About This Website

General Information

The English Department’s Digital Media and Pedagogy initiative (sometimes called "the Digital Media Lab" or "DML") facilitates departmental experimentation, connection, and collaboration with digital tools and methods. Experimentation in this context includes developing digital resources, piloting digitally-centered teaching techniques, or adapting existing technologies (such as 3D printing or book scanning) in ways that are considered innovative to the humanities.

Spring 2023 DIGITAL MEDIA LAB OPEN HOURS:
Mondays: 2:30 - 4:40 PM
Tuesdays: 3:50 - 5:50 PM
Wednesdays: 3:00 - 4:00 PM

We focus on connection by bringing department members into contact with existing institutions that can support digital research and pedagogy, including online resources, infrastructure, equipment, and people with appropriate expertise. This Digital Media and Pedagogy website--an effort to collect, curate, and disseminate resources on the production and teaching of digital media--is one aspect of this goal.

We foster collaboration and partnerships with University of Pittsburgh faculty from other departments, representatives of the library’s digital scholarship service unit, partners affiliated with other higher education institutions, and agencies and individuals outside of academia.

To this end, the Director of the DML provides support for teaching digital tools and methods and can assist instructors in constructing assignments and research projects. They also organize events promoting the innovative work students and teachers are doing in English, such as the Digital Showcase and pedagogy-focused workshop series.

They also oversee the Digital Media Lab classroom (Cathedral 435) which has space for 20 individuals and 5 more if they use laptops. See the "Lab Details" page on this site for room and lab equipment details. Several courses are held in the space each semester, and it can also be reserved for a classroom session. Email Director Jessica FitzPatrick at JLF115@pitt.edu to reserve the lab or for information on instructional support and/or digital media equipment, or use the Consultation Quick Link at left to schedule a conversation.

We seek to develop capacity among faculty and graduate students in digital research and pedagogy, and to foster collaborative digital projects in and beyond the department. In recognition of the fact that these goals may require substantive time commitments, effort, and expenditures on the part of our department members, we hope that in the future we can once again offer monetary awards under the Digital Pedagogy and Scholarship Grants program. (This program is currently not available.)