EPFL CDH 2020 annual report

Page 1

ANNUAL REPORT 2020

College of Humanities



ANNUAL REPORT 2020

College of Humanities


The Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL) EPFL is located in Lausanne, Switzerland, on the shores of Lake Geneva and at the foot of the Alps. Its main campus serves as the workplace for more than 16,000 people, including 11,000 students. Established in 1853 under the name Ecole spéciale de Lausanne, it was rebranded as the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne in 1969. In welcoming students, professors, and collaborators from nearly 120 different countries, EPFL is among the most cosmopolitan of European engineering schools. With both a Swiss and an international focus, three missions drive EPFL today: education, research, and innovation. EPFL is composed of five schools and three colleges.


CONTENTS

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

F OR EWOR D BY THE DE A N ABOUT THE CDH E D U C AT IO N RESEARCH PUBL IC OU TR E ACH FINANCES AND PERSONNEL IN T ER DIS CIPL INA RY C O L L A B O R AT IO N M A P S

4 6 12 32 58 74 80

3


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

FOREWORD BY THE DEAN

FOREWORD BY THE DEAN

I am pleased to present you with the College of Humanities’

all of us, and the fact that we were able to achieve so much

second annual report. Now in my third year as the dean of

despite the numerous challenges speaks to the extraordinary

CDH, I continue to be amazed by the vibrancy of our institution

dedication of our staff and the ingenuity of our researchers.

and the outstanding quality of our scientific research. Our College gave nearly 150 classes in 2020 on a variety of As we headed into 2020, we were full of energy and looking

topics in the humanities and social sciences. Through our

forward to a busy year. However, we quickly had to adjust to

instruction on topics ranging from history and law to psychology,

the new circumstances caused by the global pandemic. Some

economics, design, international studies and anthropology,

of the activities we had planned could unfortunately no longer

EPFL students learned how societies work, what responsibilities

take place. For example, we had to close EPFL Pavilions, our

they will have as scientists and engineers, and how they

exhibition center (formerly known as ArtLab), for many months,

can think more creatively within their own disciplines. We

and cancel our STAS minor program, which had been taking

also introduced several new classes in 2020 on such key

students to conduct field work in China and the Arctic over

issues as the future of work, critical data studies, personalized

the past few years. All our classes were shifted online and our

and global healthcare, artificial intelligence and international

research was often done from home. It was a difficult year for

law, and digital urban history.

4


FOREWORD BY THE DEAN

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

2020 was another excellent year for research at CDH. Four

At CDH, we are continuously exploring new frontiers at

of our PhD students passed their final exams with flying colors,

the interface of the humanities and the technical disciplines

while 20 new students joined our Master’s in Digital Humanities

at EPFL, such as engineering, architecture, the basic

program. Florence Graezer Bideau started a project funded

sciences, life science and computer science – thereby

by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) on the use

further contributing to EPFL’s broad culture of excellence.

of cultural heritage at the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympic Games; several of our researchers successfully applied to the CROSS

I hope you will be intrigued and inspired as you read through

program, whose topic in 2020 was Mobility; and a unique

our report.

CDH research project on the relationship between music and imagination received a competitive SNSF-Spark grant. We were delighted to welcome Prof. Jeffrey Shaw, a renowned

Yours sincerely, Béla Kapossy

media artist, as our first CDH visiting professor. Our artists in residence for 2020 were Melissa Dubbin and Aaron S. Davidson, who together helped design a major installation for our Nature of Robotics, an Expanded Field exhibition that opened in December. We also put on a string of other remarkable cultural events, such as an exhibition at the Rolex Learning Center on perspectives of utopian cities and a workshop on Soundpainting given by Walter Thompson.

5


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

ABOUT CDH

ABOUT CDH EPFL’s College of Humanities (CDH) encourages joint research and teaching programs that combine the humanities and social sciences with technical fields taught at EPFL, such as engineering, life science and the natural sciences. We work through a variety of educational, research and public-outreach programs that promote the principles of interdisciplinary thinking, global awareness, responsible citizenship and creativity. The humanities and social sciences are fundamental elements of an engineer’s education and development, meaning CDH has a vital role to play at EPFL. We help engineers further expand their view of humanity and their understanding of global societal affairs. Our programs give them the skills they need to deal with unpredictable change and unprecedented challenges, think critically, solve problems, innovate and lead. At the end of 2020, CDH had 75 employees as well as six faculty members and 129 teachers who gave 148 classes on a wide variety of topics. We also house two research institutes – the Digital Humanities Institute (DHI) and the Institute for Area and Global Studies (IAGS) – along with ArtLab/EPFL Pavilions and the CDH-Culture program, which puts on a range of artistic and cultural events.

6


Collège des Humanités - Rapport annuel

7


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

8

THE TEAM


THE TEAM

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

9


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

THE TEAM

COLLEGE OF HUMANITIES DIRECTOR'S OFFICE

INSTITUTE FOR AREA AND GLOBAL STUDIES

KAPOSSY BÉLA

Aeberli Marius Coordinator of the DRIL, FIELD and INSSINC programs

Professor and CDH dean Aghroum Nicole Financial and administrative manager Cornut Jasmina Scientific assistant Coscia Claire-Lise Administrative assistant Dahmouni Martin Néjia SHS program coordinator Dungy Madeleine Scientist Elsig Alexandre Scientist Farget Christine Administrative assistant Global Issues program Faucherand Gilles Computer scientist Gannac Anne-Laure Journalist Krichane Selim Scientist, Gamelab co-founder, and pedagogical design coordinator Lovis Béatrice Scientific assistant Luterbacher Celia Journalist Martin Nunez Virginie Communication manager Mauron Layaz Véronique Scientist and CDH culture manager Rochat Yannick Scientist and Gamelab co-founder Rochel Johan Scientist Sidorenko Semion Computer engineer Tejada Gabriela Academic deputy Tormey Roland Scientist

10

KAPOSSY BÉLA Professor and IAGS director

Bianchi Irene Scientific assistant, Lausanne Time Machine Bolli Monique Doctoral assistant Bordone Lucia Doctoral assistant Di Lenardo Isabella Scientist and Lausanne Time Machine coordinator Gonçalves Martin Johanna Scientist and LIFE program coordinator Graezer Bideau Florence Senior scientist and Heritage, Culture and City group coordinator Hoesli Eric Professor and coordinator of the STAS Russia program

Roux Héléna Doctoral assistant Theurillat Thierry Scientist Tschui Raffael Scientific assistant, CHIC and STAS China programs Zhang Mengke Doctoral assistant

DIGITAL HUMANITIES INSTITUTE KAPLAN FRÉDÉRIC Professor and DHI director SÜSSTRUNK SABINE Professor and DHI director Collins Kathleen Deputy of section Gatica-Perez Daniel Professor and section director Impett Leonardo Doctoral assistant Pidoux Jessica Doctoral assistant

Hügli Isabelle IAGS administrative assistant

Salzmann Mathieu Scientist

Khayankhyarvaa Ariunzaya Scientific assistant, Lausanne Time Machine

Vassalli Jocelyne Administrative assistant

Laperrouza Marc Scientist and coordinator of the DRIL, CHIC and INSSINC programs Nault Charmilie Scientific assistant, STAS Russia program Petitpierre Rémi Scientific assistant, Lausanne Time Machine Pollet Ludovic Scientific assistant, Lausanne Time Machine Puissant Pierre-Xavier Scientific assistant, DRIL Rappo Lucas Scientific assistant, Lausanne Time Machine

SOCIAL COMPUTING GROUP GATICA-PEREZ DANIEL Professor and SCG director Labhart Florian Research associate, guest at CDH Massé Benoit Postdoctoral researcher, guest at CDH Meegahapola Lakmal Doctoral assistant, guest at CDH Phan Thanh Trung Postdoctoral researcher, guest at CDH Sajadmanesh Sina Doctoral assistant, guest at CDH


THE TEAM

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

EPFL PAVILIONS

Moss Fabian Postdoctoral researcher

Mihailescu Ion-Gabriel Postdoctoral researcher

KENDERDINE SARAH

Neuwirth Markus Scientist

Raffestin Pauline Administrative assistant

Quinton Estelle Administrative assistant

Thomet Sylvie Administrative assistant

Professor and EPFL Pavilions director Alliata Giacomo Trainee Bini Giulia Curator and production coordinator Chouard Patrick Audiovisual technician

EXPERIMENTAL MUSEOLOGY LABORATORY

Curty Joël Communication manager

KENDERDINE SARAH

Lardeau Johnston Anne-Gaëlle Manager Mongini Camilla Trainee Nguyen Le Thy Events coordinator Nicoulaz Aurélie Events coordinator Quidort Mélissa Intern Romon Stéphanie Administrative assistant

DIGITAL AND COGNITIVE MUSICOLOGY LABORATORY ROHRMEIER MARTIN Professor and DCML director Cecchetti Gabriele Doctoral assistant Deguernel Ken Postdoctoral researcher Ericson Petter Postdoctoral researcher Finkensiep Christoph Doctoral assistant Harasim Daniel Doctoral assistant

Professor and eM+ director Al-Badri Nora Artist-in-residence Cantelli Lorenzo Software engineer Chouard Patrick Audiovisual technician Donaldson Patrick Media designer Gurnel Hadrien Software engineer Heuer Afshan Postdoctoral researcher Hou Yumeng Doctoral assistant Mannane Samy Software engineer Romon Stéphanie Administrative assistant Shaw Jeffrey Visiting professor Yacob Mary Scientific assistant

LABORATORY FOR THE HISTORY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

Hentschel Johannes Doctoral assistant

BAUDRY JÉRÔME

Herff Steffen Postdoctoral researcher

Dumas Primbault Simon Postdoctoral researcher

Lieck Robert Postdoctoral researcher

Fenzi Marianna Postdoctoral researcher

McLeod Andrew Postdoctoral researcher

Guffroy Yohann Doctoral assistant

Professor and LHST director

Volynskaya Alina Doctoral assistant

DIGITAL HUMANITIES LABORATORY KAPLAN FRÉDÉRIC Professor and DHLAB director Ares Oliveira Sofia Systems engineer Ballaud François Project manager Barman Raphaël Doctoral assistant Baumer Kevin Project manager Berger Fabrice Designer 3D Descombes Albane Photogrammetry operator Dupertuis Didier Web developer Ehrmann Maud Scientist Foucart-Noriega Alicia Administrative assistant Guhennec Paul Doctoral assistant Hamel Nils System specialist and software engineer Paccard Gaël Interface and graphic designer Pardini Federica Doctoral assistant Romanello Matteo Scientist

11


Rapport annuel - Collège des Humanités

Education

12

CHAPITRE


CHAPITRE

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

THE SHS TEACHING PROGRAM Introductory program: Global Issues Bachelor's classes Master's classes 2020 SHS Prize

STAS MINOR CHIC program Changing Arctic Program - Northern Russia

INTERDISCIPLINARY TEACHING PRACTICES FIELD initiative INSSINC program

OTHER INTERDISCIPLINARY INITIATIVES CDH partnership with ENAC on urban issues Montreux Jazz Memories

MASTER’S IN DIGITAL HUMANITIES 2020 students and graduates Internships in 2020

PHD IN DIGITAL HUMANITIES CDH EDUCATION IN NUMBERS

13


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

EDUCATION

We offer a variety of classes and degree programs in the humanities and social sciences at both the Bachelor’s and Master’s level. Our aim is to give tomorrow’s engineers a broader understanding of the world around them and enhance their awareness of societal issues. Our approach is designed to combine interdisciplinary perspectives on critical global issues with hands-on, real-world experience. We believe this is the best way to prepare engineers to address the challenges stemming from advancements in science and technology, and to give them a heightened sense of social responsibility. Through our FIELD initiative and other programs, students get practical experience with human-centered design, social innovation and prototyping, preparing them to respond to complex challenges such as climate change, urbanization and social inequality. Our Master of Science in Digital Humanities program teaches students how to apply data-science methods to the humanities and includes internships at prestigious organizations. Our PhD in Digital Humanities program aims to educate a new generation of engineers who combine domain knowledge with quantitative methods to analyze, model and think critically about real-world problems.

