About

We are dedicated to supporting research that uses digital methods, cultural heritage collections and archives, explores digital creativity and fosters critical approaches to emergent themes and issues. Our approach is based on supporting conversations between different sectors of the University and linking people to resources and expertise that can enrich their research and teaching. The DCCH will provide a focus and help orchestrate activities that will allow us to realise our collective potential.

What are digital creativity and cultures?

As the Digital Creativity and Cultures Hub, we support research that concerns digital creativity, cultures and methods, from helping researchers to secure websites to recommending software tools and providing training.

Digital creativity

We support research in creative engagement with the digital in various ways. We support creative research, including creative uses of mapping technology and imaging methods. We also support creative digital impact, and have supported researchers in projects from designing websites and apps to 3D printing, crowdsourcing and digital exhibitions. We welcome supporting researchers in navigating University processes around digital impact methods, particularly web and software design.

Digital cultures

We are closely linked with Cultural Collections and the Libraries, and can therefore support researchers working on these collections, from the ancient to the contemporary. We are particularly strong in research on contemporary digital cultures, along with working with researchers on sustainability of their projects concerning contemporary digitality. For example, we have hosted a series of seminars in this area, as well as supporting research on the impact of digital technology on contemporary culture.

Digital methods

We also support research in traditional digital humanities methods, including corpus linguistics, geospatial data analysis and social network analysis. Here, we work closely with the Digital Humanities Research Group, a group of all those interested in digital humanities methods, who are happy to share expertise with those new to digital methods. We can recommend software tools and provide training, both large-scale and bespoke, that is useful to your questions.

How do I know where to begin?

The most important thing is to have an idea, a question or something you want to research, and we can guide you through what might be the most appropriate approach, method or tool.

Digital methods can offer new insights into your research, from making visualisations to recognise trends in data to revealing damaged text on historical documents. They can boost your ability to handle large data sets and let you engage with these in creative ways, building maps and networks based on your data. And they can help you engage a wide audience, allowing collaboration with community organisations and new ways of public engagement, from 3D printing to crowdsourcing.

We've produced a list of resources for support, a list of example projects, and a list of tools for digital research. We also offer a consultation service [UoL login required] for University of Leeds researchers. Finally, we run a regular series of in-person and online training sessions, with recordings available on our SharePoint [UoL login required].

Where are we?

The Hub is off the main reading room of the Brotherton Library, on the right after the Enquiries desk (G 3.27).

Contact Us

By email:

dcch@leeds.ac.uk
(you can also find contact details for individual staff members on our People page)

By telephone:

external: (+44) 113 3430624
internal (UoL): 30624

By post:

Digital Creativity and Cultures Hub
Brotherton Library
University of Leeds
Leeds LS2 9JT