Digital Humanities 2007
June 2-8, 2007

at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

The Graduate School of Library and Information Science (GSLIS), with support from the Office of the Vice Chanceloor for Research, and in cooperation with the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) and the Center for Computing in the Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences (CHASS), will host Digital Humanities 2007 (the annual joint conference of the Association for Computers and the Humanities and the Association for Literary and Linguistic Computing), at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign, June 3-7, 2007. The site of the conference will be the new NCSA building.

Note: Reserved room blocks in conference hotels were released on May 1; rooms and rates are no longer guaranteed. Early registration for the conference itself ends on May 14: after midnight (Central Time) prices for all categories of registrants (students, members, etc.) will increase. After May 25 no further online registrations will be accepted: please register on-site.

DH2007 poster/demo requirements: We expect to have at hand for each presenter an easel, a trifold posterboard (landscape orientation, 36" high, 48" wide), a small table, a plug-in, and access to wireless internet for those who wish to bring laptops for their demonstrations.


Registration and Bursaries

Register online

Registration is $250 for ACH or ALLC members before May 15, $350 for members May 15 and after. Student members may register for $100 before May 15, and for $150 May 15 and after. Non-members may register for $400 any time, and student non-members may register for $200 any time. Membership is by (individual) subscription to Literary and Linguistic Computing: subscriptions cost $110 ($55 for students/seniors), and regular individual subscriptions may be made online here; discount subscriptions require printing and mailing or faxing a form that can be found at that same location. Registrants for DH2007 may also attend the 2007 annual meeting of the Classification Society of North America, from June 7-10 in Champaign-Urbana, at no additional cost.

ACH Bursary application: Each year, a number of bursaries are awarded to graduate students and young scholars who have had conference proposals accepted by the DH Programme Committee. The deadline for receipt of applications is April 1 each year, which decisions announced by the ACH bursary review panel in mid to late April each year. Funding is limited, so applicants should ensure that funding is not available from any other sources before applying.

ALLC Bursary Application: As part of its commitment to promote the development and application of appropriate computing in humanities scholarship, each year the ALLC awards up to five bursaries of up to 500 GB pounds each to students and young scholars who are members of the Association and who have papers or posters accepted for presentation at the joint ALLC/ACH international conference. Application for a bursary must be made at the same time as the proposal for a paper or poster is submitted, using the application form on this web site. Applications will be considered after the Program Committee has decided which papers are to be accepted. Recipients will be notified as soon as possible thereafter. A participant in a multi-author paper is eligible for an award, but it must be clear that s/he is contributing substantially to the paper.


Plenary Speakers & Schedule

Main academic program June 4-7:

Schedule overview
Detailed schedule
Online abstracts (searchable)
Complete collection of abstracts [26MB PDF])

The opening keynote will be given by Professor Franco Moretti, the Danily C. and Laura Louise Bell Professor, Professor of English and Comparative Literature, and Director of the Center for the Study of the Novel, at Stanford University. Professor Moretti is the author of The Atlas of the European Novel (1998) and Graphs, Maps, Trees (2003), among many other works.

The Busa Award lecture will be delivered by Professor Wilhelm Ott, creator of TUSTEP, long-time director of the Computing Center of the University of Tuebingen, and host of 90 seminars over several decades in the Kolloquium uber die Anwendung der Elektronischen Datenverarbeitung in den Geisteswissenschaften.

  • Saturday, June 2nd: Board meetings all day -- ADHO Steering Committee in the morning, ADHO standing committees (publications, Conference, Multilinguality, Busa Award), and the 2008 Program Committee in the afternoon. Restaurant dinner for these committee members and any board members from constituent associations who arrive in time for dinner.
  • Sunday, June 3rd: Board meetings all day -- Boards of constituent associations. Dinner on your own.
  • Monday, June 4th: Springfield excursion 8:30 am - 4 pm; opening plenary and reception in the evening
  • Tuesday, June 5th: First full day of the academic program
  • Wednesday, June 6th: second full day of the academic program; banquet in the evening (music provided by High Cotton)
  • Thursday, June 7th: half-day of academic program, Allerton excursion (12:30 pm - 6 pm) or classification short-course in the afternoon. CSNA reception in the evening.
  • Friday, June 8th: classification workshops with The Classification Society of North America: members of ADHO associations will be able to cross-register for the two-day CSNA conference, which will follow immediately on the end of DH2007, also in Champaign-Urbana


Housing and Child Care

Hotel room blocks have been arranged for conference participants at three hotels near the University campus. Lodging reservations and payment are the responsibility of individual participants. Please mention "Digital Humanities" when making your reservation in order to get the appropriate rate and availability. After the rooms are released, May 1, 2007, rooms will be on space-available basis only. Please call the hotels directly to make reservations.

