Save the Date: DTS 2019

We are delighted to announce that Digitizing the Stage will be returning to the University of Oxford in summer 2019. The successful inaugural conference in 2017 brought together dozens of participants from around the world for a lively and multidisciplinary series of talks and presentations on digital engagements with the early modern theatre archive. In 2019, the Folger Shakespeare Library and the Centre for Digital Scholarship, Bodleian Libraries, will be hosting a four-day event from 15-18 July 2019.

Digitizing the Stage will mark the concluding phase of the Folger’s project to build a new digital asset platform, called Miranda, which is made possible through generous support from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The conference sessions will be in the Bodleian’s Weston Library, with other events held in memorable locations elsewhere in Oxford.

This program of talks, presentations, and demonstrations will highlight digital explorations of the early modern stage, with a particular emphasis on performance. We will begin with a pre-conference workshop on 15 July, followed by three days of single-stream programming. The call for proposals will be published by November 2018, followed by registration opening in early 2019.

We anticipate offering a discounted rate for students, early career researchers (ECRs) and unwaged participants, as well as a limited number of tuition and UK travel bursaries. Registration for the three full days of the conference will be capped at no more than 100 seats, with the pre-conference workshop expected to seat no more than 25 participants.

Sign up below to receive updates on the call for proposals and registration information. For questions regarding these or any other matter, please contact digitalconf@folger.edu.

 

Many thanks

Digitizing the Stage: Rethinking the Early Modern Theatre Archive took place on 10-12 July 2017, just about a month ago. On behalf of the organizers, I would like to thank all the participants who made it a fascinating, convivial, and productive event. For those interested in learning more, we used the Twitter hashtag #DTStage during conference proceedings.

If you have any questions, would like to suggest a follow-up action or activity, or want to be informed about future events, please don’t hesitate to send a line to digitalconf@folger.edu.

Till next time.

One week to go!

We’re looking forward to Digitizing the Stage beginning a week from today at the Weston Library, Oxford.

• Speaker bios are now available online (with more forthcoming throughout the week.)
• We’ve also published a list of lunch suggestions for eateries within a 5-minute walk of the Weston.
• If you’re on Twitter, follow the conversation leading up to and during the conference at #DTStage.

If you have any questions about the conference, don’t hesitate to email digitalconf@folger.edu.

Conference program now available

Registration is open for Digitizing the Stage until 2 June.

The conference program is now available. We’re delighted to hear from researchers and practitioners investigating the challenges and opportunities inherent in digital explorations of the stage archive, and from those working on initiatives such as the Rose Revealed project, Digital Blackfriars, the AusStage database, the NUI-Galway and Abbey Theatre Digital Archive, the Early Modern English Drama project, the Database of Early Modern Extracts (DEx), the Collection of Theatre Architecture, the Reception & Circulation of Early Modern Women Writers project (RECIRC), to name but a few.

Please note that like all digital projects, the program is subject to iterative adjustment and some timings may change prior to 10 July. We expect to add several talks and abstracts as speakers finalize titles and confirm their availability. Most sessions include time for questions and discussion. All events will take place in the Weston Library unless otherwise noted. If you’d like to learn more about the talks, consult the current list of abstracts. Any questions or comments may be directed to Gabrielle Linnell at digitalconf@folger.edu.

Monday, July 10

9AM Registration opens

10AM Welcome and conference information | Eric Johnson and Pip Willcox

10:20AM Opening Keynote | Tiffany Stern

11:20AM Coffee and tea break

11:40AM Staging unknown quantities: explorations in the digital archive

Bed, blood and beyond: A quantitative analysis of early modern stage props | Brett Greatley-Hirsch

Women and the early modern stage: Reception, circulation, performance | Erin McCarthy

Shakespeare’s purchase of Blackfriars Gatehouse 1613: A digital analysis | Alan H. Nelson

1PM Lunch break

2PM Flash of genius: lightning talks from the digital archive

The “Rose Revealed” project | Johanna Schmitz

The Folger’s digital asset platform | Stacey Redick

Modeling Early Modern Textual Environments: Digital Archives and the Bookshops in Paul’s Cross Churchyard | Mary Erica Zimmer

