In the last nearly seven decades, the Arts and Humanities have drawn a lot from the methodology and toolkit of computational technology. As the two domains linked and influenced each other, new research areas were defined under the terms of computational humanities, humanities informatics, and, from the 2000s onwards, digital humanities (DH) as an umbrella concept. Whether DH is understood as a discipline, or a methodology and a set of tools used in specific fields of Arts and Humanities, its emergence has definitely been decisive.
As researchers of DH typically agree, the domain has two fundamental aspects: data and design. Data-driven research is already a widely known, theoretically founded approach even in many fields of Arts and Humanities. Without the appropriate quality and quantity of research data, data-driven DH research would not exist. Existing publications on DH have focused largely on the importance of data, with less attention being paid to design, both in a theoretical and practical sense.
The Special Issue Designing Digital Humanities is dedicated to the diverse interactions of DH research and design. From a theoretical point of view, designing is the process of modeling our knowledge, organising information, and building structures. On the other hand, design in a practical sense may provide an interface to this knowledge—or research data—from aesthetic and functional perspectives. This call is open to (but not restricted to) both approaches in the following topics.
- design and the digital medium: user interface, user experience (usability and user empowerment) ● information visualisations (graphs, maps, trees and more) ● virtual exhibitions and augmented reality
- modeling knowledge in the humanities: data models ● text representation ● design and the attributes of humanities research: comparing sources, criticism, handling uncertainty and hiatus/lack of sources
- designing complex systems: research environment ● digital ecosystems ● green web, fossil-free internet design as a research topic in DH research with the assistance of DH tools (data analysis methods, NLP tools, etc.) ● design history through the lens of DH ● databases focusing on the theory and practice of design
- research through design: how design affected DH research?
- open science and digital humanities: what roles can design play?
- popularisation/scholarly communication in DH: reaching the wider public through design
Disegno accepts research papers (5000–7000 words), essays (c. 3000 words), and book/exhibition reviews (c. 2000 words). Research papers undergo double-blind peer review; reviews and essays are typically reviewed by the editors.
Expected timeline of the publication process:
Extended deadline: April 23, 2023: submission of abstracts (300 words).
April 5, 2023: submission of abstracts (300 words). April 15, 2023: feedback on accepted proposals.
July 15, 2023: deadline for submitting the finished papers. Fall 2023: publication.