Past Events

Spring 2022

New Faculty and Staff Lightning Talks event flyerPoet Laureate, Paisley Rekdal event flyerIndigenous Digital Storytelling, Dr. Lorena Sekwan Fontaine event flyerAnnual Student Electronic Literature Competition event flyerSave the Date: Digital Humanities Showcase event flyerSpring 2022 events flyer

(Click on the image to view the pdf)

 

Fall 2021

TimelineJS WorkshopRoopka Risam talk StoryMapJSOnodo for Network Visualizations

Melody JueVoyant ToolsRe-imagining DH@SDSUAndrea Righi talk

(Click on the image to view the pdf)

 

Spring 2021

Marino Book TalkEthical Data Workshop Part 1 Ethical Data Workshop Part 2Wardrip-Fruin Book Talk

Chaser Book TalkDigital Pedagogy Workshop Part 1Digital Pedagogy Workshop Part 2Risam Book Talk

(Click on the image to view the pdf)

 

In response to the extended closure due to COVID-19, the Digital Humanities Initiative and Center shifted to all-virtual programming. We continue to provide opportunities for faculty and students to connect and learn together, through Zoom-based book talks, tools and pedagogy workshops, and more.

Spring 2021 for DH@SDSU is about caring through sharing. 2020 took a toll, so we offer a Spring 2021 calendar dedicated to showcasing recent books in digital+humanities scholarship published by friends of DH@SDSU, friends through personal connections and through shared intellectual and ethical DH pursuits.

We offer 4 book talks this Spring– opportunities to hear scholars speak about their ideas and their experiences putting these ideas into published form, opportunities to ask questions and bond as a community around the sharing of new research. And we’re launching two new workshop mini-series: one on critical data and the other on digital pedagogy.

Spring 2021 Virtual Programs

February 2021

  • Friday, 2/19: 1pm-2pm.DH Workshop: Ethical Data Science: Getting Data. In the first part of this two-part workshop, we’ll cover popular data repositories, how to scrape data from websites like Twitter, and critical issues around data acquisition like representation, quality, and transparency. Instructor: Brienne Hayes. Register for Zoom link.
  • Friday, 2/26: 1pm-2pm. DH Workshop: Ethical Data Science: Using Data. In the second part of this two-part workshop, we’ll discuss what to do with data, including low-to-no code machine learning tools, data visualization, and how to use these tools in a way that represents data in a critical context. Instructor: Brienne Hayes. Register for Zoom link.

March 2021

April 2021

  • Friday, 4/9: 1pm-2pm. DH Workshop: Introduction to Digital Pedagogy. Learn about different approaches to incorporating a digital tool or assignment into your classes. The workshop will cover aligning digital assignments with learning outcomes, scaffolding and scaling assignments, and assessing student work. Whether you’re new to DH instruction or a pro, this workshop can help you prepare for digitally-inflected pedagogy in the coming semesters. Instructor: Dr. Pam Lach. Register for Zoom link.
  • Thursday, 4/22: 10:30am-12:00pm. Digital Shakespeares Series: “Digital Theater: Decolonizing Shakespeare in South African Schools,” a talk by Gina Bloom (UC Davis) with Lauren Bates (Vista Nova High School and Educasions, Cape Town). Co-sponsored by the SDSU Center for the Study of Media and Performance. This talk explores how the mixed reality game Play the Knave (which was developed at UC Davis) is being used to decolonize Shakespeare in South African high schools. South Africa has been called the “most unequal country on the planet” and these inequalities are strikingly evident in the secondary school system. Bloom and Bates’s project engages South African high school students in digitally-mediated Shakespeare performance to tackle one of the major symptoms of inequality in South Africa: violence. This paper discusses a curriculum the authors developed for using Play the Knave’s gaming technology to teach the Shakespeare plays most often assigned in high schools—the violent tragedies Othello, Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, andMacbeth—connecting these to South African experiences and history. The curriculum aims to address the psychological and emotional impact of violence on the country’s youth, contributing to sustained peace. Register for Zoom link.
  • Friday, 4/23: 1pm-2pm. DH Workshop: Digital Pedagogy Assignment Design. In this hands-on workshop, participants will work to develop a digital assignment, whether converting an existing assignment or designing a new one. Whether you’re new to DH instruction or a pro, this workshop can help you prepare for digitally-inflected pedagogy in the coming semesters. Instructor: Dr. Pam Lach. Register for Zoom link.

May 2021

  • Pop-up mini virtual showcase(s) – We’ll be inviting faculty to host mini-showcases to highlight the digital work created during the pandemic. Details forthcoming…

Fall 2020

Fall 2020 WorkshopsFall 2020 LecturesTalking #BrownTV book talkBrooks book talk

Fall 2020 Virtual Programs

Missed our Fall 2020 virtual programs? Check out our event recordings below:

September 2020

October 2020

  • Monday 10/19: 12pm-1:30pm Talking #BrownTV: a book talk & conversation with the authors– Frederick Luis Aldama (Ohio State) and Bill Nericcio (English and Comparative Literature & MALAS) about race and media. Watch the recording.

November 2020

  • Tuesday 11/17: 1pm-2pm  Thinking Critically with ClioVis. ClioVis: Interactive Digital Timeline Software combines the best features of digital timeline, mind-mapping, and presentation software to help your students make analytical connections. Designed by UT-Austin history professor Dr. Erika Bsumek, ClioVis enables students to synthesize information into interconnected timelines (or, for science classes, pathways). This tutorial will go over how ClioVis works and how you can use it in your classes. No recording available.

ClioVia software talk


Spring 2020

In response to the extended closure due to COVID-19, the Digital Humanities Initiative and Center shifted to all- virtual programming. We continued to provide opportunities for faculty and students to connect and learn together, and we shifted our focus to collective adjustment to teaching, learning, and engaging in researching in virtual spaces.

More information is available at https://teachdh.sdsu.edu/programming.

