Log in

Research in computational and quantitative approaches to humanities data is a fast growing interdisciplinary area. The first Computational Humanities Research workshop (CHR2020) took place online from 18 to 20 November 2020, organized by the DHLab of the KNAW Humanities Cluster in Amsterdam and The Alan Turing Institute. Although most research presented had a strong data-driven component, the focus of the workshop was primarily on methods, techniques, and computational analyses in humanities research. Thus, the challenges of the underlying humanities data for computational research remained relatively underexposed, but are at least as important. This special collection aims to highlight the challenges of humanities data for computational research. This special collection of the Journal of Open Humanities Data is open to both authors who presented at the CHR2020 workshop and intend to submit a paper highlighting the aspect of humanities data and to new authors.

For this special collection we invite submissions of two varieties:

1. Short data papers contain a concise description of a computational humanities research object with high reuse potential. These are short (1000 words) highly structured narratives that conform to the data paper template. A data paper does not replace a traditional research article, but rather complements it.
    CHR2020 authors: If you have already published a paper in the CHR2020 proceedings and your research includes the creation of a dataset with potential for reuse, you are welcome to submit a short data paper that complements your CHR2020 proceedings paper.
    New authors: If you are a new author and have created a dataset relevant to computational humanities research, you are invited to submit a paper in this category.
2. Full-length research papers discuss and illustrate methods, challenges, and limitations in the creation, collection, management, access, processing, or analysis of data in computational humanities research. These are intended to be longer narratives (between 3000 and 6000 words + references), which give authors the ability to contribute to a broader discussion.
    CHR2020 authors: If you have already published a paper in the CHR2020 proceedings, you are welcome to submit a paper in this category focussing on the specific features and challenges of the humanities datasets used in your research.
    New authors: If you are a new author you are welcome to submit a paper in this category focussing on the specific features and challenges of the humanities datasets.

Topics of focus are the features and challenges of humanities data for computational research, including scale and size, sampling and representativeness, data complexity, multidimensionality, multimodality, diachrony, as well as the challenges of preparing data for computational humanities inquiries.

Humanities subjects of interest to JOHD include, but are not limited to Art History, Classics, History, Linguistics, Literature, Modern Languages, Music and musicology, Philosophy, Religious Studies, etc. Research that crosses one or more of these traditional disciplinary boundaries is highly encouraged.

The deadline for submissions to this special issue is 1 March 2021. Manuscripts will be sent for double-blind peer review after editorial consideration, and accepted papers will be published online in the journal’s special collection. Please follow the submission guidelines to submit your manuscript.

Note: there are Publication Fees for accepted papers. Publication Fees are scheduled to increase from 2nd March 2021. 

If you have any questions, feel free to contact the editors at info@computational-humanities-research.org

About the journal

The Journal of Open Humanities Data (JOHD) is a growing open-access peer-reviewed academic journal specifically dedicated to publications describing humanities research objects, software, and methods with high potential for reuse. These might include curated resources like (annotated) linguistic corpora, ontologies, and lexicons, as well as databases, maps, atlases, linked data objects, and other data sets created with qualitative, quantitative, or computational methods.

JOHD provides immediate open access to its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of knowledge. Authors remain the copyright holders and grant third parties the right to use, reproduce, and share the article according to the Creative Commons license agreement. Authors are encouraged to publish their data in recommended repositories.

About the Guest Editors

Folgert Karsdorp is a researcher at the Meertens Institute of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences in Amsterdam. His research focuses on quantitative approaches to cultural transmission and cultural evolution. He recently published a textbook on quantitative data analysis in the humanities, called Humanities Data Analysis: Case Studies with Python (Princeton University Press, 2021).

Melvin Wevers is an Assistant Professor in Urban History and Digital Methods at the University of Amsterdam. His research interests include the philosophy of history, historical methods, and the study of cultural-historical phenomena using computational means. He has a specific research interest in the evolution of ideas, values, and practices in advertising discourse.

Adina Nerghes is a Postdoctoral Researcher at Wageningen University & Research. Her research focuses on language use in various social contexts and emerging social structures. She has investigated the refugee crisis debates in social media, strategies of health consumers and their interactions in the social media space, and discourses of newspapers, central banks, and the European Parliament.

The deadline submission for the special collection “Humanities Data in the time of COVID-19” (Editors: Sahba Besharati and Mandy Wigdorowitz) has been extended to 30 November 2020.

For more information about the special collection, please visit: https://openhumanitiesdata.metajnl.com/

The rapid spread of ‘Coronavirus Disease 2019’ (COVID-19) on a global scale has resulted in an international pandemic making this a defining global health crisis of our time. The impact of the pandemic extends beyond health outcomes to include widespread social, economic, political, cultural and environmental effects to the individual, community and society. In the first time in our recent history the far reaching impact of this pandemic serves as a stark reminder of our global interdependence and the interconnectedness of disciplines.

