Hey, nerds. I’m going to bring some leftover supplies from Hacking Wearables and E-Textiles, the soft-circuits workshop that Bill Turkel and I recently hosted at Great Lakes THATCamp. Participants combined traditional (often gendered) techniques and materials — like embroidery stitches and grosgrain ribbon — with conductive thread, coin-cell batteries, LEDs, and interactive switches to create toys and wearable art. We also tinkered a little bit with sensors and the programmable Lilypad Arduino.

It takes a while to get even a small project off the ground, so I don’t suggest we hold an actual session and start modding our THATCamp t-shirts, or designing finger puppets, circuit pigs, and light-up counting gloves (pics above) — but I will have some small example projects on hand and a 3-minute slideshow that demonstrates how to sew a basic circuit. If you’re interested, grab me at lunch or on a break. I can quickly show you how to turn a regular LED into a sewable bead with which you can create a “self-meriting merit badge” like the ones below.

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I’m happy to cut a length of conductive thread for anybody who asks, and to hand out LEDs (while supplies last!). Even if you’re not especially artsy-craftsy, you might want to snag some conductive thread for your gloves next winter. A couple of quick stitches, and you’ll be able to use a touch-screen even in the coldest weather!

If you’d like to get a better sense of the theory and practice of wearable electronics, check out our Zotero group — where you’ll also find some smart pedagogy articles.

Okay, professional societies, large and small — what have you done for us lately? Are you ready to do more of what the digital humanities crowd needs? Less of what we don’t? (And, um, what is that, precisely?)

Because I’m in thorough agreement with the THATCamp mantra of “more hack, less yak,” I’m not actually proposing the following as a session — instead, I just want to put this concept out there with an open invitation to all of you, to corner me between sessions and share your views. I’m volunteering to take them back to the following groups:

• the Association for Computers and the Humanities (ACH), the primary professional society for the digital humanities;
• the program committee for the annual Digital Humanities conference;
• the Information Technology Committee of the Modern Language Association (MLA);
• NINES & 18th-Connect, established peer-reviewing bodies for 19th- and 18th-century electronic scholarship;
• the Scholarly Communication Institute (SCI), which is well-positioned to liaise with professional societies (and publishers and libraries and centers and institutes) around issues that matter to THATCampers.

I’m currently Vice President of the first organization (and a member of its outreach and mentorship committees), Vice Chair of the second group, an incoming member of the third, Senior Advisor to the fourth (for my sins as developer emerita), and Associate Director of the fifth. That’s a lot of administriva and service activity for a gal who hates to waste time — so I’m highly motivated to hear from the people these groups should be serving — that’s you — about how to serve you better and make what we do immediately meaningful to your lives as digital humanists.

There will actually be a few people at THATCamp who are involved in these organizations. I’m not naming names — although they’re free to self-identify in the comments section. I will, however, be quite cheerful about dragging my colleagues into any discussions you initiate. (Fair warning!)

Basically, I’m volunteering to be a walking suggestion box. Professional societies, by and large, can do better. How, exactly? You tell me.