Sounding Spirit Hymnody Index: Documenting the Diversity of Southern Sacred Song
- National Endowment for the Humanities (PW-296882-24)
- Humanities Collections and Reference Resources, Division of Preservation and Access
- $349,929, outright
- Principal Investigator
- 2024–27 (three-year term)
The transcription and indexing of 117,500 hymns published between 1850 and 1889 in and for the southern United States.
Resources
- Project website: SoundingSpirit.org
- Announcements:
- “Sounding Spirit Receives $349,929 NEH Grant to Create New Hymnody Index,” Sounding Spirit Blog, April 17, 2024.
- Maureen McGavin, “Sounding Spirit Collaborative receives $350,000 NEH grant to create new index of historical hymns,” Emory News Center, June 20, 2024.
- Press release: “NEH Announces $26.2 Million for 238 Humanities Projects Nationwide,” National Endowment for the Humanities Newsroom, April 16, 2024.
Sounding Spirit Digital Library: Digitizing Southern Vernacular Sacred Song
- National Endowment for the Humanities (PW-277494-21)
- Humanities Collections and Reference Resources, Division of Preservation and Access
- $344,687, outright
- Principal Investigator
- 2021–24 (three-year term)
The digitization of 1,284 books of vernacular sacred music from the U.S. South published between 1850 and 1925.
Resources
- Project website: SoundingSpirit.org
- Announcements:
- “Sounding Spirit Receives NEH Grant for Sacred Music Digital Library,” Emory Center for Digital Scholarship Blog, April 22, 2021.
- MiKayla Carter and Lissette De la Cruz, “Sounding Spirit Team, Including UK Libraries and Niles Center, Awarded NEH Grant for American Music Digital Library,” University of Kentucky News, June 30, 2021.
- Publicity:
- Rajee Suri and Damon Meharg, “I Am an Emory Researcher: Harnessing the Power of Song,” Emory News Center, January 20, 2022.
- Robby Hardesty, “Happy Holidays from UK Libraries! Celebrate the Season with Holiday Music from our Collections,” University of Kentucky Libraries News, December 14, 2023.
- Press release: “NEH Announces $24 Million for 225 Humanities Projects Nationwide,” National Endowment for the Humanities Newsroom, April 14, 2021.
Sounding Spirit: Scholarly Editions from the Southern Sacred Music Diaspora, 1850–1925
- National Endowment for the Humanities (RQ-260871-18)
- Scholarly Editions and Translations, Division of Research Programs
- $260,000, outright
- Principal Investigator
- 2018–23 (five-year term)
Preparation of print and digital editions of five volumes of American Protestant music from several traditions, including gospel, spirituals, lined-out hymn singing, and shape-note music.
Resources
- Project website: SoundingSpirit.org
- Announcements:
- “Sounding Spirit Receives $260,000 Grant for Digital Critical Editions from the National Endowment for the Humanities,” Emory Center for Digital Scholarship Blog, August 8, 2018.
- “Emory Project to Provide Wide Access to Influential American Songbooks,” Emory News Center, September 11, 2018.
- Press release: “NEH Announces $43.1 Million for 218 Humanities Projects Nationwide,” National Endowment for the Humanities Newsroom, August 8, 2018.
Past Grants
Sounding Spirit Digital Library: Sacred Music from the Southern Diaspora, 1850–1925
- National Endowment for the Humanities (PW-264219-19)
- Humanities Collections and Reference Resources, Division of Preservation and Access
- $58,23, outright
- Principal Investigator
- 2019–20 (one-year term)
A planning project to develop a digital library that would include books of vernacular Protestant music from the southern region of the United States published between 1850 and 1925.
Resources
- Project website: SoundingSpirit.org
- White paper: “Interinstitutional Thematic Collection Development: Technical and Procedural Considerations from the Sounding Spirit Digital Library,” National Endowment for the Humanities, July 2020.
- Dataset: “Checklist of Southern Sacred Music Imprints, 1850–1925,” Sounding Spirit Dataverse, https://doi.org/10.15139/S3/VQT4D5.
- Publicity:
- Ana Cackley, “Sounding Spirit Digital Library: A Model for Collaborative Digital Scholarship,” Atla Blog, September 17, 2020.
- “ECDS’s Sounding Spirit Initiative Launches Digital Library,” Emory Center for Digital Scholarship Blog, May 1, 2020.
- “UK’s Niles Center Joins Sounding Spirit Team for Launch of Digital Library of American Sacred Music,” University of Kentucky News, July 23, 2020.
- Announcement: “Sounding Spirit Receives $58,230 Grant for Sacred Music Digital Library From the National Endowment for the Humanities,” Emory Center for Digital Scholarship Blog, April 4, 2019.
- Press release: “NEH Announces $28.6 Million for 233 Humanities Projects Nationwide,” National Endowment for the Humanities Newsroom, March 28, 2019.
The Digital Drawer: A Crowd-Sourced, Curated, Digital Archive Preserving History and Memory
- National Endowment for the Humanities (HAA-261266-18)
- Digital Humanities Advancement Grants, Office of Digital Humanities
- $86,471, outright
- Co-Principal Investigator, with Scott Robertson (Georgia Tech).
- 2018–20 (two-year term)
The development and testing of the Digital Drawer project on digitized community archives for rural Georgia audiences.
Resources
- White paper: “The Digital Drawer: A Crowd-Sourced, Curated, Digital Archive Preserving History and Memory,” National Endowment for the Humanities, November 16, 2020.
- Announcements:
- “ECDS Collaboration With Georgia Tech to Support Accessible Crowd-sourced Digital Archive Receives $86,471 Grant From the National Endowment for the Humanities,” Emory Center for Digital Scholarship Blog, August 23, 2018.
- “Preserving the History of Georgia’s Rural Churches,” Georgia Tech Institute for People and Technology, August 9, 2018.
- Press release: “NEH Announces $43.1 Million for 218 Humanities Projects Nationwide,” National Endowment for the Humanities Newsroom, August 8, 2018.