This panel focuses how the development of digital infrastructure can support and transform the ways in which humanities scholars research and communicate research outcomes. It examines the opportunities and barriers to the development of digital humanities infrastructure, showcasing existing examples nationally of research that involves collaboration and scale, in order to canvas the possibilities for the future. How can the humanities use digital technologies to create new kinds of research, to draw people and projects together, and to communicate our research more effectively? What digital infrastructure opportunities exist nationally and internationally to allow humanities researchers to undertake projects with large-scale impact?
The National Research Infrastructure Roadmap identifies infrastructure as the catalyst for new kinds of large-scale collaborative projects with the potential to transform the research landscape: introducing new partners and new projects with transnational reach. This panel asks what are the new directions in digital infrastructure for humanities research, building on existing projects and projecting into the future? What possibilities and problems exist for collaboration and scale in digital humanities research and how can we take advantage of this new national emphasis on infrastructure?