International Research Collaboration Network in Computational Archival Science (IRCN-CAS)

模拟档案馆的大规模数字化，新兴的多种形式的数字档案馆，以及跨学科研究人员（以及公众）希望参与档案材料的新方式，正在破坏传统的档案理论和实践，并为从事档案材料工作的从业者和研究人员提出挑战。它们还提供了增强的可能性，奖学金，通过应用计算方法和工具的档案问题空间，更根本的是，通过“计算思维”与“档案思维”的整合。这一潜力促使本提案中的合作者将计算档案科学（CAS）确定为一个新的研究领域（见http：//dcicblog.umd.edu/cas/）。该网络将通过直接与档案社区和档案从业人员接触来扩展先前的工作。该网络的具体研究重点将是使用计算方法对数字化和非数字化的数字记录进行情境化。情境化是国家档案馆2017-19年数字战略中强调的现代档案馆面临的核心挑战之一，也是计算方法具有巨大潜力的领域。该网络将直接接触档案和档案从业人员，建立系统的合作和研究方案，利用和扩大各机构在这一领域开展的创新研究。记录的背景是理解其作为历史证据的价值的关键，而绘制和提供访问该背景的能力是赋予那些原本（相对）不连贯的信息片段价值的关键，使它们能够被历史学家和其他以档案为中心的学者有效地利用-发现，理解和重新利用-利用档案证据基础。档案日益数字化的性质为解决这一问题提供了机遇和挑战，通过使用一系列计算方法来满足档案用户和从业人员日益复杂的需求。该网络将组织一系列相互关联的活动，以探讨这个问题的语境化，无论是通过捕获元数据，增强记录的语义标记，或确实语境化的记录与其他记录，从而连接了以前断开的信息到“知识图”。我们将不会专注于特定的技术，而是研究一系列有潜力应对这一挑战的技术，包括自然语言处理、图形技术、机器学习、概率方法以及数据科学和人工智能广泛领域的其他方法。因此，研讨会的重点将放在研究问题而不是技术上。研讨会将分为两个研讨会和两个“数据马拉松”。第一次研讨会将是一个参与性的活动，重点是确定和开放的问题，我们将探讨，与来自信息/档案科学，计算机/数据科学和档案实践的互补领域的参与者。数据马拉松将通过小型研究人员团队（特别关注早期职业研究人员和研究生）进行与其中一些问题相关的实践实验，他们将在小型项目上合作，将计算方法应用于与记录情境化相关的一系列挑战。一个数据库将侧重于数字化记录，另一个侧重于数字化记录。最后的专题讨论会将把这些线索集中起来，重点是反思、综合和确定未来的工作方案和合作，以期落实在实践中产生的一些想法。我们将编写一份最后的白色文件，其中将纳入该网络的结论和对今后工作的建议。

The large-scale digitisation of analogue archives, the emerging diverse forms of born-digital archive, and the new ways in which researchers across disciplines (as well as the public) wish to engage with archival material, are disrupting traditional archival theories and practices, and are presenting challenges for practitioners and researchers who work with archival material. They also offer enhanced possibilities for scholarship, through the application of computational methods and tools to the archival problem space, and, more fundamentally, through the integration of 'computational thinking' with 'archival thinking'. This potential has led the collaborators in this proposal to identify Computational Archival Science (CAS) as a new field of study (see http://dcicblog.umd.edu/cas/).This Network will extend this prior work by engaging directly with the archive community and archival practitioners. The specific research focus of the Network will be on the use of computational methods for contextualising digital records, both digitised and born-digital. Contextualisation is one of the central challenges for the modern archive highlighted in the Digital Strategy 2017-19 from The National Archives, and is an area in which computational methods have great potential. The Network will reach out directly to archives and archival practitioners, establishing systematic collaborations and research programmes that leverage and extend the innovative research being carried out within individual institutions in this area. The context of a record is key for understanding its value as historical evidence, and the ability to map out and provide access to that context is key for conferring value on what would otherwise be (relatively) disconnected pieces of information, enabling them to be used effectively - found, understood and re-purposed - by historians and other archive-centric scholars drawing on the archival evidence base. The increasingly digital nature of the archive provides opportunities as well as challenges for addressing this question, by using a range of computational methods for meeting the increasingly complex demands of both archival users and practitioners. This Network will organise a series of interconnected events to explore this question of contextualisation, whether through capturing metadata, enhancing records by semantic tagging, or indeed contextualising records with other records, and thus connecting up previously disconnected information into 'knowledge graphs'. We will not focus on specific technologies, but rather examine a range of technologies with potential for meeting this challenge, including natural language processing, graph technologies, machine learning, probabilistic approaches, and other methods from the broad field of data science and AI. The focus will thus be on the research question rather than the technology.The events will be organised as two research symposia and two 'datathons'. The first symposium will be a participatory event focusing on identifying and opening up the questions we will explore, with participants from the complementary fields of information/archival science, computer/data science, and archival practice. The datathons will conduct hands-on experiments relating to some of these questions, through small teams of researchers - with a particular focus on early career researchers and graduate students - who will work collaboratively on small projects applying computational methods to a range of challenges relating to record contextualisation. One datathon will focus on digitised records, the other on born-digital records. The closing symposium will then draw these threads together, focusing on reflection, synthesis, and identifying future programme of work and collaborations, with a view to implementing some of the ideas generated in practice. We will produce a final white paper that integrates the Network's conclusions and recommendations for further work.