Spring 2019

David Ciccoricco Electronic Literature Comp. 2019DH SHowcase 2019
Click the images to view the larger pdf file

Spring 2019

RTI Workshop
2/71:00 - 3:00
For the RTI workshop: Reflectance Transformation Imaging (RTI), also known as Polynomial Texture Mapping, is a type of computational photography can be used to create a manipulative image that captures the effects of light on the topography of an object. These RTI products allow for users to move their mouse cursor around an object, which changes the light effects as if the object is being moved around. Furthermore, RTI allows for enhancement of the digital files through filters and these filters have revealed new details and information about ancient objects. RTI emerged in the early 2000's and since then has gained a wide variety of applications. Most recently, scholars have been applying this technique to the study of worn coins, manufacturing techniques on pottery, and revealing details of faded writing in medieval manuscripts. RTI files can be sent to scholars around the world, used in interactive museum exhibits, or even added as websites. For more information, check out Cultural Heritage Imaging.

Digital Humanities Center - LA 61 (Bottom of Library Dome)

3D Animation Workshop Series
2/8 - 3/29, Fridays, 1:00 - 3:00
Learn to Create 3D Computer Generated Graphics for Animation, Video Games, and Virtual Reality
Instructed by Sam Shpigelman

The Digital Humanities at SDSU, in partnership with the School of Theatre, Television, and Film, presents the 3D Animation Workshop 8-week Series, ideal for students interested in learning to create animation, game graphics, and virtual reality. Lessons can be applied to entertainment, education, research, and more. Computers with Maya and Unity are available to use at the workshops. No prior experience or skills necessary.

Students will learn how to construct 3D computer generated models, compile basic 3D scenes inside a game engine, work with real time lights and effects, and conform game scenes and visualize them inside Virtual Reality environments.

The final project will be a basic 3D computer generated Virtual Reality scene.

Learn by creating in this guided hands-on series. Space is limited. Students must register for free here: tinyurl.com/3d-workshop-series

Digital Humanities Center - LA 61 (Bottom of Library Dome)

Twitter Tools Workshop
2/13 1:00 - 2:30 Track: DH Tools

Twitter supplies a pipeline into what people are talking about, and how they talk about it. This workshop teaches you to search for and collect Twitter data from your browser or with just a little bit of coding. We'll look at a few case studies, including mapping American dialects and investigating subtle gender biases in text, to see how these methods can be used to investigate questions within the Digital Humanities.

Free and open to all and all skill levels!

Digital Humanities Center - LA 61 (Bottom of Library Dome)

Twine 2.0 Workshop
2/14 1:00 - 2:30 Track: DH Tools, CW

Have you ever wondered how to build a “choose your own adventure” game? Do you like telling stories that offer variable endings and choices with consequence? Do you have little-to-no (or lots!) of experience coding?

Then come join our Twine Workshop 2.0!

Twine is an interactive storytelling medium that allows everyone to become a game-designer in just a few hours time. Our workshop, a continuation of those offered in the Fall of 2018, offers skills for new and experienced users alike, with a refresher course on the basics before getting into some of the more complicated commands.

Be sure not to miss this excellent opportunity to create your own Electronic Literature!

Free and open to all and all skill levels!

Digital Humanities Center - LA 61 (Bottom of Library Dome)

Faculty Research Group
2/25 12:30 - 1:30
The faculty research group is a reading group of DH@SDSU that serves as the central hub for building a research community around topic and questions related to Digital Humanities. Faculty from across the colleges meet (over lunch!) to discuss readings in the field of digital humanities. In the process, we are creating a cohort of research faculty interested in exploring how traditional humanities matter in and for our digital world.

In February we are reading Tara McPherson's Feminist in a Software Lab: Design + Difference (Harvard UP, 2018). For over a dozen years, the Vectors Lab has experimented with digital scholarship through its online publication, Vectors, and through Scalar, a multimedia authoring platform. The history of this software lab intersects a much longer tale about computation in the humanities, as well as tensions about the role of theory in related projects.

Tara McPherson considers debates around the role of cultural theory within the digital humanities and addresses Gary Hall’s claim that the goals of critical theory and of quantitative or computational analysis may be irreconcilable (or at the very least require “far more time and care”). She then asks what it might mean to design—from conception—digital tools and applications that emerge from contextual concerns of cultural theory and, in particular, from a feminist concern for difference. This path leads back to the Vectors Lab and its ongoing efforts at the intersection of theory and praxis.

Digital Humanities Center - LA 61 (Bottom of Library Dome)

House of Leaves Reading Group
3/4 1:00 - 2:00

Come discuss Mark Danielewski's seminal work House of Leaves (Pantheon 2000) before he visits SDSU on March 13. Moderated by Prof. Jessica Pressman, Department of English and Comparative Literature.

Please RSVP at tinyurl.com/mzd-reading-group
Maximum of 20 participants

Love Library (First Floor): Edward E. Marsh Golden Age Of Science Fiction Reading Room


KNIT Workshop
3/6 1:00 - 2:30
Introducing KNIT: An academic digital commons for website building, networking, teaching, and public research projects

Digital publishing and networking are increasingly important skills for the 21st century academic, enabling students and researchers to collaboratively produce and disseminate knowledge in powerful new ways. This workshop will introduce KNIT, an academic digital commons for San Diego, that provides networking, website building, discussion groups, and other digital tools for fostering academic collaboration, critical digital literacy, and public engagement. Founded at UC San Diego using the open source software Commons in a Box, KNIT currently has more than 1,700 members at UC San Diego, San Diego State University, San Diego City College, Miramar College, and Mesa College. The first half of this workshop will give an overview of exciting forms of networked research and teaching practices on KNIT and in academics more broadly and consider the ethical issues involved in using different tools. We will also discuss how KNIT is being used to foster community and public engagement across San Diego’s diverse institutions of higher education. The second half of this workshop will walk participants through building their own personal WordPress website on KNIT and also guide participants through the platform’s other digital features. The workshop will end with a discussion of additional desired features and community practices that would help strengthen our local academic communities. Participants should bring their laptop to participate in the hands-on part of the workshop.

