Digital dissertations can be new to advisors too. Here are some resources to help you and your advisor navigate this together.

• Secure buy-in/approval from your dissertation committee and advisor early on!
• Consider how your project will be evaluated and how you will convey its value–see, for example, the MLA’s “Guidelines for Evaluating Work in the Digital Humanities and Digital Media.” Note: we include a larger list of evaluation materials in our guide for Faculty Advisors, which we also recommend students review.
• It cannot be stated enough: document, document, document your process so you can make it clear to those who will critique this work. For an excellent example on documentation and process work refer to Amanda Visconti’s dissertation blog.
• There are a number of publications available to inform on this topic as well. One great example: Benoit Majerus’ open access article “Training the Trainer: Being a PhD Supervisor of a Digital Historian in the Making” is a short opinion piece on methodologies, challenges, and tools of digital history, and thoughts on collaboration and evaluation.
• The entirety of Katina Roger Putting the Humanities PhD to Work (Duke UP, 2020) is recommended. But, especially relevant to this topic is the chapter called “What Faculty Advisors Can Do” which might be equally valuable to advisors and students. Roger’s text is fully available as an ebook via the Mina Rees Library.
• Check out our podcast discussion with GC faculty member and digital dissertation advisor Dr. Matthew K. Gold who touches upon these topics. GC alum Kalle Westerling‘s podcast episode also offers a relevant student’s perspective.

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