Duke University. The Literature Program announces a position at the Associate or Full Professor level in film, video, and digital studies. The candidate is expected to teach both graduate and undergraduate courses in international film, history of cinema, and film theory. Interests in new media and digital technologies are welcome. The ideal candidate will be able to contribute as well to the full intellectual life of the Literature Program, which emphasizes literature and aesthetics, critical theory, cultural studies and film, video, and digital studies. Position begins on August 1, 2006. Please submit a CV and letter of application as MS word attachments to: Pam Terterian, Administrative Manager, [litadmin@duke.edu]. Use “Faculty Search” as subject line. Applications received by October 15, 2005 will be given full consideration. Duke University is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity employer.
They Come in a Steady Stream Now
Powers’s compelling short story meditates on spam and connects our computer-mediated commuications and experiences with the contents of our memory. This Flash presentation provides the story in a series of email messages, delivered to a simulated inbox. See the Directory entry for more information about this piece.
Immediate Residential Fellowship for a Scholar Impacted by Katrina
PLEASE LINK AND DISTRIBUTE WIDELY.
The Maryland Institute for Technology in the Humanities (MITH) at the
University of Maryland, College Park is pleased to be able to offer an
immediate residential fellowship available to any one faculty member
or ABD doctoral candidate at an institution closed by Hurricane
Katrina.
Housed in the campus’s primary research library, MITH is a community
of scholars devoted to the application of new media and digital
technologies to humanities scholarship and teaching. Projects have
typically taken the form of electronic editions, scholarly databases,
or high-end teaching materials. See examples here:
http://www.mith2.umd.edu/research/index.php
While colleges and universities seem to be moving very fast to
accommodate displaced undergraduates, the careers of graduate students
and faculty also have to be protected and tended to. We are therefore
able to offer a scholar his or her personal workspace, the use of our
extensive hardware and software resources, easy access to the
university’s library collections (and a base from which to access the
unparalleled academic and cultural institutions of the DC area
besides), and expert-level consulting about digital scholarship.
While we regret we are unable to offer a stipend, *funding is
available* for temporary relocation and some initial start-up
expenses.
To apply, please send a letter of inquiry describing the project to be
undertaken (either new or continuing research), a CV, and contact
information for three references. Application materials may be sent
electronically to mith@umd.edu or by fax to 301-314-7111 or by post to
Neil Fraistat, Acting Director, MITH, McKeldin Library, University of
Maryland, College Park, MD 20742. Consideration of applications to
begin immediately. Applications from women and minorities and graduate
students and faculty at Historically Black Colleges and Universities is
encouraged.
Neil Fraistat, Acting Director (301-405-3817)
Matthew Kirschenbaum, Acting Associate Director
Carl Stahmer, Acting Associate Director
ACLS Digital Innovation Fellowships
The ACLS announces the first annual competition for the ACLS Digital Innovation Fellowships, thanks to the generous assistance of The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. This program invites applications to pursue digitally based research projects in all disciplines of the humanities and humanities-related social sciences. It is hoped that projects of successful applicants will help advance digital humanistic scholarship by broadening understanding of its nature and exemplifying the robust infrastructure necessary for creating further such works.
ACLS Digital Innovation Fellowships are intended to support an academic yeadedicated to work on a major scholarly project that takes a digital form. Projects might include but are not limited to: digital research archives, new media representations of extant data, innovative databases, and digital tools that further humanistic research. ACLS does not support creative works (e.g., novels or films), textbooks, straightforward translations, or purely pedagogical projects. The ACLS will award up to five ACLS Digital Innovation Fellowships in this competition year. Each fellowship carries a stipend of up to $55,000 towards an academic year¹s leave and provides for project costs of up to $25,000.
This year’s successful applicants may take up the fellowship in 2006-2007 or at any time up to September 1, 2007, but candidates must commit themselves firmly to their preferred timeframe on their completed applications.
