Scholars' Lab

Photo of a wall exhibit label and poster showing a photograph of Pam Lach's 2024 "Sleep/Insomnia Data Physicalization", a tight circular spiral of embroidered Z's in white and various blue threads, with orange and clear beads, on a black-blue galaxy-ish fabric background. The poster text says "Sleep/Insomnia Data Physicalization / By Pamella Lach (2024) / A yearlong, embroidered visualization of personal data: nightly sleep amounts (thread color) & types of wakefulness/insomnia (bead color)." Exhibit label text in next photo's alt text.

Photo of an exhibit label that says: "#DHmakes Sleep/Insomnia Data Physicalization Pamella Lach 2024 Materials: thread, fabric, beads Methods: embroidery, physical data visualization The photographed embroidery on this poster is a data "physicalization": data visualized via physical means, such as this project's hand-embroidered fabric. Data artist & digital humanities scholar Pamella Lach added stitches throughout 2024, tracking the entire year's data on her sleep & insomnia. Thread color represents quantities of sleep; bead color represents type of wakefulness and insomnia. A 2025 version builds on this method with added complexity & granularity of how data was captured & how those details are represented visually. "#DHmakes" is both a hashtag & a community of scholarly practice. On social media, folks in digital humanities, libraries, academia, and other learning-work who craft or make use the tag to share everything from failed first attempts at new hobby methods, to advanced professional work. Beyond social media, #DHmakes is a community that's published peer-reviewed journal articles, run scholarly conference panels & workshops, hosted a public methodological talk series, built a group project representing many kinds of data art & craft, & more. Read more about #DHmakes & how to get involved via the QR code. Scholars' Lab's Makerspace can help you explore making, crafts, & building-both as means of teaching & research, and for pleasure, advocacy, & art."

Thanks @plach.bsky.social! for letting @scholarslab.bsky.social display a poster of her 1st yearlong data physicalization: embroidery+beading representing her insomnia, wakefulness, sleep over the course of 2024 (check her #DHmakes posts for 2025's version, w/iterated method+data granularity)

Photo of a 3D print of a cityscape with skyscraper along two sides of a river; the city is white, and the river is blue filament. It's an actual city, with the forms extruded from mapping data. There are even little boats on the river!

Photo of a 3D print of a cityscape with skyscraper along two sides of a river; the city is white, and the river is blue filament. It's an actual city, with the forms extruded from mapping data. In the background is another print of another area of a city.

Photo of a 3D print of a cityscape with skyscraper along two sides of a river; the city is white, and the river is blue filament. It's an actual city, with the forms extruded from mapping data. There are even little bridges crossing the river at multiple spots.

Neat two-tone cityscape prints made by a student in our makerspace, extruded from mapping data:

Looking to after next week's holiday, we've a public talk on designing a digital archive of Caribbean speculative storytelling cal.lib.virginia.edu/event/15359711; workshop for coders on LLMs to classify texts cal.lib.virginia.edu/event/15249593; 3 textile makerspace workshops & an origami workshop:

Our makerspace will be closed all next week (11/24-30) for the holiday. We'll be back open the week of 12/1 with free workshops on making stuffed buddies, sewing pen/pencil cases, origami, & DIY felt wallets: scholarslab.lib.virginia.edu/events/

It's application season for our fellowships, so here's a quick post about the questions committees ask themselves when reading applicant materials.

walshbr.com/blog/committ...

Part of this=how Ammon, @lmmiller.bsky.social @shane.logoff.website @jeremyboggs.net + made our makerspace expansive—not stopping at just engineering-style making: textiles, costuming, cosplay, book+paper arts, retro tech, jewelry, ceramics+more, listening for more make/art/craft we can support

Makerspace @scholarslab.bsky.social is free & open to all=you don't need any connection to UVA to use our makerspace & workshops. We enjoy consulting w/folks from our local community on their making projects or method-learning goals, & teaching workshops for local groups (including local students).

