Immersive Scholar: A Guidebook for Documenting and Publishing Experiential Scholarship Works

Abstract

A Guidebook for Documenting and Publishing Experiential Scholarship Works offers a model for librarians, technologists, and scholars collaborating on the production of new forms of scholarly projects, particularly those designed for large scale or immersive spaces. Born from Immersive Scholar, a three-year grant to the NC State University Libraries from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the case studies and principles laid out in this guidebook highlight pragmatic and non-technical opportunities for integrating experiential scholarship within the current scholarly ecosystem. Borrowing from the literature and ideas of digital humanities, open science, software preservation, and academic publishing, the authors present a perspective balanced between theory and application. This guidebook paired with other resources from Immersive Scholar forms the foundation of a toolkit for the conceptualization, building, displaying, and sharing of scholarship in the broad and varied world of large scale, visual, immersive, and experimental work. This resource also includes reflection essays from Cynthia Rosenfeld and Abigail Feldman, serving as critical commenters and interdisciplinary peers.