Engaging the global digital humanities community in our governance restructuring process.
Recent Comments in this Document
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I’m in agreement with Elisabeth on the question of SIG representation, in that I think that COs (as currently constituted, largely by region) offer the primary point of membership for DH matters. I think SIGs are important, but I see a difference between interest groups and membership organizations
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I support scenario 1, as it seems to strike the best balance between ensuring the continuing health of ADHO, moving ADHO towards a leaner organizational structure, and distributing decision-making power more equitably among the community of COs. At a moment when DH is proliferating across the globe, scenario 1 offers us the best chance to hear the voices of new organizations and new members while retaining the overall strength of the organization as a whole.
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Elisabeth Burr
correction: my good example was to be DHN not a non existant DHD. The German speaking is called DHd.
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[it currently has three Partner Organization: DH Benelux, Russian DH Network, Czech DH Initiative.]
This needs to be corrected, because EADH has only one Partner Organisation DH Benelux
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[SIGs may be proposed by any group of ADHO members]
Members of ADHO are COs. Thus what is meant by members needs to be specified, for example “by any group of members of COs of ADHO”
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[Note. There are currently 3 AOs: AIUCD (Italy); DHd (German-speaking); DHN (Nordic countries). All have a relationship with EADH as their partner CO.]
This needs to be corrected, because EADH has 5 AOs: AIUCD (Italy); DHd (German-speaking); DHN (Nordic countries), CZDHI (Czech), DH Russia (Russia)
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[chapter]
this term should not be used. It is not clear what it means. There is no definition of it anywhere
According to me B.1 Associate Organisations (AO) contains contradictions (see “allied to ADHO”).
I am also unsure whether ADHO should be responsible for determining the size of membership of an AO of a CO, for assigning it to a CO (there might be special cases which require such an assignement, but we should not make this the rule). I am against that ADHO establishes that an AO can be associated with more than one CO because this would make the handling of structural terms and finance unviable.
The whole matter of AOs should be discussed with EADH because it is up to now the only CO which has AOs. It has a lot of experience and can serve as a model for other COs which are thinking on having AOs.
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My comment refers to AOs alone. If the members of ADHO are COs and if AOs are AOs of COs then the responsibility with respect to disbursements (the only exception might be Scenario 3) is the responsibility of the COs, i.e. ADHO has no influence / nothing to say on this.
Comments on the Blog
Proposed Governance Scenarios (41 comments)
According to me joint membership is a problem with respect to democratic representation. This problem could be solved in two ways: a) abolish joint membership or b) allow for joint membership but joint members need to give preference to one association for a certain length of time.
If ADHO serves COs and COs serve individuals either directly or via their own associate organisations then the membership needs to count when talking about representation. If the size of the membership of COs is not taken into account we might encounter a situation where AOs of COs do not feel to be represented and want to become COs of ADHO themselves. This needs to be avoided in my eyes. We should rather encourage COs to have AOs as such a secondary umbrella structure allows for taking into account regional / continental specifities which ADHO cannot serve so easily. We should also not assume from the start that big COs cannot be considerate and take into account the needs of smaller or developping COs. The history of ADHO proves by itself that big COs did a lot to help smaller COs to get of the ground. Why question this sense of community by expressing worries about over-representation at all?
I can see the idea behind this proposal, i.e. consensus, but I am personally against this. Such a scenario could only work if the COs represented more or less an equal size of membership and if their membership was determined each by one country / one nation. This scenario would furthermore prevent regions to work together under one umbrella. When discussions about ADHO started we envisaged that there may be sub umbrellas representing the DH associations of bigger regions. At the moment only EADH works like that, but Europe is not the only region formed of different states and / or nations and / or language communities. I personally could imagine that one day there might be an African umbrella. Would we want such an umbrella to have just one vote? One day even Humanistica could be an umbrella of AOs. Would we want an Humanistica umbrella to have just one vote? In Latin America umbrellas of AOs might form. Would we want these umbrellas to have just one vote although all of them would most probably have quite huge memberships. The case of aaDH, ACH, CSDH/SCHN, and JADH is different and will probably remain different. They should however not be the model for the whole world.
This scenario is certainly more democratic as it takes the AOs into account and would allow for the formation of more sub-umbrellas of AOs. I do not see the point of having two representatives from each CO. Furthermore I am against giving each SIG a vote. SIGs are, as their denomination says groups which form because of special interests. They do not have the same sort of responsibility to their members as associations have, they do not have the same function either. They do not have membership fees. They are not registered legal bodies as associations which have to abide to the law. I am against watering down the idea of association for whatever reason.
