Ingrid Thomson
Librarian: Humanities Information Division
Chancellor Oppenheimer Library
University of Cape Town Libraries
Private Bag
7700 RONDEBOSCH
SOUTH AFRICA
Tel: +27 21 650 3703 Fax: +27 21 689 7569
Email: Ingrid.Thomson@uct.ac.za
From: Marion Wallace
Sent: 16 July 2011
Marion.Wallace@bl.uk
SCOLMA: The UK Libraries and Archives Group on Africa
50th ANNIVERSARY CONFERENCE
Dis/connects: African Studies in the Digital Age
Oxford, 25-26 June 2012
CALL FOR PAPERS
The digital revolution is profoundly affecting African studies. New
digital resources are making available large areas of content, as well
as greatly improving access to bibliographies. In Africa, governments
and NGOs are publishing online, some publishers are moving to print on
demand and e-books, and international academic journals are increasingly
becoming available in university and national libraries.
Yet the story, as is well-known, is far from straightforward or
unproblematic. This conference will mark the 50th anniversary of the
founding of SCOLMA by taking a critical look at the field of African
studies and how it is changing. In particular, although there has been
much discussion of new digital resources and what their creators plan to
do, we have a limited understanding of their impact on their users and
on knowledge production in general. For example, what are the
implications for historical research of the availability of digitised
sources, and of the choices made in their selection? How do social
science researchers work in a field in which much, but not everything,
is now available online? Are e-journals - or indeed mobile phones -
beginning to change the research process in Africa? And, more generally,
how have broader historical and political developments changed African
studies and librarianship over the last half-century?
We welcome papers on these themes across the humanities, arts, social
sciences and sciences. Papers may deal with digital content, whether
digitised or born-digital, of any kind, e.g. archives and manuscripts;
audio-visual material; maps; newspapers; books, journals and theses;
photographs, prints, drawings and paintings; ephemera; statistical
databases; and social media.
The conference will bring together academics and other researchers with
librarians and archivists. We aim thus to have a productive exchange of
expertise, experience and analysis on the question of knowledge
production in African studies.
Themes may include, but are not limited to:
- How scholars, researchers, librarians and archivists use digitised
resources.
- How African studies is changing, and the place of the digital
revolution in these changes.
- Access to, selection of, and training in the use of digital resources
in the library context. Are resources under-used?
- To pay or not to pay? How easy is it for researchers to find
subscription e-resources? And for libraries to fund them? What is the
balance of free and charged resources in the research process? How well
do the models for making e-resources available in Africa work?
- How well does user consultation work?
- Access to the technology that underpins e-resources.
- Digital scholarship: are scholars in African studies using digital
collections to generate new intellectual products?
- The impact of mobile phone technology on African studies.
- How patchy is the creation of digital resources, and what - and who -
is being left behind?
- Language in Africa and new technology.
One-page abstracts of papers on these themes are warmly welcomed. If you
would like to give a paper, please send your abstract to
Lucy McCann
SCOLMA Secretary
Email: lucy.mccann@bodleian.ox.ac.uk.
Tel.: 01865 270908
THE DEADLINE FOR ABSTRACTS IS 31 OCTOBER 2011.
Papers in French are welcome if a summary is provided in English.
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