Workshops

Digital Humanities Winter School 2026

Date: Monday 26 January 2026 - Friday 30 January 2026
Explanation: Mon 14:30 - 17:00 Symposium; Tues 10:00 - 13:00 Transkribus workshop; Wed 10:00 - 13:00 Atlas.ti workshop; Thurs 10:00 - 13:00 AI & Education event; Friday 10:00 - 13:00 Quarto workshop
Address: Johan Huizinga
Doelensteeg 16
2311 VL Leiden
Room: 0.09 (Digital Lab)

Would you like to learn more about how you can use digital tools to help you with your research? Come to the Digital Humanities Winter School! During this week we will offer various workshops on digital tools that can assist with your research. Attendence of the Symposium and Workshops is limited to applicants affiliated with a Dutch University, EU country or Erasmus applicant. See below for the full programme.

The workshops will be given daily during the Winter School from 10:00 - 13:00 (3 hours, with a break) in the Digital Lab (Huizinga room 0.09, part of the Humanities Hub). Unfortunately you can only join in person: there is no online possibility. All workshops are free of cost to participants.

Please bring your laptop! Lecturers will let you know if you will need to download any (free) software about a week before the workshop.

Coffee/tea/water will be available, but please bring a cup.

Please remember to cancel by emailing lucdh@hum.leidenuniv.nl if, at a later date, you are unable to attend the events you signed up for.

Programme

Monday, 26 January (15:00 - 17:00): Digital Humanities Pilot Research Project & Infrastructure Symposium

To open the Winter School, we will hold the Digital Humanities Pilot Research Project & Infrastructure Symposium on Monday 26 January 2026 from 14:30 - 17:00 in the Digital Lab, Huizinga room 0.09. During this symposium, the recipients of the 2025 Small Grants for Research Projects and Infrastructure grants will briefly present on their projects. Interested? More information will be updated soon in the event item for the Symposium.

Tuesday, 27 January (10:00 - 13:00): Workshop on Handwritten Text Recognition (HTR) with Yann Ryan

Handwritten Text Recognition (HTR) has revolutionized research for many scholars, enabling computers to transcribe (historical) handwritten documents. This workshop offers an in-depth introduction to HTR and its potential applications in your research. Participants will explore a leading platform, Transkribus, for training and utilizing HTR models, as well as learn about open-source alternatives such as Loghi. Together, we will create our own training dataset and train a custom HTR model using the Transkribus web application. Additionally, we will discuss effective ways to manage and make use of your transcriptions for further research, and give advice on the resources available at Leiden to help you get started.

Wednesday, 28 January (10:00 - 13:00): Atlas.ti: Getting started with the basics of qualitative coding Workshop with Corine Gerritsen

In this workshop, you will learn the basics of qualitative coding using the ATLAS.ti. This software is a tool that researchers can use in their analysis of text or audio-visual material, and aids in the recognition of relationships and patterns in a dataset. The workshop explains the basic functions of ATLAS.ti, provides you with some do's and don'ts for the process of tagging and demonstrates how you can construct your very own codebook. This type of methodology can be applied to various fields and types of sources. There is no requirement for prior knowledge, as we warmly invite anyone interested to get acquainted with ATLAS.ti."

Thursday, 29 January (10:00 - 13:00): Symposium Humanities: What does AI mean for our education?

Shaping the future of education together in the age of AI

Developments in AI are advancing at a rapid pace. This calls for a response from the Humanities. How should we position ourselves as educators in relation to AI and chatbots in teaching? What do we want our students to understand about AI? How do our academic values align — or clash — with the rise of AI? And what stance should we, as scholars in the Humanities, take in the broader debate on AI in education?

Seperate registeration from this page: Symposium Humanities: What does AI mean for our education?

Friday, 30 January (10:00 - 13:00): Quarto Workshop: Academic Website Focus with Aron van de Pol

Academic Website Focus

Quarto is an open-source publishing system that makes it easy to build and host professional academic websites. You don't need coding experience to use it.

This course will walk you through creating your own academic personal website using Quarto. You'll learn how to set up your site, add your publications and CV, and publish it online for free. We'll cover everything from installation to hosting, with practical examples you can adapt immediately.

By the end of this beginner-friendly session, you'll have the foundation to build and maintain your own academic web presence without relying on complex platforms or web development skills.

Questions? Email lucdh@hum.leidenuniv.nl. Registration is now open!