[Air-L] Call for Participation – Digital Methods Summer School 2017

[Fernando van der Vlist]

Dear all,

The Digital Methods Initiative (DMI) will host its 11th annual Digital
Methods Summer School from 26 June – 7 July 2017 at the University of
Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Below please find the call for participation.

This year's theme is 'Get the Picture. Digital Methods for Visual
Research'. The deadline for applications is 5 May 2017. More information is
available from: http://bit.ly/dmi17_ss_call.

Best regards,

Fernando van der Vlist

-- 
F. N. van der Vlist, BDes MA
*Doctoral Researcher*
*Research Associate, Media of Cooperation*
*Research Associate, Digital Methods Initiative*
*Lecturer, New Media and Digital Culture*

University of Siegen, DFG Collab. Res. Centre 1187
University of Amsterdam, Dept. of Media Studies

F.N.vanderVlist at uva.nl; @fvandervlist <https://twitter.com/fvandervlist>
uva.nl/profile/f.n.vandervlist <http://www.uva.nl/profile/f.n.vandervlist>
fernandovandervlist.nl <https://www.fernandovandervlist.nl/>

-- 

# CALL FOR PARTICIPATION
# DIGITAL METHODS SUMMER SCHOOL 2017
# 27 JUNE - 7 JULY 2017
# UNIVERSITY OF AMSTERDAM

# GET THE PICTURE
# DIGITAL METHODS FOR VISUAL RESEARCH

Gillian Rose employs the term visual methodologies for "researching with
visual materials" (2016). Iconography, semiotics, framing analysis and
multimodal analysis are among the approaches that may be applied to digital
materials. One may also ask, does the online make a difference to the study
of the visual? That is, with which approaches is the image considered
primarily, or secondarily, as a digital object embedded in online media?
Apart from the change in the setting of the object, there may also be
methods that emerge from the new media, engines and platforms. What kinds
of so-called ?natively? digital methods can be repurposed productively for
visual analysis? How to make use of the Google?s reverse image search?

Gillian Rose employs the term visual methodologies for "researching with
visual materials" (2016). Iconography, semiotics, framing analysis and
multimodal analysis are among the approaches that may be applied to digital
materials. One may also ask, does the online make a difference to the study
of the visual? That is, with which approaches is the image considered
primarily, or secondarily, as a digital object embedded in online media?
Apart from the change in the setting of the object, there may also be
methods that emerge from the new media, engines and platforms. What kinds
of so-called 'natively' digital methods can be repurposed productively for
visual analysis? How to make use of the Google's reverse image search?

More broadly, with the increasing focus on selfies and memes but also on
Instagram stories, animated gifs, filters, stickers and emoticons, social
media and digital communications are pushing for a visual turn in the study
of digital culture. Such a push invites visual analysis into the realm of
digital studies, too. One may begin to open the discussion of interplay by
examining the new outputs such as journalists' data visualisations as well
as policy-makers' dashboards like the open data city platforms. One may
similarly compare visual literacies. Are there new ways of interpreting
images through data, both substantively (which are the related materials?)
and temporally (how do they develop over time? do they resonate? are they
memes?). In digital methods, the image is not only a research object but
also a research device. Making images "that can be seen and manipulated"
(Venturini, Jacomy & Pereira 2015) enables scholars to access and actively
explore datasets. How to make them and read them? At the same time, the
technical properties of digital images both in terms of their color,
resolution, and timestamp, as well as their 'networkedness', traceability
and resonance, become available for research, allowing one to think with
images (as visual guides and narratives) as well as through them (as data
objects).

Novel visual methodologies then emerge. There is the 'active' data
visualisation, which includes research protocol diagrams, data dashboards,
visual network analysis, and issue mapping. Protocol diagrams (Figure 1)
guide analysts, programmers and designers through their collaborative
research project. Data dashboards offer a visual aid for data metrics and
analytics, in side-by-side graphs and tables; or become critical tools (as
in the People's Dashboard). Visual network analysis offers a way into data
that can be engaged with and requires an active research attitude
(Venturini, Jacomy & Pereira 2015). Issue mapping renders legible the
actors and substance of a (possibly controversial) issue (Rogers,
Sánchez-Querubín & Kil 2015). In a second group of approaches, the image is
treated as a digitised or natively digital object of study. This includes
visual and cultural analytics, which provide distant visual reading
techniques to explore and plot visual objects such as selfies and websites
based on their formal properties (Manovich 2014; Ben-David, Amram &
Bekkerman 2016). Networked visual content analysis, in which images may be
queried 'in reverse' to study their circulation, can be used to critically
assess questions of representation and cultural standing (Figure 2).
Another group of approaches repurpose visual formats, where more playful
explorations appropriate (and tweak) the templates and visual aesthetics of
the web, creating research GIFs and critical social media profiles (Figure
3). In this 10th Digital Methods Summer School we will explore and expand
such digital methods for visual research, and critically inquire into their
proposed epistemologies.

