublin, organized by THENUCE.

October 14, 1997: Presentation of ACO*HUM at Dublin City University and contact meeting with the TNP on university/industry cooperation in the field of computing.

September 29, 1997: Presentation of ACO*HUM at ESPRIT Information Day, Brussels.

September 1997: The results of the WWW-based survey were made available to the network partners. Final reports over the first year written.

Computational linguistics and language engineering

January 29, 1998: Presentation of ACO*HUM at Nordiske Datalingvistikdage (Nodalida'98), København.

February 1998: A plan for developing six pilot ODL courses in Natural Language and Speech Processing was proposed by ACO*HUM in cooperation with ELSNET and the TNP on Speech Communication Sciences. The ELSNET board supports the plan with 30000 ECU.

For analyzing the prospects of transnational curricula and European degrees in computational linguistics, a dialogue was established with the TNP on Speech Communication Sciences, which will lead to participation at their May conference in Barcelona and close cooperation in the coming year for preparing a European master's in natural language processing (see below).

History and historical informatics

(see also the working group report)

February '98: At a workshop on library digitisation in Italy, the setting up of a sample CD-rom with resources was discussed.

Samples of census material are being collected. We already have material from Austria, Croatia, Germany, Italy, Norway and Switzerland available.

In cooperation with Association for History and Computing, a web-based bibliography server has been created.

During the autumn of 1997 and winter of 1998, we ran a joint web-based course in history with students and teachers from University College London and University of Bergen. A report will be prepared.

We have developed a plan for a European Degree in Historical informatics, which we would like to introduce at different universites. The first will probably be Bergen.

We have been working on guidelines for Internet-based teaching strategies. We feel that this is somewhat premature; first we need to collect experiences from more concrete courses.

We decided not to pursue our goal of catalogueing digitized historical sources of broad European importance for teaching during 1997. We feel that our present activities will give us a better understanding of what consitutes 'broad European importance for teaching'.

Computing in history of art, architecture and design

September 5-6, 1997: Presentation of ACO*HUM at CHArt (Computers and History of Art) 13th Annual Conference, University of Northumbria at Newcastle.

Computing for non-European languages

October 11, 1997: First contact meeting with CAMEEL to form NEL working group, Vico Equense (Napoli) focussing on curricula, launching a CDI and preparing an ODL pilot (http://www.hd.uib.no/AcoHum/nel/NEL-1stmeeting.html).

January 30-31: Working group meeting, Paris, focussing on teaching material and information gathering (http://www.hd.uib.no/AcoHum/nel/NEL-2ndmeeting.html).

A survey of relevant computational resources has been conducted among 40 institutions by one of the partners (CRIM-INALCO) and the report will be presented at a meeting in May.

Active cooperation was established between IUO and ILC in the context of an ADAPT project, for which the TNP will mediate and disseminate.

A CDI has been submitted for the purpose of setting minimum programme requirements and an indicator of minimal acquired competence.

Textual scholarship and humanities computing

September 14-17, 1997: Presentation at a poster stand at the DRH conference (Digital Resources for the Humanities), St. Anne's College, Oxford.

Issues raised by the TNP were debated in two panels in which members from the working group and the steering committee participated.

A beginning was made for a network based information exchange about curricula, courses, computational resources, national centres and repositories (http://www.hd.uib.no/AcoHum/ts/TS-Pointers.html).

A start is made with definition of common core curricula (CCC) in textual scholarship and humanities computing through collaboration on workshops and summer schools on textual computing.

4.b Activities planned (1998-1999)

After the conference in September, the common focus will shift towards a finalization of analyses and recommendations. These will be disseminated in the form of a publication on the web and on paper.

The analysis and recommendations will be based on the previous survey, on previous analyses of the field during the past activities of the TNP (including the conference), and on additional information gathering. Each of the 'vertical' working groups will contribute a chapter covering the following topics:

The 'horizontal' working groups will write special chapters (see below).

Computational linguistics and language engineering

The planned ODL courses in cooperation with ELSNET and the TNP on Speech Communication Sciences will be developed, performed and tested.

A session on computational linguistics curricula and teaching is planned at the EACL'99 conference (cooperation with EACL, ELSNET and the TNP on Speech Communication Sciences).

For finalization of recommendations on curricula, intensive cooperation is planned with the TNP on Speech Communication Sciences. The working group will participate at the Spring 1999 conference of the TNP on Speech Communication Sciences.

History and historical informatics

Finalization of recommendations, writing of book chapter.

Computing in history of art, architecture and design

Finalization of recommendations, writing of book chapter.

Computing for non-European languages

At the working group meeting in May 1998, a selection will be made among the following specific activities:

Planning of intensive programmes for training teachers.

Final recommendations for a European master's (including programme minimum requirements and indicators of minimal acquired competence).

Finalize the content of modules and units with ref. to credit and certification (in case of approval of the CDA application).

Evaluation and selection of programmes in other non-European languages which could benefit from active cooperation.

Evaluation of pilot on Akan, possible extension to other languages.

Continue work on an pilot Introductory Course on African Linguistics, including multimedia teaching aids and computational linguistics awareness.

Textual scholarship and humanities computing

A workshop will be organized at the University in Joensuu in 1999, in collaboration with the ALLC.

Finalization of work on core curricula components and on requirements and prerequisites for university level courses covering textual computing.

The proposals for core curricula components will be tested out at a summer school planned for three weeks in Glasgow in the summer of 1999. Participating universities are the universities of Crete, Cork, Joensuu, Bergen, Roma (La Sapienza) and Glasgow.

Formal methods in the humanities

The outcome of the following activities will be gathered in the special chapter for the book:

Organizing a high level restricted meeting on the problems of technological platforms for humanities applications, of humanities problems formalization, and of modeling in the humanities.

Preparing suggestions for the institution of methodology disciplines inside the curricula of humanities computing, taking care of how to teach them, and relations to be established between scholars of mathematics, engineering, linguists, philosophers, and others.

Organizing and disseminating a new web bibliography of humanities computing, on the basis of the one published by Giovanni Adamo (Rome, La Sapienza).

Showing the professional openings in the frame of research about Humanities Computing in general.