Digital Humanities Center - LA 61 (Bottom of Library Dome)

Mark Z. Danielewski
3/13 2:00 - 3:30
Award-winning author Mark Z. Danielewski comes to San Diego State this Spring as part of the programming for the Library's exhibit Death of the Death of the Novel: the Larry McCaffery Archive. Danielewski is the author of the bestselling novel House of Leaves, National Book Award finalist Only Revolutions, and the novella The Fifty Year Sword.

With Pantheon's release of the five volumes of The Familiar, the New York Times declared Danielewski "America's foremost literary Magus." He is the subject of many scholarly books and articles, including Joe Bray and Alison Gibbons's Mark Z. Danielewski and Sascha Pohlmann's Revolutionary Leaves: The Fiction of Mark Z. Danielewski.

His books have been translated into multiple languages.

For more information, contact Prof. Jessica Pressman: jpressman@sdsu.edu, Amanda Lanthorne alanthorne@sdsu.edu.

Digital Humanities Center - LA 61 (Bottom of Library Dome)

Photogrammetry Workshop
3/19 1:00 - 3:00
For the photogrammetry workshop: Photogrammetry is a type of computational photography that is used to create three-dimensional models of objects. Photogrammetry is an incredibly useful technique that produces highly accurate models using standard DSLR cameras, scales, and powerful advanced software (for archival purposes, Agisoft Photoscan Pro is recommended, but there are many other more freely software options such as SketchUp or Blender). Once created, these models can be exported as movie files, 3D PDFs, or even 3D printed, which allows the models to be shared widely. At times, photogrammetry models have even been used to re-create objects that have been destroyed, such as the gate at Palmyra, or as a means of archiving objects. Many models from museums are available on sketchfab.com, such as the Rosetta Stone. These models allow viewers to interact with objects, turn them around and even upside down. For more information, check out Cultural Heritage Imaging.

Digital Humanities Center - LA 61 (Bottom of Library Dome)

David Ciccoricco
3/21 4:00 - 5:00
“Simulation and the Posthumanities”

David Ciccoricco (Associate Professor in English and Linguistics, University of Otago in Dunedin, New Zealand) will speak on the tangled relationship between mental simulations and digital simulations.

Dr. Ciccoricco’s research focuses on literary and narrative theory, with an emphasis on emergent forms of digital literature as well as digital culture and posthumanism more generally. He is the author of Reading Network Fiction (2007), a book on pre-Web and Web-based digital fiction, and Refiguring Minds in Narrative Media (2015), which is focused on cognitive approaches to narrative and literary theory in print novels, digital narratives, and story-driven videogames.

Digital Humanities Center - LA 61 (Bottom of Library Dome)

Faculty Research Group
4/15 12:30 - 1:30

Professor Amira Jarmakani (Women's Studies) will lead this discussion.

Following up on our last conversation of Tara McPherson's Feminist a Software Lab (Harvard 2018), we will discuss Queer OS using an article by Kara Keeling (Associate Professor in the Department of Cinema and Media Studies at the University of Chicago) titled "User's Manual" (Cinema Journal, 2014), which inspired the moniker #queeros and became the subject of an article in the recent Debates in Digital Humanities (2016).

We plan to read and discuss 1) Keeling's article, "User Manual" (PDF attached) and 2) the Debates in Digital Humanities (2016) essay inspired by it.

Please RSVP at digitalhumanities@sdsu.edu

Digital Humanities Center - LA 61 (Bottom of Library Dome)

Knightlab Workshop
4/17 3:30-5:00 Track: DH Tools
This workshop will be hands-on tutorial with two Knightlab Visualization Tools: TimelineJS for making interactive timelines, and StoryMapJS for making interactive maps.

Digital Humanities Center - LA 61 (Bottom of Library Dome)

DH Annual Spring Showcase + E-lit Competition
5/10 10:00 - 12:00 Track: RD
The Digital Humanities Showcase is the celebratory exhibition of digital work at SDSU. Featuring a digital poster session, wherein creators discuss their work, as well as exhibitions and demos, the DH Showcase displays the wide diversity of creative-critical digital work happening across our campus.

Digital Humanities projects related to scholarship and/or pedagogy are welcome. Projects may be stand-alone works, components of broader projects, works-in-progress still in draft form, or works created in previous semesters. They may be fully digital, or hybrid digital-analog.

Click here to submit an application.

Digital Humanities Center - LA 61 (Bottom of Library Dome)

RTI Workshop  3D Animation Workshop Series Twitter Tools WorkshopMark Z Danielewski Save the Date

Fall 2018

Lightning TalksFirst they came for Craigslist: Free speech, censorship, and online sex work in the Trump era. Chelsea ReynoldsAfter-School Electronic Literature ShowcaseMeet, Greet, Collaboreat
Click the images to view the larger pdf file

Fall 2018

Faculty Research Group:
Please save the following dates for discussion with colleagues about recently published scholarship in digital humanities and media studies. For fall semester, we will meet on the first Tuesday of each month from 12:30-1:30pm in the Digital Humanities Center (Love Library, 61). Lunch will be served.

10/2, 12:30-1:30pm
11/6, 12:30-1:30pm
12/4, 12:30-1:30pm


SEPTEMBER

9/13 Twine Workshop @ 1-2 pm

9/14 Twine Workshop @ 1-2 pm

9/26 Digital Storytelling through Photography: Peggy Peattie’s “Tales of the Street San Diego” - 11am-12pm
Digital Humanities Center, LA 61 (bottom of the Dome)

Join DH@SDSU and the School of Journalism and Media Studies for a lecture by Peggy Peattie, an award-winning journalist with 35 years of visual storytelling in the documentary tradition, with a concentration on social and environmental justice. Peattie’s images have been published in several book and magazines including Time, Newsweek, People, Sports Illustrated and Reportage, to name a few. Peattie’s lecture will center on her website Tales of the Street SD. The website is about our shared humanity. Peattie has been telling the stories of America's homeless individuals for more than 30 years, 19 of them in San Diego. Peattie will share her experience photographing the “residentially challenged” people among us and her process of curating the photos on her website. Join us as she takes us on a journey of storytelling through the digital humanities.

