Session Abstract

There is an abundance of innovative publishing happening within the humanities, much of which is enabled by open access. The Wellcome Trust and New York Academy of Medicine present a session which will:

1 - explore and celebrate the new ways humanities researchers are working and creating literature;
2 - discuss the opportunities and challenges associated with experimental research that makes use of digital technologies and new publication methods;
3 - consider how open access affects these activities and historical practice more broadly.

The Wellcome Trust has recently turned its attention towards facilitating and promoting open access in the humanities; Cecy Marden will discuss what the Trust has been doing, and the reaction they have received from researchers and publishers. Dr. Martin Eve co-founded the Open Library for Humanities (OLH) as he saw a need for a sustainable Open Access publishing platform in the humanities. Martin will discuss some of the challenges and opportunities associated with launching OLH. Prof. Matthew Gold, City Tech and CUNY, will talk about his work on Debates in the Digital Humanities, a publication project with the University of Minnesota Press that began as a printed book with an online open-access edition, and that has morphed into a dynamic, hybrid print/digital book series. Lisa Norberg, Barnard College Library, will propose an alternative business model for publishing and preserving open access research, from all disciplines in any format, which has learned societies at its centre. Finally, Prof. Kathleen Fitzpatrick, Modern Language Association (MLA), will share her experience of developing MLA Commons, a platform providing new avenues for scholarly communication and collaboration for members of MLA. Kathleen will also place MLA Commons within the context of open access and the future of scholarly societies more broadly. The session will be chaired by Dr. Stephen Robertson, Professor and Director of Roy Rosenzweig Center for History & New Media, George Mason University.

The diverse views and experience these speakers bring to the session will help illuminate new research practices, and the business models and policies which lie behind them. Members of the audience will then be encouraged to join the discussion to consider and debate how open access, with all the changes and possibilities it brings, will transform historical practice.