14


EDUCATION

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

THE SHS TEACHING PROGRAM The Social Sciences and Humanities (SHS) program is an integral part of all EPFL degree programs. Students must take an SHS class every semester from the first year of their Bachelor’s degree through the first year of their Master’s degree. It offers students around 150 classes to choose from in a wide range of humanities and social-science topics. The classes are given by teachers at the University of Lausanne (UNIL), EPFL and other partner universities such as the University of Art and Design Lausanne (ECAL) and the Geneva School of Art and Design (HEAD).

Image from the first-year global Issues course, Food B track. Instructors: Maximilien Stauber and Carlos Canto Alvarez Photo: All rights reserved

Introductory program: Global Issues

to work in groups to develop a poster presentation on a subject

Our Global Issues program gives engineers the tools to address

of their choice. Each track is taught by two lecturers, one from

complex global challenges and enhances their understanding

the natural sciences or engineering and one from the social

of how societal mechanisms interact with technological

sciences or humanities.

development. All first-year Bachelor’s students must take a Global Issues class in one of six key areas, or “tracks”: Climate, Communication, Energy, Food, Health and Mobility. The classes use a highly interdisciplinary approach and students are asked

15


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

EDUCATION

Best-poster awards ceremony The Global Issues awards ceremony is usually held at the SwissTech Convention Center, with hundreds of students and teachers attending and a keynote speech given by a special guest (the Grand Témoin). But due to the pandemicrelated restrictions, the ceremony in 2020 was held as a smaller gathering on 10 March at ArtLab/EPFL Pavilions DataSquare. CDH Dean Prof. Béla Kapossy announced and congratulated the best eleven winning posters from the 2019 Global Issues program. The winning projects •

Red Yeast Rice: Effective and Without Risk? (Food A track)

An Army of Cockroaches Against Food Waste (Food B track)

The Release of Sulfate Aerosols into the Atmosphere: A Solution to the Global Temperature Rise? (Climate A track)

Un p’tit ver? (Climate B track)

Teratogens: Medicines of Risk During Pregnancy (Health A track)

Sommes-nous en dent-ger? (Health B track)

Scientific Publications: Access Restricted (Communication A track)

On Social Media Since Birth (Communication B track)

Programmed Obsolescence: What are the Issues? (Energy A track)

Ocean Thermal Energy: A Technology with Promising Potential (Energy B track)

The Challenges of Autonomous Cars (Mobility track)

Aloïse Corbaz, Le cloisonné de théâtre (theater compartment, detail), 1951, colored pencil, grease crayon and sewn thread on paper, 1404 x 99 cm, Collection Christine and Jean David Mormod, Lausanne. Photo from the course: Art Brut (outsider art), Bachelor cycle. Instructor: Lucienne Peiry

Winning poster for the Act for Change LAB Award 2020: Campus: alternatives énergétiques? (Campus: Alternative Energy Sources?) Global Issues course 2020 - Energy A track

16


EDUCATION

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

Winners of the 2020 Act for Change Lab Award

Bachelor's classes

The Act for Change Lab Award is handed out by EPFL’s

All EPFL Bachelor’s students must take a class from the SHS

Sustainability Unit to encourage students to design and

program in each semester of their studies. These classes

implement sustainability-oriented projects and initiatives.

have no prerequisites and require students to carry out group

Global Issues projects that deal with a sustainability-related

projects. A wide range of projects were completed in 2020,

topic and that could feasibly be tested at EPFL are eligible

reflecting the program’s breadth and diversity. New courses

for the Award. Four Global Issues projects won an Act

were added to the SHS program in 2020 in order to address

for Change Lab Award in 2020:

two areas of growing interest linked to today’s global

Vegetation in the City: A solution to Heat Islands?

challenges: ethics linked to technology, and sustainability

(Climate B track)

and climate change.

L’urbanisation des data-centers (The Urbanization of Data Centers) (Energy B track)

Microalgues : Biofixation optimale du CO2 en milieux urbains ? (Microalgae: Optimal Biofixation of CO2 in Urban Areas?) (Energy B track)

Campus : alternatives énergétiques ? (Campus: Alternative Energy Sources?) (Energy A track).

17


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

Master’s classes: New additions in 2020

EDUCATION

Digital Urban History: Lausanne Time Machine, in which

We added three new Master’s classes to the SHS program in

students reconstruct the history of Lausanne using

2020, two of which are also open to UNIL students as part of

statistical methods, datasets, software and textual,

a joint initiative. These unique classes are based on student

cartographic and photographic sources.

experiments and provide an example of the novel teaching approaches and interdisciplinary format used in the SHS program. They are:

Experimental History of Science, which gives students the background and tools to understand the key role that scientific skills and objects have played in producing

Data in Context: Critical Data Studies, which looks at the challenging methods needed to work with complex, heterogeneous and often messy datasets to address socially relevant questions.

Painting for the film directed in 2006 by Michael Arias based on the manga of Tayō Matsumoto, Tekkon Kinkreet (bitter concrete), 1993-4. Visual from the course: Contemporary Japan, Culture and Thought as Mirrored in Architecture Instructor: Irène Vogel Chevroulet

18

knowledge throughout history.


EDUCATION

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

2020 SHS Prize The SHS Prize, introduced in 2012, recognizes high-quality, original Master’s projects carried out as part of the SHS program. Winning projects highlight the important contribution that the humanities and social sciences can make to an engineering education. The SHS teaching committee selects the winning project at the end of each school year, and the award is handed out on the eve of EPFL’s graduation ceremony. The 2020 SHS Prize was given jointly to two groups of three Master’s students each, in recognition of their outstanding work. Unfortunately, the award ceremony, scheduled to be held at the Rolex Learning Center, had to be canceled due to the pandemic.

The 2020 SHS Prize winners were: •

Léandre Tarpin-Pitre, Rachel Lee and Nikolina Tomic Project: Danish Language Requirements’ Role in the Socio-economic Integration of Migrants Class: Governing Global Migration (taught by Madeleine Dungy)

Nora Joos, Stanislas Jouven and Balz Marty Project: A Trade-Off between Growth and Sustainability: An Inquiry into the Role of Trade in Chile’s Development Class: Economic Growth and Sustainability (taught by Philippe Thalmann).

19


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

EDUCATION

STAS MINOR We offer a minor in Science, Technology and Area Studies (STAS), which sits at the crossroads of science, technology and the social sciences. The minor is designed to give students the tools and skills they need to communicate across disciplines and regions. It includes lectures as well as specific training to prepare students for fieldwork. Lecturers Marc Laperrouza and Eric Hoesli supervised several projects up until the 2019–2020 school year. For the 2020–2021 school year, the trips planned to China and Russia had to be canceled due to the pandemic and replaced by other projects.

CHIC program In the China Hardware Innovation Camp (CHIC) program, cross-disciplinary groups of students from EPFL, ECAL and UNIL design a product from scratch and finalize it in southern China. While the trip to southern China had to be canceled in 2020, we did everything we could to ensure students still learned as much as possible from the experience. To that end, we held a two-week summer-school session in Lausanne in early September. Activities included developing prototypes and setting up user tests. Professionals were on hand to coach the student groups and help them fine-tune their prototypes. Students then pitched their ideas via Zoom to business accelerators in Hong Kong and Shenzhen. We also arranged a number of field visits to introduce students to Switzerland’s hardware ecosystem.

Constructive feedback session during the ideation phase in groups composed of students in engineering, design, and economics. Photo : Marius Aeberli

20


EDUCATION

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

Pitching session during the CHIC kick-off Photo : Marius Aeberli

The student projects for this sixth year of the CHIC program were: •

Canary – a system that alerts rail workers when a train is approaching

Check-y – a smart headband for athletes to monitor head impacts

Odeji – an application and programmable device that can make meetings more efficient

Roots – an artistic exhibit that generates visuals when a plant is touched by a human hand. The Universities of Applied Sciences in Geneva, Fribourg and Yverdon also took part in the program through our openCHIC initiative. Two projects from past years have been taken further:

Hapstick (CHIC 2018–2019), which won first place in the Start Lausanne competition (CHF 30,000 in prize money) and is now part of UNIL’s UCreate program

FlyQ (CHIC 2019–2020), which is now part of the Pulse Incubator in Geneva.

21


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

EDUCATION

Changing Arctic Program - Northern Russia

Two expeditions had been planned in 2020 for students’ field

In this three-semester program, Master’s students study the

projects: one on the Professor Molchanov research vessel,

effects of climate change through classroom learning and

and one to visit the remnants of a gulag on the Yamal Peninsula.

real-world experience that complement their main curriculum.

Both expeditions had to be canceled due to the pandemic-

It includes lectures and modules as well as activities

related travel restrictions and were replaced with projects here

to meticulously prepare students for a field project of their

in Switzerland, although students were able to make full use

choice. The projects are carried out in the break between

of the preparatory work they had already performed.

school semesters, and students must subsequently write and submit a report. Nineteen students (seven from EPFL, four from UNIL, two from UNINE, four from UNIGE and two from ETH Zurich) took part in the program in 2020, with the support of the Swiss Polar Institute, which provided five grants.

22


EDUCATION

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

The 19 students were divided into the following groups: •

Microplastics research group This group developed computer models of how microplastic particles flow and accumulate in the Barents Sea and collected samples from Lake Geneva and analyzed them in a lab.

Water cycles & systems research group This group studied water systems on Bretaye Lake, in the foothills of the Swiss Alps, looking in particular at how various environmental factors interact, the effects of weather conditions and the dynamics of greenhouse gases.

Yamal research group This group published a collection of articles about an old gulag, its remnants, the surrounding natural environment, how the environment has changed and

Members of the "flow and water" group shake bottles for two minutes in order to obtain an equilibrium in the concentrations of CH4 and CO2 in the gas and water. Photo: César Ordóñez Valdebenito

Representation of camp 93 on site 501-503 in the Yamal Peninsula, which can be found on the website www.yamal.ch. Photo: Changing Arctic Program, all rights reserved

what we can learn from gulag camps; the group also developed a related website. •

Journalism & communications research group This group worked with various stakeholders to help outline a Swiss arctic policy for the Swiss federal government. The students wrote an in-depth article on the issue, investigated the advantages and disadvantages of using testimonials from their research in this professional context, and studied how remote working could affect this type of survey.

23


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

EDUCATION

I N T E R D I S C I P L I N A RY TEACHING PRACTICES We actively promote the development and adoption of innovative, interdisciplinary teaching practices by working in association with other EPFL schools and units.

FIELD initiative

The FIELD initiative brings together four key principles

Through our FIELD initiative, we help the next generation of

of an engineering education:

scientists and engineers incorporate design thinking and

human- and design-centric approaches into their methods.

interdisciplinary teamwork – working with students from different disciplines, both within EPFL and beyond (e.g., UNIL and ECAL)

Our FIELD team works to develop and implement novel,

interdisciplinary educational activities that can be used in open-ended courses and programs (e.g., CHIC and

field •

INSSINC). The team also helps EPFL teachers incorporate design-driven approaches and project-based learning methods into their classes. Through FIELD, EPFL students

immersion – getting out of the classroom and into the decentering – approaching problems using tools and methods from the humanities and design sphere

reiteration – learning by doing and by drawing lessons from the experience

get an opportunity to engage in holistic design processes as part of their Bachelor’s or Master’s programs, initiate

In 2020, our FIELD team ran the sixth edition of the China

their own projects and lay the foundations for

Hardware Innovation Camp (CHIC) and the second edition

an entrepreneurial venture.

of the India Switzerland Social Innovation Camp (INSSINC). The team also supported other EPFL initiatives, such as the Discovery Learning Labs (DLLs), Tech4Impact and AMEKE, and helped design the pilot edition of the Climate and Sustainability Action Week (CSAW). The team has developed a software program – now part of the EPFL Learning Companion – that guides students and faculty members interested in using human- and design-centric approaches in their open-ended projects.

The Learning Companion application aims to improve students' learning process and allows instructors to better target students' difficulties. Photo : Marius Aeberli

Doha Mahfoudhi (HEC Lausanne) and Amara Slaymaker (Energy Science and Technology, EPFL) testing the application with an instructor and her interpreter, in a school at a migrant camp outside of Bangalore. Photo : Vivian Ambrose, INSSINC 2020

24


EDUCATION

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

INSSINC program

The human-centric design process promoted through INSSINC

The India Switzerland Social Innovation Camp (INSSINC) is

is essential for achieving effective social innovation, as it

a two-week social innovation program in which students travel

facilitates new streams of thought for analyzing complex and

to Bangalore, India, to tackle social challenges out in the field.

deeply embedded social challenges. In this unique program,

Students work in interdisciplinary groups that draw on skills

the prototyped solutions are just one outcome; the other,

in engineering, design and the social sciences to address

more important, one is the valuable learning process applied

local problems.

to creating them.