We look forward to welcoming you to Amsterdam in the Summertime!

--

## SUMMER SCHOOL PHILOSOPHY

The Digital Methods Summer School is exploratory and experimental. It is
not a setting for 'just' tool training or for principally tool-driven
research. Substantive research projects are conceived and carried out.
Participants are encouraged to 'span time with their issue' and the
materials. In other words, we heed Alexander Galloway's admonition about
data and tool-driven work: "Those who were formerly scholars or experts in
a certain area are now recast as mere tool users beholden to the
affordances of the tool - while students spend ever more time mastering
menus and buttons, becoming literate in a digital device rather than a
literary corpus" (Galloway 2014: 127). We encourage device and corpus
literacy! The device training we ask you to do prior to the Summer School
through online tutorials, and at the Summer School itself, in a kind of
flipped learning environment (if you'll excuse the overused phrase), we
would like to believe that you have familiarised yourself already with the
tools and completed the tutorials available online. During the Summer
School we will discuss and tinker with the nitty-gritty, aim to invent new
methods, techniques and heuristics and create the first iterations of
compelling work to be shared.

## ABOUT DIGITAL METHODS AS A CONCEPT

Digital methods is a term coined as a counterpoint to virtual methods,
which typically digitize existing methods and port them onto the Web.
Digital methods, contrariwise, seek to learn from the methods built into
the dominant devices online, and repurpose them for social and cultural
research. That is, the challenge is to study both the info-web as well as
the social web with the tools that organize them. There is a general
protocol to digital methods. At the outset stock is taken of the natively
digital objects that are available (links, tags, threads, etc.) and how
devices such as search engines make use of them. Can the device techniques
be repurposed, for example by remixing the digital objects they take as
inputs? Once findings are made with online data, where to ground them? Is
the baseline still the offline, or are findings to be grounded in more
online data? Taking up these questions more theoretically (but also
practically) there is also a Digital Methods book (MIT Press, 2013) as well
as a complementary Issue Mapping book (Amsterdam University Press, 2015),
and other digital methods publications.

## ABOUT THE DIGITAL METHODS SUMMER SCHOOL

The Digital Methods Summer School, founded ten years ago, in 2007, together
with the Digital Methods Initiative, is directed by Prof. Richard Rogers,
Chair in New Media & Digital Culture and Department Chair at Media Studies,
University of Amsterdam. The Summer School is one training opportunity
provided by the Digital Methods Initiative (DMI). DMI also has a Winter
School, which includes a mini-conference, where papers are presented and
responded to. Winter School papers are often the result of Summer School
projects. The Summer School is coordinated by PhD candidates in New Media
at the University of Amsterdam, or affiliates. This year the coordinators
are Sabine Niederer, Natalia Sánchez-Quérubin and Fernando van der Vlist.
The Summer School has a technical staff as well as a design staff, drawn
from the ranks of Density Design in Milan. The Summer School also relies on
a technical infrastructure of some nine servers hosting tools and storing
data, which recently (and intrepidly) moved to the cloud. In a culture of
experimentation and skill-sharing, participants bring their laptops, learn
method, undertake research projects, make reports, tools and graphics and
write them up on the Digital Methods wiki. The Summer School concludes with
final presentations. Often there are subject matter experts from
non-governmental or other organizations who present their analytical needs
and issues at the outset and the projects seek to meet those needs, however
indirectly. For instance, Women on Waves came along during the 2010, Fair
Phone to the 2012 Summer School and Greenpeace International and their Gezi
Park project in 2013 as well as the COP21 Lima project in 2015. We have
worked on the issue of rewilding eco-spaces with NGOs in the 2014 Summer
School. More recently we have sought to repopulate city dashboards (Summer
School 2015 and Winter School 2017).

* Previous Digital Methods Summer Schools, 2007-2016, https://wiki.
digitalmethods.net/Dmi/DmiSummerSchool.
* Previous Digital Methods Winter Schools, 2009-2017, https://wiki.
digitalmethods.net/Dmi/WinterSchool.
* What's it like? Digital Methods Summer School flickr stream 2012 and
flickr stream 2013. There is also a 2015 flickr collection.
* Most recently we have created Summer and Winter school shorts (thanks to
Lisa Maier): Promo video about the Digital Methods Summer School (2014);
Summer School in 2015. (tip!) and Winter School 2016 video.
* 2016 keynote lecture by Prof. Richard Rogers on Critical Analytics

## ABOUT THE DIGITAL METHODS INITIATIVE

The Digital Methods Summer School is part of the Digital Methods Initiative
(DMI), Amsterdam, dedicated to developing methods for Internet-related
research. DMI was founded a decade ago with a grant from the Mondriaan
Foundation, and the Summer School has been supported by the Center for
Creation, Content and Technology (CCCT), University of Amsterdam, organized
by the Faculty of Science with sponsorship from Platform Betatechniek. It
also has received support from the Citizen Data Lab, Amsterdam University
of Applied Sciences as well as "Media of Cooperation," University of
Siegen. The 2017 Summer School will be held in collaboration with the
Netherlands Research school for Media Studies (RMeS).