This global impact opens a unique opportunity for researchers to explore these widespread effects through the lens of the Humanities. Moreover, the availability of open data is critical to allow for the needed investigation of the pandemic, and to help us understand and contextualise it.

We are planning the publication of a special collection of the Journal of Open Humanities Data entitled: “Humanities Data in the time of COVID-19”.

Submissions can include but are not limited to the following topics:

• Social impact of COVID-19 across various domains of life (health, work, school, relationships) over the lifespan 
• Impact of COVID-19 using cross-cultural comparisons 
• Historical comparison(s) of pandemics or diseases 
• Implications of migration, movement, and/or restriction/free-will 
• Evaluation or shift of identity or self-image (including uptake of face coverings, social distancing and limited person-to-person contact) 
• Impact, use, and access to social media and the internet 
• Politicisation of health, movement, messaging, and gatherings 
• Use and/or change of language across time, including translation and analysis of information for multilingual populations 
• Data representation, presentation, and access to information 
• Artistic responses to COVID-19 (art, music, theatre, expression) 
• Interconnectedness of society at local, national, and/or global levels 
• Community and country response to inequality, food insecurity, mobilisation of resources 
• Religion or moral identity and its effect on well-being and connectedness 
• Attitudes and behaviours related to COVID-19 including risk perception, social belonging, national identification, political ideology, and conspiracy theories 

The deadline for submissions to this special collection is 30 September 2020. Manuscripts will be peer reviewed after editorial consideration, and accepted papers will be published online on a rolling basis. Accepted publications are subject to a publishing fee of £100 +VAT (if applicable) for short papers and £300 + VAT (if applicable) for long papers; a discount or waiver can be applied for and all applications are considered. Follow the submission guidelines to submit your manuscript.

The Journal of Open Humanities Data (JOHD) is a growing open-access peer-reviewed academic journal specifically dedicated to publications describing humanities research objects, software, and methods with high potential for reuse. These might include curated resources like (annoptated) linguistic corpora, ontologies, and lexicons, as well as databases, maps, atlases, linked data objects, and other data sets created with qualitative, quantitative, or computational methods. For this special collection we invite submissions of two varieties:

1. Short data papers contain a concise description of a humanities research object with high reuse potential from research related to the COVID-19 pandemic. These are short (1000 words) highly structured narratives and must conform to the data paper template. A data paper does not replace a traditional research article, but rather complements it.

2. Full length research papers discuss and illustrate methods, challenges, and limitations in the creation, collection, management, access, processing, or analysis of data in Humanities research related to the COVID-19 pandemic, including standards and formats. These are intended to be longer narratives (3000 - 5000 words), which give authors the ability to contribute to a broader discussion around the impact of the pandemic.

Humanities subjects of interest to JOHD include, but are not limited to Art History, Classics, History, Linguistics, Literature, Modern Languages, Music and musicology, Philosophy, Religious Studies etc. Research that crosses one or more of these traditional disciplinary boundaries is highly encouraged. JOHD provides immediate open access to its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of knowledge. Authors remain the copyright holders and grant third parties the right to use, reproduce, and share the article according to the Creative Commons license agreement. Authors are encouraged to publish their data in recommended repositories.

If you are interested in submitting an article, please express your interest to: Sahba Besharati (sahba.besharati@wits.ac.za) and Mandy Wigdorowitz (mw738@cam.ac.uk)

Sahba Besharati and Mandy Wigdorowitz (special collection guest editors) Barbara McGillivray (editor-in-chief of the Journal of Open Humanities Data)

About the Guest Editors:

Sahba Besharati is a neuropsychologist and senior lecturer in cognitive neuroscience at the Department of Psychology at the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits). She completed a collaborative PhD in neuropsychology from King’s College London and the University of Cape Town (UCT), having previously trained in psychological research and clinical neuropsychology at UCT. Dr Besharati’s research specialises in the area of human social-affective neuroscience. Her research integrates neuroimaging, neuropsychological and experimental methods to investigate self-consciousness and social cognition. She is the co-founder of a new cross-disciplinary neuroscience group, Wits NeuRL, which aims to advance the research and practice of the neurosciences in the South African context.

Mandy Wigdorowitz is a PhD candidate in Theoretical and Applied Linguistics at the University of Cambridge. She is researching the psycholinguistic and cognitive effects of language experience in multilinguals with a focus on language, education, and interaction from linguistic, social, cognitive and psychological perspectives. In addition to her doctoral research, she is a registered Research Psychologist with the Health Professions Council of South Africa and an Executive Member of the Division for Research and Methodology of the Psychological Society of South Africa.