From October 8st to October 11th 2019, the Academy of Sciences and Literature | Mainz will host the annual "International Summer School (ISS)" of the MA program "Digital Methods in the Humanities and Cultural Sciences" jointly conducted by the Johannes Gutenberg-University and the University of Applied Sciences Mainz. While 25 seats are booked for the students of the first semester of the MA programme, 15 seats are open for external application.

Further information: https://iss.adwmainz.net/

About "Reflections on Code"

In 2019, a special focus will be put on the critical reflection of data, methods and algorithms within the Digital Humanities. In recent years, digital methodologies have become an intrinsic part of research practices in the Humanities and Social Sciences. The application of formal, quantitative methods has substantial consequences on the questions asked and inferences drawn. These effects can only be fully understood if researchers develop a fundamental understanding of the underlying technologies. The main goal of the summer school is to build up expertise on foundational concepts, methods and tools used in a broad range of disciplines. At the same time, participants are encouraged to take a critical look at the presented methodologies and discuss the implications of their application within the research process. The schedule comprises introductory lessons on web-based collaboration and annotation tools (like structuring and writing text with Markdown, Git and GitLab) as well as classes on annotating texts and images or the encoding and digital presentation of music. Another block of sessions will cover network analysis and its application to historical sources as well as a critical evaluation of different data visualization practices. Finally, spatial analysis by digital means, tools like graph databases supporting data exploration and indexing and an overview over NLP (natural language processing) methods will complete the picture.

Organisational notes

The summer school addresses an international audience and is open to all students and/or researchers with a BA degree in the humanities, cultural sciences, computer science or information science. For a successful participation credits according to the European Credit Transfer System (ECTS) will be awarded. Lessons will be held in German and/or English, depending on the amount of foreign speaking participants to a class. The total amount of participants is limited to 40 persons. From this amount, 25 seats are booked for the students of the first semester of the MA programme "Digital Methods in the Humanities and Cultural Sciences" until the start of the semester. 15 seats are open for external application. We will maintain a waiting list to ensure a fair allocation if any of the seats is not taken by the start of the semester.

Costs

There is no fee for the summer school. Participants must cover their travel and accomodation expenses by themselves.

Application

Please apply via email (short motivation letter and CV) until 06. September 2019 to: ISS_mz@uni-mainz.de