student conference – Interdisciplinary Perspectives: Bridging Sociological Studies in the Digital Age • 11 June 2024

This conference is organised by PhD students at the Department of Digital Humanities.

11 June 2024 – King’s College London, Strand Campus (Bush House Lecture Theatre 1)

Interdisciplinary Perspectives: Bridging Sociological Studies in the Digital age

The Department of Digital Humanities at King’s College London is pleased to host the international conference Interdisciplinary Perspectives: Bridging Sociological Studies in the Digital Age on 11 June 2024. The conference will be in-person only and will take place in London, at King’s College London Strand Campus (WC2R 2LS), where the Department of Digital Humanities is based. 

The event aims to foster discussions and collaborations across various disciplines, specifically including Natural Language Processing (NLP), Social Sciences, and Social Media and Digital Methods in broader research in Digital Humanities.

In an era defined by unprecedented connectivity and vast digital datasets, the intersection of NLP, Social Sciences, and Social Media alongside Digital Methods sparks a profound dialogue, reshaping our understanding of human behavior and societal dynamics within vast digital ecosystems. NLP emerges as a transformative force, equipping computers with the ability to comprehend, interpret, and generate human language, bridging the gap between digital data and human insights. This integration with Social Sciences fosters a multidisciplinary framework, enabling nuanced analyses of cultural phenomena, societal trends, and individual behaviors within digital realms. Concurrently, Social Media platforms emerge as dynamic arenas, offering real-time glimpses into human interactions, preferences, and sentiments, thus serving as invaluable sources for both NLP-driven research and social science inquiry. Through this interconnected dialogue, researchers navigate the complexities of the digital landscape, uncovering layers of meaning and driving innovation at the nexus of technology, social sciences, and digital methods.

The conference will feature keynote speakers for each of the its main thematic areas: Andrea Nini (Manchester University) for Linguistics and NLP, Chiara Amini (UCL) for Social Sciences, and Tim Highfield (University of Sheffield) for Social Media and Digital Methods. They will offer insights into the latest advancements, challenges, and future directions within their respective fields, enriching the interdisciplinary dialogue and inspiring attendees to explore innovative avenues at the intersection of sociological studies and the digital age.

For this conference, we invite submissions of abstracts in English focusing on the intersection of sociological studies and the digital age. 

Abstracts should be tailored for presentations lasting 20 minutes, with an additional 10 minutes allotted for questions. We particularly welcome submissions in the following areas or any intersection between them:

  1. NLP
  2. Social Sciences 
  3. Social Media and Digital Methods

We encourage submissions from researchers, scholars, practitioners, and postgraduate researchers who are exploring innovative approaches, methodologies, and findings within these domains. 

Submission Guidelines:

  • Abstracts should not exceed 300 words in length.
  • Abstracts should include the name of the author(s) and their affiliation(s).
  • Abstracts should clearly outline the research objectives, methodology, and, possibly, anticipated contributions to the field.
  • Abstracts must be submitted via email to andrea.farina[at]kcl.ac.uk by 20 April 2024.Please write “ABSTRACT Interdisciplinary Perspectives Conference” as the object of your email.
  • Please indicate the preferred topic area for your presentation (NLP, Social Sciences, Social Media and Digital Methods).
  • Notification of acceptance: 10 May 2024.

For inquiries and further information, please contact Andrea Farina at andrea.farina[at]kcl.ac.uk.

The organisers:

Andrea Farina, Rendan Liu, Chiara Mignani, Zhi Ye

Conference Contact: andrea.farina[at]kcl.ac.uk

Seminar: Diversity and Inclusion in the Sharing Economy: An Airbnb Case Study • 27 March 2024

Event organised by the Computational Humanities research group.

To register to the seminar, please fill in this form by Friday 22 March 2024.

