DHReSCU Receives National Endowment for the Humanities Grant to Support Research Software Projects


We are honored to announce that we have been awarded a $30,000 Chair’s Award from the National Endowment for the Humanities. This grant will create a pilot for a Digital Humanities Research Software Consulting Unit (DHReSCU). DhReSCU’s mission will be to aid early-stage digital humanities research software projects in developing a technical implementation plan.

Research software consists of software, code, and tools that allow researchers to generate, analyze, and present data in order to produce research results. A common issue in these projects is poor planning in terms of budget, development timeline, and sustainability considerations, leading to software that “dies” after a grant has ended or, even worse, software that is badly implemented, doesn’t work, or is never completed.

Many DH researchers who plan to develop research software do not otherwise have support from a research software engineering group at their institutions, particularly those institutions that are less funded. Connecting these projects with research software engineers with expertise in digital humanities can substantially improve project outcomes.

To help solve these issues, the DHReSCU project aims to connect projects planning to develop DH research software in their planning and design stage with experienced DH Research Software Engineers to create a technical implementation plan.

The grant provided by NEH will help the DHReSCU pilot program determine the extent and needs for a consulting unit in DH research software. The resulting feedback and project outcomes of DHReSCU will shape its future operations.

DHReSCU is a collaboration of members of DHTech, a Special Interest Group of the Alliance of Digital Humanities Organizations (ADHO) that provides a community for individuals doing technical work in the digital humanities.

ABOUT THE NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR THE HUMANITIES

Created in 1965 as an independent federal agency, the National Endowment for the Humanities supports research and learning in history, literature, philosophy, and other areas of the humanities by funding selected, peer-reviewed proposals from around the nation. Additional information about the National Endowment for the Humanities and its grant programs is available at www.neh.gov