Membership numbers can vary every year. A good example is DHD who has just more or less doubled its membership. A span of three years would not take such changes into account. A yearly adjustment would be needed, given that the development of DH in the world is very fast and we cannot forsee what the future brings. Such a yearly adjustment would be a lot of work and make things very chaotic.
This scenario disproportionately benefits COs existing in regions with a longer history of DH work. I am against instituting such systemic bias; it is not fair to newcomer organizations, and also will be very difficult to balance out in the future.
I disagree re SIGs. ADHO isn’t an association, itself; and ADHO approves SIGs. They may not be registered legal bodies, but they represent broad ranging — and deep — interests of digital humanities researchers. They may be “special,” but they are relevant across the field, not to a small part of it. SIGs should not be marginalized. I think they should have a vote.
In that light, I think that with AOs and SIGs having voting power in this scenario, it does make sense for COs to have two votes (or two representatives). I would be in favor of each AO having a vote
I share the IC’s concern that this group could become unwieldy, but think that this is the most well represented of the scenarios presented, and am in favor of it.
That said, there must be issues on which a simple majority rule would not make sense — such as, for example, disbanding ADHO. This should be worked out, though perhaps after a governance model is established.
I think that, as above, over-representing established COs should be a non-starter here. In an alliance that purports to be worldwide, in the current world political climate, with the current conversation about colonialism happening all across the field, to propose giving Europe and the U.S. & Canada 10 out of 14 votes seems ridiculous to me.
Total COB size would be 14 seats, 14 votes, according to the list below.
“ADHO should beware of initiating activities that don’t arise from the COs. Its sole purpose is to support COs. Wherever practical, all infrastructure, activities and projects supported should be proposed by, and managed by one or more COs and not by ADHO itself.” I think this is at the heart of what needs to be done at the ADHO level. Implied are issues of funding and mutual understanding. ADHO should collectively and transparently allocate funding for infrastructure to the COs managing it; and, for each piece of infrastructure, whether or not funded monetarily, a Memorandum of Understanding should exist and be signed on to by all of the COs.
What would happen if ADHO saw a part of a CO constitution that it did not approve of?
This appendix should include expansions of all CO name acronyms, or none. (All makes sense to me.)
Agreed.
This is the only one of the models that preserves balance in voting outside of Europe. I would strongly support this model. The purpose of our alliance is indeed to support CO’s, but those CO’s have geographies (even the “language” ones or CenterNet) attached to them, and any democratic balance should take that into account. I agree with E. Burr’s reservations about the other two models. This model ensures BOTH equal representation and the emphasis on COs. We can continue to allow COs to participate in the conversation without votes, and hopefully onboarding them as COs in the future).
This model, I think strikes a nice balance membership # and representation in voting. Of course, we would need to make sure that the ranges stayed equitable – for example I wouldn’t support a move to establish more gradations of power > 100 (e.g. 200 = 4, 300 = 5, and so on) members since EADH dwarfs the rest.
Honest, ignorant question here: does anyone have a sense of how many people are represented solely by AOs or SIGs? And is there any structure for differentiating groups that would/might be CO’s (given resources, etc.) vs. groups for people with cross-cutting interests? (Or is that fundamentally the AO/SIG distinction?)
The SIG that comes to my mind immediately is the geohumanities one, and it strikes me as a bit odd to give them a separate vote. I think of their interests and advocacy being at a different level from CO’s. If ADHO is trying to do less, too, if a SIG were to want to get ADHO to host something as infrastructure, they’d have to work through a CO anyway, wouldn’t they? So I imagine it would make more sense to advocate to the members’ respective CO’s, and get CO’s to work together, rather than having a CO-level vote within ADHO itself.
But at the same time, limiting votes to COs is undesirable if it cuts out people, assuming they’re not realistically represented at all in any other way (i.e. there’s no CO that would be a good fit for them, not just because they haven’t managed to get the Oxford registration form to work or forgot to renew.)
I agree with Elisabeth that joint membership is a fatal flaw in this third scenario. In the past, I’ve been a joint member because I wanted to contribute more, financially, to all of the associations. I have valued this networking opportunity and I exercised membership privileges over the years, though I’ve voted only in the associations that were closest to me and served me most. If asked to pick only one CO, of course I would align with ACH — but this model as stated disenfranchises me and disadvantages my “home” association — and, really, any association that may have a greater proportion of globally-minded members. Looking at the numbers, this is surely the case for AADH and JADH, which should not be penalized for having attracted lots of joint members. Scenario 3 only works in any sense if you abolish joint membership or require a “home” CO.