INSSINC is an initiative of CDH along with the SELCO Foundation,

Marius Aeberli and Marc Laperrouza from CDH, along with

swissnex India, Tech4Dev (under EPFL’s Vice Presidency for

Hilda Liswani from Tech4Dev, are now working to ensure that

Innovation) and the Canton of Vaud.

this iterative design process can be applied to other student programs in the future, notably through EPFL’s Digital Resources

For the second edition, ten students from EPFL, EPFL+ECAL,

for Instruction and Learning (DRIL) program.

ECAL, and HEC Lausanne spent two weeks in India in February 2020 to prototype multifaceted solutions for assisting marginalized communities. More specifically, they leveraged their diverse backgrounds and skills to tackle practical, social and technological challenges at two schools located in migrant camps outside of Bangalore.

25


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

EDUCATION

OT H E R I N T E R D I S C I P L I N A RY I N I T I AT I V E S CDH partnership with ENAC on urban issues

development concepts, methods and models unique to

CDH senior scientist Florence Graezer Bideau is taking part in

Asian cities. It takes an interdisciplinary look at the theoretical

an ENAC Week program titled The Ephemeral City. This program

frameworks that researchers can use to analyze urban

teaches students about the various issues involved in large

development in Asia and compare it to that in Europe.

public events and their effects on cities. Focusing on the 50th edition of Lausanne’s Festival de la Cité, students examine the effects that temporary structures built for this event have on the city’s resources (both material and economic), infrastructure and relationship with its environment. Graezer Bideau, along with her colleague Beatrice Ferrari, also gives a class on Urbanism in Asia to architecture students that explores the urban

26


EDUCATION

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

Montreux Jazz Memories Digitalizing a Cultural Heritage This interdisciplinary class is given by Alexandre Camus, Alain Dufaux and Florence Graezer Bideau as part of CDH’s association with the PIC (Programme Innovations Culturelles) initiative at UNIL-EPFL’s dhCenter. The class encourages students to develop a critical-thinking approach and practical skills for using modern tools to digitalize cultural heritage assets and showcase that heritage. Students put that approach and those skills to work as they contribute to the Montreux Jazz Digital Project, which is being run by EPFL’s Cultural Heritage & Innovation Center (CHC) and Fondation Claude Nobs in an effort to safeguard past editions of the Montreux Jazz Festival.

ENAC Week, The Ephemeral City, invites architecture students to explore the impact of the 50th edition of Lausanne's Festival de la cité, which will take place in summer 2021. Photo : Alexandre Gonzalez

Montreux Jazz Digital Project, with director Alain Dufaux Photo : Alain Herzog, EPFL

27


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

EDUCATION

MASTER’S IN DIGITAL HUMANITIES

Our Master of Science in Digital Humanities is a comprehen-

Internships in 2020

sive program covering the foundations and applications of

Students in the Master’s in Digital Humanities program must

computer science and the humanities. It is the only program

complete a six-month internship at a cultural institution,

of its kind in Europe and is intended for students with

company, international organization or public institution of

a background in science and engineering. Students work

their choice. At the end of the six months, they create a short

on cutting-edge projects such as the flagship Venice Time

video describing their experience, which is then published on

Machine and the famous Montreux Jazz Festival Archives.

CDH’s YouTube channel.

Students must complete a Master’s thesis as part of this pro-

Some of the institutions that hosted interns in 2020 were:

gram. The breadth of topics covered by the students’ projects

Agence Mediafaune, Aspremont, France

illustrates the many possibilities for applying data science to

Institut National d'Histoire de l'Art (INHA), Paris

the humanities in a wide range of fields including musicology,

MET International AG, Zug

literature, arts, global cultural heritage, historical archives,

Bibliothèque Nationale de France (BnF), Paris.

social media and more.

2020 students and graduates 15 new students joined the Master’s in Digital Humanities program in the fall of 2020, bringing the total number of students to 24 (25% women and 75% men). Most of them came from EPFL, with the rest coming from other universities in Switzerland, China, India and the US. The second cohort of Master’s in Digital Humanities students (eight students) graduated in a ceremony on 3 October 2020. The ceremony was kept small due to the pandemic-related restrictions. This brought the total number of graduates to 13.

28


EDUCATION

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

PHD IN DIGITAL HUMANITIES

Our PhD in Digital Humanities program (EDDH) is designed to educate a new generation of scientists and engineers who combine domain knowledge with quantitative methods in order to analyze, model and think critically about real-world problems. The program is intended mainly for computer scientists, data scientists, engineers, mathematicians, biologists and broadly skilled students from the humanities and social sciences who are interested in the spectrum of interdisciplinary research issues related to the digital humanities. Students are trained to provide intellectual contributions

The graduates of 2020: Valentine Bernasconi, Evgeniy Aleksandrowitsch Chervonenko, Marion Kramer, Arthur Antoine Parmentier, Rémi Petitpierre, Santiago Saint-Supéry, Cédric Viaccoz and Jenny Paola Yela Bello.

and develop leadership skills in the digital humanities, but also to address societal and cultural issues more generally. Research opportunities in the program include empirical research in the areas of art, music, history and literature; data sculpting and experimental museology; social computing; the social, political, cultural and ethical dimensions of digital technology; data science; machine learning; and distributed information systems. Admission to the program is highly competitive. We received 51 applications in 2020 from top-tier international universities, underscoring a rising trend in both the number and quality of applicants.

29


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

EDUCATION

C D H E D U C AT I O N IN NUMBERS

148

courses in the SHS program

129

lecturers in the SHS program

STUDENTS SHS Bachelor's Spring 2020 - 1st year introduction

1380

Spring 2020 - 2nd and 3rd years

2046

Autumn 2020 - 2nd and 3rd years

2045

SHS Master's Spring 2020 (class 2019-20)

1222

Autumn 2020 (class 2020-21)

1402

STAS Minor Cycle 2019 - 2020 (fieldwork in 2020) CHIC - China

18

Russia

19

INSSINC - India

10

Master in Digital Humanities

15

Doctoral students Doctoral Program in Digital Humanities (EDDH) Doctoral Program in Architecture and Sciences of the City (EDAR)

30

9 7

7

EPFL schools involved



Research


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

TWO INSTITUTES Institute for Area and Global Studies (IAGS) Digital Humanities Institute (DHI)

IAGS RESEARCH INITIATIVES Heritage, Culture and City Makerspaces project Lausanne Time Machine

DHI LABORATORIES Digital and Cognitive Musicology Laboratory Digital Humanities Laboratory Laboratory for Experimental Museology Laboratory for the History of Science and Technology Social Computing Group

PHD THESES Theses completed in 2020 Ongoing theses

OTHER RESEARCH GROUPS Engineering education UNIL-EPFL GameLab History of industrial pollution

CROSS PROGRAM 2020 CROSS topic: Mobility Selected projects CROSS research linked to the COVID-19 pandemic

CDH VISITING PROFESSORS FACULTY DEPARTURES AND APPOINTMENTS GRANTS AND RESEARCH PROJECTS IN 2020 PUBLICATIONS AND LIBRARY SERVICES

33


Rapportofannuel College Humanities - Collège - Annual des Humanités Report 2020

RESEARCH CHAPITRE

CDH is home to world-class interdisciplinary research conducted through our two institutes: the Institute for Area and Global Studies (IAGS) and the Digital Humanities Institute (DHI). Researchers at the IAGS examine local realities across diverse geopolitical contexts from the perspectives of urban studies, cultural heritage, historical conservation and more. Researchers at the DHI foster cutting-edge discoveries in digital humanities by applying methods from data science, computer science and engineering to the study of culture, society and history. Our other research groups at CDH stepped up their work significantly in 2020. Their interdisciplinary initiatives covered topics such as engineering education, game studies and the history of industrial pollution. We also host a growing number of PhD students who explore a broad array of topics and methodological approaches, reflecting the diversity of research possibilities in our pioneering disciplinary areas. Through our role as coordinator of the Collaborative Research on Science and Society (CROSS) program, we bring together researchers from EPFL and UNIL to study pressing issues related to society and technology.

34


RESEARCH

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

TWO INSTITUTES

Albane Descombes and Didier Dupertuis install the omnidirectional camera on the ScanVan. Photo: DHLAB / EPFL

Institute for Area and Global Studies (IAGS)

Digital Humanities Institute (DHI)

The Institute for Area and Global Studies (IAGS) conducts

The Digital Humanities Institute (DHI) equips students with

research on a variety of subjects including urban anthropology,

international leadership skills in research and education in

cultural heritage, historical archives, urban culture and innovation

the digital humanities. It applies methods from data science,

and climate change. IAGS has built up a cross-disciplinary

computer science and engineering to fields in the humanities

network of researchers both within EPFL and beyond to support

and social sciences – from music to cultural heritage.

our scientific discoveries and educational programs, which include semester projects and a minor in Science, Technology

Our digital humanities program is an excellent example

and Area Studies (STAS).

of EPFL’s interdisciplinary approach, which goes beyond traditional disciplinary boundaries while strengthening each

In terms of education, the institute’s goal is to prepare students

field’s contribution to engineering and the social sciences.

to work effectively in emerging countries by giving them the tools they need to better understand societies and cultures outside

DHI was established in 2015 and already houses some of

the Western world.

Europe’s most prestigious laboratories in this exciting, rapidly growing field.

Renovation work in the historic neighborhood of Qianmen, Beijing Photo : Florence Graezer Bideau

35


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

RESEARCH

IAGS RESEARCH I N I T I AT I V E S Heritage, Culture and City

Lausanne Time Machine

Led by senior scientist Florence Graezer Bideau, this group

This initiative, coordinated by Isabella Di Lenardo, aims to give

conducts research at the crossroads of social science,

researchers easier access to the vast collection of archives

architecture and urban studies, investigating the place and

currently stored at our region’s main heritage institutions.

role of social actors in the process of heritage-formation from

It is being carried out jointly by CDH and UNIL-EPFL’s

the perspective of the cultural and urban policies that underpin

dhCenter, a consortium of researchers from Time Machine

it. One of the group’s new projects, Uses of Cultural Heritage

Europe, and the City of Lausanne.

at the Beijing Winter Olympic Games of 2022, looks at new consumption practices in connection with the cultural,

In 2020, researchers affiliated with the Lausanne Time

sporting and public-health policies promoted by the Chinese

Machine published a collection of articles on digital and

government for the Olympic Games. The project is being

computational research methods in urban history. Their

run by Graezer Bideau, along with Helena Roux and Mengke

articles spanned a variety of topics in art, digital humanities

Zhang from CDH and Thierry Theurillat from HEG-Arc Neuchâtel.

and urban planning. Di Lenardo and Marie-Hélène Coté, from UNIL, obtained funding through our CROSS program for a new

In 2020, the group took part in the new PIC (Programme

project to be conducted in 2021, called Names of Lausanne:

d’Innovations Culturelles) initiative by the UNIL-EPFL

The Evolution of Family Names in Administrative Records.

Center for Digital Humanities (dhCenter), and helped set up

They plan to develop a database of Lausanne’s population

the UNIL-EPFL East Asian Research Group, which is working

between 1803 and 1900 by automatically extracting data from

on a 2020–2021 SNSF project.

archived documents (such as civil records, census data and directories) that are stored at local heritage institutions.

Makerspaces project - Culminating in a Chinese book launch Graezer Bideau, along with fellow CDH researchers Marc Laperrouza, Monique Bolli and Clément Renaud, as well as external contributors, published a book in 2020 titled Realtime: Making Digital China. This compendium of essays, articles, analyses and artwork explores the rapid transformation of innovation practices and spaces in urban China. The book marks the culmination of a four-year research project supported by the SNSF, titled Makerspaces: Politics and Communities of Innovation in Contemporary China. The book’s authors traveled to manufacturing epicenter Shenzhen, China, on 11–12 January to launch their book at the Eyes of the City exhibition. Curated by MIT Prof. Carlo Ratti, this exhibition was part of the 2019 edition of the Shenzhen Bi-City Biennale of Urbanism/Architecture.

