ICT in Arts and Humanities Research e-Science Institute Public Lecture A Potential for All: e-Science for the Arts and Humanities 30 April 2007

ICT in Arts and Humanities Research What is e-Science in the Arts and humanities Agenda rather than a methodology, still less a subject An Oxymoron? e-Science vs e-Research National agenda developed in the natural sciences and technology Infrastructure of advanced technologies for secure collaboration and resource- sharing across the Internet all Research Councils committed in their Delivery Plans

ICT in Arts and Humanities Research Grid technologies Computational grid Data grid Communications grid (Access Grid) Associated technologies (service grid) Visualization Data mining Security But looser definition

ICT in Arts and Humanities Research First phase of the Programme: £98m spread across Research Councils Core e-Science Programme managed by EPSRC on behalf of all the Research Councils AHRB misses out Tony Hey Director of the e-Science Core Programme

ICT in Arts and Humanities Research Third phase of the Programme: No earmarked money: AHRC misses out again Core e-Science Programme managed by EPSRC on behalf of all the Research Councils Malcolm Atkinson e-Science Envoy

ICT in Arts and Humanities Research e-Science Why is it important for the humanities? –Money tools and generic resource development –Injection of new technologies collaborations between computer scientists and arts and humanities researchers –Dispersed and heterogenous nature of typical humanities data resource the typical AHRC-funded resource –Not an instant solution Combination of top-down and bottom-up developments to integrate resources –But not just the data grid

ICT in Arts and Humanities Research Existing provision AHRC Research Panels –Up to 2003, about 50% of £100m of research projects have some kind of digital output and/or input –What kind of projects? Support services funded by AHRC and JISC –Arts and Humanities Data Service (AHDS) creation, curation, preservation, and on-line dissemination of digitised research materials –Resource Discovery Network (RDN: now Intute) gateways for the discovery of online resources

ICT in Arts and Humanities Research ICT in Arts and Humanities Research Programme includes the creative and performing arts –practice-led research £3.8m for 5 years from October 2003 Part of a uniquely centralized system of public support for ICT in the arts and humanities –but...

ICT in Arts and Humanities Research ICT Programme’s aims: to build capacity nation-wide in the use of ICT for arts and humanities research –complementing existing provision to advise on the AHRC's ICT strategy –later... strong infrastructure in place on which to build up e-Science activities –despite arriving at the table very late

ICT in Arts and Humanities Research Main activities: ICT Methods Network: £1m for 3 years from April 2005 –use of advanced ICT methods Projects and methods database (with support from JISC) –methods taxonomy –will be part of a unified on-line resource: ICTGuides (AHDS) including training materials at all levels register of experts list of centres ICT Strategy Projects (£1m) –knowledge-gathering: needs, uses, scoping surveys –resource-development Problems of funding tools development

ICT in Arts and Humanities Research AHRC-EPSRC-JISC Arts and Humanties e-Science Initiative –Scoping survey –JISC A&H e-Science Support Centre (King’s: ) based in AHDS and Methods Network –AHRC A&H e-Science Research Workshops –EPSRC e-Science demonstrators –six 4-year AHRC e-Science postgraduate studentships. –AHRC-JISC e-Science research projects (£1.2m + EPSRC?) varying emphasis on tools development and research findings

ICT in Arts and Humanities Research Workshops in e-Science for the Arts and Humanities Alan BowmanUser Requirements Gathering for the Humanities Paul EllGeographical Information System e- Science: developing a roadmap Angela PicciniPerformativity/Place/Space: Locating Grid Technologies David ShepherdThe Access Grid in Collaborative Arts and Humanities Research Gregory SportonBuilding the Wireframe: E-Science for the Arts Infrastructure Melissa TerrasReACH: Researching e-Science Analysis of Census Holdings

ICT in Arts and Humanities Research –cross dataset searching (across complex and fuzzy data) and developing a configurable tool to undertake record matching not merely limited to historians and census material physicists and astrophysicists working on the Astrogrid –to track and trace different entities in space across massive datasets Workshops in e-Science for the Arts and Humanities Melissa TerrasReACH: Researching e-Science Analysis of Census Holdings

ICT in Arts and Humanities Research e-Science Demonstrators (EPSRC) Peter AinsworthVirtual Vellum: Online Viewing Envionment for the Grid and Live Audiences Charles Crowther A Virtual Workspace for the Study of Ancient Documents Sarah-Jane Norman Motion Capture Data Services for Multiple User Categories

ICT in Arts and Humanities Research Research Grants and Studentships Scheme Aims: to advance research in the A&H through the use and development of e-Science technologies –build up the infrastructure of tools and resources for ICT- based research in the A&H, –and to demonstrate the value of such tools and resources through the achievement of significant A&H research findings.

ICT in Arts and Humanities Research Balance between development and research findings may vary from one project to another the development of e-Science tools or resources specifically for research in the arts and/or humanities –must present a significant research or development challenge in terms of the technology and/or the achievement of significant research findings in an arts or humanities subject using e-Science technologies. –must achieve significant research findings panel expects to fund a selection of both types of project

ICT in Arts and Humanities Research The Panel sought to fund a broad range of activities, covering a number of different technologies and subject areas, including practice-led research in the creative and performing arts. Projects of varying size, which may last for a period of from six months up to a maximum of four years maximum FEC of £400,000 (plus any studentships)

ICT in Arts and Humanities Research Projects must involve an appropriate level of collaboration between ICT specialists and arts or humanities scholars expressed in terms of time commitment and demonstrate that their participants possess collectively the appropriate level of expertise in both areas.

ICT in Arts and Humanities Research Archaeology4 Art5 Dance & Drama8 Generic4 History Politics2 Language & Linguistics4 Literary Studies5 Media Studies & Photography2 Museums3 Music4 Creative Writing1 TOTAL42 A&H PI25 CS PI17

ICT in Arts and Humanities Research Malcolm Atkinson, national e-Science Envoy e-Science is the systematic development of methods using advanced ICT to enable better research (20th March 2007)