Digital projects are collaborative. Successful projects usually require people with diverse skills and knowledge to work together. Part of my research practice investigates the way this type of collaboration works. There is growing body of research and professional practice that recognises the value of communities of practice for working on digital projects as a way of avoiding ‘siloing’ of digital expertise.
A few examples of publications, projects and initiatives I have been working on:
Cultural Conversations Series 2022-2023
This series brings together professionals from the Galleries, Libraries, Archives and Museums. Presented in partnership between the Australian Museums and Galleries Association (AMaGA) ACT and the Humanities Research Centre (HRC) at the Australian National University. Cultural Conversations aims to create space for deeper connections between museum professionals, academics, and students in the ACT to share ideas and practice relating to the museums and galleries sector. See the reports from past conversations:
- Ideas, Practice, NetworkingÂ
- Museums of the Future/Stand Up Show Up for NAIDOC Week
- Multi-disciplinary collaboration in GLAM
- Digital GLAM
- AI and beyond: Exploring the shared work STEM and GLAM research & institutions
Teaching with the National Museum of Australia
Since 2019 I have been running an annual course with the NMA on Digital Humanities and Public Culture: Projects and Engagement. This course has invited students to respond to a brief from the museum that sets out a current project and a challenge associated with it and invites the students to think about ways that digital technology can be used creatively to create a project that fits the brief. Together we have created a range of really exciting projects, some very polished and now available online, others very experimental but excellent opportunities to push the boundaries of what a Digital Museum project can look like. See some examples of the student project outcomes below:
Digital Thylacine
This project developed from the Skullbook library (see more here) and from my involvement with the NMA Digital Classroom through teaching. We were invited to create a model of a Thylacine skeleton and cranium for the section in the Digital Classroom that looked at the history of the Thylacine. I led the project and worked with Renee Dixson on the scanning and with Sofia Samper Carro on the annotations. You can see the model on the NMA website here, and you can even download your own copy via Sketchfab here if you would like to print it.