27 March 2024 – 5pm GMT

In person – King’s College London (Macadam Building MB-2.1)

Remote – Via Microsoft Teams

Giovanni Quattrone (Middlesex University London), Diversity and Inclusion in the Sharing Economy: An Airbnb Case Study

Abstract

The sharing economy model is a contested concept: on one hand, its proponents have praised it to be enabler of fair marketplaces, with all participants receiving equal opportunities; on the other hand, its detractors have criticised it for actually exacerbating preexisting societal inequalities. In this paper, we propose a scalable quantitative method to measure participants’ diversity and inclusion in such marketplaces, with the aim to offer evidence to ground this debate. We apply the method to the case of the Airbnb hospitality service for the city of London, UK. Our findings reveal that diversity is high for gender, but not so for age and ethnicity. As for inclusion, we find strong signals of homophily both in terms of gender, age and ethnicity, thus suggesting that under-represented groups have significantly fewer opportunities to gain from this market model. Interestingly, the sentiment associated to same-group (homophilic) interactions is just as positive as that associated to heterophilic ones, even after controlling for Airbnb property’s type, price and location. This suggests that increased diversity and inclusion are desirable not only for moral but also for economic and market reasons.

Bio

Dr Giovanni Quattrone is a prominent researcher and expert in the fields of Social Data Science and Urban Science. With a strong background in data-driven analysis and interdisciplinary research, Giovanni has made significant contributions to advancing our understanding of complex social phenomena and urban dynamics.

Giovanni’s expertise lies in leveraging computational methods, such as machine learning and network analysis to gain insights into social interactions and human behaviour across both online and offline domains. Giovanni’s research also encompasses the analysis of urban data, driving the development of data-driven solutions to enhance urban planning, sustainability, and livability. To date, Giovanni has published more than 80 peer-reviewed publications, with over 1900 citations collectively (Source: Google Scholar).

Twelve new posts in the Department of Digital Humanities

The Department of Digital Humanities is recruiting for twelve full-time, permanent positions across a range of areas.

Please help us share with those who might be interested in applying. Full details and links can be found on this jobs.ac.uk page.

Some background information about these posts:

The Department of Digital Humanities (DDH) is one of the largest and most prestigious DH Departments in the UK and internationally. DDH has expanded a great deal in the last fifteen years, and during this time “the digital”, both in and as related to the humanities, has changed beyond all recognition. As well as revolutionising the way in which we deal with data, computation and analysis in the humanities, we have seen the rise of the interactive World Wide Web, of social media, the digital economy, and key contemporary issues such as fake news and misinformation, and the progress of AI. Our philosophy is that none of these ways in which “the digital” relates to the “the human” can be researched or taught in isolation, and this has underpinned our expansion. We therefore encourage applications for these posts from across the DH broadly defined.

These new posts will consolidate our research and teaching in key areas of DH including computational humanities, global digital politics, digital economy and industries, and digital media and culture, as well as engaging with emergent areas, such as AI and creativity. Some of the posts will also develop and support our new online PGT programmes, including an MSc in Digital Economy and an MA in Digital Futures, both of which are expected to recruit globally, but with a particular focus on South-East Asia . These appointments will also enable us to expand and improve the activities that make the DH student experience at King’s unique, and help students to enhance their skills, such as our Writing and Coding Labs. These posts provide an opportunity for qualified individuals to play a major role in shaping our vision of a diverse and innovative Department of Digital Humanities.

Here are links to the positions:

Here are links to the social media posts:

Seminar: Exploring Changes in Sensory Descriptions Over Time: A Frame-Based Approach to the Study of Smelling and Tasting • 27 February 2024

Event organised by the Computational Humanities research group.

To register to the seminar, please fill in this form by Tuesday 20 February 2024.

27 February 2024 – 3pm GMT

In person – King’s College London

Remote – Via Microsoft Teams

Teresa Paccosi (University of Trento / Fondazione Bruno Kessler), Exploring Changes in Sensory Descriptions Over Time: A Frame-Based Approach to the Study of Smelling and Tasting

Abstract

The world in which we live is mediated by our senses, so it is not surprising that every language has specialized words to describe our perceptual experience. Previous research has revealed a dominance of sight in the usage of sensory words and in the composition of the sensory lexicon in Western European languages. This often results in taste and smell being expressed with a more limited vocabulary in these languages. Existing works on olfactory and gustatory language focus on contemporary language and the specific words employed in these sensory vocabularies. This seminar aims to offer a quantitative exploration of the evolution of English olfactory and gustatory language over time, adopting a FrameNet-like approach for the analysis of sensory descriptions in textual data. The frame-based approach is designed to effectively capture sensory events, i.e., more complex structures involving different participants, rather than focusing solely on the occurrences of single terms in texts. This approach serves as the basis for a system for the automatic extraction of gustatory references from texts. During the seminar, a preliminary version of this system will be presented.

