The digitization of information sources and research methods exerts an ever increasing influence on the various disciplines within the domain of Literature and Philosophy. For several years, researchers have clustered internationally around the emerging field of "Digital Humanities" (DH) to investigate how the technological development of new digital resource series and research methods can broaden and renew the domain of Arts and Philosophy. This field has developed very successfully in recent years, and has gained in importance and visibility within the human sciences.

In concrete terms, the development of Digital Humanties as a discipline has led to the delivery of new research methods, new search strategies, new research questions and new, more collaborative forms of collaboration. The methods developed from the DH are an important addition to the traditional methods. This yields many opportunities for research innovation in some of the fields in which the faculty of Arts and Philosophy at VUB strongly stands. For example, in contemporary linguistics (LIST), translation studies (LIST), literature (LIST), philosophy of science and history (HARP) and socio-economic history (HARP) extensive use is being made of innovative digital research methods. Techniques from the field of Digital Humanities. It is expected that the field of Digital Humanities will continue to grow strongly in the coming years by developing more and more advanced digital applications, expanding ever larger digital data files, and expanding into new research domains. It is therefore important that the Faculty of Arts and Philosophy responds to this ever-growing evolution within the humanities.

These opportunities also present a number of challenges at the same time, with which the digitally active researchers within LW are also confronted. After all, the increase in scale and growing complexity of DH require: a) a greater structure and bundling of expertise, experience and training in digital techniques, b) a more targeted input of ICT-trained DH specialists, and c) a more careful planning of financial and time investments in research infrastructure, and d) extensive support in both the application of research projects that use DH, and in carrying out research that is based on research methods and techniques from the Digital Humanities. By striving for better coordination and collaboration between DH researchers in various disciplines from the Arts and Philosophy, we hope to be able to meet these challenges together. By sharing experiences, combining complementary expertise, expanding interdisciplinary and collective infrastructure, and pooling investments, we believe that an interdisciplinary and research group on research groups around Digital Humanities can offer significant added value for the research community of the VUB. The Brussels Platform for Digital Humanities (DIGI) wants to take on this role. DIGI will also be the central point of contact for the participation of the VUB in DARIAH-VL1 (Digital Research Infrastructure for the Arts and Humanities - Flanders, ESFRI), and in this way reinforce partnerships with colleagues from other Flemish university institutions that already have DHP expertise centers (Ghent Center for Digital Humanities at the UGent, platform {DH} at the UA, and the DH Task Force at the KUL4) and Europe.

The Brussels Platform for Digital Humanities (DIGI) aims to be a transversal platform that brings together and supports members who use DH from various existing research groups. This will be done by grouping and building technical knowledge with an interdisciplinary focus, and offering a series of seminars and workshops focused on methodological and infrastructural topics. This research group therefore aims to be complementary to the existing research groups. The composition of the research group shown below is provisionally limited to the founding members, and will be extended after incorporation with more members from all levels (ZAP, post- and pre-doctoral).