UVA teachers, we 💜 class makerspace visits & to design+teach workshops exploring what you're teaching, across all UVA schools (Ammon has graduate training in history & in education!). Especially noting our unusual expertise in humanities-supporting critical making. And that we're open to all & free✨

The @scholarslab.bsky.social makerspace is such a lovely affirming, inspiring space to spend time. Proud of what leader Ammon achieved in our new space, its constant gentle friendly hum of people crafting+teaching each other. Seen multiple classes not just awake but excited at 8am(?!) to be using it

This fellowship grew from @walshbr.bsky.social running a pilot of a teaching exercise in his book on speculative budgeting w/staff+students; he & @spw4s.bsky.social built on student suggestions for funding faculty+PhD student teams, & UVA Data Analytics Ctr's interest in outreach to UVA humanists

So many people at this in @scholarslab.bsky.social that I'm sitting on the ground 😂 Work-in-progress event for new joint IATH+SLab/DH Center+DAC fellowship, which supports faculty+grad student team working w/us+Data Analytics Ctr. Meant to show humanities research uses for high-performance computing

UVA people, please join us tomorrow at 11am in The Scholar’s Lab where I’ll be talking with Professor Adrienne Ghaly about our use of LLM’s to look for biodiversity in nineteenth century prose fiction. There’s lunch and we’re looking for feedback on our work.

New entries to my ZineBakery.com online catalog of free tech+culture+justice zines: DH (free maker software; bodies+datafied city; queering feminist geography; edtech surveillance; digipress); Fritton's Day-Glo Ink "Primer"; @prisonculture.bsky.social's Arrested at the Library; & Virginia Trans Joy+

Such a privilege to have something I made hanging in the @scholarslab.bsky.social, who represent all the good parts of academia to me 😊

Thurs 11/20 1pm, UVA Prof @hgnroadshow.bsky.social:
"Why Write w/an Editor (Human or Otherwise)": What does it mean to invite another mind—human or machine—into your writing process? We consider all the aspects of what human editors actually do—& how these do/n't translate when working w/AI editors

Turkey Time Workshop Come to the Makerspace between 1pm and 3pm to make a Turkey decoration for Thanksgiving. All materials are provided and no experience needed!

Tues 12/18, drop in to our makerspace (UVA Shannon Library 3rd floor) anytime between 1-3pm to learn+make a Thanksgiving craft. Free supplies provided, open to public!

DH Center Tuesday Forum: Can AI Read Biodiversity in Prose Fiction? With special thanks to our co-sponsors for this event, the UVA Research Computing Data Analytics Center, we welcome you to the next installment of our digital humanities series,...

"Can AI Read Biodiversity in Prose Fiction?" Our DH Center + Digital Analytics Center Fellows present their in-progress work analyzing historical fiction for signs of climate change on Tues 12/18 11am
cal.lib.virginia.edu/event/15472950

Thurs 11/20 1pm, UVA Prof @hgnroadshow.bsky.social:
"Why Write w/an Editor (Human or Otherwise)": What does it mean to invite another mind—human or machine—into your writing process? We consider all the aspects of what human editors actually do—& how these do/n't translate when working w/AI editors

Turkey Time Workshop Come to the Makerspace between 1pm and 3pm to make a Turkey decoration for Thanksgiving. All materials are provided and no experience needed!

Tues 12/18, drop in to our makerspace (UVA Shannon Library 3rd floor) anytime between 1-3pm to learn+make a Thanksgiving craft. Free supplies provided, open to public!

DH Center Tuesday Forum: Can AI Read Biodiversity in Prose Fiction? With special thanks to our co-sponsors for this event, the UVA Research Computing Data Analytics Center, we welcome you to the next installment of our digital humanities series,...

"Can AI Read Biodiversity in Prose Fiction?" Our DH Center + Digital Analytics Center Fellows present their in-progress work analyzing historical fiction for signs of climate change on Tues 12/18 11am
cal.lib.virginia.edu/event/15472950

Next week's events: 2 talks on LLM research impacts: historical climate data+fiction analysis, how editing goals look when human vs machine editor (Tues+Thurs); +drop-in makerspace time for making a Thanksgiving craft (open to all, supplies provided free, bring friends/fam!) scholarslab.org/events +

At @scholarslab.bsky.social Coffee+Code listening to UVA Spanish ABD & SLab Intern @winnieepm.bsky.social talk about using the static site generator (tool that helps you make very lightweight mostly-HTML websites) @11ty.dev (www.11ty.dev) to create her portfolio site #mincomp

A large poster version of the cover of Élika Ortega's book "Binding Media: Hybrid print-digital literature from across the Americas", on a white background with a large, pixelated, gradient yellow to red to purple mouse cursor series on top

Photo of a wall hung with multiple posters and a banner. A large black cotton banner created by Francis Osid has appliqued felt letters, each in a different color creating an overall gradient effect. The letters spell "Make your pride part of history". The posters are the cover of Élika Ortega's book "Binding Media: Hybrid print-digital literature from across the Americas", on a white background with a large, pixelated, gradient yellow to red to purple mouse cursor series on top; the cover of the "Digital Futures of Graduate Studies in the Humanities" volume; and last year's Praxis Fellows research poster on analyzing archival university satire magazines.