Bio

Teresa Paccosi is a PhD student in Cognitive Science at the University of Trento, holding a scholarship funded by the Digital Humanities group of Fondazione Bruno Kessler. The primary focus of her PhD project is the examination of sensory descriptions in textual data and how their linguistic encoding has evolved over time. Throughout her PhD, she actively collaborated within the H20 project ‘Odeuropa’. The goal of the project is to demonstrate that critically engaging with our sense of smell and exploring our scent heritage is an important and viable means of connecting and promoting Europe’s tangible and intangible cultural heritage.

All Mapped Out: A new book about maps and digital mapping transitions

Today Reaktion Books published All Mapped Out, by Mike Duggan

All Mapped Out is a unique approach to maps, exploring how they have shaped society and culture. Maps go far beyond just showing us where things are located. All Mapped Out is an exploration of how maps impact our lives on social and cultural levels. This book takes readers on a journey through the fascinating history of maps, from ancient cave paintings and stone carvings to the digital interfaces we rely on today. But it’s not just about the maps themselves; it’s about the people behind them. Discover how maps have affected societies, influenced politics and economies, impacted the environment, and even shaped our sense of personal identity. Mike Duggan uncovers the incredible power of maps to shape the world and the knowledge we consume. This is a unique and eye-opening perspective on the significance of maps in our daily lives.

Available here and at all good book shops!

King’s Engaged Research Awards for collaborative project to develop arts-, research- and community-based responses to anti-Asian racism

A collaboration led by researchers at DDH and CMCI to develop arts-, research- and community-based responses to anti-Asian racism has been recognised with a King’s Engaged Research Award in the Local Collaborations category:

I, Human: Becoming Visible (IHBV) was a collaborative, creative project organised by King’s College London; City, University of London and Moongate Productions, working with students, community members, performers and artists of East and Southeast Asian (ESEA) heritages. The IHBV project was conceived in response to anti-Asian racism that has seen a surge since Covid-19. It engendered a caring forum for ESEA communities to come together to celebrate, create and build resistance and solidarity.

Further details can be found here.

Seminar: Large language models show human-like content biases in transmission chain experiments • 20 March 2024

Event organised by the Computational Humanities research group.

To register to the seminar and obtain the link to the call, please fill in this form by Monday 18 March 2024.

20 March 2024 – 12pm GMT

Remote – Via Microsoft Teams

Alberto Acerbi (University of Trento), Large language models show human-like content biases in transmission chain experiments

Abstract

As the use of Large Language Models (LLMs) grows, it is important to examine if they exhibit biases in their output. Research in Cultural Evolution, using transmission chain experiments, demonstrates that humans have biases to attend to, remember, and transmit some types of content over others. In five pre-registered experiments with the same methodology, we find that the LLM ChatGPT-3 replicates human results, showing biases for content that is gender-stereotype consistent (Exp 1), negative (Exp 2), social (Exp 3), threat-related (Exp 4), and biologically counterintuitive (Exp 5), over other content. The presence of these biases in LLM output suggests that such content is widespread in its training data, and could have consequential downstream effects, by magnifying pre-existing human tendencies for cognitively appealing, and not necessarily informative, or valuable, content.

Bio

I am a researcher in the field of cultural evolution. My work is at the interface of psychology, anthropology, and sociology. I am interested in particular to contemporary cultural phenomena, and I use a naturalistic, quantitative, and evolutionary approach with different methodologies, especially individual-based models and quantitative analysis of large-scale cultural data. Currently, I focus on using a cultural evolutionary framework to study the effects of digital technologies, and I wrote a book for Oxford University Press: Cultural evolution in the digital age.
I am an Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology and Social Research at the University of Trento, and member of the C2S2 – Centre for Computational Social Science and Human Dynamics.

Daniele Quercia, Empowering Cities: Health, Culture, Knowledge, and Resiliency • 31 January 2024

Event organised by the Computational Humanities research group.