“Give me ocular proof”: Digital theatre archives and the early modern at NUI Galway| Barry Houlihan

3PM Coffee and tea break

3:20PM Reimagining the stage: audiovisual experiments

Upon the platform(s) where we watch: Digital multimedia Shakespeare editions| Noam Lior

A Midsummer’s Night’s sonification: Sonic analysis of a community using A Midsummer Night’s Dream | Iain Emsley

Digital Blackfriars: A multimedia experiment | Kirk Quinsland and Rebecca Rouse

4:55PM Adjournment

6PM Opening reception at the Old Divinity School, with tours of the Old Bodleian Library available

Tuesday, July 11

9AM Coffee and tea available

9:30AM Exit, pursued by a database: developing the archive

Opening the Archives: DEx, a Database of Dramatic Extracts | Beatrice Montedoro

The digital theatre archive: Making the most of material for research and teaching | Claudine Nightingale

Collection of Theatre Architecture, TU Berlin | Franziska Ritter

Seeing is Believing: The AusStage Database and the development of visualisation tools | Julian Meyrick

11:10 Coffee, tea

11:30AM Reimagining Performance 

Performance as research: Research as performance | Christie Carson

Reimagining performance | Sarah Ellis

12:30PM Lunch break

1:45PM Strange capers: experiments with the archive

200 Years of the Russian Stage: Establishing a TEI-encoded corpus to gain insights into the structural evolution of drama | Irina Pavlova

What we digitize when we digitize the stage | Ivan Lupić

“Not just a pretty picture”: Digitization as a catalytic instrument in the research of early modern theatre and performance | Ildiko Solti

3:15PM Coffee and tea break

3:30PM Tracing the stage: between text and tech

Genealogies of the text: digital provenance and early modern drama | Meaghan Brown

Early modern dramatic paratexts in print and digital archives | Sonia Massai and Heidi Craig

4.30PM Adjournment

7PM Conference dinner at the Cherwell Boathouse (Bardwell Road, Oxford, OX2 6ST)

Wednesday, July 12

9AM Coffee and tea available

9:30AM Digitizing the Bard: Reimagining the Shakespeare Archive with talks by Pip Willcox, Victoria Lane, and Eric Johnson

11AM Coffee and tea break

11:15AM The Screen’s the thing: performance multimedia and pedagogy

The MIT Global Shakespeares Merchant module, in 2017 | Diana E. Henderson

Teaching the digitized stage: pedagogy in the archives | Erin Sullivan

12:05PM Break

12:10PM Closing keynote | Michael Dobson

Confirmed speakers update

Registration is now open for Digitizing the Stage.

In addition to the speakers already confirmed, we look forward to hearing from the following in Oxford this July:

• Dr. Meaghan Brown, Fellow for Data Curation in Early Modern Studies, Folger Shakespeare Library
• Heidi Craig, University of Toronto
• Sarah Ellis, Director of Digital Development, Royal Shakespeare Company
• Professor Sonia Massai, King’s College London
• Dr. Erin McCarthy, National University of Ireland, Galway
• Dr. Kirk Quinsland, Fordham University
• Professor Johanna Schmitz, Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville

More information about the conference program to come in the upcoming weeks.

Registration now open

Registration is now open for Digitizing the Stage. Registration will be open until 2 June 2017 and is limited to a maximum of 100 attendees.

The registration fee covers full conference attendance, the opening reception, the conference dinner, and refreshment breaks (morning and afternoon.) The fee is £150 for full or £100 for students/early career researchers (within 3 years of obtaining highest degree)/unwaged.

If you have requested a fee waiver and/or travel bursary, we will be responding to your request by Monday, May 8th. Please wait to hear from us before you register.

For those who have submitted proposals in response to the CFP, we are reviewing abstracts now and will respond by mid-May.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to email Gabrielle Linnell at digitalconf@folger.edu. We look forward to seeing you in Oxford this July.

