BIRI Digital Coordination and Strategy Project

Inaugurated in 2022, the BIRI Digital Coordination and Strategy Project, involving the eight British International Research Institutes (BIRI), is an initiative that aims to share knowledge and to develop a joint portal between all these institutes, which will enable access to and facilitate querying and searching collectively on the resources of all the individual member institutions.

The projects endeavor has arisen due to each eight BIRI possessing large-scale resources of historical significance, which range from photographic archives to plans and maps, and from archeological collections to corporate records – and, as a plethora of locations and persons are stored and forgathered (and continue to be stored) in these collections and archives, in the instances that they appear in the vault of more than one BIRI, then this ultimately opens up a possibility for discovering perhaps unexplored connections and as well as generate new research questions. In consideration and comparison of these previously uncharted network webs of connections, the project’s primary purpose is to:

• increase the skills and competencies of each BIRI in managing and digitizing their archives, making them available, and developing digital humanities projects;
• link shared information across BIRI, particularly locations and persons that appear in the collections of more than one BIRI and allow new (inter)-disciplinary research based on connections and comparison;
• develop standardised best practice and facilitate interoperability, allowing the BIRI to collaborate to various existing and future digital projects;
• set up a Linked Open Data framework across BIRI, in order to connect records (through a shared platform or a search engine);
• develop and create tools, platforms and digital material aimed at a range of publics, including public engagement online and in person.

Ultimately, this initiative and portal will help to preserve and champion the BIRIs digital data for future generations.

STORYMAP: A History of the British International Research Institutes STORYMAP: Women transcending boundaries