Two-day ScholarTHON on Organising Knowledge

Two-day ScholarTHON on Organising Knowledge runs from 2 December 2026 to 3 December 2026. Venue: Cardiff University, Cardiff.

ScholarTHON: Organising Knowledge Ontologies and Knowledge Representations in Arts and Humanities and Cultural Heritage Data How we organise knowledge shapes what can be found, connected, and reused – and by whom. Join us at Cardiff University on 2–3 December 2026 for the second ScholarTHON: two days bringing together Arts and Humanities researchers, GLAM professionals, digital humanists, and Research Software Engineers (RSEs) to explore how cultural heritage knowledge is structured, represented, and sustained. ScholarTHON rethinks the hackathon for Arts and Humanities research. Rather than starting with a technology or asking participants to build a finished product, we start with research questions . You will work in a small interdisciplinary group, with an RSE at the table from the outset, to develop a question and explore the data, methods, and tools that might help address it. Across the two days, you can expect: conversations and hands-on sessions on knowledge organisation, ontologies and knowledge representation, metadata and structured data, Python, Linked Open Data, data reconciliation, and sustainable digital infrastructures ; collaborative work turning a research question into a knowledge model, ontology sketch, metadata strategy, and sustainable research workflow ; opportunities to meet researchers, project teams, and PIs through our Common Interests Lunch , with themed tables organised around participants’ interests; a final collaborative challenge, with groups presenting their proposals on Day Two and ten hours of dedicated RSE collaboration available to the winning teams to take their work further. Our guiding question throughout will be: How do we organise knowledge in ways that remain useful, accessible, sustainable, interoperable, and accountable to the communities who use it? The event is free to attend , and no prior coding experience or established digital project is required. Researchers at every career stage are welcome, alongside librarians, archivists, curators, Wikimedians, RSEs, and other GLAM professionals. Five £200 bursaries are available to help with the costs of attending. Come with a research question – or simply the beginnings of one – and spend two days developing it with people who approach knowledge, data, and cultural heritage from different perspectives. Organisers ScholarTHON is organised by Data/Culture (University of Oxford), the Mapping the Arts and Humanities Project (School of Advanced Study, University of London), and the Centre for Digital Humanities and Cultures Research (Cardiff University), with support from the Arts and Humanities Research Council . The first ScholarTHON took place in June 2026 at the Centre for Digital Scholarship, Weston Library, Oxford. Read about what happened in Inside the ScholarTHON . Programme Day One — Frame · Model · Organise 2 December | 09:30–17:15 09:30 — Arrival & Coffee 10:00 — Opening & Framing Giovanna Di Martino (Oxford) & Jenny Kidd (Cardiff) What is a ScholarTHON? As humanities research becomes increasingly digital, knowledge organisation lies at the heart of cultural heritage and collaborative research. 10:30 — Knowledge Representation & Ontologies I Alex Cline (Queen Mary) How do we represent complex humanities knowledge in ways meaningful for researchers and understandable by computers? An introduction to conceptual modelling, ontologies, and semantic relationships. 11:15 — Coffee / Tea Break 11:30 — From Records to Networks: Graph Thinking for Humanities Data Matilda Peruzzo (Oxford) & Elena Zaltouaridou (SAS, London) Metadata provides the structure that allows collections to be searched, analysed, and reused. This session introduces Python as a practical tool for exploring and transforming cultural heritage datasets. 13:00 — Lunch 14:00 — Cleaning and Reconciling Data with OpenRefine Kunika Kono (SAS, London) A hands-on session using OpenRefine to clean, reconcile, and enrich metadata, preparing collections for interoperability, linked data, and long-term reuse. 15:00 — Research Questions & Group Formation Working in interdisciplinary teams, participants identify a humanities research challenge and begin developing their approach. Collaborative Workshop I Groups begin building a conceptual knowledge model, identifying their research question, key concepts and entities, relationships, ontology sketch, and metadata requirements. Day Two — Connect · Apply · Share 3 December | 09:30–17:15 09:00 — Case Studies: Infrastructure and Open Data Managing Authority with Linked Open Data Jason Evans (National Library of Wales) How can institutional collections become reusable research infrastructures? Exploring open collections and linked cultural heritage. Computational Philosophy, Digital Ontology and Data Visualisation David Freeborn (Northwestern University / London Computational Philosophy Lab) How computational methods and interactive visualisations can represent and analyse philosophical knowledge, revealing patterns, relationships, and structures difficult to discern through conventional methods. Creating Digital Archives with GitHub Pages and Collection Builder Alison Harvey (Cardiff Special Collections and Archives, CDHCR) A practical introduction to creating scalable, sustainable, and citable digital archives using simple structured metadata. 10:30 — Roundtable: Infrastructure for Digital Arts and Humanities Giovanna Di Martino (Oxford), in conversation with Arianna Ciula (KDL), Pieter Francois (Oxford), Jenny McHugh (UK-IE DHA), Joan Murphy (DARIAH-IE), and Jane Winters (SAS) A roundtable exploring the infrastructures that support digital arts and humanities research, and how collaborative infrastructures can enable more connected, interoperable, and resilient research communities. 11:45 — Collaborative Workshop II Groups develop reusable knowledge models by combining conceptual design, metadata, and digital infrastructures. Together, they consider whether their model answers the research question, what assumptions underpin it, which standards improve interoperability, and how others could build upon their work. 13:00 — Lunch 16:00 — Group Presentations & Reflection Each team presents its conceptual proposal, including its research challenge, knowledge model, ontology, metadata strategy, workflow, reuse potential, and critical reflections. Jury Deliberation & Awards The event concludes by recognising innovative approaches to organising humanities knowledge, with awards for Most Sustainable Knowledge Model , Best Interoperability Strategy , and Most Innovative Research Question .