36


RESEARCH

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

THE DHI L A B O R AT O R I E S ←

In August 2020, the DCML published a study identifying the key stylistic traits of roughly 300 pieces of music from Brazilian choro. Photo: a 2019 musical tribute to renowned choro composer Jacob do Bandolim, on the 50th anniversary of his death in São Paulo, Brazil. Credit: Governo do Estado de São Paulo / CC BY

Digital and Cognitive Musicology Laboratory

In August, they published a study in the Journal of New Music

(DCML)

Research that identified key stylistic traits from some 300

Led by Prof. Martin Rohrmeier

pieces of Brazilian choro music, providing an unprecedented

The DCML explores music from cognitive, computational,

empirical analysis of the harmony and form of the genre. To

musicological and psychological perspectives. It combines

perform the analyses, DCML postdoc Fabian Moss worked

modern algorithmic methods, corpus research, music-theo-

with Willian Fernandes Souza from the Federal University of

retical expertise and experimental approaches to study four

Rio de Janeiro in Brazil to apply data-science and statistical

main research topics: musical structure-building, musicologi-

methods to the characterization of choro’s musical style

cal corpus research, the cognitive foundations of music and

for the very first time.

computational modeling. The DCML also draws on a global network of experts in musicology, artificial intelligence and

In September, DCML postdoc Steffen Herff received a grant

neuroscience to deepen researchers’ understanding of

of over CHF 95,000 from the SNSF’s Spark program for

musical structures by employing cutting-edge technology.

a one-year project on the relationship between music and imagination. His unique project, titled Wanderful Music:

In 2020, DCML researchers completed a multi-year study

A Systematic Investigation into Music-Induced Mind

on the basic compositional building blocks that structurally

Wandering, will test and empirically characterize how

underpin different music styles from Bach to Beethoven.

music stimulates imagination, or mind wandering.

They also obtained funding for new projects that examine music's relation to creativity, human mobility and historical theory from a range of methodological approaches.

37


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

RESEARCH

Digital Humanities Laboratory (DHLAB)

information contained in historical documents. The researchers

Led by Prof. Frédéric Kaplan

have created 3D replicas of over 1,000 buildings and are now

The DHLAB studies new computational approaches for

looking at how their approach can be applied to the entire

re-examining the past and anticipating the future. Its innovative

city. The lab hired a new PhD student to study this topic.

educational programs and didactic technology are training a new generation of digital humanists.

ScanVan, another SNSF project, entails generating digital images of Sion using a 360° camera. The lab hired a web

The lab received an extension from the SNSF to complete

developer to create a digital interface that enables users

its Sinergia project titled Impresso - Media Monitoring of the

to take an interactive tour of Sion’s “digital twin.” Florent

Past, which it is working on in conjunction with the University

Thouvenin from the University of Zurich helped design

of Zurich and the Luxembourg Centre for Contemporary

the website to ensure that it complies with Swiss

and Digital History. The Impresso database already contains

personal-data protection laws. The researchers have

75 historical journal titles – or some five million pages

filed a patent for their novel method for digitalizing cities.

of content – that users can browse through. Under a project that had obtained funding through the In October, the DHLAB, in association with the Digital Epide-

CROSS program, DHLAB researchers, working in association

miology Lab, which is in EFPL’s School of Life Sciences and

with Vincent Kaufmann (from EPFL’s LASUR laboratory) and

headed by Prof. Marcel Salathé, published a study that used

Patrick Rerat (from UNIL), conducted a pilot study on visualizing

digitized historical records to provide novel insights into

future mobility systems in Switzerland. In 2021, DHLAB

the spread of the bubonic plague in Venice. This work

will take that research further through a Sinergia project

underscores the importance of digital data collection as

conducted jointly with LASUR to analyze and visualize cities

a tool for studying the global patterns and local dynamics

and their transformations.

of disease spread. Another SNSF project the lab is working on is Parcels of Venice, which involves building a complete model of Venice and its residents in the year 1808 based on cadastral

The ScanVan supports an innovative scanning system that produces spherical images in regular increments. This project, financed by the SNSF, brings together researchers from the EPFL Digital Humanities Laboratory, the HES-SO Valais/Wallis Institute of Systems Engineering, and the University of Zurich’s Center for Information Technology, Society, and Law. Photo: DHLAB / EPFL

38


RESEARCH

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

Created by eM+, in collaboration with 24 Swiss museums, the muse application offers visitors an engaging way to communicate their experiences. Photo : Sarah Kenderdine

Laboratory for Experimental Museology (eM+)

In August, as part of EPFL’s A Calling for Research summer

Led by Prof. Sarah Kenderdine

series of articles, Kenderdine shared her experience tracing,

eM+ is an interdisciplinary research laboratory at the crossroads

photographing and digitally reconstructing the seldom-told

of immersive visualization technology, visual analytics,

story of Buddhism’s maritime spread across Asia. Her work

aesthetics and cultural (big) data. It promotes post-cinematic

was carried out under the Atlas of Maritime Buddhism project,

multisensory engagement using experimental platforms

which aims to create a vast, permanent exhibition to be

and is home to an array of custom-built cluster-based 3D

unveiled in Taiwan in May 2021 (following a year-long delay

systems. eM+ also works on tangible and intangible heritage

due to the COVID-19 pandemic). A traveling exhibition of

and archival materials from Asia, Australasia and Europe.

the Atlas project will premiere in Hong Kong in late July 2021.

Researchers employ state-of-the-art computer science and human-computer interaction methods to transform

In September, eM+ announced that it had received funding from

cultural data into advanced, ultra-high-resolution visualiza-

Engagement Migros to develop muse, a pioneering audience-

tions and new museological experiences.

evaluation app, in association with 24 Swiss museums. The app will give museum visitors an engaging way to comment on their

In 2020, Kenderdine had the honor of being included in

experience, while providing museums with valuable feedback

Bilanz’s list of digital shapers – the “100 most important

for developing other exhibitions and attractions.

people driving digitization in Switzerland” – in the Creatives category. She was also a finalist in the Falling Walls Science Breakthroughs of the Year competition for her pioneering work in experimental museology. She was ranked by Blooloop as one of the top ten influences for museums globally, placing her among some of the world’s most visionary museum directors and practitioners.

39


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

RESEARCH

The ALPES team mid-way between Sixt and the summit of Mont Buet (3,098m). Jérôme Baudry, Simon Dumas Primbault, Ion-Gabriel Mihailescu, Marianna Fenzi, and a Genevan colleague. Photo : Jérôme Baudry

Laboratory for the History of Science and Technology (LHST) Led by Prof. Jérôme Baudry The LHST aims to provide greater insight into the transformations of science and technology in their historical, cultural and social contexts. In addition to studying the past using approaches from the digital humanities, LHST researchers explore contemporary developments in science and technology in order to understand how they shape and are shaped by today’s world. In 2020, the LHST hosted the first History of Science in Switzerland/Schweiz/Svizzera (HSSuisse) conference – a soonto-be annual gathering of Swiss-based researchers studying the history of science and technology. The event was held at the DataSquare in the EPFL Pavilions building on 6 March. The LHST also held a virtual workshop called Digital Traces, Navigational Paths, and Intellectual Mobility on 26–27 November. One LHST project, titled Digital Trail Blazing: Understanding and Remaking Intellectual Mobility on Online Research Platforms, was selected to receive funding under our 2020 CROSS program. The lead researchers on this project are

40

Jérôme Baudry and Simon Dumas Primbault from the LHST and Jean-François Bert from UNIL. New LHST hire Alina Volynskaya received funding through the SNSF’s doc.ch program for her project titled Querying the Digital Archive of Science: Distant Reading, Semantic Modeling, and Representation of Knowledge. In addition to Volynskaya, the LHST also hired Sylvie Thomet in 2020 as an administrative assistant. The LHST introduced a new project in 2020, titled Historians in the Wild: A Cross-Media Reconstruction of Science in the Mountains, in association with Geneva’s History of Science Museum. This project aims to reconstruct the research expeditions that Geneva scientists carried out in the Alps in the 1770s. In August, the LHST unveiled a new digitized catalog of the UNIL-EPFL Collection of Scientific Instruments, making more than 1,000 instruments available online to students, researchers and the general public.


RESEARCH

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

Social Computing Group (SCG)

In early April 2020, as EPFL – along with Switzerland and the

Led by Prof. Daniel Gatica-Perez

rest of the world – began grappling with the full effects of the

The SCG, part of LIDIAP – the EPFL laboratory associated

COVID-19 pandemic, Daniel Gatica-Perez and his colleagues

with the Idiap Research Institute – studies how people and

Vincent Kaufmann and Claudia Binder were selected to

technology interface in everyday life. In doing so, it combines

receive EPFL funding for their Swiss Corona Citizen Science

theories and methods from ubiquitous computing, social

Research project. This project entails conducting a survey

media, machine learning and the social sciences to analyze

of Swiss citizens to examine how they are coping with the new

human and social behavior and design systems that support

living and working conditions under the pandemic. The results

individuals and communities. The group’s current research

will be used to help policymakers understand how such crises

looks at the use of mobile crowdsensing and social media

can be better managed in the future.

analytics for cities, healthcare systems and ubiquitous interaction analysis. The group is affiliated with EPFL’s

In November, Gatica-Perez and his research partner Trinh-

School of Engineering and CDH.

Minh-Tri Do were honored with a 10-Year Impact Award at the International Conference on Mobile and Ubiquitous Multimedia

Several of the group’s scientists reached important milestones

for their paper titled "By Their Apps you Shall Understand

in 2020. PhD student Jessica Pidoux was named to the Forum

Them: Mining Large-Scale Patterns of Mobile Phone Usage."

des 100 list of the most influential figures in French-speaking Switzerland, established by Swiss daily Le Temps. Guest student Thanh-Trung Phan obtained his PhD degree in electrical engineering from EPFL. And the group bid farewell to Dr. Skanda Muralidhar, who left EPFL to join an international video-game developer.

iStock image, credit: Jasper Chamber

41


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

RESEARCH

PHD THESES Theses completed in 2020

Monique Bolli (IAGS)

Leonardo Laurence Impett (DHI)

Following her online defense on 27 March, Bolli became

Following his online defense on 8 May, Impett became the

the first student to earn a PhD from IAGS. Her thesis, Liminality,

second student to earn a PhD from EDDH, which is the DHI’s

Ephemerality, and Marginality with Impact Makerspaces in the

PhD program in digital humanities. His thesis, Painting by

Chinese Urban Fabric: Shanghai, Shenzhen, Beijing, and Addis

Numbers: Computational Methods for Art History, attempts

Ababa, deals with the narratives and imaginaries about maker

to prototype a new methodology for computational art history

cultures and makerspaces that have flourished in recent years

in the tradition of distant reading (from literary criticism) and

in the Chinese urban fabric. What is the government’s interest in

based on operationalization (the transcription of a concept

bringing new narratives supporting innovation into these maker

or theory from cultural history into an algorithm). Impett applies

movements? What is the impact on people’s lives and what

this methodology to three case studies by operationalizing

sort of outreach do projects born in these spaces have? How

concepts from two 20th century art historians – Aby Warburg

can innovative research methods be developed to capture

and Michael Baxandall – and from the 16th century Italian painter

the dynamics of such a culture?

and art theorist Giovanni Paolo Lomazzo.

42


RESEARCH

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

Lucia Bordone (IAGS)

Daniel Harasim (DCML)

Following her combined online/in-person defense on

Following his online defense on 11 December, Harasim earned

9 October, Bordone earned a PhD in architecture and sciences

a PhD in digital musicology from the DCML. His thesis, The

of the city from IAGS. By drawing upon sociology and urban

Learnability of the Grammar of Jazz: Bayesian Inference of

anthropology, her research explores how the links between

Hierarchical Structures in Harmony, examines computational

collective memory and spaces in contemporary cities change,

models of harmonic knowledge. Music is very rich in all kinds

with a field study of Rome, Italy, as an example. She reveals

of structure in various dimensions such as melody, timbre,

working-class memories in their material, narrative and

harmony and rhythm. Harasim’s research found that general

experienced dimensions using three different disciplinary

prior knowledge enables an ideal learner to acquire abstract

perspectives: historic and historiographical controversies,

musical principles by statistical learning. Thus, it is plausible

everyday life (as observed through ethnographic fieldwork),

that many aspects of musical grammar have been learned

and urban public policy.

by jazz musicians and listeners, instead of being innate predispositions or explicitly taught concepts.

