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Association for Literary and Linguistic Computing Committee Minutes of the ALLC Committee Meeting held at Sorbonne, Paris, France, 4-5 July 2006 Agenda
July 4 2006 The Chair opened the meeting at 14.10 welcoming everyone to Paris. 1. Attendance Apologies for absence were received from Thomas Rommel, Michael Sperberg-McQueen and Liliane Gallet-Blanchard. 2. Minutes and matters arising The minutes of the mid-term Committee meeting in Oslo, Norway, were accepted as an accurate and true record of the meeting. The Chair welcomed Trish Thomas, Executive Editor, OUP to the meeting and suggested that we proceed to item 9.1. Communications of the Association/Journal so as to excuse her from the rest of the meeting. This was accepted. Marilyn Deegan pointed out the key issues regarding the journal at present. The submission and review system went live with Manuscript central and this is a considerable improvement from the point of view of the Editors. The journal is still overwhelmed with copy, which is probably still the effect of the demise of CHUM, but the Editors hope that the Digital Humanities Quarterly (DHQ) will kick in and start drawing some of that copy towards it. With respect to the Oxford journals online archive, access to the LLC archive for members is still under discussion. Trish Thomas gave a report on the journal from the perspective of OUP. She presented a circulation summary, noted that production is running smoothly, mentioned that OUP keep track of the top 10 articles, ie which ones people are looking at, presented some marketing strategies and noted that OUP will send materials to all conferences that they are notified of. She also discussed the issue of open access and the concept of publicly funded research being made publicly available. The Chair thanked Trish Thomas for her presentation. The possibility of casting our net wider, perhaps to look for the possibility of publishing multimedia and graphics, was discussed. OUP would be willing to offer access to online datasets to go with articles. The Committee extend their congratulations and appreciation to Marilyn Deegan, Edward Vanhoutte, Simon Horobin and Stefan Sinclair for all their work in the past year. The meeting then went back to item 2 on the agenda, Minutes and matters arising. The action points from the previous meeting were looked at and noted. Coffee break began at 3.30 and the meeting resumed at 4.00.3. Chair's Report The Chair reported that the key issue during the past six months had been the ADHO developments, which he then outlined. In particular, the protocols are being updated. The Chair also noted that we had renewed the bursaries for young scholars at the CLiP conference and this had worked out well. 4. Secretary's Report The Secretary thanked Melissa Terras for her work during the past year as Acting Secretary. The Secretary noted that she, the Treasurer and Alejandro Bia had looked into the costs for the midterm meetings and noted that costs were fairly similar regardless of where the meeting was held. They all suggested that costs should be taken into consideration, but that the midterm meeting was of such great importance that under no circumstances should we give it up. The Secretary said she had written a brief obituary for Paul Fortier to be published on the website and in LLC. She had also spoken to Thomas Rommel, who agreed to edit a special volume of invited papers in remembrance of Paul Fortier.5. Treasurer's Report The Treasurer reported that the income for 2005 (ie the income based on 2004) was up a little, but the income for 2006 (ie based on 2005) was up considerably. The estimated income based on 2006 is £ 32,000. Looking at our expenditure it seems that we need to publicize our activities more, perhaps in the journal. One question is also whether we should spend more on the journal. It was left to Marilyn Deegan, Simon Horobin and Edward Vanhoutte to discuss this and report back to the Committee. Marilyn Deegan has brought forward a proposal for a workshop in India and she asked for a supplement to costs for attending a conference in Calcutta. £ 300 was agreed. The Treasurer also noted that midterm meetings should continue and we should concentrate our efforts on promoting the organization and spending money. At the same time we should look into keeping the costs of the meeting down, perhaps by looking at cheaper hotels and being aware of flight costs, etc. The LLC subscriptions and the income they generate was discussed at the ADHO meeting and accepted as a basis for the distribution of the income. The total subscriptions have increased and the share of consortia, in particular, are increasing. After deducting the costs of LLC, including a special issue, and the DHQ, we have increased profit. Membership issues should also be discussed, but the meeting will return to those later. 