9/27 DH@SDSU Kickoff Talk: Liz Losh: "Hashtag Histories" - 4pm
Celebration and criticism of so-called “hashtag activism” rarely addresses the hashtag itself as an artifact or tries to locate its place in the history of information design. Although the story of the hashtag tends to be associated with Silicon Valley invention myths or power users like celebrities, the hashtag is actually the result of accreted sets of practices and invisible labor involving negotiating competing claims about identity, ownership, and naming conventions. This talk discusses how the #hashtag actually exists in two pieces, with two separate but related design histories. The # is a special kind of character used to facilitate non-human machine-to-machine communication that has a prehistory in teletype machines, touch-tone telephones, and IRC chat. The letters after the # also are part of a bigger narrative: the human-to-human story of metadata. The history of technological adoption and adaptation by social movements and hashtag feminism in particular offers a new way to think about theories of political performance and assembly. Case studies for this talk come from the United States, Ukraine, India, and Singapore.

OCTOBER

10/2 DH Faculty Research Group 12:30-1:30

10/25 DH@SDSU Faculty Research Lightning Talks w/ new faculty 4:00-5:30 pm:
-Angel David Nieves, Associate Professor, History: "Mapping Queer Victims of Human Rights Violations in 1980s South Africa: Theories and Practice"
-Danielle Bennett, Postdoctoral Fellow, Classics and Humanities: “The Use of Computational Photography to Examine Greek Vase-Painting”
-Daniel Reinholz, Assistant Professor, Mathematics and Statistics: “Equity, analytics, and educational change: Introducing the EQUIP observation tool”
-Angel Daniel Matos, Assistant Professor, English & Comparative Literature
-Sureshi M. Jayawardene, Assistant Professor, Africana Studies

10/29 First they came for Craigslist: Free speech, censorship, and online sex work in the Trump era. Chelsea Reynolds - 11am-12pm


NOVEMBER

11/6 DH Faculty Research Group 12:30-1:30

11/7 After-School Electronic Literature Showcase and ARC Kickoff Event 4:30 -6pm Digital Humanities Center - LA 61
SDSU’s Digital Humanities Initiative partnered with arc, a California-based company focused on empowering youth, to create an after-school electronic literature program for local high school students. Join us as these students visit SDSU to celebrate the conclusion of the program, discuss their experiences, and showcase their work.

11/13 DH Student Interdisciplinary Networking Event: Meet, Greet, Collaboreat 1-3pm
Have an idea for a (digital) project but need other students to help make it happen? Undergrad and graduate students from all departments (programmers, visual artists, filmmakers, writers, etc.) are invited to gather and network. The event will focus on facilitating creative and academic partnerships. Let's discover how we can work together!

11/28 #AsYouAre: Digital Advocacy & LGBTQ Youth with Nathian Shae Rodriguez 11-12

DECEMBER

12/4 DH Faculty Research Group 12:30-1:30

12/5 DH Mini Showcase: ENGL562 + HIST 496A

12/10 DH Mini Showcase: ENGL562 + HIST 496A
Fall 2018 EventsTwine Workshop Fall 2018Digital Storytelling through Photography: Peggy Peattie’s “Tales of the Street San Diego” Liz Losh: "Hashtag Histories"
Click the images to view the larger pdf file

Spring 2018

Chidren's Literature Competition 2018Electronic Literature Competition 2018MARTIN COOPER 
INVENTOR OF THE MOBILE PHONEDigital Humanities Showcase and DH Center Grand Opening

February 5, March 5, April 2, May 7: DH Faculty Research Group
12 – 1 in the Digital Humanities Center (LA 61)

The DH Faculty Research Group is a monthly discussion group, wherein we read and discuss recent scholarship in the field of digital humanities over a yummy lunch. Feel free to come to any and all meetings, and invite your colleagues and top graduate students.

For our first meeting, we will continue our discussion of DH Infrastructure, started last semester with Patrik Svensson's talk. We will read excerpts from Signal Traffic: Critical Studies of Media Infrastructure, eds. Lisa Parks and Nicole Starosielski (University of Illinois Press, 2015). The text is available as an e-book from our library.

"Introduction" by Lisa Parks and Nicole Starosielski (1-27)==*this is the primary text for discussion*
Chapter 2: "Fixed Flow: Undersea Cables as Media Infrastructure" by Nicole Starosielski (53-70)
Chapter 3: "'Where the Internet Lives': Data Centers a Cloud Infrastructure" by Jennifer Holt and Patrick Vonderau (71-93)

February 15th: Digital Children's Literature, a talk by writer and scholar Mark C. Marino (USC)
3:30 – 4:30 in the Digital Humanities Center (LA 61)

Marino is a professor of Writing at USC and author, with his two kids, of the digital interactive children's story Mrs. Wobbles and the Tangerine House. Marino will discuss this work as well as the emerging international field of born-digital children's literature, based on his work curating an exhibition for the Electronic Literature Organization in Porto, Portugal (June 2017). This talk is sponsored by SDSU's Common Experience: Imagination.

March 14th: Twine Workshop
12:30-2pm, Digital Humanities Center, LA 61

Led by Kristin Herr (SDSU class of 2018)

What is Twine?
Twine is a simple-to­use web-based platform for writing electronic literature & videogames.

How easy is Twine?
So easy that someone coding experience will be able to make a game in an hour

What to bring?
Bring a laptop.

E-Lit Comp
If you are interested in the electronic literature competition, don't miss this workshop!