Honestly, this one seems like a mess to administer, a difficult set of COB meetings to run, and a sure-fire way to over-represent the already privileged places and cultures that are more likely to spawn SIGs and AOs. As a former CO president and ADHO Steering member, the simple one CO / one vote model (Scenario 1) has my support.
Alex, you might have misunderstood me. I am – and I am talking here only as Elisabeth Burr – against this scenario.
I am really sorry to have to contradict. ADHO is a registered charity organisation in the Netherlands. Apart from this, I am absolutely in favour of SIGs. SIGs do a great job and it would be really sad not to have them, but SIGs are not associations themselves, instead they work inside a legal body, in this case, inside of ADHO.
Just a very short note. The members of SIGs are represented by their COs / AOs because the members of SIGs are members of COs / AOs. According to me – very personal – SIGs should be represented on the COB on the whole but not as individual SIGs. According to me – very personal – the original proposal takes this very well into account giving SIGs a representation on the COB but without a vote. We all should know that not having a vote does not mean in our DH community that one is not listened to / not taken into account and that the question of not having a formal vote only plays a role when there are oppositions. Normally we just work together as well as we can.
As I have said in the context of financial questions (see the other document) the history of ADHO contradicts such worries. When ADHO was formed there were only two associations, ACH and ALLC. These two associations, which already had a long history, did everything which was possible to foster the creation of new and sometimes very small associations whose members had been members of either ACH or ALLC for a long time. Furthermore, the only association which in those days had a sound financial basis, i. e. ALLC, did everything to put the joint adventure, ADHO, on sound grounds. Why do we need to put all this in question? Why, suddenly, do we have to create all these worries of supremacy? I personally get the impression, that we will soon be victims of business models which are akin to our up to now quite fruiteful collaboration.
I have been for a long time on the scientific board of the German Association for Applied Linguistics. This association has a steering committee (president, chair, treasurer etc.) and a scientific board of about 20 to 30 members. We all came together twice a year. We were able to work very constructively and fruitefully and we had very lively discussions. The association is still thriving. And this is not the only association which works like that. Why should ADHO not be capable to do the same? Why is everybody so afraid?
I agree whole heartedly. I am against national criteria, COs are different, anyway. If I belong to a CO I belong to it for certain reasons and it is my own choice. My choice can change because of circumstances, but at any one time, I need to make up my mind.
I agree whole heartedly. I am against national criteria, COs are different, anyway. If I belong to a CO I belong to it for certain reasons and it is my own choice. My choice can change because of circumstances, but at any one time, I need to make up my mind.
According to me ADHO would have to enter into discussions and negotiations. If the critical points of the constitution of the CO in question cannot be changed, then a decision on inclusion or exclusion will have to be taken. In order to take such decisions ADHO would need to lay down very clear criteria, however.
I agree. Our documents need to be accessible to everybody not only to insiders.
Because people belonging to marginalized groups have had repeated bad experiences with ADHO, and I see no reason to create a system that makes those experiences easier to come by.
I was just pointing out that “11 seats, 11 votes” is incorrect.
Agreed.
I agree that this is important, which is why we have two scenarios that represent membership size in different ways. That said, we wanted to provide another option – the one vote per CO which is simpler. I should add that calculating membership is difficult.
In answer to Quinn’s question. We don’t know membership of SIGs, but we do have numbers for COs and AOs. SIGs don’t currently need to track membership. As for AOs, some have significant membership like the Nordic and German. They are then counted under EADH.
Good point. We created the appendix for the first (financial) proposal, but now need to expand it.
If this model has a dependency on up-to-date information on membership, and there has been a comment above on how difficult it is to get accurate membership information (such as numbers of members), then why should this scenario be presented as an option? It seems the margin for inaccuracy is a given. If this approach is selected, then what assurances are there that ADHO would commit to improving how it tracks membership? I did see that the ADHO governance proposals site does mention the possible formation of a membership services committee, but I don’t see such a committee listed at the general ADHO site.
I’m a little surprised that there is only a recognition that “it will become increasingly important in this model to have up-to-date information on membership” and not, for example, “This scenario will require ADHO to have up-to-date information on membership, which it currently does not have.” It seems that lack of confidence in membership information should eliminate this scenario.