Update: Confirmed speakers

We are delighted to announce that in addition to the speakers already confirmed, we look forward to hearing from:

• Professor Michael Dobson, Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham, who will deliver the closing keynote on 12 July
• Professor Diana E. Henderson, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
• Victoria Lane, archivist, Shakespeare’s Globe
• Professor Alan H. Nelson, University of California, Berkeley, emeritus
• Pip Willcox, Head of the Centre for Digital Scholarship, Bodleian Libraries, Oxford

For the full list of confirmed speakers thus far, please consult our program page.

There is still time to submit an abstract in response our Call for Proposals, which closes on the 30th of April. Many thanks to those who have already done so.

Requesting Fee Waivers and Travel Bursaries

As we look forward to registration opening very shortly, we have received inquiries over how to apply for a fee waiver and/or travel bursary for attending Digitizing the Stage. We have extended our original timeline for funding requests in order to match the extension for Calls for Papers.

We are fortunate to have a limited number of fee waivers available for participants. To apply for one, please submit a brief paragraph describing your interest in participating and reason for requesting a fee waiver and/or travel bursary by April 30th, prior to registration. Email this information to Gabrielle Linnell (digitalconf@folger.edu).

A note on travel bursaries amounts: we have travel bursaries approximate to the cost of many train journeys to Oxford from within the U.K. We unfortunately do not have enough funds to cover the cost of international travel.

We will respond by May 8th to let you know whether we are able to provide you with the waiver and/or bursary. We want to maximize participation in the conference with the limited amounts of funds that we have; however, we will not be able to provide financial assistance to everyone who applies.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to be in touch via email to digitalconf@folger.edu. We look forward to seeing you in Oxford this July.

Update: Call for Proposals Extended

We have extended our Call for Proposals to a new deadline of 30 April 2017.

Digitizing the Stage:

Rethinking the Early Modern Theatre Archive

Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford

The Bodleian Libraries and the Folger Shakespeare Library will convene a conference from 10-12 July, 2017, on digital explorations of the early modern theatre archive. We are interested in applying approaches from other disciplines, genres, and time periods which can prompt new thinking about the ways we preserve, describe, research, and teach the early modern stage; as well as in hearing from early modernists who engage with their subject through digital means. Seeking to foster a spirit of collaborative experimentation, we invite proposals in the full range of project completion taking the form of 20-minute papers, as well as “lightning talks,” panel discussions, multimedia presentations, and others.

Invested in both material and method, Digitizing the Stage is a singular opportunity to consider the future of the early modern archive.

Confirmed speakers include Professor Tiffany Stern (Royal Holloway, University of London) who will be delivering the opening keynote; Dr. Christie Carson (Royal Holloway, University of London), Dr. Brett Greatley-Hirsch (University of Leeds); Eric Johnson (Folger Shakespeare Library); and Dr. Erin Sullivan (Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham). Attendance will be limited to 100 participants, with registration opening in April 2017.

Submissions should relate to one or more of the following topics and themes:

• Materiality and methods
• Early modern theatre and film
• Working in audio, text, and image
• Performance and theatre history
• Challenges and experiments in the archive
• Digital archiving and cataloging

Proposals for conference papers, panel discussions, lightning talks, multimedia and interactive demonstrations should not exceed 250 words.

Please include your name, contact information, academic affiliation (if relevant), and a brief biographical description including relevant interests. Submit proposals within the text of an email to digitalconf@folger.edu.

Proposals are now due the 30th of April, 2017. Some fee waivers and UK travel bursaries are available; please enquire.

Digitizing the Stage is organized by the Centre for Digital Scholarship, Bodleian Libraries; the Folger Shakespeare Library; and Professor Tiffany Stern, Royal Holloway, University of London.

Update: Confirmed speakers

We are delighted to announce that in addition to Dr. Tiffany Stern, who will be delivering the opening keynote, we can confirm the following speakers for Digitizing the Stage:

• Dr. Christie Carson, Royal Holloway, University of London
• Dr. Brett Greatley-Hirsch, University of Leeds
• Eric Johnson, Director of Digital Access, Folger Shakespeare Library
• Dr. Erin Sullivan, Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham

More information about the conference schedule and registration will be forthcoming.