1. Introduction
The sustainability of Digital Humanities (DH) as a field hinges on finding the right equilibrium between conducting fundamental academic research and addressing the training and educational needs of the business sector. Over the past decade, there has been a notable emergence of undergraduate and graduate programs that integrate digital humanities practices into the educational system, playing a pivotal role in establishing the field as a recognized area of study within academia. However, it is now imperative to assess the progress of these DH programs and their potential benefits for future graduates. This evaluation, coupled with an analysis of the evolving job market, will help identify key challenges faced by the field and the emerging job opportunities. This process will enable DH programs to align their offerings with the market's demand for new graduates as a workforce while fostering continued growth as a research field capable of providing critical perspectives on the market.
2. Objectives
This research primarily aims to explore the current landscape of digital humanities programmes in Europe and North America and identify their strategies to enhance career prospects for graduates in this field. Key parameters for comparison include the annual intake of new students, program duration, areas of study, and the fields of employment for graduates. Additional parameters encompass the type of institution (private or public) and the type of program (face-to-face/online/hybrid, research-oriented (thesis)/practicum/both). A secondary objective is to foster closer collaboration among DH programs across continents, between universities and the industry, and raise awareness about the important role of research infrastructures, such as DARIAH, CLARIN and the Digital Humanities Course Registry (DHCR), in facilitating the exchange of knowledge and expertise between countries and institutions.
3. Methods
The methodology employed for this research involves updating and collecting new data for registration in the Digital Humanities Course Registry (DHCR) and analysing the data through its API. DHCR is a platform developed and curated by DARIAH and CLARIN research infrastructures that provides an overview of the growing range of teaching programmes and activities in the field of digital humanities worldwide. Between 2014 and December 2023, 175 institutions from 32 countries registered the metadata of 573 programmes and courses in the database. Out of the 573 registered courses, about 219 are updated regularly. The course metadata provides information about the course content (e.g., education type, language, modality, recurrence, disciplines, DH objects and techniques) and information about the course provider (e.g., institutions, cities, and countries). The objects and techniques are based on the TaDiRAH Taxonomy, designed by Borek et al. (2016) to organise and categorise DH content. All the course data and metadata can be exported and visualised with the help of a public JSON data API (for example, see Tognitz, M. & Gehring, L., 2020).
Using data from the DH Course Registry as a starting point for our study, we combine multiple methods, such as desktop research, surveys, focus interviews and workshops, to review the current strategies DH programs employ to increase the employability opportunities of their graduates in a very dynamic job market influenced by rapid technological advancements.
4. Preliminary results
A report on our initial overview of challenges and potential solutions for DH programs was compiled around the workshop "Digital Humanities and Industries: Identifying Employment Niches," which took place on June 6, 2023, in the context of the DARIAH Annual Event in Budapest. The report included the results of 34 preparatory surveys and interviews with directors and coordinators of various DH postgraduate programs across Europe (Sanz et al. 2023). Initial findings show that European DH programs are characterised by their interdisciplinary approach, strong emphasis on digital and programming skills, and practical internships and collaborations with industry.
5. Current Status
We have complemented the previous study by conducting interviews with 50 European alumni, six of which will be invited to take part in a round table discussion at the DARIAH Annual Event in Lisbon on June 18, 2024. In parallel, we have collected data from 118 North American institutions, launched a survey and we are scheduling interviews with North American DH program coordinators, all of which will allow us to conduct a preliminary comparative analysis between Europe and North America in terms of skills gaps and emerging job profiles. We will compare our findings with data from recent surveys distributed to technological companies, cultural heritage institutions, and research centres (see, for example, the Report on the Most Demanded Profiles in Digital Humanities and Language Technologies (CITT, 2024)).
6. Significance and implications
This study is built upon one of DARIAH and CLARIN's fundamental pillars, which is to approach training and education strategically and in a coordinated fashion with institutions across the globe. As research and employment evolve in a fast-changing environment, it becomes essential to (1) share resources and know-how among communities of practice, (2) maintain more fluid interactions between policy, program design, alumni, and societal needs, and (3) establish networks of collaboration between educational institutions and the industry. In the future, we plan to expand our research by considering a broader geographical range of DH programs, especially the Global South.