I think this point is essential. A clear understanding on whether the COB should be more inward looking towards ADHO or outward looking towards the COs would be helpful. It seems to me that the first scenario look more inwardly towards the evenness of CO representation as a way to ensure ADHO’s health. The other scenarios seem to put more weight on the power and influence that each CO, and other units, will have on the COB.
Therefore, I support this scenario over the others.
This option potentially leads to large fluctuations in the composition of the COB. If we stay in the OUP system, we are extremely dependent on their update schedule. Should we change the composition once a year (proposition is 3 years, but probably not feasible if a new CO joins every year)? When? (January or July can change everything) How to include the membership data of associations that are not in OUP? and those under an umbrella? etc.
I make the same observation about Euro-centrism. But I wonder, if this option is chosen, if DHD, AIUCD, Nordic, etc. will not wish to be represented otherwise than by their umbrella (this would probably restore euro-centrism).
Well, with option 2, the COB is not any more a CO Board but a kind of general assembly, with all the possible groups represented. That’s good, but that’s not replacing a COB! Having a place where a few representatives of the CO meet is necessary to take the decisions linked to the fundamental participation of the COs to the ADHO.
The problem of such a large assembly, if it is chosen as an extended-COB, is that we may refrain ourselves to create new SIG just because that will means adding chairs to the table. This is not a problem anymore if this assembly is a body in itself, very large and variable on purpose, complementary to a COB from option 1 or 3.
And the other problem of such a representation of all instances is, as others have pointed out, that we are no longer in a representative system since AOs and SIGs are composed of people already represented by COs.
correction: my good example was to be DHN not a non existant DHD. The German speaking is called DHd.
I support scenario 1, as it seems to strike the best balance between ensuring the continuing health of ADHO, moving ADHO towards a leaner organizational structure, and distributing decision-making power more equitably among the community of COs. At a moment when DH is proliferating across the globe, scenario 1 offers us the best chance to hear the voices of new organizations and new members while retaining the overall strength of the organization as a whole.
I’m in agreement with Elisabeth on the question of SIG representation, in that I think that COs (as currently constituted, largely by region) offer the primary point of membership for DH matters. I think SIGs are important, but I see a difference between interest groups and membership organizations
Proposed Financial Scenarios (33 comments)
Is this supposed to be Digital Studies / Le champ numérique?
Yes. Thanks for the correction.
A minor detail but defining COB at its first usage (which, I believe is above) rather than later in the document would facilitate greater clarity.
A minor detail but defining COB at its first usage (which, I believe is above) rather than later in the document would facilitate greater clarity.
Another query, on the matter of redistribution of funds leftover: are members who are (paid) members of multiple COs double counted or only counted in their primary affiliation?
I am strongly in favor of the Scenario 2: continuing without a minimal service fee, as long as the financial health of ADHO’s funding priorities is secure. The details in this proposal suggest that Scenario 2 would work out financially.
By way of background, I served as ACH’s liaison to the conversations about adding nominal fees for additional CO membership, and while I was hesitant about agreeing to it, it did, indeed, seem nominal enough that I was swayed.
My hesitations are the same with the minimal fee model: our COs should be as accessible to graduate students, people with contingent employment, and people in countries with currencies weaker than British £, Euro, USD, CAD, etc. as possible.
Granted, if there is a way to guarantee that a minimal service fee would actually be cheaper than the current membership dues without the journal subscription, bring on the minimal service fee model. From numbers I have seen, my sense is that not likely to be the case.
While the proposal to create a fee schedule to account for students, economic status, or retirement would certainly help mitigate accessibility for some of these constituencies, it doesn’t take into account how far the currency in which one is paid can stretch in relation to a fee in British £. I’m not sure the extent to which a fee schedule could be sufficiently differentiated to equitably capture the range of fiscal realities on a global scale.
Particularly as we are seeing the emergence of new COs from countries of the Global South gaining admittance to ADHO, we should strive to maintain our fiscal health while not discouraging new membership to COs from countries where such fees would be prohibitive simply on the basis of global economic inequality. It isn’t a stretch to imagine that particular communities might be dissuaded from seeking CO status on the basis of a minimal service fee.
Moreover, a fee schedule that distinguishes between faculty and student may also not adequately capture the fiscal constraints on faculty in many countries, where they aren’t compensated like full-time tenure-line faculty in the US (for example).
With the minimal service fee, we are at risk of depressing global participation at a time when ongoing collaboration and communication is important as ever.
Regardless of the outcome of the other proposals in the document, I think requiring MOAs between ADHO and COs is critical to protect the interests and expectations of both parties.
