Organisation

Three modes of enquiry are central in the Studio: thinking, observing and playing. These three metaphors capture the interplay we expect between thorough analysis and more experimental, playful design of new tools and practices. The design of new tools is never only a technical job. Opening up new possibilities for humanities and social science scholars with the help of advanced networked information and communication technologies implicates the rethinking of old research questions, questioning established research methods and techniques, and asks for the intellectual courage to try out new forms of scholarly work. This is why we emphasise that the Studio will not in the first place help design new tools but rather new scholarly practices.

To realise its dual mission of increasing our understanding of e-humanities and e-social science, and of supporting scholars to make use of e-research, the Studio has two interrelated modules: the Analytic Centre (AC) and the Construction Platform (CP). These facilitate long-term research based on a clear intellectual agenda combined with flexible short-term projects created in response to the changing needs of researchers at universities and research institutes. All projects in the CP result from, and are led by, partnerships with external research groups. Whereas the CP helps create new epistemic objects and practices in the humanities and social sciences, both inside and outside of the Studio, the AC studies this process. To facilitate this, the AC is responsible for the creation and maintenance of the Studio's inhouse knowledge database.

The Studio will be supervised by a scientific advisory board which has two roles: to oversee the scientific quality of the research program and to promote the anchoring of the Studio in the Dutch humanities and social science communities, and in relevant audiences outside of academia. The Studio should be housed in a research oriented environment. The core budget of the Studio is 900 k€ per annum. Additional external funding is expected to increase the Studio budget considerably.