43


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

RESEARCH

Ongoing theses

Paul Guhennec (DHLAB)

Raphaël Barman (DHLAB)

Guhennec’s research relates to the procedural reconstruction of

Historical Cadaster as a Computational Object. Barman’s

the architecture of past cities using historical sources. His work

research aims to develop and formalize the process of

focuses primarily on 19th century Venice, for which a great deal

extracting data from historical cadasters so that the data can

of information exists (in the form of cadasters, visual depictions

be used to create an evolutionary model of the populations

and textual descriptions) and can be extracted algorithmically.

represented in these documents.

Johannes Hentschel (DCML) Gabriele Cecchetti (DCML)

Hentschel, a musician, music theorist and educator, is conducting

Cecchetti's research explores the interface between formal

thesis research in musicology. His work involves evaluating

models of musical structure and the fundamental cognitive

a large corpus of digital music scores from three centuries

processes involved in the experience of music. By linking music

and empirically examining the evolution of musical language

theory, computational modeling and empirical investigation,

throughout music history.

this project will further our understanding of how the way music is structured relates to the way humans experience it.

Federica Pardini (DHLAB) The Cadastral City. A European Urban History through the

Christoph Finkensiep (DCML)

Geometry of the 19th Century. Pardini’s research investigates

Modelling Polyphonic Structure in Music. When listening to music,

the relationships among measured cartography, information

humans are able to identify structural entities such as chords

systems and urban revolution, demonstrating that 19th century

and voices. However, very little is known about how these entities

geometrical cadasters acted as pivotal instruments for further

are linked to the musical surface or, for example, what makes

urban decisions. Her work considers cadasters not just as

us say that two musical fragments form the same harmony. This

historical documents but also as mechanisms for spurring city

thesis explores the principles by which sequences of notes form

transformations, combining typo-morphological and social

“voices,” how this relates to harmony, and how it contributes

issues in ways that prefigured the discipline of town planning.

to a listener’s perception of a piece.

Jessica Pidoux (DHI) Yohann Guffroy (LHST)

Online Dating Quantification Practices: A Human-Machine

Representing the Invention: Study of the Evolution of Technical

Learning Process. Through mixed methods, Pidoux’s research

Object Design in England (1750-1850). Guffroy’s research aims

addresses three agents in online dating: interfaces, users and

to explore the role that technical object drawing played in

developers. She argues that these agents act together to learn

the invention process in England and how it evolved between

how to establish affective-algorithmic communication. Dating

the 18th and 19th centuries. This entails studying the drawing

apps shape and measure personal preferences via conventions

process from the perspective of the physical production

and at the same time establish a human-machine trial-error

of a diagram and as a possible language technique.

dynamic for reviewing the affordances that matter to each agent. Pidoux’s findings map the dating app market and shed light on how coding and app usages may or may not facilitate finding a date.

44


RESEARCH

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

Yumeng Hou (eM+)

Mengke Zhang (IAGS)

EncodingActs. Hou’s thesis studies the potential for standardizing

New Leisure and Outdoor Activities in Chinese Urban Growth:

the consumption of tangible and intangible cultural heritage

Zhangjiakou and Chongli Development for the Beijing Olympic

by exploring a use case for the Hong Kong Martial Arts Living

Games of 2022. Zhang’s research investigates how the hosting

Archive. The goal is to develop an ontology-based knowledge

of the Beijing Winter Olympics and its use of heritage will affect

representation framework combining aspects of embodied

urban economic and social transformation, with a particular

experience, poses, motions, physical objects and historical

focus on sustainability. Her work looks at the mountain areas

documents with the meaning of tradition.

of Yanqing in the suburbs of Beijing and Zhangjiakou-Chongli, where new ski and leisure resorts are being developed

Héléna Roux (IAGS)

to promote a consumption-based society.

Shougang: Industrial Heritage and Creative Parks in the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympic Game Era. Roux’s research looks at the renovation of Shougang, an abandoned steel plant that has been converted into a site for the Olympic Games, complete with recreational areas, sporting facilities and shops. Shougang’s redevelopment serves as an example of the process China is using to revitalize old industrial sites – a process that is contributing to the emergence of new urban practices and lifestyles.

Alina Volynskaya (LHST) Querying the Digital Archive of Science: Distant Reading, Semantic Modelling and Representation of Knowledge. Volynskaya’s research examines how digital science archives can be used as an agency of memory and knowledge production. Her work focuses on institutional repositories, looking at both their infrastructure (in particular, linked-data technology) and methods (distant reading).

45


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

RESEARCH

OTHER RESEARCH GROUPS Engineering education

video games in pedagogical contexts. UNIL-EPFL GameLab

Engineering education research developed by Roland Tormey

researchers, including Selim Krichane and Yannick Rochat

aims to deliver meaningful change in how professors teach

from CDH, give classes on video games as part of

and students learn, sitting at the interface of technical disciplines

the SHS program and through UNIL-EPFL’s continuing

and the humanities and social sciences. Tormey works

education program.

in association with EPFL’s Teaching Support Center (CAPE), Center for Digital Education (CEDE), CHILI lab, MAKE initiative,

UNIL-EPFL GameLab held a series of talks in 2020, called

and Center for Learning Sciences (LEARN).

Games on Campus, aimed at bringing together all the various researchers working on (or with) video games at UNIL

In 2020, Tormey was elected to the Board of Directors of the

and EPFL.

European Society for Engineering Education (SEFI). He is also involved in a new swissuniversities-funded project to examine

History of industrial pollution

how students can develop the necessary skills and attitudes

In the fall of 2020, historian Alexandre Elsig joined CDH from

for working with data responsibly.

the University of Lausanne’s Interdisciplinary Mountain Research Center (CIRM) to spearhead a project funded by the SNSF’s

New research partnerships were established in 2020, such

prestigious Ambizione program. The project, titled The Dose

as with Umeå University in Sweden to work on the Emotions

and the Poison. Measure, Govern, and Face Industrial Toxicity

in Engineering Education project. Under this project, scientists

in the 20th century, will use historical archives to study the

will carry out a systematic review of the literature on emotions

measurement, control and criticism of industrial pollution in

in engineering education. Another partnership relates

the 20th century. Specifically, Elsig will investigate the regulation

to UniAnalytics, an SNSF-funded project to develop analytical

of three pollutants that shaped Switzerland’s secondary sector:

programs for the learning process, enabling stakeholders

mercury, a heavy metal; fluorine, a chemical element; and

to adopt more effective educational methods.

polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB), a persistent pollutant of organic matter. His research will examine Switzerland’s chlorine,

UNIL-EPFL GameLab

petrochemical, aluminum and electrotechnical industries, as

Originally launched as UNIL GameLab in 2016, this initiative

well as efforts to standardize and control these substances on

became the UNIL-EPFL GameLab in 2020 – a change that

a global scale. Elsig will also look at the impacts that industrial

highlights the close ties being forged between video-game

pollutants have on workers and communities, as their effects

researchers at EPFL (CDH) and UNIL (Faculty of Arts).

may persist long after the toxic compounds are banned.

Research at UNIL-EPFL GameLab studies the relationships among film and game studies, the history of video games in Switzerland, video-game archiving (in collaboration with Musée Bolo), the application of digital humanities methods to the study of video games, and the long tradition of using

46


RESEARCH

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

CROSS PROGRAM Our Collaborative Research on Science and Society (CROSS) program facilitates interdisciplinary projects that address pressing societal and technological issues and that are carried out jointly by researchers at EPFL and UNIL. Through an annual call for projects, CROSS provides competitive grants to support the preparatory phase of new research endeavors with a view to obtaining major funding.

2020 CROSS topic: Mobility

all of them examine the impacts and implications of mobility,

The 2020 CROSS Program focused on the topic of Mobility.

whether from a social, cultural, data management

20 applications were received and six were selected, resulting

or technological perspective.

in a total of CHF 356,931 being awarded as grants. The six winning projects were chosen and announced in April;

Cross project 2020: From Route Cantonale to Passage Paysage: Threading Zero Impact Mobilities in Swiss Metropolitan Areas through Landscape Architecture. D. Dietz and L. Garc.a de Jalon, ALICE IA ENAC (EPFL); P. Rerat, IGD FGSE (UNIL)

47


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

RESEARCH

SELECTED PROJECTS •

Swiss Architects in Saint Petersburg: Technology

From Route Cantonale to Passage Paysage:

Transfer and Culture Shift

Threading Zero Impact Mobilities in Swiss

N. Braghieri and F. Cattapan from IA LAPIS ENAC

Metropolitan Areas through Landscape

(EPFL); E. Simonato and N. Bichurina from SLAS FL

Infrastructure

(UNIL)

D. Dietz and L. García de Jalon from ALICE IA ENAC (EPFL); P. Rerat from IGD FGSE (UNIL)

Swiss in Motion: Analyzing and Visualizing Daily Rhythms

Framing Analysis of Online Discourse

F. Kaplan and N. Hamel from DHLAB DHI CDH (EPFL);

of Returning Foreign Fighters and their Families

P. Rerat and Y. Dubois from IGD FGSE (UNIL); G. Drevon

K. Aberer and T. Elmas from LSIR IC (EPFL);

and V. Kaufmann from ENAC IA LASUR (EPFL)

D. Anke Tresch from GREC ISS (UNIL); M. Reveilhac from LINES ISS (UNIL)

Digital Trail Blazing: Understanding and Remaking Intellectual Mobility on Online Research Platforms

Models of Musician Mobility and Migrating

J. Baudry and S. Dumas Primbault from LHST DHI CDH

Musical Patterns

(EPFL); J-F. Bert from IHAR FTSR (UNIL)

M. Neuwirth and J. Hentschel from DCML DHI CDH (EPFL); M. Piotrowski and D. Picca from SLI FL (UNIL)

Cross project 2020: Swiss in Motion: Analyzing and Visualizing Daily Rhythms. F. Kaplan and N. Hamel, DHLAB DHI CDH (EPFL); P. Rerat and Y. Dubois, IGD FGSE (UNIL); G. Drevon and V. Kaufmann, ENAC IA LASUR (EPFL)

48


RESEARCH

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

CROSS research linked to the COVID-19 pandemic Robert West and Andreas Spitz from EPFL’s School of Computer and Communication Sciences, along with Ahmad Abu-Akel from UNIL’s Institute of Psychology, carried out a social-sciences survey in April 2020 in order to better understand popular support for social-distancing measures. The survey built on their 2019 CROSS research on resistance. Their findings resulted in various publications which concluded that scientific experts and governments should not underestimate their power to inform and persuade in times of crisis, and which underscored the importance of selecting the most effective spokespeople for delivering messages about pandemic prevention.

iStock image, credit : microgen

49


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

RESEARCH

CDH VISITING PROFESSORS Through our visiting professor program, we forge ties with international scholars working in digital humanities research and education and in other interdisciplinary fields that combine engineering and the social sciences. Through the program, CDH labs and research institutes invite visiting professors and guest lecturers to EPFL, helping to expand and enhance our various activities, establish new partnerships and supplement the other hosting initiatives carried out by CDH faculty.

First visiting professor In April 2020, eM+ announced that renowned new-media artist Jeffrey Shaw had been granted a CDH visiting professorship, which has been extended into 2021. Shaw’s primary research topic is presence, or telepresence: the representation of the self in virtual environments. During his visiting professorship, Shaw received the prestigious 2020 Distinguished Artist Award for Lifetime Achievement in Digital Art from ACM SIGGRAPH, the International Association for Computing Machinery's Special Interest Group on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques.

50

Jeffrey Shaw created the very first work of augmented reality in 1981. It was reconstructed for his recent retrospective exhibition WYIWYG at the Osage Gallery in Hong Kong and henceforth belongs to the permanent collection of the ZKM Center for Art and Media in Karlsruhe, Germany. Photo: all rights reserved


RESEARCH

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

FAC U LT Y D E PA R T U R E S AND APPOINTMENTS

Prof. Eric Hoesli Photo : Alain Herzog, EPFL

Frédéric Kaplan

Eric Hoesli

In October 2020, CDH Prof. Frédéric Kaplan, head of the

Prof. Eric Hoesli retired at the end of September 2020,

Laboratory for Digital Humanities (DHLab), was named director

stepping down from his role as a teacher and head of the

of the Digital Humanities Institute (DHI). Kaplan replaced

STAS-Russia minor program introduced in 2016. We would

outgoing director Prof. Sabine Süsstrunk, who held the position

like to thank him for his creativity in helping to develop

since the DHI was established in 2015.

this program, his contribution to its success, his expertise, his unfailing support for his students and his commitment

Florence Graezer Bideau

to satisfying their thirst for real-world experience in the Arctic.