Given the motivation of this document is to ensure the long-term financial stability of ADHO I also agree priority should be given to short-term projects (even if they later demonstrate that long-term support is beneficial to ADHO’s mission).
It’s a little hard to evaluate the need for these scenarios without access to current and projected finances. Based on what is presented here, it seems as though ADHO is being proactive about exploring different models in case of changes. This strikes me as sensible, especially at a time when institutions continue to face financial constraints and threats. Even so, Scenario 2, if sustainable, seems like the preferred option since it will likely keep overheads and costs to individual members down.
Nonetheless, the proposed model outlined in scenario 1 seems like a reasonable solution to the question of how to make ADHO less dependent on subscriptions to DSH. I especially like how it addressees the question of how COs will report membership numbers (a figure that presumably would be used to help calculate both the minimal service fee and the amount to be refunded at the end of each financial year).
I am concerned, however, about the potential amount of overhead that implementing this system will add to ADHO and especially wonder if there might be issues with scalability given that there is potential to have to deal with a growing number of countries, each with differing international laws on how these types of transaction are handled (not to mention additional costs related to currency conversion fees, etc.) I could see this becoming quite difficult to manage very quickly, especially if ADHO continues to grow.
I also share the concern about how the costs of a minimal fee might be passed on inequitably to individual members of a CO. Thinking about just the US context, it is easy to imagine that even a modest increase in fees could make membership unaffordable to contingent faculty/staff and students, even with the already heavily discounted rates. This becomes even more pressing for COs that don’t have the membership levels of larger organizations and might be less able to absorb some of these additional fees. Again, I don’t know what proportion of ADHO members fall into these categories, but anything that makes membership less attainable has to be carefully considered before being implemented.
Other random thoughts. I don’t think the question of how to handle a person who has taken out a membership in multiple COs is really an issue. Verifying if a person falls into this category seems like an onerous task, especially since they would likely have also contributed to the cost of two service fees as part of their memberships.
The final bullet here also concerns me. I may have misread, but I understood Scenario 1 to require COs to pay a service fee to ADHO, whereas this bullet implies that this fee will only be due if “ADHO should ever need that income.” Some rewriting to clarify this might be warranted.
I agree with the assessment by Dr. Risam.
I am in favor of scenario 2. I think it will streamline the financial relationships between ADHO and the CO’s without adding a potential burden to members.
It also leaves ample room for revision if/when/as needed. As ADHO continues to grow, a scalable model seems the most appropriate. Scenario 2 lends itself more easily for new CO’s to join the organization as they figure out their own financial status and health.
I am not so sure whether the server should be run by one CO. Perhaps you should delete “all” next to infrastructure. The sentence starting with “Wherever practical” would then also make more sense.
it could also be that what makes the text not clear enough for me is the fact that it talks about shared infrastucture and all infrastructure in § 6
I would advise to refrain as much as possible from transferring money because of the costs and possible currency losses. The ADHO treasurer might have to study carefully which are the best ways of administering funds.
Some COs have a chair and a president or just a chair. According to me the MoA – it finds my approval – needs to be signed by the person who “runs” the CO and not only represents it.
The paragraph about funds left over would seem to predict that Scenario 1 will be agreed upon. This paragraph needs to be deleted here to make the proposal more clear.
The same goes for the paragraph starting with “The COs kee any funds”
The same goes really also for the next paragraph on the COs running their own membership systems
I would like to propose to put under “General Recommendations” only dots 1-4 and then the two Scenarios. Dots 5-9 do only apply if Scenario 1 is adopted.
As long as ADHO really can do what it is supposed to do with the income from the institutional subscriptions then I would favour Scenario 2 because it is much leaner and avoids transferring money back and fro between different countries. I would built in, however, a clausola that Scenario 2 may have to be amended at a later point.
I cannot find the financial model. Would be good to be able to look at it.
I agree that it may be important symbolically that there be sources of income for ADHO that all COs are invested in. I would refrain, however, from redistribution (costs, currency losses, complexity of the whole business). I would rather build up a certain amount of funds for the time when the income from institutional subscriptions might lower or invest them in more bursaries or the like.
Your point about deleting “all” is a good one and makes sense to me. I’ll bring it to the Implementation Committee.
Thanks,
Geoffrey Rockwell
You are right. We should define it in the first usage.
On the matter of the redistribution of funds the idea is that those who sign up through Oxford could only pick one CO to keep things simple. That said, once COs start building their own membership systems this will be impossible. Someone could pay a membership to multiple COs. I think the COB will then have to work with the COs to iron things out. They could decide that a paid up member is a member, even if they pay to more than one CO.