Chidren's Literature Competition 2018

Winning Works Displayed at the Digital Humanities Showcase on April 27
$250 Cash prize

SUBMISSIONS DUE APRIL 15th BY MIDNIGHT
Submit a link to your best born-digital work to jpressman@sdsu.edu

Electronic Literature Competition 2018

Winning work will be displayed during the Digital Humanities Showcase on April 27
$250 Cash prize for the Best Creative work & best scholarly essay

SUBMISSIONS DUE APRIL 15th BY MIDNIGHT
Questions/Submit to jpressman@sdsu.edu

April 17th: 45 Years of Cell Phones: Reflections on Social Impact, with Martin Cooper
4:00 - 5:00 at Digital Humanities Center. LA 61

The very first cell phone call was made on April 3, 1973 by Martin Cooper. While working for Motorola, he led the team that developed the innovative technology. There were earlier types of mobile phones, though Cooper's invention was the first to utilize "cellular technology;· and it began the mobile revolution that has transformed almost every aspect of modern society. In 2007, Time magazine named him one of the top 100 inventors in history.

Now, more than four decades after his famed phone call, Martin Cooper comes to SDSU to reflect on the social impact of the cell phone. Some of these changes were anticipated, though as with most technologies, some of the effects were not. Cooper will discuss the technology's influence on social interactions, politics, along with his thoughts on the persistence of the digital divide. New media technologies can have dramatic effects, though the use of these technologies is not evenly distributed to all segments of society.

Event presented by Digital Humanities and the School of Journalism & Media Studies.

April 27th: Digital Humanities Showcase and DH Center Grand Opening
10am to 2pm (ribbon-cutting at 10:30am) at Digital Humanities Center, LA 61

Come See How SDSU Students and Faculty Do Digital
Questions? Email plach@sdsu.edu

SDSU Digital Humanities Annual Showcase Entry Form

Digital Children's Literature, a talk by writer and scholar Mark C. MarinoTwine Workshop 2018

Fall 2017

Demoscene, or Decentering Digital Media Conversation with Pioneer of Electronic Literature Marjorie Luesebrink/M.D. CoverleyWhy Should Humanists Care About InfrastructureDigital Humanities@ SDSU: Welcome Back
Click the images to view the larger pdf file

September 12: Demoscene, or Decentering Digital Media
3:30-4:30 in Love Library (LL) 430

Piotr Marecki (Jagiellonian University, Krakow, Poland).

Digital media, which are today dominant in social communication, serve also different types of creative expression (video games, new media art, electronic literature, demoscene). It is trivial to say that digital media are dominated by the English language. Both most recognized theoretical texts as well as canonical works are in the English language. And it is the West that is treated as dominant in this area. However, only over the past few years have we seen a new trend emerging, one which aims to discover what has happened in areas that the center has meaningfully called the “end (s)”. Particularly interesting are the perspectives and phenomena that have developed without influence or inspiration from the center in question (for example, communist countries beyond the Iron Curtain or the non-Latin languages, like Arabic or Chinese).

There is no strong scientific recognition of the distinctiveness of the approach to digital media in eastern countries. Both a lack of access to hardware and legal software under communism, as well as exclusion of the peripheries after the transformation gave rise to a number of local phenomena as cloning hardware, creating independent software, and widespread creative programming. The best proof of this is the demoscene – an underground subculture which developed in Europe (also in Central and Eastern Europe), with no comparable phenomena in other areas of the world.

October 19: Conversation with Pioneer of Electronic Literature Marjorie Luesebrink/M.D. Coverley
11 - 12:15 in EBA 254

Luesebrink has published multiple hypertext novels, collections of short stories, poetry, interviews, and articles on electronic literature. Marjorie Luesebrink is a founding board member and past president of the Electronic Literature Organization.

November 8: Why Should Humanists Care About Infrastructure
4:00-5:30 in Love Library (LL) 431

Patrik Svensson (Umeå University, Sweden and UCLA)

Patrik Svensson is Professor of Humanities and Information Technology at Umeå University and Visiting Professor of Digital Humanities at UCLA. Svensson is the former Director of HUMlab (2000-2014). He spent the academic year of 2015-2016 as a a Distinguished Visiting Fellow/Visiting Professor at the Graduate Center, City University New York.

Recent publications include Big Digital Humanities (University of Michigan Press, 2016), Between Humanities and the Digital (co-edited with David Theo Goldberg, MIT Press, 2015) and Close Reading PowerPoint (on line publication). He consults on building spaces, institutions and infrastructure.

November 15: Digital Humanities@ SDSU: Welcome Back
2 - 3pm Digital Humanities Center - LA 61

  • Learn about DH and how it connects disciplines and departments
  • See the new DH Center and how it can benefit you
  • Meet the new DH Core Faculty I Join the DH@SDSU community!

Spring 2017

electronic lit @SDSUDH Scholarship at SDSUComputational PoetrySpring Showcase 2017
Click the images to view the larger pdf file

January 23: Daniel Landou's Time-Body Study
2-3:30, LL430
Time-Body Study is a performative experiment created by Israeli media artist and researcher Daniel Landau exploring the boundaries of body, identity, and self using virtual reality technology. This live event includes a lecture and demonstration of an experiment where a participant wearing a virtual reality head-mounted display (HMD) is re-embodied in the body of a 7, 40 and 80 year old person. Presented in partnership with SDSU’s Jewish Studies Program.

View the event photos on our Facebook page.

February 7: Lecture by UCSD Distinguished Professor of Literature, Dr. Seth Lerer on “Children's Literature and the Arts of the Book: Reflections in a Digital Age”
UCSD Distinguished Professor of Literature Seth Lerer visits to speak about book history, children's literature, and the book in the digital age.
Year of the Book series
4 pm, LL 430


February 18, 25, 26: Digital Humanities is a Proud Sponsor of Big Data Hackathon
Peterson Gym - Room 153
The Digital Humanities Initiative is co-sponsoring the Big Data Hackathon, whose theme this year is Public Health. This event is free and everyone is welcome to participate. Students, engineers, developers, programmers, journalistics, scientists, public officials, and community members are just a few people who may find this Big Data event of interest. Food and beverages will be provided.


