Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 39, No. 380.
Department of Digital Humanities, University of Cologne
Hosted by DH-Cologne
www.dhhumanist.org
Submit to: humanist@dhhumanist.org
[1] From: Tobias Blanke <t.blanke@uva.nl>
Subject: Postdoctoral Researcher in Open AI research for social sciences and humanities - Amsterdam (22)
[2] From: Suzanne Mpouli <suzanne.mpouli@gmail.com>
Subject: Fully funded PhD studentships in Computational Cultural Science, Paris (30)
[3] From: Paul Guhennec <paul.guhennec@uzh.ch>
Subject: PhD Positions in Zürich/Rome (International Max Planck Research School for Multimodal Digital Humanities) (205)
--[1]------------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 2026-03-24 16:44:54+00:00
From: Tobias Blanke <t.blanke@uva.nl>
Subject: Postdoctoral Researcher in Open AI research for social sciences and humanities - Amsterdam
The Humane AI research priority area at the University of Amsterdam is hiring a
Postdoctoral Researcher in Open AI research for social sciences and humanities
(2 years).
The position focuses on developing a new, critical understanding of
'open(-source)' AI for the social sciences and humanities. The Postdoc will work
at the intersection of AI engineering and academic inquiry, helping to build an
open SSH AI Commons where researchers can use state-of-the-art Large Language
Models with transparent, ethical, and reproducible infrastructure.
Key aspects of the position include:
- Conducting independent research on AI methods for social sciences and
humanities
- Developing small open-source AI prototypes (e.g. using Python and the open-
source AI stack such as Hugging Face)
- Publishing and presenting at leading international venues
- Collaborating with an interdisciplinary team and wider networks
- Contributing to knowledge dissemination and project organisation
Full details and application link:
https://werkenbij.uva.nl/en/vacancies/postdoctoral-researcher-in-open-ai-
research-for-social-sciences-and-humanities-netherlands-14914
--[2]------------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 2026-03-24 11:22:58+00:00
From: Suzanne Mpouli <suzanne.mpouli@gmail.com>
Subject: Fully funded PhD studentships in Computational Cultural Science, Paris
Dear all,
The Major Research Program "CultureLab: Computational Science of Culture
<https://www.culturelab.psl.eu>" invites applications for two fully funded
PhD studentships (3 years) starting in October 2026.
CultureLab is a five-year interdisciplinary program led by Université Paris
Sciences et Lettres, aimed at structuring and coordinating computational
research in the humanities and social sciences. In this respect, it
involves various institutions from the Université Paris Sciences et Lettres
university (École Normale Supérieure, École des Chartes, Université Paris
Dauphine, École Pratique des Hautes Études, Observatoire de Paris) as well
as external partners such as the Archives nationales de France, the
Bibliothèque nationale de France and the Institut national de l'audiovisuel.
Application deadline: 31 May 2026
Interviews: June 2026
Starting date: October 2026
Details regarding the application procedure can be found here:
https://www.culturelab.psl.eu/en/news-culturelab/2026-culturelab-phd-grant-call
For those interested in applying, two travel grants of 500€ each
<https://c2s.sciencesconf.org/resource/page/id/3> are now offered to attend
the Computational Cultural Science workshop next May (deadline: 13th April
2026).
Best,
Suzanne Mpouli
--[3]------------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 2026-03-24 07:38:46+00:00
From: Paul Guhennec <paul.guhennec@uzh.ch>
Subject: PhD Positions in Zürich/Rome (International Max Planck Research School for Multimodal Digital Humanities)
Dear all,
The International Max Planck Research School for Multimodal Digital Humanities
(IMPRS-MDH) is offering up to 5 fully-funded doctoral fellowships starting from
August 2026 for PhD positions at the University of Zürich, in partnership with
the Bibliotheca Hertziana — Max-Planck Institute for Art History in Rome.
Application Deadline: May 31, 2026,
Interviews: June 2026,
Start: from August 2026.
Website: https://www.mdh.uzh.ch/en.html
The Research Program
The IMPRS-MDH is driven by a central question:
How can the nuanced and culturally diverse patterns of thought and argumentation
of the humanities be modelled using AI, and how might we use these models to
study both cultural history and the cultural position of AI systems themselves,
across languages and cultures?