Agreed!
Yes, I agree that actual transfers should be kept to a minimum. This will be an issue for the Treasurer. One worry is that the book keeping may get too complicated for a volunteer. In that case ADHO may need to look at getting the Treasurer help.
Good point. I will look into a change of wording and propose it to the Implementation Committee.
Interesting, that was not our intent. Currently the institutional subscriptions more than cover the costs so there would be funds left over to redistribute in both scenarios. I would go further and say that we hope the COB will try to make sure that there are funds going to the COs rather than being tempted to spend them.
Our hope was that all the general recommendations would apply to both, but we may have to revisit that.
Thanks,
Geoffrey R.
I will check to see if we can post it in public.
Geoffrey R.
Thanks for this,
Geoffrey Rockwell
I’m in favor of scenario 2 IF there is a provision for what happens if ADHO expenses do exceed income from institutional subscriptions. Something about splitting overage among COs based on membership numbers and where in the world they operate
Is there a provision behind the scenes to revisit whichever financial scenario gets adopted after a certain amount of time? If not, I’d strongly advocate making an explicit plan to revisit after 3 years or so.
Was there ever a discussion about a minimal service fee per CO that doesn’t depend on the individual memberships?
I bring this up because, it seems to me, it would provide a financial parallel to Scenario 1 in the governance discussion.
I’d be concerned that Scenario 1 of the Financial Model could potential skew governance based on membership numbers and monetary contribution (more members=more monetary contributions=bigger representation in the COB). While there is, of course, reason for a model such as this, I can’t help but think this would punish small COs (often the newer ones) in the long term.
Finding a way to make the COs contribute to ADHO budget is an important element to me. Without saying that the contribution from DSH must become a minority at any cost, a good financial model would indeed be that we do not depend only on the benefits of a single journal. I’m therefor in favour of scenario 1 (kind of).
Proposed Committee Recommendations (14 comments)
This may not be the type of commentary you wish to receive, but I have heard misinformation being spread regarding the reviewers database on more than one occasion and wish to set the record straight for the time I had access to and was working on the database and to make a few recommendations regarding work that should be done.
When the Digital Humanities Conference ConfTool was set up in the fall of 2006, accounts were set up for everyone on the spreadsheet of reviewers given to Ray Siemens by the previous Program Committee chair, for those reviewers listed on the list of reviewers by subject knowledge who weren’t included on spreadsheet and whose current contact information could be tracked down, and for members of that year’s Program Committee who hadn’t previously been reviewers. Anyone who contacted the Program Committee and asked to opt out of reviewing was opted out of reviewing.
It became apparent when a couple of Russian academics submitted proposals in Russian without providing English language translations that it would be very helpful for information on the languages that each reviewer was willing to read to be entered into ConfTool so future PC Chairs wouldn’t have to try to guess who was willing to read which language or have a member of the PC do eleventh hour translations into English. It also seemed apparent to me that it was very important to make sure that there were adequate numbers of reviewers willing to read each of the languages listed on the CFP which circa DH2007 was Arabic, Chinese, English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Russian and Spanish. As of the fall of 2006 there was not a single reviewer capable of reading Arabic and there was only one European reviewer willing to read Chinese and Japanese even though there were a number of native Chinese or Japanese speakers who had presented at multiple ACH/ALLC conferences.
After DH2007, I went through the database and compiled a list of people I knew had presented at more than one previous ACH/ALLC conference, whose presentations at DH2007 had been highly spoken of by long term members of the community, who were awarded bursaries by the ACH or ALLC bursary committees and were fluent in English, and whose names came up in conversations regarding increasing the number of reviewers willing to read certain languages. I sent this list to the DH2008 PC Chair who sent it on to the Program Committee and the Local Host to ask for their feedback and suggestions regarding other potential reviewers. After feedback was received from the Program Committee and Local Host, various people were contacted and invited to review. A couple of people invited to review made suggestions regarding potential reviewers and that information was relayed to the PC Chair whose approval was sought before they were contacted.