## APPLICATIONS & KEY DATES

To apply for the Digital Methods Summer School 2017, please use the
University of Amsterdam Summer School form. Or, please send a one-page
letter explaining how digital methods training would benefit your current
work, and also enclose a CV (with full postal address), a copy of your
passport (details page only), a headshot photo as well as a 100-word bio
(to be included in the Summer School welcome package). Mark your
application "DMI Training Certificate Program," and send to summerschool
[at] digitalmethods.net.

* The deadline for applications for the Summer School is 5 May 2017.
* Notifications will be sent on 8 May. Accepted participants will receive a
welcome package, which includes a reader, a schedule, and a face book of
all participants.
* The cost of the Summer School is eur 895 and is open to PhD candidates
and motivated scholars as well as to research master's students and
advanced master's students. Data journalists, artists, and research
professionals are also welcome to apply. Accepted applicants will be
informed of the bank transfer details upon notice of acceptance to the
Summer School on 8 May.
* The fee must be paid by 16 June.
* University of Amsterdam students are exempt from tuition and should state
on the application form (under tuition fee remarks) that they wish to apply
for a fee waiver. Please also provide your student number.
* RMeS members participate in the first two days of the Summer School. To
participate in the full Summer School the regular fee applies.

Any questions may be addressed to the Summer School coordinators Sabine
Niederer, Natalia Sánchez-Querubín, and Fernando van der Vlist:
summerschool [at] digitalmethods.net. Informal queries may be sent to this
email address as well.

## SCHOLARSHIPS

The Digital Methods Summer School is part of the University of Amsterdam
Summer School programme, which has a video giving a flavor of the Summer
School experience. Students from universities (outside of the Netherlands)
in the LERU and U21 networks are eligible for a scholarship to help cover
the cost of tuition for the DMI Summer School. Please state LERU or U21
university affiliation under tuition remarks when applying to the Summer
School. Dutch universities are not eligible.

## ACCOMMODATIONS & CATERING

The Summer School is self-catered, and there are abundant cafes and a
university mensa nearby. For a map we made of nearby lunch (and coffee)
places, see bit.ly/dmi17_ss_lunch.
Apply as early as possible to the reasonably priced Student Hotel. For
those who prefer other accommodations, we suggest Airbnb or similar. For
shorter stay, there is Hotel Le Coin, where you may request a university
discount.

## SUCCESSFUL COMPLETION & COMPLETION CERTIFICATES

To successfully complete the Summer School and receive a completion
certificate (and 6 ECTS when necessary), you must complete a significant
contribution to two Summer School projects (one in week one and the other
in week two), evidenced by co-authorship of the project reports as well as
final (joint) presentations. Templates for the project report as well as
for the presentation slides are supplied.

## SUMMER SCHOOL SCHEDULE

The Summer School meets every weekday. Please bring your laptop. (An iPad
is not enough.) We will provide abundant connectivity. We start generally
at 9:30 in the morning, and end around 17:30. There are morning talks one
to two days per week. All other time is devoted to project work with
occasional collective and individual feedback sessions. On the second
Friday we have a a festive closing with a boat trip on the canals of
Amsterdam.

## REFERENCES

* Ben-David, A., Amram, A. & Bekkerman, R. (2016). The colors of the
national Web: visual data analysis of the historical Yugoslav Web domain.
International Journal on Digital Libraries. doi:10.1007/s00799-016-0202-6
* Galloway, A. (2014). The Cybernetic Hypothesis. Differences. 25(1),
107-131.
Manovich, L., Stefaner, M., Mehrdad, Y., Baur, D., & et al. (2014).
Selfiecity. Investigating the style of self-portraits (selfies) in five
cities across the world. URL: http://selfiecity.net/
* Rogers, R. Sánchez-Querubín, N. & Kil, A. (2015). Issue Mapping for an
Ageing Europe. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press. Open access book
download
* Rose, G. (2016). Visual Methodologies. An Introduction to Researching
with Visual Materials. London: Sage.
* Venturini, T., Jacomy, M, De Carvalho Pereira, D. (2015). Visual Network
Analysis, (working paper). URL: http://www.tommasoventurini.it/wp/wp-
content/uploads/2014/08/Venturini-Jacomy_Visual-Networ
k-Analysis_WorkingPaper.pdf.