February 27: DH Research Discussion

12 - 1 p.m., LL 430
Join us for a discussion on "In the Shadows of the Digital Humanities," a 2014 special issue of differences: A Journal of Feminist Cultural Studies, edited by Ellen Rooney and Elizabeth Weed. The journal is freely available through our library catalog. Download the special issue here.


March 22: Twine Workshop and Lecture with Porpentine Heartscape
3:45-5pm, LARC Lab, Storm Hall 204 (Workshop) 7-8pm, Love Library 430 (Lecture)
Join us in welcoming acclaimed video game designer Porpentine, whose work investigates transgender identity, sexuality, and trauma.
Everyone is welcome, but space for the workshop is limited.
Hosted by Digital Humanities Collaborative.


March 22: DIY Publishing panel with Dr. Adam Hammond and Jenny Minniti-Shippey, MFA, of SDSU’s Dept. of English, and special guest, April Peveteaux, author of blog-turned-book Gluten is my Bitch (Stewart, Tabori and Chang, 2013).

Year of the Book series
2pm, LL 430


April 10: DH Scholarship at SDSU

12 - 1 p.m., LL 430
Please join us for short talks given by two our new faculty members, Nathian Rodriguez (JMS) and Bridget Gilman (Art History).


April 19: Computational Poetry with

4-5:30, Love Library 430
Join us in welcoming Israeli poet, software developer, and new media artist Eran Hadas, who will discuss his work of poetry in the age of computation, as well as his collaborative projects including a headset that generates poems from EEG brain waves, and a documentarian robot that interviews people about what it means to be human.
Presented in partnership with the Jewish Studies Program.


April 28: Deadline for submissions for SDSU Student Electronic Literature Competition 2017
Cash prize of $250! All student submissions of born-digital literature of all genres and styles are welcome.


May 5: DH Spring Showcase
11am-1pm, Library Media Center
We are now accepting proposals for our DH Spring Showcase. DH projects related to scholarship and/or pedagogy are welcome as standalone projects or components of larger, works-in-progress. Projects may be fully digital or hybrid digital-analog. The showcase will feature a poster session, digital displays, and demos of SDSU DH work.

SDSU students, faculty, and staff are invited to submit and showcase their digital projects and works-in-progress. Submit a proposal using our easy, streamlined process here!

Fall 2016

Daniel LandauChildren's Lit and the Arts of the BookTwine Workshop and Lecture with Porpentine HeartscapeDIY Publishing
Click the images to view the larger pdf file

Now through Spring 2017: Exhibit Bookish: or, A Compendium of Student Work in the Book Arts at San Diego State University
On display in the Love Library Donor Hall, first floor.
Brought to you by Special Collections & University Archives, Library & Information Access.


December 6: Talk: Jessica Pressman (Department of English and Comparative Literature, SDSU) on “Bookishness: On Fetishizing the Book in the Age of its Disappearance(Year of the Book series)
4pm, LL 430


December 12: DH Working Group - Digital Humanities Lab Design Workshop, Part I
12 - 1 pm, LL 430
Join us as we begin designing the new Digital Humanities Lab space we'll be creating in the Library. We’ll use this working group meeting to identify the types of user groups and core activities we envision this space supporting. Through this exercise we will begin to develop and articulate a shared vision for the future space. This will be the first of several working group sessions dedicated to designing our DH space. In preparation, please think about your own DH practice, whether current or aspirational.

Can’t make it? Please send your ideas to Pam Lach (plach@sdsu.edu).


December 15: Pop-Up Showcase
2–4 pm, Love Library, Media Center

Student Showcase - The Book as Medium (Year of the Book series)

A curated exhibit of creative research and projects that explore the book in concept and/or form. Call for entries open until Nov. 30th. Email Cathy Nguyen at cathynguyen@sandiego.edu or Riley Wilson at riley.wilson96@yahoo.com for more information.

DH Fall Showcase
An exhibit, concurrent with the Student Showcase—Book as Medium, that aims to display the wonderful diversity of creative-critical work happening in digital humanities across our campus. Call for proposals open until November 21. Questions and proposals should be directed to Pam Lach at plach@sdsu.edu.

View the event photos on our Facebook page. | View full program. (.pdf)

November 29: Digital Humanities Collaborative Lab Design Workshop
4-5:30pm, LL430
Students from across departments should join us and contribute their ideas for the design of the new Digital Humanities Lab space in the Library. During this brainstorming session students will work together alongside DH librarian Pam Lach to develop and articulate a shared vision for the future space.

If you can't make it but would like to contribute, please send your ideas to Pam Lach (plach@sdsu.edu).

November 14: DH Working Group Workshop,"Digital Historiography and Performance" with Professor Sarah Bay-Cheng (Theater and Dance, Bowdoin College), who will share forthcoming research.
Sponsored by Theater Film & TV
12:30 pm, Love Library, room 431
Light lunch provided. Please RSVP: digitalhumanities@sdsu.edu

Student Workshop

Computer Technologies have impacted nearly every area of history and historiography. This seminar invites students to take stock of these changes in their own work. What does it mean to "do" performance history digitally? How have digital technologies shaped contemporary historiography? As theater and dance makers and artists of all types, how does one create work in light of the digital record?
3:30-5:30, SDSU LARC PC Lab, Storm Hall, Room 204
Seating is limited. Reserve your seat here!


September 19: DH Welcome Back/Working Group
Meet Area of Excellence new faculty
12 - 1 p.m., LL 430


October 4: "What is Digital Humanities?: A Conversation" (Organized by the Digital Humanities Collaborative, a recognized student group)
4 - 5:30pm, LL 430
A student-driven Q&A session with DH faculty Jessica Pressman and Adam Hammond (English & Comp. Lit), Nathian Rodriguez (JMS), and Pam Lach (Library). A great opportunity for students to meet one another and network, as well as forecast DHC plans for the 2016-2017 school year!


October 10: DH Working Group

12 - 1:30 p.m., LL 430
Faculty lightning talks on digital humanities-related research.


October 11: Bookmaking Workshop with Michele Burgess (Year of the Book series)
11 - 1 p.m., A 453
Only 25 seats available—first come, first serve. RSVP early to aculbertson@sdsu.edu.


