The Northeastern University Women Writers Project (formerly the Brown University Women Writers Project) or WWP, founded in 1986 at Brown University, is a long-term research and publication project which focuses on making texts from early modern women writers in the English language available online. The Women Writers Project maintains "Women Writers Online" an

electronic Electronic may refer to: *Electronics, the science of how to control electric energy in semiconductor * ''Electronics'' (magazine), a defunct American trade journal *Electronic storage, the storage of data using an electronic device *Electronic co ...

collection of rare or difficult to obtain works written or co-authored by women from the sixteenth century to the mid nineteenth century. In addition, the WWP is actively engaged in researching the complex issues involved in representing manuscripts and early printed texts in digital form and holds an occasional conference, ''Women in the Archives,'' as well as teaching workshops in text encoding and other practices central to

digital humanities Digital humanities (DH) is an area of scholarly activity at the intersection of computing or Information technology, digital technologies and the disciplines of the humanities. It includes the systematic use of digital resources in the humanitie ...

History

The Brown University Women Writers Project developed at the end of the 1980s from the marriage of two communities, early modern

women’s studies Women's studies is an academic field that draws on feminist and interdisciplinary methods to place women's lives and experiences at the center of study, while examining social and cultural constructs of gender; systems of privilege and oppress ...

and electronic text encoding. As a method of preservation and to make the texts more widely accessible, the WWP transcribed an initial digital collection of about 200 texts in the first five years and experimented with publishing editions of selected works in traditional print format. The 15-volume series “Women Writers in English, 1350–1850” is still available. In 1993, with the publication of the expanded

Text Encoding Initiative The Text Encoding Initiative (TEI) is a text-centric community of practice in the academic field of digital humanities, operating continuously since the 1980s. The community currently runs a mailing list, meetings and conference series, and main ...

or TEI guidelines, the WWP began a three-year period of research on how to use the new guidelines to represent early women’s texts. During this time, few new texts were added to the collection, but a new set of encoding methods and improved systems of documentation and training took place. From 1996 onwards, new texts were once again encoded with the new TEI standards. Between 1997 and 2000, funded by a grant from the

Andrew W. Mellon Foundation The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation of New York City in the United States, simply known as Mellon Foundation, is a private foundation with five core areas of interest, and endowed with wealth accumulated by Andrew Mellon of the Mellon family of Pitts ...

, the WWP developed “Renaissance Women Online,” a project studying the impact of electronic texts on teaching and research. The project included the creation of introductory materials for 100 texts, currently constituting a sub-collection of Women Writers Online. In 1999 Women Writers Online was published, making the corpus available online. Since the release of Women Writers Online, initiatives include publishing a Guide to Scholarly Text Encoding, offering

workshops Beginning with the Industrial Revolution era, a workshop may be a room, rooms or building which provides both the area and tools (or machinery) that may be required for the manufacture or repair of manufactured goods. Workshops were the onl ...

and seminars in text encoding, and hosting a periodic conference, ''Women in the Archives.'' In 2013 the WWP moved from Brown University in

Providence, Rhode Island Providence is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Rhode Island. One of the oldest cities in New England, it was founded in 1636 by Roger Williams, a Reformed Baptist theologian and religious exile from the Massachusetts ...

to Northeastern University in Boston, Massachusetts.

Women Writers Online

Women Writers Online is a full-text collection of early women’s writing in

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...

ranging from 1526 to 1850. As of 1 February 2022, the database contains 439 individual works, with around fifteen new texts being added to the collection every year. The focus of the corpus is currently on hard to find or generally inaccessible texts from both well known and more obscure writers. Authors included in the corpus include, among many others: *

Anna Laetitia Barbauld Anna Laetitia Barbauld (, by herself possibly , as in French, Aikin; 20 June 1743 – 9 March 1825) was a prominent English poet, essayist, literary critic, editor, and author of children's literature. A " woman of letters" who published in mu ...

