CDH New Staff Profile: Emily McGinn

Earlier this fall, we welcomed Emily McGinn to the Center for Digital Humanities as our HC3 Curriculum Specialist. We asked Emily about her DH experience and her hopes for her new position.

How did you get involved in digital humanities?

I found DH by accident. As a grad student I was asked to work on a project creating a digital edition of Virginia Woolf’s “The Mark on the Wall.” Voted most likely to learn new technology by the group, I learned TEI and XML for that project and found that the collaborative, open methods of DH were a much better fit for me professionally. I ended up being the first grad student in Comparative Literature [at the University of Oregon] to pursue an extra certificate in “New Media and Culture” and a career in DH.

What is one DH-related project or accomplishment you are proud of?

As a CLIR postdoc in DH at Lafayette College in Pennsylvania, I designed a Summer Scholars program. It was a six-week program that gave students the opportunity, time, and space to create a DH project of their own design. This program is now in its sixth year at Lafayette, and it was taken up by Gettysburg College which just completed its fifth year. I took the same program to my work as Head of DH at the University of Georgia, where I worked with two cohorts.

Tell us a little more about your role at the CDH.

With the CDH I am the Curriculum Specialist for the Humanities Computing Curriculum Committee (HC3). I am helping to develop a new certificate for Humanities Computing to combine the critical and analytical strengths of the humanities with the data science and computational skills of our more STEM focused students.

What are you enjoying working on at the CDH? What are you looking forward to?

I love working on a team again! I’m looking forward to thinking together and finding creative solutions with my colleagues.

Editor’s note: Check back later this week for a profile of our new Project Manager, Caterina Agostini!