In 2020, IAGS senior scientist Florence Graezer Bideau also became a senior scientist affiliated with the architecture section

Sabine Süsstrunk

of EPFL’s School of Architecture, Civil and Environmental

On 30 September 2020, Prof. Sabine Süsstrunk resigned

Engineering (ENAC).

from the post of director of the DHI to take on her new role as president of the Swiss Science Council, a position to which she was elected by the Swiss Federal Council.

51


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

RESEARCH

GRANTS AND RESEARCH PROJECTS IN 2020 DHI Project Title

Principal Investigator(s)

Funding

Wanderful Music a Systematic Investigation into Music-Induced Mind Wandering

Steffen A. Herff

SNSF

Digitizing the Dualism Debate: A Case Study In The Computational Analysis of Historical Music Theory Sources

Fabien Moss

CROSS

Models of Musician Mobility and Migrating Musical Patterns

Markus Neuwirth

CROSS

From Bach to the Beatles: Exploring Compositional Building Blocks and Style Change with Hermeneutic and Computational Methods

Markus Neuwirth

VolkswagenStiftung

PMSB - Principles of Muscial Structure Building: Theory, Computation and Cognition

Martin Rohrmeier

European Research Council (ERC)

Distant Listening - The Development of Harmony over Three Centuries (1700-2000)

Martin Rohrmeier

SNSF

Time Machine

Frédéric Kaplan

H2020 – CSA

Impresso Media Monitoring of the Past

Frédéric Kaplan, Maud Ehrmann

SNSF

ScanVan: A Distributed 3D Digitization Platform for Cities

Frédéric Kaplan

SNSF

Parcels of Venice

Frédéric Kaplan, Isabella di Lenardo

SNSF

Collaboration Swiss Cadastre

Frédéric Kaplan

Research contract with Swiss Cadastre

Swiss in Motion: Analyzing and Visualizing Daily Rhythms

Frédéric Kaplan, Patrick Rérat

CROSS

Knotted Curves: A History of Graphical Features, Patterns and Analogues

Ion Mihailescu

LHST

Paper Minds: A Material History of Scholarly Work through the Working Papers of Viviani and Leibniz, ca. 1650-1700

Simon Dumas Primbault

CROSS

Figuring (Out) Technology: A History of Technical Drawing in England, ca. 1750-1850

Yohann Guffroy

LHST

Quill-and-Paper Algorithmic: A Material Archaeology of Computational Thinking from Leibniz Onwards

Simon Dumas Primbault

LHST

Digital Trail Blazing: Understanding and Remaking Intellectual Mobility on Online Research Platforms

Jérôme Baudry, Simon Dumas Primbault, Jean-François Bert

CROSS

Querying the Digital Archive of Science: Distant Reading, Semantic Modeling and Representation of Knowledge

Alina Volynskaya

SNSF

SAVOIRS

Jérôme Baudry, Simon Dumas Primbault

EHESS, ENSSIB, BNU Strasbourg, UNIL, LHST

52


RESEARCH

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

Heroes of Science: The Making of Scientific Glory

Jérôme Baudry, Simon Dumas Primbault

LHST

Interconnected Cropscapes: Antagonism and Complementarity in Conservation and Breeding

Marianna Fenzi

Future Food Initiative

Inventing Intellectual Property

Jérôme Baudry

LHST

Rethinking Science and Public Participation

Bruno J. Strasser

SNSF, University of Geneva

Cultural Sensorium: An Indigenous Ethnography of the Senses

Sarah Kenderdine, Jennifer Biddle

Australian Research Council

Muse: The Voice of the Visitor

Sarah Kenderdine

Engagement Migros

Atlas of Maritime Buddhism: Transforming Visualisation in Museums: Deep Mapping for Narrative Coherence

Sarah Kenerdine, Lewis Lancaster, Jeffrey Shaw

Australian Research Council

Digital Lyric: Beyond the Book

Antonio Rodrigues, Sarah Kenderdine

SNSF

Immersive Environment for Cosmological Big Data

Jean-Paul Kneib, Sarah Kenderdine

Interdiciplinary Seed Fund

Winter at Tantora Festival in Al Ula

Sarah Kenderdine

RCU

Squatty Project for the JOJ 2020

Sarah Kenderdine, Florian le Formal, Laurent D’Andrès, David Bourgit

EPFL

AI4Media: A European Excellence Centre for Media, Society and Democracy

Daniel Gatica-Perez

H2020

ICARUS: Innovative Approach for Urban Security

Daniel Gatica-Perez

H2020

WeNet: The Internet of Us

Daniel Gatica-Perez

H2020

Characterizing Youth Nightlife Spaces, Activities and Drinks

Daniel Gatica-Perez, Emmanuel Kuntsche

SNSF

HealthVlogging: Social Media Culture and Health-related Practices by YouTubers

Maria del Rio Carral, Daniel Gatica-Perez

SNSF

Automatic Analysis of Verbal and Nonverbal Behavior and Provision of Feedback in Video Selection Interviews

Adrian Bangerter Daniel Gatica-Perez, Marianne Schmid

SNSF

Trust over Time

Nicolas Henchoz, Daniel Gatica-Perez

Initiative for Media Innovation (IMI)

The Metrics of Online Dating: A Sociology of Algorithmic Matching

Jessica Pidoux

SNSF


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

RESEARCH

IAGS Project Title

Principal Investigator(s)

Funding

Uses of Cultural Heritage at the Beijing Winter Olympic Games of 2022

Florence Graezer Bideau, Thierry Theurillat

SNSF

Carrying Time. City and Memory in a UNESCO Site

Florence Graezer Bideau, Filippo de Pieri

SNSF

Makerspaces: Politics and Communities of Innovation in Contemporary China

Florence Graezer Bideau

SNSF

Hybrid Cities: Informal Resistances to the Violence of Urbanization in China, India and Venezuela

Yves Pedrazzini, Florence Graezer Bideau

SNSF

Transition Towards Urban Sustainability through Socially Integrative Cities in the EU and in China

Bernhard Mueller, Florence Graezer Bideau

H2020

Metare app: Appropriating Digital Technologies for Tikuna Language Revitalisation in the Colombian Amazon

Johanna Gonçalves Martin

CODEV - EPFL

Open-ended Project Design Companion

Marius Aeberli, Marc Laperrouza

EPFL - DRIL

China Hardware Innovation Camp (CHIC)

Marc Laperrouza, Marius Aeberli

EPFL - MAKE

Lausanne Time Machine

Isabella di Lenardo, Béla Kapossy

UNIL - EPFL

54


RESEARCH

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

OTHER Project Title

Principal Investigator(s)

Funding

Video Game Study

Loïse Bilat, David Javet, Selim Krichane, Isaac Pante, Yannick Rochat

EPFL (CDH), UNIL (Lettres)

Uni Analytics: What, How, and Why Do Different Educational Stakeholders Use Learning Analytics in Higher Education?

Pierre Dillenbourg, Roland Tormey, Francisco Pinto, Patrick Jermann

SNSF

Supporting Responsible Computational Problem Solving across Domains

Patrick Jermann, Roland Tormey, Jessica Dehler Zufferey, Denis Gillet, Gerd Kortemeyer, Adrian Holzer

swissuniversities under P8

Swiss Corona Citizen Science

Vincent Kaufmann, Daniel Gatica-Perez, Claudia Binder, Marie Santiago Delafosse

EPFL

LOIS: Leveraging On-device Smartphone Inference to Address Resistance to Participate in Social Surveys.

Caroline Roberts, Daniel Gatica-Perez, Jessica Herzing

CROSS

The Dose and the Poison: Measure, Govern and Face Industrial Toxicity in the 20th Century

Alexandre Elsig

SNSF Ambizione

55


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

RESEARCH

P U B L I C AT I O N S AND LIBRARY SERVICES EPFL’s liaison librarian for CDH, Jacqueline Despond, and

contracts, publication models, data and code publication

her staff provided ongoing support to lecturers, students

(including licenses), reuse of material, ORCID profiles,

and researchers in 2020 on issues related to copyrights and

data management plans and more.

1,596

Total publications in Infoscience by end 2020

146

1,174

IAGS

SHS (incl. students projects)

276 DHI

42

New publication entries in Infoscience in 2020

298

15

people trained (Bachelor’s, Master’s and PhD students, lecturers, and researchers)

training sessions (representing a total of 17 hours)

15,000

32

annual budget for purchasing books (CHF)

new electronic titles

1 Global Issues video published on YouTube and watched by 250 people between March and May 2020

3 Golden Open Access publications received financial support from the EPFL Library (one in Nature and two in Cogitatio)

56

202 new printed volumes

1 Zoom Q&A session with 25 students



Public outreach


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

ARTLAB/EPFL PAVILIONS ArtLab rebranded as EPFL Pavilions 2020 Exhibitions Events and partnerships Upcoming exhibitions

CDH-CULTURE 2020 events Daily free-ticket giveaways Artwork displayed on the EPFL campus

ARTIST IN RESIDENCE PROGRAM The program 2020 artists in residence 2019 artist in residence exhibition

2020 HIGHLIGHTS CHIC program students develop a connected device Lecture series on the digital humanities Interviews with researchers on the effects of 2020 lockdown

59


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

PUBLIC OUTREACH

CDH serves as a natural bridge between culture, art and campus life on one hand, and teaching, research and technological innovation on the other. We also play an important role in spurring public debate on key current issues. Our public outreach initiatives are spearheaded mainly by ArtLab/ EPFL Pavilions, CDH-Culture and our artist in residence program. Many of the exhibitions and events we had planned in 2020 had to be postponed or canceled due to the pandemic-related restrictions, although we were able to present some of our work to the general public. More specifically, ArtLab/EPFL Pavilions held three exhibitions and four open-air cinema nights and contributed to several online events, while CDH-Culture held four events that attracted a large audience, put on an exhibition exploring the architecture of utopian futuristic cities and installed a nine-meter-high sculpture at the Rolex Learning Center. At CDH, we also published a series of video interviews where EPFL researchers discuss how the lockdown has affected their work and teaching. Our 2020 artists in residence – Melissa Dubbin and Aaron S. Davidson – were able to collaborate remotely with EPFL’s Biorobotics Laboratory and display the results of their work. However, the exhibition showcasing the work of our 2019 artist in residence, Nora Al-Badri, had to be postponed several times and is now scheduled to open in March 2021. 60


PUBLIC OUTREACH

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

ARTLAB/EPFL PAV I L I O N S 2020 was punctuated by major events such as ArtLab’s participation in the World Economic Forum and preparations for the new EPFL Pavilions brand launch.

Despite the pandemic and Pavilion B being closed for eight

ArtLab rebranded as EPFL Pavilions

months, ArtLab/EPFL Pavilions had the honor of hosting three

We rebranded ArtLab in 2020 in order to align our exhibition

exhibitions in 2020: Infinity Room 2, which was to be extended;

center more closely with the EPFL brand, to link its name with

Hope, the Prix Pictet exhibition that was held on schedule,

the pavilions in the Kengo Kuma building, and to underscore

providing a glimmer of hope that things will soon return to

the image of EPFL Pavilions as an open space for experimental

normal; and Nature of Robotics, an Expanded Field, which

art and science and cutting-edge dialogue. In addition to

opened at the end of the year, after being postponed three

changing the center’s name, we undertook an entire rebranding

times. This latter exhibition was open for only a few days in

process to reposition the EPFL Pavilions identity. The process

2020 but should go on display again in March 2021, in line

included designing a fresh logo, creating new building signage

with the planned reopening of cantonal museums.

and revamping the website – all with the goal of bringing

View of the exhibition Nature of Robotics: An Expanded Field EPFL Pavilions, Pavilion B Photo : Alain Herzog

EPFL art and science into focus. The new brand identity was developed by Knoth & Renner, a German agency whose bid was selected out of the six agencies invited to participate in our request for proposals.