After noticing a marked increase in submissions dealing with GIS and mapping, I compiled a list of potential reviewers with expertise in that area which I sent to the DH2009 PC Chair. This list was based on my reading of articles and books on using GIS or other mapping software with historical data or literary texts and presentations I had attended at the 2008 Historical GIS conference. I ask the PC Chair whether she had any recommendations regarding potential reviewers with expertise in archaeology as a number of reviewers with that particular expertise had asked to opt out of reviewing. I also sent her a list of reviewers who had not submitted reviews for DH2007 and DH2008 as I was concerned that PC Chairs would continue assigning reviews to people who were apparently not interested in reviewing. She contacted those individuals to make sure it wasn’t a case of ConfTool generated emails being spam filtered by their universities and reviewer status was removed for anyone who did not reply to her email to affirm they were willing to review for the conference. She also asked to have certain information regarding DH2008 conference presenters who weren’t reviewers pulled from the archived data so it could be used to compile a list of potential reviewers. The individuals on that list, the individuals on my list of GIS and mapping experts, individuals with expertise in archaeology suggested by the PC Chair and experts she suggested I contact, and anyone recommended by the Program Committee were contacted and asked if they would be willing to review.
I sent the DH2010 PC Chair a list of potential reviewers and after receiving his approval contacted those individuals and set up accounts for and contacted individuals he asked me to set up accounts for.
I sent a list of potential reviewers to the DH2011 PC Chair, but to the best of my knowledge none of those individuals were contacted. These were individuals who had inquired about becoming reviewers or who had been recommended as potential reviewers by long time reviewers when I spoke with them at DH2010 to ask which languages they were willing to read as I was working on trying to ensure that information was entered into ConfTool for each reviewer. I also spoke with one of the local hosts for DH2011 at DH2010 and mentioned that I hoped given the location that they would be trying to do outreach to the Spanish speaking communities in Mexico and South America and suggested that two particular Spanish language reviewers might have some ideas on how to see that the CFPs reached members of the Spanish speaking DH community and might have some ideas on potential Spanish language reviewers as there was a need to increase the numbers of reviewers willing to read Spanish and various other languages.
There was an open call for reviewers before DH2012 which unfortunately undid some of the work that had previously been done to diversify the database of reviewers. Possibly because of the way the open call was shared via twitter, it worked to increase the number of Anglo reviewers (i.e. those affiliated with English, U.S. and certain Canadian universities) and increase the number of reviewers who were affiliated with or had previously been affiliated with a single London based university to the point where they made up at least 13% of the reviewers in the database.
Judging by the spreadsheet of reviewers and list of reviewers by subject knowledge that I was given in the fall of 2006, it appeared that the group of reviewers contained primarily individuals who had served on previous program committees or who were affiliated with previous local host universities and a few individuals who had either volunteered to review or been asked to review because they had specific subject expertise and/or language knowledge. I was later told by a former ACH/ALLC program committee member that he had worked to recruit new reviewers at previous conferences only to have a subsequent PC Chair cull most of the new reviewers who had been recruited.
There is unfortunately a subset of members of the ACH/ALLC community who see themselves as “gate keepers” to use a term a few of them have used to self describe and a subset of members of the community who believe that everything should be presented in English and only in English and that anyone who wishes to present in a different language should submit to their national conference instead of DH.
I strongly believe that the database of reviewers needs to be looked at in terms similar to those trained librarians use when doing collection development. In other words, one needs to look at the strengths and weaknesses of the current group of reviewers and ask certain questions included but not limited to the following in order to determine which areas one should focus on in terms of recruiting new reviewers:
Are there adequate numbers of reviewers willing to review for each of the priority topics?
Are there adequate numbers of reviewers willing to review for each of the languages abstracts can be submitted in?
Are there at least three reviewers willing to read abstracts in each of the languages for each of the priority topics?
Are there any countries whose DH communities are underrepresented in the reviewers database?
Is the group of reviewers diverse enough? — i.e. has enough been done to see that the group of reviewers isn’t overwhelmingly made up of English speaking white males?
Are there any reviewers who have repeatedly not turned in reviews and who haven’t contact the PC Chair to opt out of reviewing for a specific conference or conferences?
In addition the list of priority topics should be looked at and updated on a regular basis and work should be done to make sure there are enough reviewers for each topic added.
Also should additional languages be added to the list that people can submit abstracts in then work should be done to make sure there are enough reviewers for each language.
Do we really need to make explicit reference to Oxford University Press in this document? It’s just the technical solution (and could be replaced), not the basic principle.
Is it possible to “refer [the] selection to the COB” to “ensure inclusion and diversity” without breaking the anonymity of the candidates? (is it already the case today?)
This is a necessary simplification, and it allows a better empowerment and professionalisation of communicators.
