Digital collections

Whether it’s about “solid” working outfits or “dainty” ladies’ clothes, the changes in fashion and lifestyle over the past century have been reflected in the images from the Worcester-based Kays & Co mail order catalogue, which are being digitised by the JISC-funded World of Kays project. Every day this week Project Manager Jennifer Waugh talks […]

These Minyong Adi men are leading a mithun (bos frontalis) to a sacrifice, conducted to cure an illness. Christoph von Fürer-Haimendorf noted that this animal resisted fiercely and finally fell down exhausted before it was successfully brought to the place for its sacrifice. From the School of Oriental and African Studies’ Fürer-Haimendorf collection (Any blog […]

A number of new digital collections for researchers, teachers and learners have been added to the JISC Content web site, including descriptions of Islamic manuscripts, virtual Darwin’s library and crowdsourced content on WW1 in Wales, flooding and early 21st Century life in Britain. The JISC Content website provides an introduction and links to over 80 […]

Visualising China, the JISC-funded digital archive of images on the history of China 1850-1950 launches today. There are a number of interesting features on this web site which was put together by the University of Bristol: – separate collections (Historical Photographs of China from the University of Bristol; the Sir Robert Hart Collection from Queen’s […]

It’s been a couple of years since the end of the JISC’s Enriching Digital Resources programme. The programme funded 25 projects, 24 of which were either digitising new content or enriching and clustering existing digtial resources. Given the concern JISC has for sustaining digital resources, we thought it we be good to run a quick […]

In the last week, in preparation to bidding for the current eContent Capital programme, many institutions have made contact with Programme Managers to discuss their project ideas. Part of these conversations have focused around issues of learning resources creation, as projects in Strand A are asked to digitise special collections and then create Open Educational […]

(This blog post coincides with the publication of the recommendations of the JISC Film and Sound Think Tank – pdf report) JISC has invested signficant amounts in two fine archives of of moving images. NewsFilm Online contains over 3,000 hours of film featuring events such as the Crystal Palace fire, an early interview with Nelson […]

The recording of the online briefing session held on 21st June for the JISC funding call 6/11 eContent Capital programme can now be accessed through Elluminate Live! at http://bit.ly/mS0AXi . The power point slides can be downloaded here (see bottom of the page). The briefing highlighted key issues to be considered in proposals as well […]

The eight projects from the international Digging into Data programme presented their project findings at a conference in Washington DC in June 2011. Much was discussed; here are the pertinent topics from a JISC point of view. Visualisation of data was a crucial medium. If you have results from over 190,000 trials (as the Data […]

Media coverage is always a good way of raising the profile of (digital) collections. If your university’s collection includes “treasures, oddities and curiosities”, the Times Higher Education would like to know about it for a new series they’re running entitled “Odds and Quads“. Last week, the magazine reveiwed the Knitting Collection based at the University […]

Presentation given at Digging into Data conference in Washington DC, June 2011 Download the presentation via Slideshare

a) After using the British Library Archival Sound Recordings website, an FE teacher commented: “The realism of it [interviews with photographers included on the site] inspired students and encouraged them to source other material beyond Google searches. It also placed the photographs in context, which you don’t get from Google.” b) A teacher who incorporated […]

A recent article in the Guardian notes plans of the British Library, working with the commercial firm BrightSolid, to digitise around 40m pages from their 750m pages of their historic newspaper archive. The article points out that these newspapers form something of a ‘national memory’ but also implies that this is the first time that […]

JISC Programme Managers, Alastair Dunning and Paola Marchionni, will be giving presentations related to current and future JISC funding at various events in June. If you are interested in discussing funding bids please come along – all the events below are open to any interested delegate. 2nd June – London Digital Humanities Group, Central London […]

1. After using the British Library Archival Sound Recordings web site, an FE teacher commented: “The realism of it [interviews with photographers included on the site] inspired students and encouraged them to source other material beyond Google searches. It also placed the photographs in context, which you don’t get from Google.” 2. A teacher who […]

Two previous blog posts outlined issues relating to the next JISC Content call, Strand B Large-scale digitisation and Strand C Clustering digital content. (Note all the JISC Content Call is still to be signed off by the relevant JISC sub-committee) Here are some of the key issues relating to Strand A Digitisation for Open Educational […]