Final Report: Infrastructure Futures for Digital Cultural Heritage

23 Oct 2024
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The final report for the Infrastructure Futures for Digital Cultural Heritage project is now available to download. This project was led by Professor Jen Ross, with Dr Phil Sheail and Professor Melissa Terras as co-leads, and Cate Schofield as project researcher. 

The project involved surveys and workshops to explore a series of speculative scenarios. The scenarios were distilled and reimagined from a literature review and nine expert interviews undertaken in late 2023 and early 2024. The research objective was to get a better understanding of current meanings, priorities, concerns and hopes about digital infrastructure by imagining and collectively scrutinising possibilities for the future. The project was funded by the Creative Informatics AHRC Creative Cluster programme.

The approach used in this project built on pioneering work on speculative methods from the Centre for Research in Digital Education, developing and applying this in the Galleries, Libraries, Archives and Museum (GLAM) sector. The speculative dimensions of the project enriched the dialogue around digital cultural heritage infrastructures, and demonstrated the usefulness of creative, forward-thinking methodologies in addressing complex issues in their planning and development. The research highlighted that while digital transformation offers tremendous possibilities for accessing and preserving cultural heritage, it also requires careful consideration of infrastructural support to realise these benefits sustainably. The insights from this project are expected to inform future decisions on funding, policy-making, and strategic planning, and to serve as a model of speculative design for institutions to adopt when exploring innovative solutions to emerging challenges in digital infrastructure.

The final report can be accessed here: Ross, J., Sheail, P., Terras, M., & Schofield, C. (2024). Infrastructure Futures for Digital Cultural Heritage. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.13710266