Digital Humanities Center Usage Request Policy
The Digital Humanities Center was designed to support the SDSU Digital Humanities Initiative (DH@SDSU) mission to lead national change in the humanities by developing and sharing a sustainable DH infrastructure that engages diverse students, faculty, staff, and regional community in public-facing humanistic research that advances human equity across diverse global communities. The DH Initiative takes a critical stance towards digital technology and focuses its work on equity, diversity, inclusion, and social justice. As the hub of that work, the DH Center supports anti-racist and anti-oppressive research, teaching, and learning that values the importance of the humanities, and the interactions of humans in real time and space, in the digital age. The DH Center advances research and creative activities about and through the digital.
The Center hosts a range of DH-related activities, from public talks and lectures to workshops, showcases, and performances. Our partnerships engender meaningful cross-disciplinary collaboration, networking, and support for co-learning opportunities for faculty and students.
Due to staffing constraints and high demand, we currently can only partner on a limited number of activities beyond official DH@SDSU programs, particularly on Fridays. Scheduling priority is given to activities that are explicitly rooted in critical digital inquiry, including:
- Official DH@SDSU activities. This includes activities organized by DH core faculty, advisory board, and affiliate members. The DH Center cannot support activities that are not clearly and directly digitally-inflected, even when a DH@SDSU community member requests it.
- DH learning activities. This includes DH instruction, course-based instruction, and workshops.
- Digitally-inflected activities that advance strategic partnerships of the DH Initiative.
Responsibilities
Faculty, staff, and students wishing to partner with us on an event should be prepared to assist in all logistics, including pre-planning, advertising, set-up, and break-down. DH Center staff can support this work, but it is the partner’s responsibility to ensure completion.
All public-facing events must adhere to SDSU and Library public health measures. We strongly encourage partners to develop contingency plans for face-to-face events in case the DH Center team are sick or have to quarantine.
Partners interested in running hybrid events should be prepared to oversee all aspects of both the in-person and Zoom modalities, including identifying a dedicated person to manage Zoom functionality and/or live streaming for the duration of the activity.
Criteria
Requests are evaluated based on DH@SDSU strategic priorities. Requests should meet at least one of the following criteria:
- Involves studying and/or using digital technologies and culture
- Addresses global diversity in the digital age, including the uneven impact of digital technologies on different communities
- Aligns with the DH@SDSU mission to lead national change in the humanities for the digital era
- Prepares students to be discerning and responsible users of the digital by incorporating aspects of our critical digital literacy student learning outcomes: 1) Assess, evaluate, and interpret information (including visualizations, data and text) presented in a variety of digital formats; 2) Recognize and articulate how medial formats and contexts shape information and its reception; 3) Analyze interface design and recognize the relationships of power mediated through it; 4) Critically assess how digital media inform identity; 5) Reflect on how changes in medial contexts impact users and their societies
When making a request to partner on an event, you will be asked to explicitly articulate how your activity relates to the Digital Humanities, and how your activity incorporates questions of equity, inclusion, global diversity, and social justice.
Limitations
DH Center staff cannot partner on activities that do not align with DH@SDSU strategic priorities, events scheduled for times when the staff are unavailable, or events that are held outside of our regular operating hours (M-F 10am-4pm when classes are in session). Individuals or groups requesting to partner in the space must be affiliated with SDSU, and must comply with all campus and Library public health measures. Please note that the DH Center is understaffed on Fridays. We do not permit fee-for-service activities in any of our spaces.
Requests must be received no less than four (4) weeks in advance of the requested date and will be considered within 3-5 business days. All event partners will be asked to review and accept our general use policies prior to the scheduled activity.