Illini Union (sold out as of May 1)
1401 West Green Street, Urbana, Illinois 61801
217.333.1241
iu-hotel@uiuc.edu (please include the number of guests, a mailing address, and a telephone number)
Rates: $86 single, $99 double
Located in the heart of campus.

Hampton Inn
1200 West University Avenue, Urbana, Illinois 61801
217.337.1100; toll free 800.426.7866 (booking online will not guarantee conference rates or availability)
Rates: $89
Located just north of campus; within walking distance.

Busey Evans Residence Halls
1111 West Nevada, Urbana, Illinois 61801
217.333.1766 ask for guest housing.
You may email conference@uiuc.edu for reservations or book on-line here.
Rates: $25.65 shared room; $39.45 single; bathrooms are community style.
Reservations may be made until May 27, 2007.

If you are interested in child care during the conference, please send email to John.M.Unsworth@gmail.com


Travel

If you fly into Willard Airport, the local airport, you can take the "27 Air Bus" to the Illini Union or the Hampton Inn. The Union stop is not a far walk to Busey-Evans, nor is the main Library stop, though if you have lots of luggage you may want to take a cab from the Union. The Hampton Inn also has a free airport shuttle.

If you fly to Chicago (O'Hare or Midway) instead of Willard, you can take The LincolnLand Express or Suburban Express to Champaign. LincolnLand Express also serves the airports at Bloomington-Normal and Indianapolis. For either, you should make reservations.

If you rent a car and drive from Chicago, it should take you about 2.5 - 3 hours (150 miles); from Bloomington-Normal IL the drive is about 45 minutes (45 miles), and from Indianapolis it is about 2 hours drive (107 miles). Amtrak also runs regular train service from Chicago to Champaign, but that is somewhat less accessible from the airports.

The University web site also provides detailed directions to campus.


Meals

Morning and afternoon coffee breaks will be provided to registered participants. Lunch will be provided on excursions, and dinner at the banquet, for those who register for these events. Beyond that, meals are the responsibility of participants. Cooking facilities are not available in the Busey-Evans student housing.

A variety of restaurants of good quality are within walking distance of the campus. A short bus or cab ride brings into range some other very good choices. Favorites include:

  • Bacaro Italian wine bar, expensive by local standards, but excellent food, wine, and service. Wines by the glass half-price on Sunday. Downtown Champaign.
  • Cafe Luna: European menu, very good food and service; large groups are a problem here. Walking distance from campus.
  • Timpone's: Italian, very good, reasonably priced. Walking distance from campus.
  • Siam Terrace: Excellent and reasonably priced Thai food in an unassuming atmosphere. Downtown Urbana.
  • Milo's Restaurant: Family-style American restaurant, great food and service, reasonably priced. Downtown Urbana.
  • Basmati Restaurant: Very good Indian food, very nice people. Walking distance from campus.


Excursions

Springfield Excursion: 8:30 AM - 4 pm, June 4th

$50 including lunch: $55 after May 14th. This excursion will include both of the following:

Dana-Thomas House: In 1902, Susan Lawrence Dana, the forward-thinking socialite daughter of a Springfield industrialist, commissioned architect Frank Lloyd Wright to design a new residence. Trusting in Wrights genius, Dana gave him complete authority and spared no expense. Wright went all out in what's considered his first full expression of the Prairie style. When it was finished in 1904, the $60,000 project was the largest residence Wright had built: 35 rooms on three main levels, encompassing 12,000-square-feet of living space. Operated by the Illinois Historic Preservation Agency, the house contains the largest collection of Wright furniture and art-glass windows. George Niedecken painted many murals for Wright, but the Dana-Thomas House has the only intact Niedecken original. Dana loved to entertain, and her house was designed with that in mind. The grand entrance is theatrical; one enters the house as if walking onto a stage. The three floors contain 16 varying levels. In the early 1980s, in order to preserve this architectural gem, the state of Illinois acquire the residence; the Dana-Thomas House Foundation, a nonprofit that promotes the house and programs special events, was formed the following year.