We seek doctoral candidates who bring genuine intellectual investment to one or
more of the following research areas, which are not fixed tracks but overlapping
problem spaces, we actively encourage proposals that cut across them:
1. Epistemic Modeling of Multimodal Reasoning
How can the interpretive methods of art historians, scholars of literature, and
humanists at large be operationalized as multimodal AI models?
This area moves beyond using AI as a retrieval or classification tool toward
making humanistic argumentation itself transparent, testable, and
computationally legible. Projects might examine how specific methods and
epistemic approaches and frameworks can be encoded as multimodal pipelines, or
how large, digitized collections such as the BHMPI's, or more specific ones like
the Wölfflin edition (HWGW: https://hwgw.humanitiesconnect.pub/index.html) can
serve as grounds for training and probing such models.
2. Spatiality, Temporality, and World Models
How can the diversity of humanistic knowledge be mobilized to develop AI systems
that are genuinely adequate to the spatial and temporal complexity of cultural
phenomena?
Multimodal AI research has largely addressed text-image relations while leaving
spatial and temporal dimensions theoretically and computationally
underdeveloped. This area investigates how perspectival systems, architectural
typologies, urban morphologies, and the multilingual discourses through which
they have been named and transmitted might inform the design and evaluation of
spatially and temporally aware models for humanistic inquiry. It further asks
how temporal processes such as gradual transformation, feedback, and drift might
be modelled across modalities like text, image, and space, in ways that go
beyond frame-by-frame pattern detection. Fellows may draw on spatial theory,
corpus linguistics, or media archaeology, and might work with 3D reconstruction,
video models, or multimodal corpora. Projects might develop cross-modal methods
for representing historical process and spatial meaning or use architectural and
urban corpora as evaluation grounds for culturally situated spatial AI.
3. Critical AI and the Culture of AI Systems
What cultural assumptions are encoded in the latent spaces of large multimodal
models, and how can humanistic frameworks reveal, critique, and contextualize
them?
This area brings the methods of art history/visual studies, linguistics, and the
history of science to bear on AI systems as objects of inquiry themselves, and
not only tools for analysis. Topics include: the visual, literary, and cultural
genealogies of training datasets; circuit tracing and mechanistic
interpretability as methods for humanistic AI critique; the cultural position of
AI-generated images and text in contemporary culture; the history of
computational thought in art history, linguistics, and the humanities; and the
relationship between critical AI studies and Bildwissenschaft. Fellows are
encouraged to develop work that is genuinely bidirectional, using AI to study
culture while using culture to study AI.
4. Multimodal Corpus and Network History
How did fundamental cross-modal concepts like style, space, model, influence
evolve and circulate through scholarly and cultural networks over time?
This area applies multimodal AI methods to large-scale historical corpora,
investigating the formation and transmission of key concepts across image, text,
and space. The BHMPI's Knowledge Graph, digitized library, and photographic
collection offer exceptional material for such work, as do UZH corpora of 19th-
and 20th-century mountaineering yearbooks and other journals. Fellows might
examine multilingual and cross-cultural dimensions of art historical discourse
or develop new corpus linguistic methods for integrating visual and textual
data.
Further Areas and Cross-Cutting Problem Spaces
Beyond the four core areas above, the IMPRS-MDH welcomes proposals that open
onto adjacent or hybrid problem fields with questions that do not map neatly
onto a single research area but draw productively from several fields. These
include: generative curation and AI in museum practice, exploring how multimodal
AI can assist curatorial reasoning across text, image, and spatial collection
data, and how curatorial practice can in turn reveal cultural and multimodal
limitations of foundation models, with particular attention to cultural bias in
systems trained predominantly on Western visual and textual traditions; the
text-image relation in large historical corpora, developing new methods for
studying how visual and linguistic meaning co-constitute each other across time
and across cultures; the historical and temporal dimensions of multimodal
models, examining how processes of drift, accumulation, and transformation might
be modelled beyond static pattern detection; and AI literacy and the
epistemology of humanistic computing, asking how scholars, students, and publics
come to understand, evaluate, and critically engage with AI systems as tools and
as cultural objects. Candidates are encouraged to identify and articulate their
own cross-cutting research questions within the program's broader intellectual
horizon.
