Digital humanities as an incentive for digitalisation strategies in Eastern European HEIs: A case study of Romania

Abstract

The modern university has the potential to turn into a nexus of digital embracement and innovation, thus responding to both strategic planning for higher education and societal demands. Priorities in digitalisation strategies (White Paper 'Bologna Digital 2020', Rampelt et al. 2019) for higher education institutions (HEIs) are actively promoted, and their implementation is in progress throughout Europe. However, the embedding of the digitalisation reform at the institutional level is considerably uneven from one country to another, with Eastern European HEIs lagging behind (Conrads et al. 2017). The aim of this position paper is to present and discuss the case of digital humanities (DH) as an incentive for digitalisation strategies at Eastern European universities. We briefly contextualize the configuration of DH initiatives in the region by using the results of the Digital Humanities Survey and propose the case study of Romania, where we investigate the implementation status of such initiatives. We further exemplify the process of developing a DH centre and evaluate the institutional impact of the recently created research centre CODHUS, from the West University of Timişoara, Romania, the second DH centre in the country. The strength of the new centre relies on its capacity to converge cross-disciplinary expertise with digital technologies. The centre intends to develop computational solutions and digital tools for research, course development and assessment. CODHUS is also a digital-competence training centre for teachers and students, with the purpose of bridging the gap between teaching strategies and goals, on one hand, and students' digital experiences and expectations from HEI, on the other. The study offers a multiple-lens perspective on the integration of digital-intensive research initiatives, such as DH, into the Bologna process. We argue that DH centres can support further HE developments which contribute to building "new learning ecologies" (Galvis 2018) and creating an "education area with digital solutions" (Rampelt 2019).