61


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

PUBLIC OUTREACH

2020 Exhibitions •

Infinity Room 2

Infinity Room 2 exhibition EPFL Pavilions, Pavilion B Archival Constellations - Jazz Luminaries Full dome eM+ Photo: Catherine Leutenegger

13 September 2019 to 29 March 2020 Based on collected archives, documents and assemblages, Infinity Room 2 delved into EPFL’s rich history through eight exhibits: Open Science, Archives de la Construction Moderne, Alain Herzog Archive, Campus Chronicles, Constellations Archives, Super-vision, Balélec Nights and Shadows of Drones. The exhibition also explored

Hope, the 2020 Prix Pictet exhibition

the various ways in which institutional archives can evolve

4 September to 4 October 2020

and examined the history of archival creation. Infinity

At the start of the 2020–2021 school year, ArtLab/EPFL

Room 2 was designed as a modern-day “cabinet of

Pavilions hosted the Prix Pictet exhibition for the second

curiosities,” drawing on augmented reality, virtual reality,

time. This time the exhibition was a traveling one titled

visualization, interactivity and machine learning technology

Hope, which opened at the Victoria and Albert Museum

developed at over 50 EPFL labs.

in London and was showed in Tokyo, Zurich and Moscow before going on display at ArtLab/EPFL Pavilions here in Lausanne. Hope features the work of the 12 finalists of the 2019 Prix Pictet, who were selected from the over 600 artists who applied. Their images reveal moments of triumph in the face of adversity and the accomplishments of all those who are working to preserve the environment. A true testament to how an optimistic attitude can spur change.

62


PUBLIC OUTREACH

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

Nature of Robotics, an Expanded Field 11 December 2020 to 25 April 2021 This exhibition walks visitors through emerging perspectives and future scenarios related to the field of robotics. The premise is to give visitors an unconventional look into this rapidly expanding field, by bringing together works of art and research prototypes developed right here in EPFL labs. Nature of Robotics aims to broaden visitors’ comprehension of this continuously evolving field, which can be achieved only at the confluence of science and art. The modular, reconfigurable, flexible, micro- and bio-robots on display reflect just a few of the emerging technologies coming out of today’s labs.

Sarah Kenderdine, director of EPFL Pavilions and Giulia Bini, curator Nature of Robotics: An Expanded Field EPFL Pavilions, Pavilion B Installation : Katja Novitskova, Pattern of Activation (Mamaroo nursery, dawn chorus), 2017 Courtesy : the artist and Kraupa-Tuskany Zeidler, Berlin. Photo: Alain Herzog

View of the exhibition Prix Pictet 2019 - Hope EPFL Pavilions, Pavilion B Photo: Alain Herzog

63


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

PUBLIC OUTREACH

Events and partnerships

Several one-of-a-kind events were held in person

ArtLab/EPFL Pavilions strengthened its digital presence in 2020

Four open-air film screenings were put together as part of the

through the introduction of virtual tours for each of the three

Geneva International Film Festival, and the “Be Ariel F” evening

exhibitions mentioned above.

of theater was held live and broadcast from Théâtre de Vidy.

We also supported various initiatives by the EPFL community to explore the different facets of digital culture. Examples include the Curve Festival run by EPFL students, the PIC (Programme d’Innovations Culturelles) initiative, and the ScienceCommHack hackathon held in association with CERN.

Open-air cinema, EPFL Pavilions – EPFL Esplanade Photo: Alain Herzog

64


PUBLIC OUTREACH

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

Upcoming exhibitions Babylonian Vision – ‫الرؤية البابلية‬ 9 March to 21 March, 2021 2019 Artist-in-Residence Showcase: Nora Al-Badri Watt is Art 26 March to 25 April, 2021 Photovoltaic Art Exhibition Asclepios 3 May to 25 May, 2021 A do-it-yourself space mission designed and run by EPFL students Technorama 14 June to 4 July, 2021 Exhibition of the Winterthur museum’s showcase for 2021. A special opening ceremony will be held on 11 June with EPFL President Martin Vetterli. Deep Fakes 16 September 2021 to 6 February, 2022 While the political uses of fake news to manipulate and mislead are making headlines worldwide, another kind of “fake” has arisen that combines advanced computational photography with computer graphics and art. In the world of cultural heritage, the term “deep fake” has taken on an entirely different meaning – one that invokes unparalleled intimacy with objects of art and architecture while at the same time challenging authority and yielding new democratic modes of access.

More information about EPFL Pavilions’ upcoming exhibitions and the people making them possible is available in the EPFL Pavilions 2020 Annual Report.

65


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

PUBLIC OUTREACH

C D H - C U LT U R E Our CDH-Culture schedule was disrupted in 2020, as many events were postponed or canceled. However, our staff members were able to host many inspiring moments – whether artistic, cultural or intellectual – as well as creative endeavors and fruitful meetings. Thanks to their ingenuity, patience, perseverance and agility, our team successfully put together around a dozen events and exhibits in the public spaces on the Lausanne campus, with displays of music, dance, the performing arts, modern art and science fiction. Some of the events and exhibits were created by our teachers and students, others by young or established artists. But they were all designed to evoke key societal issues and stimulate different forms of thinking and creativity.

2 & 12 March Sensory exploration How would you experience the places you visit on a daily basis if you were stripped of your eyesight? In this exhibition, members of the EPFL community took a physical and sensory journey through the Rolex Learning Center, guided by dancers from the Utilité Publique dance company led by Corinne Rochet and Nicholas Pettit. These journeys, which opened visitors’ eyes and minds, had to be canceled upon Switzerland’s first lockdown.

2020 events 12–19 February Soundpainting Constance Frei, a musicologist, worked in association with Le Musical EPFL to organize a Soundpainting workshop given by Walter Thompson, the man who invented this live-composition artform. Around a dozen students took part in the workshop and put on two public events at ArtLab/ EPFL Pavilion A: one was a cinema screening with live music, and the other a musical performance.

Sensory wanderings through Rolex Learning Center Photo : Virginie Martin Nunez

Ceremony for the exhibition Quand la ville du futur se rêvait utopique (When the city of the future was a utopian dream) at Rolex Learning Center Photo : Virginie Martin Nunez

66


PUBLIC OUTREACH

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

29 September Utopia/Dystopia Can images be used to convey abstract concepts like utopia and dystopia? Students in the Artistic Practices A class, given by Frank Westermeyer and Aurélie Pétrel as part of the SHS program, took photographs addressing this question and presented them at an evening event held at ArtLab/EPFL Pavilion A. The presentation was followed by a talk by author and geographer André Ourednik, along with an animated discussion on the utopian visions that animate our imagination and our society.

7–8 October 9 September–14 December

Sevelin moves to EPFL #2

A Utopian Vision of Futuristic Cities

This exhibition spiced up lunch breaks at EPFL. It consisted of

This exhibition, held at the Rolex Learning Center, was

two dance performances: one by Joachim Ciocca on a unicycle,

developed in association with Marc Atallah, the director

and the other by Mélissa Guex and Charlotte Vuissoz. The

of the La Maison d’Ailleurs science-fiction museum in

short performances, which were given in ArtLab/EPFL Pavilion

Yverdon-Les-Bains. Using a collection of science-fiction

A, combined elements of krumping, circus acts, modern dance

posters and other graphic art forms, it explores how utopian

and improvisation for a fresh, surprising, bold and lively show.

urban architecture was portrayed in the first half of the 20th century.

24 September 2020–30 May 2021 Up#4 This sculpture was designed by a pair of world-renowned, Bern-based artists – Lang/Baumann – specifically for one of the Rolex Learning Center’s patios. It consists of a 9.2-meter-high, white-lacquered tubular structure made of steel and bent into an elongated “U” shape. Poised delicately between balance and imbalance, Up#4 creates a dialogue with the Center’s curved architectural forms.

The sculpture Up#4 from the pair of Swiss artists Lang/Baumann Photo : Virginie Martin Nunez

Sévelin moves to EPFL #2, Insaisissable (elusive) by Joachim Ciocca Photo : Joël Curty

67


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

PUBLIC OUTREACH

Daily free-ticket giveaways The pandemic drastically reduced the number of events and performances listed on our online agenda, offres-culturelles.epfl.ch. We were able to give away just a few hundred tickets to EPFL students and staff during the brief periods when cultural events could be held. Fortunately, the 70-odd cultural institutions we have been working with on this free-ticket initiative for several years now are eager to pick it back up as soon as possible.

Artwork displayed on the EPFL campus Our CDH-Culture staff members seek to promote the 19 artworks permanently displayed on the Lausanne campus. In 2020, they filmed seven videos describing the stories behind some of these creations. They had to use drones to film sections of the first five sculptures built on our campus back in the early 1980s, due to those sculptures’ large size. Two other sculptures – by Marcel Poncet and Hans Aeschbacher – are on loan from the Swiss federal government and were recently installed at EPFL; they were filmed during the first lockdown. This initiative lets our community enjoy EPFL’s artworks, even from home.

Jocky 27 (1979), André Nallet. Height: 27 meters, location : Av. Piccard. Photo by drone: Jean-Christophe Hugli Videos of the works of art on campus are available on the EPFL CDH YouTube channel.

68


PUBLIC OUTREACH

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

ARTIST IN RESIDENCE PROGRAM The Program

2019 artist in residence exhibition

Our artist in residence program, introduced in 2019, invites

Nora Al-Badri

artists to spend three to twelve months at CDH working with

Babylonian Vision – ‫الرؤية البابلية‬

EPFL labs, students and researchers. The goal is to promote

Neuronal Ancestral Sculptures Series

research in the arts by forging ties among the arts, the

Nora Al-Badri, our 2019 artist in residence, created this

humanities, science and technology.

exhibition during her term at EPFL, which was extended until the end of 2020. The exhibition opening was planned for

The artists are selected by a committee, and their work is

November 2020 but had to be pushed back to 2021 as a result

coordinated by ArtLab/EPFL Pavilions, the artistic creation

of the pandemic-related closure of ArtLab/EPFL Pavilions.

and exhibition center they will mainly collaborate with. Under this approach, the artists’ work culminates in an exhibition

Al-Badri worked with three EPFL machine-learning students –

or artistic performance showcasing the synergies that can

Melika Behjati, Negar Foroutan and Kyle Matoba – to develop

be achieved between art and science.

her work. Together they activated neural networks based on general adversarial networks (GAN) technology and trained

2020 artists in residence

them on 10,000 digital images from five museum collections

Melissa Dubbin and Aaron S. Davidson

of Mesopotamian, Neo-Sumerian and Assyrian artefacts. The

Dubbin and Davidson are interdisciplinary artists based in

collections are housed at institutions including the Metropolitan

Brooklyn, New York, and Northern California. Their work has

Museum of Art in New York City and the Cleveland Museum

been described as addressing processes of transmission

and were accessed through the institutions’ open API.

and reception, interference and transference, often seeking

The images had time and memory etched in them through

to materialize immaterial or ephemeral states of matter.

artefactual patinas such as shards and flakes. Al-Badri and her team entered inchoate inputs into the GAN algorithm

In 2020, they collaborated remotely with EPFL’s Biorobotics

to generate original, synthetic images.

Laboratory, headed by Prof. Auke Ijspeert. This partnership enriched Dubbin and Davidson’s knowledge in the field of soft robotics, leading to the creation of Delay Lines, (feedback) – a structure created for the Nature of Robotics: An Expanded Field exhibition shown at ArtLab/EPFL Pavilions in late 2020.

69


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

PUBLIC OUTREACH

2020 HIGHLIGHTS Below are highlights of our activities in 2020 in each of our three core missions: teaching, research and public outreach.

Check-y

member Maëlick Brochut says: “The process of conducting

CHIC program students develop a connected device

interviews and speaking directly with the people who are

In this project, carried out as part of the China Hardware

affected by this issue was essential. I would definitely follow

Innovation Camp (CHIC), an interdisciplinary group of five

that approach again if I had the opportunity to develop a new

students overcame the challenges of the pandemic

product in the future.”

to implement a socially conscious design process. Their work underscores the importance of interdisciplinary

The Shockey team members:

research to the fluid creative process promoted by CHIC.