Amount (for stipends): up to $55,000
Amount (for project costs): up to $25,000
Tenure: one academic year, plus institutional support for an additional
period.
Completed applications must be submitted through the ACLS Online Fellowship Application system (ofa.acls.org) no later than 9 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, November 10, 2005. Decisions will be announced in late March 2006.
More information: archive of: http://www.acls.org/difguide.htm
Bleeding Through
Bleeding Through: Layers of Los Angeles, 1920-1986 is a co-production between USC’s Labyrinth Project, Germany’s ZKM (Center for Art And Media), and cultural historian Norman Klein. It poetically explores the history of a small area near downtown Los Angeles — a city often thought to have no history or downtown. Images of the city past and present are superimposed upon each other, archival documents are presented for exploration, and Klein appears in a small video window to tell the story of Molly — a fictional neighbor based on a real person, who may have murdered her husband.
Duchampian Net-Lit
Literaturhaus Stuttgart is sponsoring an unusual net-literature competition. The 1st Bachelors’ Prize for Net-Literature is “aimed at making the sterile bachelors’ machine fertile and is calling for entries in a productive net-literature competition.” The site goes on to say: “In accordance with the nature of the venture, participation is restricted to men.” The winner will receive 2000 euros, and the deadline is September 30th. Only web addresses can be submitted.
Eliza/Doctor
Weizenbaum devised a startling invention in the mid-1960s: the first computer character. When Eliza system that he built ran his script, Doctor, it could simulate a Rogerian psychotherapist in a way that was, if nothing else, highly amusing and enjoyable. Eliza/Doctor is the first “chatterbot,” and has remained available through the decades, since Weizenbaum documented the system well enough for it to be re-implemented.
Shandy Hall Residencies
Laurence Sterne (1713-68) wrote The Life and Opinions of Tristam Shandyin Shandy Hall, Coxwold, York, in the 18th Century. The innovative nonlinear novel is often cited by contemporary new media writers as an influence on their creative practice. It was recently announced that Shandy Hall will now house Asterisk*, a center for the study and development of narrative. Rather than simply developing the site as a museum dedicated to Sterne’s life and works, the center will be dedicated to innovation in both old and particularly new work. Asterisk* will support residencies for artists, “we envisage that these residencies will take forward current practice in a variety of narrative engagements: with diverse media, non linearity, digression, interactivity and audience participation, particularly (though not exclusively) where these intersect with technology.” The center will also commission new works, host exhibitions and performances, lectures and events, and a web forum. Last year hypertext author Deena Larsen completed a short hypertext, Shandean Ambles, during a three-day residency at the site. Asterisk* is now accepting applications for two three-week residencies this fall, one intended for a new media artist and the second for a writer with minimal technical background interested in integrating new media into his or her practice. Asterisk* also intends to gather an extensive library of innovative interactive literature at Shandy Hall.
The Beast
The first successful alternate reality game, this project never had an official name or website, but involved writing and work in other media being distributed across the Web on thirty sites; on other Internet servies; via phone, fax, USPS, bathroom walls, and live events; as well as on TV. It never advertised itself as a game and in fact declared “this is not a game.” Microsoft developed this non-game, which centered on the mystery of the death of Evan Chan, to promote the movie A.I. Thousands worked to solve what came to be called “The Beast”  which involved interpreting nearly 4,000 documents (in four languages), constructing a nightmare database, decrypting from the WWII Enigma code, and so on  a feat only possible with many readers cooperating online.
The Unknown
The encyclopedia hypertext novel The Unknown tells the story of a group of successful authors (who call themselves “The Unknown” and happen to be named William Gillespie, Scott Rettberg, and Dirk Stratton) on a drug-crazed cross-country book tour. The Unknown has been publicly read more than three dozen times, in readings where the audience is invited to interrupt and take things in a different direction whenever linked text is read. See the Directory entry for more information about this piece.