6. Election of Officers At this point the President, David Robey, took over and chaired the meeting. Harold Short was nominated for Chair by Espen Ore and seconded by Elizabeth Burr. He was elected unanimously. Lisa Lena Opas-Hänninen was nominated for Secretary by Laszlo Hunyadi and seconded by John Nerbonne. She was elected unanimously. Jean Anderson was nominated for Treasurer by Elizabeth Burr and seconded by Espen Ore. She was elected unanimously. Harold Short thanked on behalf of all Officers and resumed the chair.7. Election of Committee Members Melissa Terras was nominated by Edward Vanhoutte and seconded by Alejandro Bia. John Nerbonne was nominated by Lisa Lena Opas-Hänninen and seconded by Jean Anderson. Melissa Terras and John Nerbonne were elected unanimously. The issue of a third member was discussed, as was the question of co-opted members. Dino Buzetti was put forward as a potential third Committee member and Dawn Archer was mentioned as a co-opted member. This question needs to be returned to after the Chair has had a chance to approach the people concerned. The meeting was adjourned at 17.30 The meeting reconvened on Wednesday, July 5 at 9.40.5. Treasurer’s report The issue of subscriptions was returned to, as was decided in conjunction with the Treasurer’s report. We need to look at lapsed subscriptions and contact those people. We should also contact all those who have published in the journal but are not members. In addition, we should contact all who have attended our conference and those who attended DRH and CLiP. For the lapsed subscriptions we need information from OUP and we can then target those who we think would renew. The Committee congratulated Harold Short and Melissa Terras for having taken this issue this far.8. Constitution The Committee looked at the constitution and noted the following: Clause 2 needs amending. Clause 23 is a crucial one. However, any changes to clauses 2, 23 or 25 need to be approved by the Charities Commisssion. Clause 4 – institutional membership, what is the meaning of it? For some countries this makes sense, for others it doesn’t. Clause 5 needs review. Clause 13 needs rethinking. We should really exclude officers of another association here, because there would be conflict of interest. Clause 15 – Associate Editors need to be considered as does the question of editorial independence. Clause 17 – here we need to acknowledge that we are in an electronic age. A new possible role would be membership coordinator. It was proposed that the December meeting would be called specifically for the purpose of looking at the constitution. Harold Short, Edward Vanhoutte and David Robey will draft a possible new constitution and send it to the Committee members by the end of September. The Committee asked Melissa Terras to take on an ad-hoc role as membership coordinator. 9. Communications of the Association The Chair noted that most of the issues around this had already been dealt with. The Chair noted that Willard McCarty has written a report on the Humanist and it will be posted on the website. The Chair noted that a link to the new website has been sent to the Committee. Comments are welcome. It is possible to go live with the new site within a few weeks. It was decided that the site would go live by 14.7. 10.30-10.55 Coffee break 10. ADHO 10.1 Governance: The Chair noted that the ADHO Steering Committee had met the day before and the ALLC representatives on it are Espen Ore, Laszlo Hunyadi and Harold Short. The DHQ Editor and the Humanist Editor were formally added to the committees. ADHO had also formally set up the Multilinguality Committee. There was also an itemized list of the responsibilities of the Steering Committee. Lisa Lena Opas-Hänninen proposed that we formally ratify the ADHO Governance Protocol and this was seconded by jean Anderson. The motion was carried unanimously. Next, the issue of the admission of new constituent organizations was discussed. Harold Short had discussed with Ray Siemens concerning the Canadian organization. Their publication, Text Technology, would then become an ADHO publication. A protocol governing the admission of new organizations and looser affiliations will be needed. Harold Short will draft this and send it to the Committee members. 