I think mandating that the MAC do this is also an option. This would be an important service to the larger worldwide DH community. Mandating this would discourage selective mentoring on the part of the MAC, which may give this committee too much preemptive gatekeeping power and skew the eventual membership.
What would the threshold be for buy-in on the part of MAC members, in order for this recommendation to be officially made?
Yes please!
This should should outline the support provided and reporting expected.
The second “should” needs to be deleted
In this paragraph is something missing. It is not really understandable
This is funny. ADHOC was one of the acronyms proposed during the process of the formation of ADHO a long time ago.
obviously “chapter” does not make sense anymore. As the paragraph in question is a quote, it stands here in its own right, I find the term “chapter” however in the Document on Sigs, Associate, and Affiliate Organizations. I will comment on it.
[The Revised Protocol only editing]
“needs” needs to be inserted
[The Protocol only editing]
same here
Thanks
Proposed ADHO SIGs, Associate, and Affiliate Organization Recommendations (11 comments)
Regarding the last bullet point: isn’t the entire purpose of ADHO to manage infrastructure, activities and projects on behalf of COs? The last sentence doesn’t make sense to me, though agreed on the “beware” part.
I think it may be prudent to designate a percentage of total ADHO funds, or a flat number revisited regularly, for support of AO/AfO/SIG activities. I would recommend that unused funds roll over from one year to the next, perhaps with a cap on the total. Successful applications mentioned in Scenario 3 would then be funded out of this money.
“Associate, and Affiliate Organisations and Special Interest Groups are sponsored groups” – waht does sponsored groups mean in this context? How are Associate Organisations “sponsored” groups?
[An Associate Organisation is a formally established association which is allied to ADHO but is not financially affiliated through the governance structures.]
EADH has Associate Organisations which are allied to EADH. Only through EADH they are allied with ADHO. They are not directly allied with ADHO. This paragraph needs to be reworked according to me
Recommendation 2 would seem to contradict what is said in the Preamble (§ 6) of Proposed ADHO Foundation Recommendation: “The members of ADHO are therefore the COs”. It would seem to contradict, furthermore, what is said about The Membership and Admission Committee in Proposed Committee Recommendations (§8): “There needs to be only one committee that deals with the admission and membership of COs”. In §9 it is said rightly thet “The MAC will review applications to join ADHO”.
According to me it cannot and should not be the responsibility of the MAC to accept an AO. AOs are AOs of COs and thus COs need to decide on accepting an association as AO. See also Recommendation 3: “AOs are always connected to a CO”.
[There are range of options]
“a” needs to be inserted
My comment refers to AOs alone. If the members of ADHO are COs and if AOs are AOs of COs then the responsibility with respect to disbursements (the only exception might be Scenario 3) is the responsibility of the COs, i.e. ADHO has no influence / nothing to say on this.
[chapter]
this term should not be used. It is not clear what it means. There is no definition of it anywhere
According to me B.1 Associate Organisations (AO) contains contradictions (see “allied to ADHO”).
I am also unsure whether ADHO should be responsible for determining the size of membership of an AO of a CO, for assigning it to a CO (there might be special cases which require such an assignement, but we should not make this the rule). I am against that ADHO establishes that an AO can be associated with more than one CO because this would make the handling of structural terms and finance unviable.
The whole matter of AOs should be discussed with EADH because it is up to now the only CO which has AOs. It has a lot of experience and can serve as a model for other COs which are thinking on having AOs.
[Note. There are currently 3 AOs: AIUCD (Italy); DHd (German-speaking); DHN (Nordic countries). All have a relationship with EADH as their partner CO.]
This needs to be corrected, because EADH has 5 AOs: AIUCD (Italy); DHd (German-speaking); DHN (Nordic countries), CZDHI (Czech), DH Russia (Russia)
[SIGs may be proposed by any group of ADHO members]
Members of ADHO are COs. Thus what is meant by members needs to be specified, for example “by any group of members of COs of ADHO”
[it currently has three Partner Organization: DH Benelux, Russian DH Network, Czech DH Initiative.]
This needs to be corrected, because EADH has only one Partner Organisation DH Benelux
Proposed Executive Board Scenarios (3 comments)
I have the impression that this two-headed system is unnecessarily complicated.
They would, however, then have to secure the nomination of a CO to *be* eligible for election.
Just a minor correction needed
Thanks
Proposed ADHO Foundation Recommendation (1 comment)
This alignment is common sense. But with a system of progressive renewal of the executive, isn’t there a risk of having to repeat every year legal procedures (and fees) to change the names of the officers of the foundation?