October 21: SD|DH Convergence: Learning through Digital Humanities @ USD

This one-day event will focus on Digital Humanities Learning for learners of all levels-- faculty, graduate students, undergraduates, high school teachers and students-- as we gather to share best practices and build ties between institutions. This event will highlight a variety of innovative DH approaches to pedagogy, students' DH work in classes and in undergraduate research activities, and faculty DH projects that engage students meaningfully in digital research. Sessions will include faculty and student presentations and workshop sessions on key DH tools (like Scalar). Our keynote speaker will be Prof. Alan Christy (History, UC Santa Cruz), who will discuss his work with students on The Gail Project, a large-scale long-term DH project on post-WWII Okinawa.

The SD|DH Showcase is free and open to students, faculty, and the public, and people are welcome to come for all or part of the day. Please register so we know how much space we will need and how much food to order. (Breakfast, lunch, and break snacks will be provided.)

The SD|DH Showcase builds upon the foundation established during 2015-16 by the NEH-sponsored Digital Humanities Pedagogy workshops (held at SDSU and organized by Co-PIs Professors Jessica Pressman and Joanna Brooks) to further foster our regional collaborative and implement digital pedagogy throughout San Diego.

What is digital humanities?Learning through Digital HumanitiesSarah Bay-ChengStudent Lab Design Workshop
Click the images to view the larger pdf file

Spring 2016

The Future of Humanties in the Digital AgeElectronic Literature ReadingBINACOM 2016Maker Scholar Digital Literacies Speaker - Mark Marino
Click the images to view the larger pdf file

January 26 @6pm- Guest Lecture “The Future of the Humanities in a Digital Age”
The 22nd Annual Adams Lecture in the Humanities
Location: Conrad Prebys Aztec Student Union, Montezuma Hall

Presenters: Dr. Vint Cerf, Vice President and Internet Evangelist, Google and Dr. Bruce Cole, Senior Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C. and Former Chair of the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH)

Free and open to the public, but advanced registration is required.
More information and registration


February 8 @12:30-1:30 - Faculty Research Group Meeting
We are reading The Modern Language Association (MLA), Literary Studies in the Digital Age: An Evolving Anthology.


February 17 @7pm - Electronic Literature Reading Event

Location: Love Library 430

Augmented-Reality Storytelling
Caitlin Fisher, Canada Research Chair in Digital Culture (York University, Toronto)

February 26 - UCLA's The Digital Humanities Infrastructure Symposium
UCLA Center for Digital Humanities
Jessica Pressman will speak on the SDSU Initiative
More information


February 29: Deadline for CFP for 19th Annual Binational Communication (BINACOM) Conference “Digital Communication: Transformations, Innovations and New Directions” which will be held @ SDSU April 22-24.
The Binational Association brings together communication educators and students from the US/Mexico border region. The mission of BINACOM is to facilitate ethical communication and demystify the stereotypes associated with the border. The primary activity of BINACOM is to organize a biennial “encounter,” at which communication students and educators from across the region present and discuss their work.


March 3 @2:30pm - Twine Workshop
LARC Lab (Storm Hall, 204)
Prof. Adam Hammond (English)
More information


March 7 @12:30-1:30pm - Faculty Research Group Meeting


March 24 @12:30pm - Workshop on Making Electronic Literature

Location: LARC lab
Led by Professor Mark C. Marino (Writing, USC)

Open to all students!

Learn how to make digital literature by a practitioner and scholar in the field. Get prepared to enter SDSU's first-ever student competition for electronic literature (April 2016) with a cash prize of $250!


March 24
@ 4-5:30pm - Scalar Workshop
Location: AH 4176

Led by Professor Mark C. Marino (Writing, USC) More information at http:// scalar.usc.edu
View the event flyer (.pdf)


April - Electronic Literature Student Competition

SDSU's first-ever student competition for electronic literature with a cash prize of $250
Deadline Extended! Submit by Friday, 4/29 @ midnight.


April 1 and 2 - Digital Humanities and Foreign Language Learning Conference

The Southwestern Alliance for Language Learning Technology (SWALLT) will hold its conference at SDSU's Language Acquisition Resource Center. More information at: https://larc.sdsu.edu/swallt/our-conferences


April 11 @12:30-1:30pm - Faculty Research Group Meeting


April 22-24 19th Annual Binational Communication (BINACOM) Conference
Location: SDSU
Theme: "Digital Communication: Transformations, Innovations and New Directions"

The Binational Association brings together communication educators and students from the US/Mexico border region. The mission of BINACOM is to

facilitate ethical communication and demystify the stereotypes associated with the border. The primary activity of BINACOM is to organize a biennial “encounter,” at which communication students and educators from across the region present and discuss their work.


May 21 - NEH Regional Workshop in Digital Pedagogy

Fall 2015

BookishYear of the BookThe Book as MediumPop-Up Showcase
Click the images to view the larger pdf file

October 1 @11am - Salvador Plascencia
Author of the experimental novel The People of Paper
Location GMCS 333


October 3 - Big Data Hackathon

More information


October 5 @12pm - Faculty Research Group Meeting

Location AL 266

Topic: "Readings from Between Digital and Humanities, edited by Patrik Svensson and David Theo Goldberg (MIT Press, 2015):

  • Todd Presner’s “Critical Theory and the Mangle of Digital Humanities”
  • Zephyr Frank’s “Spatial History as Scholarly Practice”
  • N. Katherine Hayles's Final Commentary: A Provocation


October 6 @3pm - Digital Humanities and Global Diversity Area of Excellence Launch Event

Location: Love Library 430


October 23-24 - NEH Regional Workshop in Digital Pedagogy

Supported by a Level I start-up grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities Office of Digital Humanities, “Building and Strengthening Digital Humanities Through a Regional Network” gathers 30 faculty members from campuses across our region to work together to improve digital pedagogy for our diverse student populations and faculty needs.