To register to the seminar and obtain the link to the call, please fill in this form by Monday 29 January 2024.

31 January 2024 – 5pm GMT

In person – King’s College London, Bush House Lecture Theatre 3 BH(NE)0.01

Remote – Microsoft Teams

Daniele Quercia (Nokia Bell Labs / King’s College London, United Kingdom), Empowering Cities: Health, Culture, Knowledge, and Resiliency

Abstract

The future of the city is, first and foremost, about people, and those people are increasingly producing a variety of digital breadcrumbs. We will see how a creative use of four datasets can tackle hitherto unanswered research questions. We will see how to:

  1. Track people’s well-being at scale from aggregate records of food purchases
    https://goodcitylife.org/food/project.php
  2. Quantify the cultural capital of neighbourhoods from geo-referenced pictures
    https://goodcitylife.org/cultural-analytics/project.php
  3. Predict the innovation success of cities from online records of “who works where”
    http://goodcitylife.org/cities4innovation/
  4. Profile the psychological resiliency of US regions to COVID-19 from tweets
    http://social-dynamics.net/EpidemicPsychology/

Bio

Daniele Quercia is Director of Responsible AI at Nokia Bell Labs Cambridge (UK) and Professor of Urban Informatics at the Center for Urban Science and Progress (CUSP) at King’s College London. He has been named one of Fortune magazine’s 2014 Data All-Stars, and spoke about “happy maps” at TED. He was Research Scientist at Yahoo Labs, a Horizon senior researcher at the University of Cambridge, and Postdoctoral Associate at the department of Urban Studies and Planning at MIT. He received his PhD from UC London.

web: researchswinger.org

Seminar: Studying Temporal Changes in Long-Term Audiovisual Data • 13 February 2024

Event organised by the Computational Humanities research group

To register to the seminar and obtain the link to the call, please fill in this form by Friday 9 February 2024.

13 February 2024 – 3pm GMT

Remote – Microsoft Teams

Mila Oiva (Tallinn University, Estonia), Studying Temporal Changes in Long-Term Audiovisual Data

Abstract

Digitized audiovisual heritage data is seldomly studied in long temporal continuum even though a long temporal perspective could help to explain both specificities of our time, and to reveal longer term continuities as well as short-term caprices. Drawing examples from my studies on Soviet and Estonian newsreels, in this presentation I will talk about the different ways my collaborators and I have been studying temporal changes in audiovisual data computationally.

Bio

Dr. Mila Oiva is a Senior Research Fellow at the ERA Chair for Cultural Data Analytics project at the CUDAN Open Lab at Tallinn University. She holds a PhD from Cultural History with a specialization on the history of Russia and Poland and digital research methods. Currently she runs a project dedicated to studying Soviet and Estonian newsreels in 1922-1997 computationally. Earlier she has been studying the 19th century global news flows, circulation of fake historical narratives in the Russian language internet forum discussions, and the Cold War era transnational information circulation. 

AI incidents and ‘networked trouble’: The case for a research agenda

A paper on “AI incidents and ‘networked trouble’: The case for a research agenda” has just been published by Department of Digital Humanities PhD researcher Tommy Shane.

The paper is open access and can be found here and the abstract is copied below.

Against a backdrop of widespread interest in how publics can participate in the design of AI, I argue for a research agenda focused on AI incidents – examples of AI going wrong and sparking controversy – and how they are constructed in online environments. I take up the example of an AI incident from September 2020, when a Twitter user created a ‘horrible experiment’ to demonstrate the racist bias of Twitter’s algorithm for cropping images. This resulted in Twitter not only abandoning its use of that algorithm, but also disavowing its decision to use any algorithm for the task. I argue that AI incidents like this are a significant means for participating in AI systems that require further research. That research agenda, I argue, should focus on how incidents are constructed through networked online behaviours that I refer to as ‘networked trouble’, where formats for participation enable individuals and algorithms to interact in ways that others – including technology companies – come to know and come to care about. At stake, I argue, is an important mechanism for participating in the design and deployment of AI.

Continue reading “AI incidents and ‘networked trouble’: The case for a research agenda”