Candidates’ Profiles
We seek candidates with strong academic preparation in one of the following
fields: art history/visual studies, linguistics/history of literature, computer
science, and related disciplines. Genuine curiosity about working across
disciplinary boundaries is essential. Prior experience with computational
methods, machine learning, AI critical studies, or digital humanities is
required. We are particularly interested in candidates whose proposed projects
address problems that are genuinely art historical, linguistic/literary, or
humanistic in their orientation.
The MPG and the UZH have a strong commitment to diversity, equity, and
inclusion, and particularly welcome applications from underrepresented groups.
What We Offer
* Up to five fully funded predoctoral fellowships
* A salary range of 50-54k CHF p.a. at 80% employment, including social
security contributions
* A yearly PhD contract that can be extended up to three years plus one
(max. four years)
* A PhD awarded by the UZH with the special mention of the IMPRS-MDH
* A structured interdisciplinary curriculum including dedicated IMPRS-MDH
seminars, workshops in Zurich and Rome, reading seminars, and summer schools
* Financial support for publications, conferences, and research activities
* An attractive range of campus amenities and activities in Zurich,
including the DSI
* Access to the BHMPI's unique digitized collections and DH Lab expertise
* Access to LiRI’s technological expertise and CLARIN-CH corpus resources
* Close supervision by leading researchers in digital art history, corpus
linguistics, and critical AI studies
* Integration into an active international research network spanning Europe,
East Asia, and North America
* Opportunities for research mobility and co-supervision with partner
institutions
* Opportunities for teaching experience at UZH
Application
Applicants are asked to submit:
* Cover letter (max. two pages): describing the educational and research
background, motivation, and fit with the IMPRS-MDH program
* Research proposal (max. ten pages, including references, excluding
illustrations or diagrams): outline of the research question in relation to the
program's research areas, state-of-the-art, theoretical framework, methodology,
hypothetical outcomes
* Curriculum vitae, including a list of publications
* Up to three writing samples (optional)
All materials should be submitted in English via the following recruitment
platform by May 31, 2026: https://recruitment.biblhertz.it/position/21299200.
Shortlisted candidates will be invited to present their project in an online
interview in June 2026.
About the IMPRS-MDH
The International Max Planck Research School for Multimodal Digital Humanities
(IMPRS-MDH: https://www.mdh.uzh.ch/en.html) is a new doctoral school jointly
established by the Bibliotheca Hertziana – Max Planck Institute for Art History
(BHMPI: https://www.biblhertz.it/en/home) in Rome and the Faculty of Art and
Social Sciences (PhF: https://www.phil.uzh.ch/en.html) of the University of
Zurich (UZH: https://www.uzh.ch/en.html), funded by the Max Planck Society (MPG:
https://www.mpg.de/en/imprs) for six years. Building on pioneering research at
the MPG-UZH Digital Visual Studies center (DVS: https://dvstudies.net/), the
IMPRS-MDH opens a new field at the crossroads of art and architectural history,
linguistics, and multimodal artificial intelligence. It is based at the
University of Zurich.
IMPRS-MDH predoctoral fellows work within a uniquely rich research environment
and with access to special resources (https://www.mdh.uzh.ch/en/Resources.html):
on the one hand, the BHMPI's fully digitized photographic collection
(https://www.biblhertz.it/en/photographic-collection) of 1.3M assets, 3M pages
of scanned art historical literature, and the Max Planck Research Group Machine
Visual Culture (MVC: https://www.biblhertz.it/en/machine-visual-culture), led by
Prof. Dr. Leonardo Impett; and on the other hand, the UZH's Linguistic Research
Infrastructure (LiRI: https://www.liri.uzh.ch/en.html), CLARIN-CH
(https://clarin-ch.ch<https://clarin-ch.ch/>) resources of text corpora and
computational linguistic technology, and the Digital Society Initiative (DSI:
https://www.dsi.uzh.ch/en.html). The program is directed by Prof. Dr. Tristan
Weddigen (BHMPI/UZH) and Prof. Dr. Noah Bubenhofer (UZH), with scientific
coordination by Dr. Darío Negueruela del Castillo (DVS).
Contact
For questions about the program and its research areas, please contact the
Scientific Coordinator: Dr. Darío Negueruela del Castillo (DVS/IMPRS-MDH),
dario.neguerueladelcastillo@uzh.ch<mailto:dario.neguerueladelcastillo@uzh.ch>
Best regards.
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