Day 1 of our Digital Humanities Forum is a series of hands-on workshops. Day 3 is a conference with papers and poster sessions. The format of these sessions will be familiar to most participants, and the schedule and session titles for both these days are already on the website.

But for those who are new to THATCamp, you may be wondering what to expect from Day 2. As you will notice, the schedule is completely open….and it will stay that way until the day of the Camp.

First held at George Mason University’s Center for History and New Media in 2008, THATCamp follows an “unconference” model in which the participants themselves set the agenda. There are no papers or presentations—instead each session is intended for discussion, sharing of information, and interaction. Every unconference is different, depending on the number of participants and their interests. Here’s is how we are planning to organize THATCamp Kansas:

1) Prior to the conference, participants can post to this blog ideas or topics they think would make for interesting sessions (please use the “Session Ideas” category to make it easy for others to find). Others can then respond with expressions of interest, or their own suggestions.

2) On the morning of THATCamp (Friday, Sep 23rd) the organizers will post the ideas on large sheets of paper, and as participants arrive, register and drink coffee, they can vote or sign up for sessions that interest them. We will then schedule the most popular topics into one of the rooms and time slots for that day. With four rooms available, and 5 hours of session time for each room, there will be plenty of time for a variety of topics!

For more information on proposing a session, including many examples of of sessions from previous THATCamps, please see our Propose a Session page.