November 9@ 12pm-1pm - Faculty Research Group Meeting
Location: AL 266

Topic: Matt Jockers’s Macroanalysis: Digital Methods and Literary History (University of Illinois Press, 2013), Chapter 1, "Foundation"


November 18, 2015@8:00 am - Mobile Digital Storytelling Workshop
Workshop Presenter: Noah Geisel, 2013 ACTFL Teacher of the Year

Location: LARC Computer Lab, Storm Hall 204
Price: $70.00 Early Bird (Before 10/16), $80.00 Regular (deadline 11/4)
More information and registration


December 7 @12pm - Faculty Research Group Meeting
Location: AL 266

Topic: Tanya Clement, David Tcheng, Joao Barbosa’s “Distant Listening to Gertrude Stein’s ‘Melanctha’: Using Similarity Analysis in a Discovery Paradigm to Analyze Prosody and Author Influence” in Literary and Linguistic Computing, Vol. 28, No. 4 (2013). This article appears in a special issue of the journal titled ‘Digital Humanities 2012: Digital Diversity: Cultures, Languages and Methods” (edited by Paul Spence, Susan Brown and Jan Christoph Meister), and the entire issue just might be of interest to us.

Roopika Risam’s “Beyond the Margins: Intersectionality and the Digital Humanities” in the latest issue of Digital Humanities Quarterly, Volume 9 Number 2 (2015). This article is also part of a special issue, “Feminisms in Digital Humanities” edited by Jacqueline Wernimont. (Essay is available by clicking on the hyperlinkst above).

Salvador PlascenciaBig Data HackathonDigital Humanities and Global Diversity Area of Excellence Launch Event Mobile Digital Storytelling
Click the images to view the larger pdf file

Spring 2015

CTL Learning Community ShowcaseElectronic Literature ReadingSocial Network Analysis with TwitterTHATCamp: Diving into Digital Humanities
Click the images to view the larger pdf file

May 19 - Reboot 2.0
The goal of Reboot 2.0 is to enhance intellectual energy amongst CAL faculty and to build a community committed to strengthening humanities research at SDSU through creative-critical and collaborative engagement with the digital.

May 12 - CTL Learning Community Showcase
Join us for a showcase of lessons and learning led by faculty and students from our Digital Communication Across the Curriculum group.

May 4 - Faculty Research Group Meeting
Discussion of Nick Montfort and Ian Bogost’s Racing the Beam: The Atari Video Computer System (MIT Press, 2009), introduction and chapter 1, and Wendy Chun’s Programmed Visions: Software and Memory (MIT Press, 2011), chapter 1, “Sorcery and Source Text”

May 3 - Mextasy Premiere
SDSU's own Bill Nericcio, a core member of the digital humanities faculty, will premiere his latest project at UCSD's Filmatic Festival the pilot episode of Mextasy.

April 24 - CTL Learning Community Meeting

April 16 - Lecture
Vicente Luis Mora: "From Sheltered Literary Production to Literature Out in the Open Air of the Internet: New Hispanic Practices of Production and Distribution of Literature"

April 6 - Faculty Research Group Meeting
Discussion of Mark C. Marino’s “Critical Code Studies” (2006) in electronic book review.

March 19 - Electronic Literature Reading
Samantha Gorman and Danny Cannizzaro read from their iPad novel, Pry (2015).

March 2 - Faculty Research Group Meeting
Discussion of Johanna Drucker’s Graphesis: Visual Forms of Knowledge Production(Harvard UP, 2014)

February 9 - Faculty Research Group Meeting
Discussion of Franco Moretti’s “Conjectures on World Literature” (New Left Review, 2000 also available in Distant Reading (Verso, 2013). –We can pair Moretti with “cultural analytics” big data visualizations by Lev Manovich’s Calit2 Lab, available for viewing here.

February 6 - Tools Workshop
Citation/Research Management Tools (Zotero, EndNote Basic, Mendeley), led by Carolyn Baber (library)

February 6 - Lecture
"Social Network Analysis: Using Twitter to Visualize Opinions about Common Core State Standards," Professor Alan J. Daley(Chair of Education, UCSD) and Professor Miguel DelFresno (University of Madrid, Spain). Discussion moderated by Jessica Pressman.

Fall 2014

December 9 - Faculty Research Group Meeting
Selections from the multimodal journal Vectors: 1) Sharon Daniels and Erik Loyer, "Public Secrets," 2) David Theo Goldberg, Stefka Hristova, and Erik Loyer,, "Blue Velvet: Re-dressing New Orleans in Katrina’s Wake," 3) Caren Kaplan and Raegan Kelly,"Dead Reckoning: Aerial Perception and the Social Construction of Targets," and Matthew K. Gold’s "Digital Humanities" from The Johns Hopkins Guide to Digital Media.

November 21 - Tools Workshop
TimeRime
and FreeMind. Presented through SDSU’s Digital Humanities initiative. Linnea Zeiner facilitator.

November 18 - Faculty Research Group Meeting
Digital_Humanities
by Anne Burdick, Johanna Drucker, Peter Lunenfeld, Todd Presner, and Jeffrey Schnapp (MIT Press, 2012) and Liu, Alan and William G. Thomas III, “Humanities in a Digital Age,” Inside Higher Ed (October 2012)

October 24-25 - THATCamp: Diving into Digital Humanities
THATCamp is “The Humanities and Technology Camp,” and it is an “un-conference” meeting where humanists and technologists of all skill levels learn and build together in sessions proposed on the spot. Collaboration between four regional institutions (SDSU; UCSD; CSU San Marcos; USD) to have interested participants engaged in the Digital Humanities and to create networks of collaboration. ThatCamp promotes working together and collaborating across disciplinary, departmental, and institutional divides.

October 14 - Faculty Research Group Meeting
Chapter 1: “Humanities to Digital Humanities ” in Digital_Humanities by Anne Burdick, Johanna Drucker, Peter Lunenfeld, Todd Presner, and Jeffrey Schnapp (MIT Press, 2012).