Latest news from the Digital Antipodes

It's been an action-packed start to the year! We look forward to seeing you all soon and here are a few updates in the meantime.

1. Digital Humanities Australasia 2014 is just two weeks away!

UWA will be hosting the DHA2014 conference from 18-21 March and we're excited to see so many UWA postgrads and academics presenting papers and taking part in panel sessions. Most of the workshops are free - including the one I am helping facilitate - The #Altac track: Strategies to imagine and build alternative academic careers (only 5 tickets left!). Take a look at some of the other workshops here. You still have time be part of the event by presenting work-in-progress in poster form but you need to get in quick. Contact Jenni ASAP on jenni.harrison@uwa.edu.au.

2. The next meeting of the Digital Antipodes will be held 2-3pm on Friday 11 April (Arts 1.33)

You won’t want to miss this one. We’ll be discussing major themes and ideas from DHA2014. What were the main ideas that emerged? What do they mean in the context of our own research?

3. We’re looking for a new coordinator for the Digital Antipodes!

I’ll be overseas from mid April until September 2014 so we're seeking a volunteer to facilitate meetings over the next 6 months. It’s a great opportunity to get more involved in the DH community and it’s not too time consuming. You’d simply need to liaise with the group to choose a journal article, blog post or online portal to discuss at each monthly meeting, book a room and dispatch an email. The role has greatly enriched my understanding of the DH landscape and I highly recommend it. Send me an email if you are interested.

Could you be the next coordinator of the Digital Antipodes?

4. Want to learn to code?

Rail Girls is back! It is taking place  21-22 March and it’s free to attend. I attended the last workshop as a coding novice and enjoyed it immensely. Find out more here. The more experienced coders among you might be interested in a Trove hacking workshop that will be held at Spacecubed on Tuesday 18 March from 1pm to 5pm. The workshop will be run by Tim Sherratt - a man who spent so much time hacking Trove data that they gave him a job managing the entire website. Brilliant. He is going to be showing off the API for Trove (the National Library of Australia search tool) and giving participants a chance to discover the multitude of possibilities it holds. The event costs $15 and you can register here.

Don't miss the Digital Antipodes at DHA2014!

DHA2014 Perth

We’re absolutely thrilled to see so many of the Digital Antipodes delivering papers and running workshops at DHA2014. Take a look at the final event programme.

Papers and panel sessions include:

• Brett Hirsch, Philip Mead (Debate): That Literary Studies Needs More Graphs, Maps, and Trees
• Ethan Blue (with Zephyr Frank) -  Mapping the Routes and Roots of American Deportation
• Jenni Harrison (with Darren Gibson) - The altruistic crowd – the ethics of using social data in humanist research
• Jo Hawkins - Historian to Hacker in 48 hours: Why do so few humanists attend civic hacking events?
• Patricia Alessi - Early English opera and the Digital?: The utilisation of digital approaches in historically- informed performance practice opera re-creations
• Susan Taylor Suchy - Engaging the "Quaint" Creative Writing Classroom in the Social Media Marketplace
• Toby Burrows - Mandelbrot, Braudel and Taleb: fractal geometry and randomness in history
• Toby Burrows (with Deb Verhoeven) - Deploying Ontologies in the Humanities and Creative Arts
• Toby Burrows (with Deb Verhoeven) - Integrating research in the humanities: the HuNI Virtual Laboratory

Getting a job after your PhD: Strategies to imagine and build alternative academic careers

DHA 2014, Perth.

Given the realities of the competitive academic job market - why aren't more postgrads discussing hybrid and alternative career options?

Register today to attend a free workshop

We're running a free workshop on Tuesday, 18 March (9am - Midday) exploring strategies and tools to help PhD candidates and early career researchers imagine and build alternative academic careers.

What is an 'alternative academic' career?

#Altac careers have been described as off the tenure track, but within the academic orbit.  These positions are serviced by “hybrid humanities scholars” who work in a diverse range of institutions including universities, cultural heritage bodies, libraries, museums, academic publishing, and the public sector. Roles often include a combination of administration, project management, teaching and research work.

About the workshop

The workshop will include a panel session with several practicing “alt-academics”, hands-on activities and plenty of lively discussion and debate.

We’ll be asking questions such as:

• How can PhD students better locate their research and work in an employable context?
• How can PhD students prepare for alternative academic careers during and after their candidature?
• What are the main opportunities and challenges associated with alternative academic careers?

Who should attend this workshop?

Postgraduate students and early career researchers.

How do I register?

This workshop is free of charge however  registration is required. Numbers are limited so register online today!

(In the event that tickets are unavailable, please email johawkins@gmail.com to join a wait list.)