The Abraham Lincoln Presidential Museum: "Combining scholarship and showmanship, the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum in downtown Springfield, Illinois communicates the amazing life and times of Abraham Lincoln in unforgettable ways."

Allerton Excursion: 12:30 pm - 6 pm, June 7th

$50 including box lunch and an optional guided tour of the sculpture and grounds; $55 after May 14th.

Allerton Park: Robert Henry Allerton donated his private estate,"The Farms" to the University of Illinois in 1946. The property which is located just outside of Monticello, Illinois consists of 1,500 acres of formal gardens, nature areas, and his manor house. In keeping with Robert Allerton's orginal concept, the estate is used as a conservation area devoted to education, research, and recreation. Today, more than 100,000 people - including researchers, teachers, and students as well as the general public - visit the park or attend conferences at the Conference Center each year.


About the Campus and Surrounding Area

The University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign is located about 140 miles south of Chicago, in central Illinois. The University is served by Willard Airport (CMI) in Savoy, IL, about 10 minutes from the University campus. Amtrak has daily train service from Chicago. The city bus system that serves both Champaign and Urbana is excellent. The University web site provides more detailed directions to campus. Champaign has a population of 67,518 and Urbana's is 36,395. The University straddles the border between the two towns. In summer months the average high temperature is 85 degrees and low temperature is 65 degrees. Between April and July there is an average of 5 to 7 thunderstorms per month and our annual rainfall is 39.74 inches. During June, July and August there is an average of six to seven days per month when the temperature is above 90 degrees. Historically, July is the warmest month. The Champaign County Visitor's Guide has more information about the area.

Since its founding in 1867, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign has earned a reputation as a world-class leader in research, teaching, and public engagement. It is one of the country's 37 original public land-grant institutions created within 10 years of the signing of the Morrill Act by Abraham Lincoln in 1862. It has 272 major buildings located on 1,458 acres. The University has 1,986 permanent faculty, 29,294 undergraduate students, and 11,066 graduate students, from all 50 states and 100 nations.

Campus Attractions

The Library at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign is the largest public university collection in the world, and the one of the world's premier research libraries. Among the Library's most notable collections are its holdings in Slavic and Eastern European history, literature, and science; music, especially Renaissance music; 17th- and 18th-century American and British literature; American, British and Irish history, including a distinguished collection of Lincolniana; French, German, and Italian literature, including world-famous Proust, Rilke, Dante, and Tasso collections; and historic and modern maps. The Library is also world-famous for its outstanding collection of emblem books and incunabula, and for archival collections, including personal papers of John Milton, Marcel Proust, H.G. Wells, Carl Sandburg, and Avery Brundage of the international Olympic movement. The Library holdings include more than ten million volumes.

Since 1969, the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts has served as one of the nation's premier educational and professional performing arts complexes. Each season, Krannert Center features over 300 performances and productions. Encompassing two city blocks, the Center is a stunning architectural achievement designed by University of Illinois alumnus Max Abramovitz. The Krannert Center has four main venues, and is most famous for its acoustically superior concert hall, the Foellinger Great Hall.

The Krannert Art Museum has the second-largest permanent collection of art in Illinois. Acknowledged strengths of the collection include: The Trees Collection of European and American Painting, Moore Collection of European and American Decorative Arts, The Olsen Collection of pre-Columbian Art, and examples of 20th Century Art collected during the Contemporary Arts Festivals (1948-1974). Additionally, focal points of the collection include a small but exquisite collection of Asian art, a growing collection of African art, and a large and important collection of works on paper, particularly a group of prints by WPA-artists and photographs by Edward Weston and others.

With approximately 46,000 artifacts in its collections, The Spurlock Museum's permanent galleries celebrate the diversity of cultures through time and across the globe, highlighting the Ancient Mediterranean, Africa, Asia, Oceania, Europe, and the Americas.


About the Hosts

GSLIS is the top-ranked school of its kind in the United States, and among the best in the world. Its faculty include notable humanities computing and digital library researchers, including two past presidents of ACH (Allen Renear and John Unsworth). NCSA is one of the nation's oldest and largest supercomputing centers, the birthplace of the Mosaic web browser (the progenitor of Netscape/Mozilla and Microsoft Internet Explorer), and home of the D2K software that is the basis for ongoing GSLIS data-mining projects involving music (M2K) and humanities digital libraries (NORA). CHASS, directed by Vernon Burton, is a new effort at UIUC to support humanities computing.

Local Host: John Unsworth
Email contact: dh2007@digitalhumanities.org


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