10.2 Finances: Finances had been discussed the previous day. 10. 3 Conferences: The Annex for conferences will be dealt with at a later date because Susan Hockey is still working on it. The only change to the conference protocol is that there will be a Programme Committee Vice-Chair elected from within the Committee. Lisa Lena Opas-Hänninen proposed that we ratify the conference protocol and Elisabeth Burr seconded this. The motion was carried unanimously. The Committee wish to extend their thanks to Susan Hockey for all her work on the Conference Coordinating Committee.10.4 Publications: The Chair noted that the protocol still needs to be discussed. 10.5 Multilingualism: The Chair noted that the protocol is a draft for discussion at this stage. 10.6 Other activities and initiatives: The Chair noted that John Unsworth is chairing a committee on cyberculture. We have a mediation role with respect to other learned societies in the Humanities and should be discussing getting involved in the digital age. The Mellon Foundation has suggested we develop a kind of clearing house. Harold Short will circulate more information on all this. David Robey noted that there are two issues here: 1) the sustainability of digital resources and 2) demonstrating what the added value is for developing and researching digital resources. The ALLC could have a role here. Once example might be the peer review of digital resources. One might think about how one’s project looks to those who are agnostic. This issue should be discussed over the next few months. 10.7 ADHO appointments: Lisa Lena Opas-Hänninen proposed that Harold Short, Espen Ore and Elisabeth Burr be elected as the ALLC members to the ADHO Steering Committee. This was seconded by John Nerbonne and carried unanimously. The Committee extended their thanks to Laszlo for his work on the ADHO Steering Committee. Jean Anderson porposed the following appointments: Conference Coordinating Committee: Espen Ore Publications Committee: Edward Vanhoutte Multilingualism and Multiculturalism Committee: Concha Sanz-Miguel These were seconded by John Nerbonne and carried unanimously11. Conferences The papers from the 2005 conference have been published. The Committee thanked the 2006 Programme Committee and its Chair, Lisa Lena Opas-Hänninen, for all their work. The Committee wished to extend a special thanks to Marie-Madeleine Martinet and Liliane Gallet-Blanchard for all their hard work. The 2007 conference will be held in Urbana-Champaign, Illinois. The Programme Committee is chaired by Ray Siemens. The ALLC representatives on the Committee are: Espen Ore, Elisabeth Burr, Jean Anderson and Paul Spence. The 2008 conference will be held in Oulu, Finland. The ALLC needs to propose three people for the Programme Committee Chair and the ADHO Steering Committee choose one of those people. The Committee agreed to propose John Nerbonne, Espen Ore and Thomas Rommel. The Committee decided that the ALLC representatives to the PC would be Jean Anderson, Paul Spence and two others. These two would be discussed over email in the next few months. 12. Memorials David Robey reported on the discussions regarding the Zampolli Prize. The suggestion is that it will be given to a scholar for a single piece of work at any stage of their career. David Robey will circulate a discussion on this document and the Committee will decide in December on the matter. Lisa Lena Opas-Hänninen reported that Thomas Rommel and she were discussing possible contributors to a volume in memory of Paul Fortier. It would concentrate on stylistics and literature. It was mentioned that Ashgate might be interested in publishing such a volume. They will put together a proposal. 13. Association initiatives 13.1 TEI The Chair noted that there was not much to report on this. There has been some discussion on the idea of a workshop. 13. 2 Busa Award Nothing to discuss 13.3 Bursaries Money has been received from the French Ministry. It was decided that it would be used top offer 2 bursaries to French students to attend the conference in Illinois. 13.4 Workshops A decision was made to fund the Jadavpur University workshop. Marilyn Deegan will liaise with them. 13.5 Student Prize It was decided that this would be renamed the Paul Fortier Prize. It needs to be discussed further, but it could include both MA and PhD theses. 13.6 Project Support We need more proposals here. 13.7-13.11 Were already discussed. 14. Any other business The mid-term meeting will be in Ghent 1-3.12. The Chair closed the meeting at 12.35 . |
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