Thanks also to @elikaortega.bsky.social for helping us display the cover of her book "Binding Media: Hybrid print-digital literature from across the Americas"! Élika gave a fantastic talk for @scholarslab.bsky.social in '22 on literary & material experimentations via hybrid print-digital books.

Photo of a wall hung with multiple posters and a banner. A large black cotton banner created by Francis Osid has appliqued felt letters, each in a different color creating an overall gradient effect. The letters spell "Make your pride part of history". The posters are the cover of Élika Ortega's book "Binding Media: Hybrid print-digital literature from across the Americas", on a white background with a large, pixelated, gradient yellow to red to purple mouse cursor series on top; the cover of the "Digital Futures of Graduate Studies in the Humanities" volume; and last year's Praxis Fellows research poster on analyzing archival university satire magazines.

Closeup photo on a large black cotton banner created by Francis Osid has appliqued felt letters, each in a different color creating an overall gradient effect. The letters spell "Make your pride part of history".

Photo of a museum exhibit label that says: "Pride 2025 Francis Osis, queer archivist & artist living in Glasgow, Scotland Materials: felt & cotton Methods: hand appliqué & machine sewing This banner was made in a feverish last minute scramble for West Lothian's 10th anniversary Pride, which the West Lothian Council Museums & Archives Services attended to engage with the local community & to encourage donations to the service so their history could be told. In addition to his archival expertise, Francis Osis holds a Ph.D. in history of medicine, and creates textile and fibre based art including clothes, quilts, and embroideries."

New art in @scholarslab.bsky.social's Text Aisle! Huge thanks to #DHmakes colleague @fosis.bsky.social for letting us exhibit his bright & strong "Pride" banner in our public space ("Make your pride part of history"🌈):

Photo of a desk and window sill in the Scholars' Lab Makerspace in early morning light, showing a sewing machine or serger, and various art such as felted animals and pumpkins, lego cacti, and costumed mannequin dolls

Early morning makerspace still life. We 💜 how our community has filled the room with their art 🎨🪡🖨️

Free DHy zine alert! @capnpilot.bsky.social's
* "CTRL+S: Preserving Your Work for the Long Haul" (plan, preserve/archive resilient digital projects, so that when time to sunset them, is easy to preserve core attributes)
* "Web-Native Cryptids & Creatures: A Spotter’s Guide" (web safety+literacy)

At Jess Walter's @uvalibrary.bsky.social Zines Now! workshop in @scholarslab.bsky.social. Jess is starting us off w/reading zines they shared on our tables so we can share the different approaches to advocacy-via-zine we observe (& folks new to zines can get up to speed too).

Photo of two white-framed, roughly 12 inches by 18 inches prints. First print is by Ryan Cordell's Skeumorph press, in white-silver ink on a dark navy paper, with an image of a computer in front of a packed bookshelf. Around the image, the print says print "'Nothing is more ephemeral than a website' - Élika Ortega". The second print is by Chris Fritton, aka Itinerant Printer. It says "Just because something ends doesn't mean it wasn't good" in all caps, black inked text, on a colorful mixed pink, yellow, orange, and mint green background.

You may have seen Fritton's "Just because something ends doesn't mean it wasn't good" print in @scholarslab.bsky.social's space, paired with @ryancordell.org @elikaortega.bsky.social @quinnanya.me's "There is nothing more ephemeral than a website" project.

If you dig this pre-digital "ASCII style" typed art (historical memes!), check out @ryancordell.org's "Programmable Type: the Craft of Printing, the Craft of Code" which includes many examples, including his ID of this early memed "The Dude" art below (1883!) ryancordell.org/research/pro...

In the @scholarslab.bsky.social, @literaturegeek.bsky.social and I try to practice what we call "gossip for good," performative and outspoken gratitude and appreciation to people's faces and also behind their back. Hear someone praising the work of someone else? They should know about.