It’s Not Magic: The Soft Skills of Digital Humanities Librarianship

ACRL // Cleveland, OH // April 11, 2019, 9:00 AM - 10:00 AM // Roundtable Discussion, Table 8

Mackenzie Brooks, Assistant Professor & Digital Humanities Librarian, brooksm@wlu.edu

Abstract:

For academic libraries, the interest in digital humanities (DH) has been an opportunity to reassert their value. However, the nature of DH librarian positions presents a challenge. As a predominantly female occupation, librarians are no stranger to emotional labor and strong expectations of service. However, the nature of DH librarian positions present a unique challenge. As a field, DH claims to value the work, knowledge, skillset, and presence of librarians. Librarians often hold the keys to important pieces of the research process - access to material, knowledge of preservation practices, or expertise in metadata standards. But the values and motivations of librarians can differ from disciplinary faculty and students. DH librarians often find themselves in the position of having to justify best practices to skeptical collaborators, alleviate technology anxiety to students of all ages, or even convince fellow librarians that DH is not a shiny new toy, but rather the evolution of scholarly communication.

This roundtable discussion will give attendees an opportunity to share effective strategies for developing and employing these skills. As a profession, we’ve dissected the methods for an effective reference interview - it’s time to do the same for the collaborative, long-term relationships inherent in DH librarianship. How do we go beyond “helping out” on a grant project? How do we talk across and between disciplines? How do we guide students through messy projects without a template? How do we ensure that DH is inclusive of all library staff? How do we convince administrators of the time and labor required to develop and sustain a DH project? How do we explain the idiosyncrasies of technology to those who think it’s magic? How do we cultivate these skills in an ethical and healthy way? How do we prepare for these positions, or how do we interact with DH librarians in our own institutions, especially those without a library background?

Objectives:

  1. Identify shared challenges in digital humanities collaborations.
  2. Collaboratively develop strategies for communicating about DH work to multiple audiences.
  3. Obtain methods for improving collaborative relationships in and outside the library.

Questions:

  1. Introductions: Who are you? What do you do?
  2. What challenges do you face in your DH work that require soft skills? What role does your identity play in these challenges?
  3. What strategies have you developed to meet these challenges?
  4. What soft skills have you developed while in your position? What resources have you turned to to help you develop these skills?
  5. How do you know when your soft skills aren’t enough? (Credit: Megan Kudzia)
  6. What would you want new DH Librarians to know about this type of work?

Other Sessions of Interest:

  • Launching a Library Digital Humanities Center: Reflections and Lessons Learned in the First Year // Pamella Lach // Thursday, 2:00 PM - 2:45 PM, Poster 12
  • Approaches to Upskilling in Academic Libraries // Sandy Hervieux, Ekatarina Grguric // Thursday, 9:00 AM - 9:45 AM, Poster 3
  • The Soft Stuff is the Real Stuff: Reframing Librarianship Through a Relational-Cultural Lens // Veronica Arellano Douglas, Anastasia Chiu, Joanna Gadsby, Alana Kumbier, Lalitha Nataraj // Thursday, 9:40 AM - 10:40 AM
  • Valuing our expertise: Asserting teaching librarians’ roles in campus conversations // Jennifer Jarson, Rachel Hamelers, Veronica Arellano Douglas // Thursday, 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM, Grand Ballroom C
  • Soft Skills Revealed: An Examination of Relational Skills in Librarianship // Miriam Matteson // Thursday, 4:00 PM - 4:30 PM, Room 26B
  • Working Outside the Lines: A Case for Knowledge Exchange within the Academic Library // Amy Bocko, Amy Barlow // Thursday, 3:00 PM - 3:45 PM, Poster 24
  • Recasting the Learning Narrative in Digital Humanities // Laura Braunstein  // Friday, 11:15 AM - 11:20 AM, Atrium Ballroom A
  • Learn it, Do it, Teach it: Increasing Sustainable Digital Scholarship Support through Collaborative In-House Professional Development // Kimberly Davies Hoffman, Emily Sherwood, Eileen Daly-Boas, Kristen Totleben // Saturday, 9:45 AM - 10:45 AM, Room 4

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