DIGITENS

The Digital Encyclopaedia of European Sociability (DIGITENS) project will produce the first open-access digital encyclopaedia and anthology of sociability in Europe throughout the long-eighteenth century. The purpose of the DIGITENS project is to build an original framework for understanding the interactions, tensions, limits and paradoxes underlying European models of sociability and to reflect on the following question: Can the emergence and formation of European models of sociability be traced throughout the long eighteenth century (1650-1850)? Drawing upon the expertise of international members from different disciplines and national traditions, the project will create a toplevel interdisciplinary network and facilitate intersectoral communication between its academic and non-academic partners. The nine international universities will work together with the Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Musée Cognacq-Jay in France, and The National Archives in Great Britain, allowing members to explore how understandings of sociability might be enhanced through dialogue, international collaboration, and digital technology, developing a broader contextualisation of the research into European sociability. As the first digital encyclopaedia of its kind, the expected impact of the resource will not only benefit researchers, but anyone interested in the history of European models of sociability. The project is not, however, of purely historical or academic interest. Through the implementation of outreach events, workshops and the production of the accessible digital platforms, the DIGITENS team will promote a wide investigation of the value of eighteenth century principles in twenty-first-century private and public lives throughout Europe. The interdisciplinary and international aspects of the DIGITENS project, and coherent methodology, are innovative, and the scope broad and ambitious.