MITH is very pleased to announce 2006-7 calls for its Resident Fellows program, as well as a new Team Fellowship program. Applications for Resident Fellows are due Friday, April 14, and applications for Team Fellowships are due Friday, May 1.

The University of Maryland Libraries’ Digital Collections and Research is pleased to announce the online publication of symposium proceedings from The Library in Bits and Bytes: A Digital Library Symposium, held September 29th, 2005 at the University of Maryland. The online publication contains remarks from session presenters, panelists, and poster presenters on how library practice has embraced and is challenged by digital library initiatives.

Symposium proceedings can be found at:
http://www.lib.umd.edu/dcr/events/symposium/epubs.html

On Tuesday, March 14, MITH is very pleased to welcome two very distinguished guests, Johanna Drucker and Jerome McGann, both of the University of Virginia. Professors Drucker and McGann will be in MITH between 11:00 and 12:00 for a warm up conversation about the future of the digital humanities (bring an early lunch if you like . . .) and will then conduct on a seminar on the current state of the digital humanities from 12:30-2:00 in 3105 Susquehanna Hall. Both events are open to all. Their visit is co-sponsored by MITH and the English department.

Johanna Drucker is the Robertson Professor of Media Studies and was the first director of the Media Studies program which she created at the University of Virginia on arrival in 1999. She has a PhD in Ecriture (University of California, Berkeley, 1986) and has been on the faculty of Yale University, Columbia University, the University of Texas at Dallas, State University of New York at Purchase, and Harvard University where she taught art history, theory, and practice. Her publications have been in the field of 20th-century art history, the history of writing and the alphabet, artists’ books, experimental typography, and visual and concrete poetry. Her most recent publication is Sweet Dreams: Contemporary Art and Complicity (University of Chicago Press, 2005). Her other scholarly titles include: Theorizing Modernism (Columbia University Press, 1994), The Visible Word: Experimental Typography and Modern Art (University of Chicago Press, 1994), The Alphabetic Labyrinth (Thames and Hudson, 1995) and The Century of Artists’ Books (Granary Books, 1996). She is also internationally known for her work as a book artist and writer and has been publishing experimental editions since 1972; her most recent titles include Figuring the Word (Druckwerk 1998), Narratology (Druckwerk, 1994), and Nova Reperta (in collaboration with Brad Freeman, JABbooks, 1999), Night Crawlers on the Web (2000), A Girl’s Life (Granary, 2001), Quantum (2002), Damaged Spring (2003), and From Now (Cuneiform Press, 2005). She is currently working on a large-scale digital project, Artists’ Books Online, and is helping in the planning and development of the MA in Digital Humanities, to be launched at the University of Viriginia in Fall 2007.

Jerome McGann, John Stewart Bryan University Professor at Virginia, has had a major influence in half a dozen fields, from Romantic and Victorian literature to contemporary poetry and poetics to textual scholarship. McGann’s work in digital media is just part of his larger, abiding interest in the material conditions of textuality. Projects like The Rossetti Archive are, among other things, textual-critical experiments in the uses of markup and data-processing environments for the embodiment, transmission, and ongoing dialogic interpretation of imaginative texts. He has recently extended these experiments, exploring the ways digital media might enable collaborative game-play and “deformance” as scholarly and pedagogical activities. Some of these matters are taken up in his book on literary studies after the World Wide Web, Radiant Textuality: Literary Studies After the World Wide Web (Palgrave/St. Martin’s Press, 2001).

This is a superb opportunity to find out what’s on the mind of two of the most active individuals shaping the future of the digital humanities.

MITH Acting Director Neil Fraistat has been re-elected to the Executive Council of the Association for Computers and the Humanities, the premier North American organization for its field. He is joined there by Susan Schreibman, the University Library’s Head of Digital Collections and Research, thus ensuring Maryland’s ongoing representation in this important organization (Matthew Kirschenbaum and Martha Nell Smith have both previously served on the Executive Council).

Also, MITH Acting Associate Director Matthew Kirschenbaum has accepted an invitation to join the advisory board of Chadwyck-Healey’s Literature Online, the world’s largest cross-searchable database of literature and criticism.

Director, Maryland Institute for Technology in the Humanities (MITH)

The College of Arts and Humanities is seeking nominations and applications for a Director for the Maryland Institute of Technology in the Humanities (MITH). The successful candidate will be selected from the tenured or tenure-track faculty of the College or the permanent status or permanent status-track faculty of the University Libraries and appointed for a three-year term beginning July 1, 2006. This is a 12-month appointment with two-course release time per year for teaching faculty or library equivalent. The Director reports jointly to the Dean of the College of Arts and Humanities and the Dean of Libraries, but for matters pertaining to budget reports to the Dean of the College of Arts and Humanities. The University of Maryland is an Affirmative Action, Equal Opportunity Employer. Women and minorities are encouraged to apply.

MITH is a joint project of the College of Arts and Humanities and the University Libraries. Located in McKeldin Library, MITH will foster the development of innovative humanities and digital library projects and will encourage the wise use of these projects in the library and the classroom, both on campus and in the K-12 community. MITH will establish an ongoing program of faculty training and mentoring.

The MITH Director will be responsible for helping to identify and solicit sources for project funding and will work cooperatively with College development staff. The Director will be the principal administrator of MITH, and will also work collaboratively with the MITH Administrative Council and Projects Council to develop and articulate a viable vision to further advance MITH. The Director will be responsible for MITH programming and will assist the College in related areas of technology. Supervisory responsibilities include oversight of Associate Directors, administrative staff and graduate students.

All candidates for the position of Director must be members of the tenured or tenure-track faculty in the College of Arts and Humanities or the permanent status or permanent status-track faculty of the University Libraries and must have experience using technology in arts and humanities research or teaching. The successful candidate will have strong administrative skills including supervision, consultation, mentoring, and planning. The ideal candidate should also be able to demonstrate successful grant-writing experience. Fundraising, corporate and/or foundation knowledge is highly desirable.

Applications for the MITH Directorship should include a letter of interest, current curriculum vitae and the names and phone numbers of three references. Please send applications to:

Chair, MITH Director Search c/o Jennifer Zachmann College of Arts and Humanities 1102 Francis Scott Key Hall College Park, MD 20742

Deadline for best consideration is: March 15, 2006

Nominations are being accepted by email by the committee chair, Professor Juan Uriagereka, at juan@umd.edu. He is also available to answer any questions regarding the search.