The Center for the Humanities, NYU Libraries, and NYU Research Technology fund the initial development of new research projects that will analyze digital sources, apply algorithmic methods to humanities data, or create digital publications, exhibits, or websites. The goal of the program is to seed projects that may go on to receive greater funding from other sources or otherwise build NYU’s institutional capacity in Digital Humanities work.
We are excited to announce this year’s cohort of funded projects. Congratulations to them all!
Historic Fractures: Toward a Digital Future in Museum Accessibility
Contributors: Rosanna Flouty, Museum Studies (GSAS); Craig Kapp, Courant (CAS)
Abstract
This project is a catalyst for access to open Villa La Pietra’s rich collection of over 6000 objects dating from the 17th to 20th centuries for audiences with disabilities. Working at the intersection of Museum Studies and Computer Science, Historic Fractures: Toward A Digital Future in Museum Accessibility leverages inclusive design practices and digital technology to make historic house museums accessible. Faculty members from Museum Studies and Computer Science conduct original field research at Villa La Pietra with students to lead content and development for the creation of three digital modules designed for a range of visitors with disabilities: 1) an augmented reality platform that integrates historical and archival photography to create a guided tour for visitors that are deaf or have low levels of hearing 2) a relational database of signatures that trace connected histories of early 20th c. visitors 3) implementation of a selected museum object from Villa La Pietra’s collection for visitors that are blind or have low vision. By training the next generation of computer scientists and museum scholars as highly-informed advocates for audiences with diverse motor, cognitive, sensory, and behavior-emotional disabilities, this project supports tactical and strategic skills to develop multi-sensory content in historic houses.
Sight Site/Cite in the Digital Middle East
Contributors: Helga Tawil-Souri, Jared McCormick, Ada Petiwala, Digital Middle East Lab, Hagop Kevorkian Center for Near Eastern Studies (GSAS)
Abstract
Sight/Site/Cite (S/S/C) seeks to create a digital hub dedicated to examining changing practices of Middle East digital scholarship which will gather, curate, and publish multimedia chronicles about the methods undergirding such projects. The aim is to engender and amplify scholarly exchange around changing digital practices and methods for humanistic research on, in, and of the larger Middle East. Our application is for the development and creation of the initial infrastructure of S/S/C. In the first year, six solicited pieces will serve as methods and practice-based chronicles detailing multi-modal and multi-media approaches to digital scholarship on, in, and of the region from a diverse set of academics. During the initial year we will build the S/S/C hub and plan its future expansion, establish an advisory board, host a roundtable at the 2022 Middle East Studies Association conference, establish a long-term partnership with the Kevorkian Center and its fledgling Digital Middle East Lab, and seek other potential partners and funding.
Digitizing Chemical Humanities: Towards a cross-cultural history of chemistry
Contributors: Farzad Mahootian, Liberal Studies; Guillermo Restrepo, Max Planck Institute
Abstract
The vast majority of non-European alchemy sources remains, for a variety of reasons, untranslated. I address the strategic question of where to start the slow, labor intensive process of translating vast multilingual corpora from the Middle East, India and China. My short-term focus is to use natural language processing (NLP) methods of unsupervised metaphor detection to triage untranslated alchemical texts and sort them for different research needs. I propose to identify key metaphoric phrases drawn from well-known English alchemical text as a basis for our NLP discrimination model. Recent advances in unsupervised metaphor detection, based on the ubiquity of metaphor in all languages may anchor NLP detection of naturally occuring meaningful clusters in virtually any language. My overarching goal is to demonstrate the potential of digital humanities tools in combination with computational chemistry resources, such as the Reaxys CC database, with data on 200 million chemical substances and about 60 million chemical reactions from 1750 to 2015. My colleague, Prof. Restrepo at the Max Planck Institute for Mathematics in Science, and the History of Science, has licensed access through MPI to Reaxys and has agreed to collaborate on extending his analysis of chemical knowledge production to pre-1750 periods.
Arts of the Errant Americas
Contributors: Edward J. Sullivan, Summer Sloane-Britt, Megan Kincaid, Lizette Ayala, Institute of Fine Arts
Abstract
“Arts of the Errant Americas” proposes a pilot program for a series of annual digital humanities art exhibitions that aim to reroute the standard narrative of “American art” by emphasizing unvoiced or silenced stories. Hosted by the Institute of Fine Arts (IFA), NYU, the program provides a broad remit for student curators to mount online exhibitions across chronology and media that reconsider the standard classification of American art typically confined to tight sociopolitical boundaries, such as stable notions of nationality, class, and race. By organizing exhibitions concentrating on underrepresented communities, this project foregrounds diversity, equity, and inclusion. With the funds from the seed grant, we will build an expandable website to host the annual exhibitions, secure digitization tools for future use, and curate a prototype exhibition to inaugurate the website and demonstrate the wide offerings of the digital world for art humanities. This exhibition will center on Chicana artist Yreina Cervántez’s recently restored mural La Ofrenda (1989). Cervántez was selected as the first artist in this series due to her institutional neglect despite her significant impact on the Central American community in Los Angeles. This exhibition is a platform for increased appreciation of her contribution to Latinx arts and a prompt to develop compelling solutions to translate her murals into the digital.
n Lines and Changing: Writing the Shanghai Metro System to the End
Contributors: David Perry, NYU Shanghai; Joe Yu, Hai An
Abstract
n Lines and Changing is an ongoing digital poetry project that arises from nearly 15 years of living in Shanghai, and which I use the expanding Shanghai Metro system as a compositional tool which both guides explorations of the city and which shapes the composition of a digital poem. I use chance procedures to determine destinations within Shanghai’s sprawling Metro system (currently 506 stations, with more opening soon, and 19 active lines, with more planned). I then do an “algorithmic walk” determined by chance procedures. The goal is to “write the city” in line with its constant, dynamic, ongoing change. I do not intend to “finish” in the conventional sense, but keep it “open” as I take new trips, and as new lines and stations are added, and as collaborators join (including, eventually, via a public app). I would use this grant to take it from its current proof-of-concept stage and to launch it publicly, both online and in talks, readings and lectures. The grant would allow me to develop and expand the site (adding documentation, photography, video and sound recordings, a Chinese translation “toggle,” and a critical essay).