* Aphra Behn *

Margaret Cavendish Margaret Lucas Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle-upon-Tyne (1623 – 15 December 1673) was an English philosopher, poet, scientist, fiction writer and playwright. Her husband, William Cavendish, 1st Duke of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, was Royalist co ...

Queen Elizabeth I Elizabeth I (7 September 153324 March 1603) was Queen of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death in 1603. Elizabeth was the last of the five House of Tudor monarchs and is sometimes referred to as the "Virgin Queen". El ...

Margaret Fell Margaret Fell orMargaret Fox ( Askew, formerly Fell; 1614 – 23 April 1702) was a founder of the Religious Society of Friends. Known popularly as the "mother of Quakerism," she is considered one of the Valiant Sixty early Quaker preachers and m ...

Felicia Hemans Felicia Dorothea Hemans (25 September 1793 – 16 May 1835) was an English poet (who identified as Welsh by adoption). Two of her opening lines, "The boy stood on the burning deck" and "The stately homes of England", have acquired classic statu ...

* Catherine Parr *

Mary Sidney Mary Herbert, Countess of Pembroke (born Sidney, 27 October 1561 – 25 September 1621) was among the first Englishwomen to gain notice for her poetry and her literary patronage. By the age of 39, she was listed with her brother Philip Sidney ...

Mary Wollstonecraft Mary Wollstonecraft (, ; 27 April 1759 – 10 September 1797) was a British writer, philosopher, and advocate of women's rights. Until the late 20th century, Wollstonecraft's life, which encompassed several unconventional personal relationsh ...

Access to Women Writers Online is available through a

web-based A web application (or web app) is application software that is accessed using a web browser. Web applications are delivered on the World Wide Web to users with an active network connection. History In earlier computing models like client-serve ...

interface with a paid subscription, available to both institutions and individuals. There is also a free one-month trial period for potential subscribers. The WWP usually makes their textbase available free of charge for the month of March, in honor of

Women's History Month Women's History Month is an annual declared month that highlights the contributions of women to events in history and contemporary society. It is celebrated during March in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia, corresponding with ...

. In March 2012, the WWP released a new interface for Women Writers Online.

Resources and outreach

The WWP hosts a number of text encoding workshops and seminars throughout the year for various skill levels. From 2008 through 2011 the WWP also hosted an annual conference ''Women in the Archives'' in collaboration with the

Sarah Doyle Women's Center The Sarah Doyle Center for Women and Gender (SDCWG), formerly the Sarah Doyle Women's Center, is a center at Brown University, which "seeks to provide a comfortable, yet challenging place for students, faculty, and staff to examine the multitude o ...

and several other groups at Brown University. In addition to the Women Writers Online collection, the WWP also offers some public resources helpful for researchers and teachers interested in early modern women writers. These include orientations for getting the most out of researching within the online collection, possible

assignment Assignment, assign or The Assignment may refer to: * Homework * Sex assignment * The process of sending National Basketball Association players to its development league; see Computing * Assignment (computer science), a type of modification to ...

s that take advantage of the online

user interface In the industrial design field of human–computer interaction, a user interface (UI) is the space where interactions between humans and machines occur. The goal of this interaction is to allow effective operation and control of the machine f ...

, and

syllabi A syllabus (; plural ''syllabuses'' or ''syllabi'') or specification is a document that communicates information about an academic course or class and defines expectations and responsibilities. It is generally an overview or summary of the curric ...

submitted by professors that incorporate the online texts and focus on courses in

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history The history of Europe is traditionally divided into four time periods: prehistoric Europe (prior to about 800 BC), classical antiquity (800 BC to AD ...

and early modern

literature Literature is any collection of written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially prose fiction, drama, and poetry. In recent centuries, the definition has expanded to include ...

, and related subjects.

References

External links

*
List of texts in Women Writers Online
{{Authority control Brown University Organizations for women writers Text Encoding Initiative 1986 establishments in Rhode Island Organizations established in 1986 Northeastern University Digital humanities projects

History

Women Writers Online

Resources and outreach

See also

References

External links