Diane Marquette (EPFL)

Diane Marquette, one of the students on the project, explains:

Taavet Kangur (EPFL)

“What really stood out for me was how much flexibility we

Maëlick Brochut (EPFL)

had.” The team – which dubbed themselves the “Shockeys” –

Marine Fondin (ECAL)

pooled their skills to create an app-enabled headband

Nicolas Mauroux (UNIL)

called “Check-y” to measure the magnitude of head impacts in high-contact sports such as hockey. The headband was designed and tested through several rounds of feedback from athletes, parents and coaches. Early interviews with these users helped the students identify concussion-detection as a “big need” and enabled them to continue developing their system despite the pandemicinduced constraints. Taavet Kangur, another Shockey member, says: “We spent the lockdown crammed up at home. I had to turn my kitchen into a makerspace with a 3D printer and a soldering iron.” User tests performed during the CHIC summer-school session helped the team regain momentum coming out of lockdown. All the students involved learned important methods for community engagement that they will take with them throughout their careers. Shockey

Team meeting before pitching for the first milestone. Photo : Taavet Kangur

Talk by Prof. Gerhard Lauer, University of Basel: Reading with machines. Reading and writing in the digital age.

70


PUBLIC OUTREACH

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

DH Research Seminar

The 2020 speakers covered a large palette of topics,

A lecture series on the digital humanities

from literature and music to video games, such as:

The DH Research Seminar is a lecture series run by the Digital Humanities Institute (DHI). It includes talks by researchers in

Looking Beyond the Staff Lines and Listening Behind

a wide range of fields and backgrounds from both Switzerland

the Sound: Novel Applications of Two Old-Fashioned

and abroad. The goal is to present the vast array of subjects

Paradigms to the Analysis of Musical Harmony

covered in the field of digital humanities. The lectures all

Dr. Thomas Noll, Catalonia College of Music, Spain

include Q&A sessions at the end to facilitate open discussion among researchers and students.

Reading with Machines: Reading and Writing in the Digital Age

Several talks had to be canceled in the spring of 2020 as

Prof. Gerhard Lauer, University of Basel

a result of the pandemic, but the series picked up again in the fall with online presentations given to enthusiastic

participants. Giving talks online does have some advantages,

From Digital Humanities to Game Studies Dr. Yannick Rochat, UNIL & EPFL

such as letting people from around the world participate. •

Quantitative Approaches to Historical Texts: Should You Care about OCR? Dr. Simon Hengchen, University of Helsinki, Finland

• →

Videos of the DH Research Seminar talks can be viewed online at dhi.epfl.ch.

71


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

PUBLIC OUTREACH

COVID-19 – What’s Changed

Researchers interviewed:

Interviews with EPFL researchers on how Switzerland’s

Anna Fontcuberta i Morral

first lockdown affected their work

Simon Dumas Primbault

CDH journalist Anne Laure Gannac interviewed EPFL professors

Marie-Valentine Florin

and PhD students in April and May 2020 – right in the middle

Vincent Kaufmann

of the first lockdown – about the changes they had to make

Melanie Blokesch

to their research and teaching.

Roland Tormey

Blagovesta Pirelli

What she found offers comprehensive insight into the effects

Michael Herzog

that an almost complete lack of face-to-face discussion,

Anne-Laure Mahul-Mellier

a slowdown in business activity and an intense, weeks-long

Francesco Stellacci

media focus on one particular subject can have on

Magalí Lingenfelder

the scientific community.

Dominique Foray

Wendy Lee Queen

Solomzi Makohliso

• →

Gannac’s videos are available

The questions Gannac asked were: •

How has the lockdown affected your subject of research or teaching?

What will this experience change in your area of research?

How did you use digital technology in your work before the pandemic hit, and afterwards?

Which of this technology do you plan to keep using after the pandemic is over?

72

on CDH’s YouTube channel.



Finances and personnel


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

EXPENSES Full-year expenditure by sector and funding source Expenditure of third-party funding by funding source

HUMAN RESOURCES Staff distribution by category Staff distribution by funding source Staff distribution by gender Staff numbers

75


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

FINANCES AND PERSONNEL

EXPENSES

FULL-YEAR EXPENDITURE BY SECTOR AND FUNDING SOURCE (IN CHF)

2,009,523

70%

60%

5,656,127

50%

40%

30%

1,651,538

20%

1,627,130

10%

382,393

0

4% 17%

61%

9,317,188

18%

Internal salaries (EPFL)

76

Internal operating costs (EPFL)

External salaries (third-party funding)

External operating costs (third-party funding)


FINANCES AND PERSONNEL

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

EXPENDITURE OF THIRD-PARTY FUNDING BY FUNDING SOURCE (21% OF TOTAL EXPENDITURES IN CHF) 70%

60%

50%

40%

832,796

734,347

30%

380,569

20%

10%

61,812

0

3% 41%

19%

2,009,523

37%

SNSF

Private and non-profit foundations

H2020

Various

77


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

FINANCES AND PERSONNEL

HUMAN RESOURCES On December 2020 we bid farewell to Eliane Gesseney-Laeri, the Human Resources Manager for the CDH, who held the position since 1 July 2014 and was instrumental in CDH's advancement in recent years. She was replaced by François Jaccottet.

STAFF DISTRIBUTION BY CATEGORY

40

40 35 30

29

25 20 15 10

6

5 0

STAFF DISTRIBUTION (FTE) BY CATEGORY 40

33.6

35 30 25 20

20.3

15 10

5.8

5 0

Administrative and technical personnel

78

Academic personnel

Professors and Senior Scientists


FINANCES AND PERSONNEL

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

STAFF DISTRIBUTION BY FUNDING SOURCE Category

BY GENDER Internal funding

Third-party funding

Total

Women

Men

Total

Administrative and technical personnel

26

3

29

19

10

29

Academic personnel

25

15

40

17

23

40

Professors and Senior Scientists

6

0

6

2

4

6

TOTAL

57

18

75

38

37

75

STAFF DISTRIBUTION (FTE) BY FUNDING SOURCE Category

BY GENDER (FTE) Internal funding

Third-party funding

Total

Women

Men

Total

Administrative and technical personnel

18.1

2.2

20.3

13.1

7.2

20.3

Academic personnel

14.8

18.8

33.6

13.3

20.3

33.6

Professors and Senior Scientists

5.8

0

5.8

2

3.8

5.8

TOTAL

38.7

21.0

59.7

28.4

31.3

59.7

2016

2017

2018

2019

2020

Staff

33

58

52

74

75

Staff (FTE)

28.1

42.5

41.4

56.4

59.7

Share of women (FTE)

11.4

18.9

18.1

27.4

28.4

STAFF NUMBERS (2016-2020) Category

79


College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

INTERDISCIPLINARY COLLABORATION MAPS

INTERDIS CIPLINARY C O L L A B O R AT I O N M A P S CDH has around 70 researchers and project managers from a wide variety of academic backgrounds. They work with scientists and engineers both inside and outside EPFL to incorporate methods and approaches from other disciplines into their practice, further expanding the interdisciplinary nature of their endeavors.

We also give classes in the humanities and social sciences

This is depicted in the five interdisciplinary collaboration

to all EPFL students, across all schools and colleges, through

maps below, which provide an overview of how we bring

our SHS program. This program includes over 140 classes that

different fields of study together within the broader Swiss

students can chose from on topics ranging from anthropology

research ecosystem, based on the three divisions

and design to ethics, outsider art, history and mythology.

of the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF):

Interdisciplinary collaboration is the cornerstone of nearly

1.

Humanities and social sciences

everything we do at CDH, whether in our research, teaching

2.

Mathematics, natural sciences and engineering

or public outreach activities.

3.

Biology and medicine

80


Data visualization: Shin Alexandre Koseki, 2021

Each colored circle represents a research discipline according to the SNSF classification, and the size of the circle corresponds to how many projects involve that discipline. The lines between circles indicate how many times the two disciplines were involved in the same project. Map 1 shows that disciplines tend to associate more frequently with other disciplines in the same division, but also reveals the extent of interdisciplinary collaboration.

This map shows all the various disciplines involved in SNSF-funded research projects that started between 2017 and 2020.

The first map is intended to establish an overall framework based on data from the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF). The idea is to position our interdisciplinary approach within Switzerland’s current research ecosystem.

INTERDISCIPLINARY COLLABORATION MAPS College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

Fig. 1 SNSF interdisciplinary projects

81


82

Data visualization: Shin Alexandre Koseki, 2021

For example, it indicates that our staff members have developed targeted expertise in the humanities and social sciences, and that their work also extends to the SNSF’s two other divisions, and particularly to computer science and mathematics.

Map 2 uses the same discipline classification as above to show how our researchers and project managers are positioned within Switzerland’s current research ecosystem.

Our interdisciplinary approach includes the cross-disciplinary range of skills, background, knowledge and experience that our researchers and project managers have built up individually and bring to the work they do.

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020 INTERDISCIPLINARY COLLABORATION MAPS

Fig. 2 Interdisciplinary skills of individual CDH researchers and project managers


Data visualization: Shin Alexandre Koseki, 2021

In this map, the size of each circle corresponds to how often that discipline was involved in a joint initiative, and the lines between circles reflect how many times the two disciplines were involved in the same initiative.

It clearly indicates that such initiatives give our staff members an opportunity to broaden the disciplinary scope of their work, especially with regard to the SNSF’s two other divisions.

Map 3 shows which disciplines our staff members generally team up with to supplement their own expertise when working on joint research, teaching or public outreach initiatives.

Our interdisciplinary approach also encompasses the joint initiatives we carry out with other EPFL units as well as other institutions.

INTERDISCIPLINARY COLLABORATION MAPS College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

Fig. 3 Interdisciplinary collaboration by CDH researchers and project managers involved in joint initiatives

83


84

Data visualization: Shin Alexandre Koseki, 2021

This interdisciplinary education serves to enhance students’ understanding of the cultural and societal issues associated with their studies in science, engineering and architecture.

This map indicates that the humanities and social sciences are the starting point for most SHS program classes, but also that students’ education in these disciplines is enhanced with contributions from the natural sciences and engineering, as well as in the health and life sciences.

Map 4 shows how our interdisciplinary approach at CDH enhances the education received by all EPFL students.

Our SHS program gives EPFL students a further opportunity to develop their interdisciplinary skills.

College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020 INTERDISCIPLINARY COLLABORATION MAPS

Fig. 4 Interdisciplinary collaboration in the SHS program


Data visualization: Shin Alexandre Koseki, 2021

This map can be used to evaluate how the SNSF currently operates and to help us outline the main focus areas for CDH in the coming years.

Map 5 indicates that through our various activities, we form ties with an array of disciplines spanning most of the SNSF classification.

We also superimposed these three maps onto Map 1, which shows the various disciplines involved in SNSF-funded research projects that started between 2017 and 2020, in order to illustrate how our interdisciplinary approach fits into Switzerland’s current research ecosystem.

Interdisciplinary skills of individual CDH researchers and project managers Interdisciplinary collaboration in joint initiatives Interdisciplinary collaboration in the SHS program

Map 5 superimposes three of the maps discussed previously, in order to show how our various interdisciplinary forms fit together. The three maps are:

INTERDISCIPLINARY COLLABORATION MAPS College of Humanities - Annual Report 2020

Fig. 5 Interdisciplinary collaboration in CDH activities

85


PUBLISHER College of Humanities (CDH)

CONCEPT AND WRITING College of Humanities (CDH)

CONCEPT AND GRAPHIC DESIGN Oxyde

DATA VISUALIZATIONS Shin Alexandre Koseki

PHOTOGRAPHY College of Humanities (CDH) Alain Herzog Shutterstock iStock image

PHOTOLITHOGRAPHY A point nommé

TRANSLATION, PROOFREADING AND EDITING Christopher Scala and Sylvia Smith Philippe Barraud Marco Di Biase

PRINTING Repro - Centre d'impression EPFL Papier FSC © CDH, June 2021





MANAGEMENT Béla Kapossy, Dean Gabriela Tejada, Academic deputy

ADMINISTRATION AND FINANCES Nicole Aghroum, responsable administrative et financière

COMMUNICATIONS Virginie Martin Nunez, Communication manager Celia Luterbacher, Journalist

CDH-CULTURE Véronique Mauron Layaz, CDH-Culture manager

SHS PROGRAM Néjia Dahmouni Martin, SHS program coordinator Christine Farget, Administrative assistant, Global Issues program

INSTITUTE FOR AREA AND GLOBAL STUDIES (IAGS) Isabelle Hügli, Administrative assistant

DIGITAL HUMANITIES INSTITUTE (DHI) Kathleen Collins, Deputy of section Jocelyne Vassalli, Administrative assistant

EPFL PAVILIONS Anne-Gaëlle Lardeau, Manager Aurélie Nicoulaz, Administrative assistant

CONTACT CDH-EPFL Centre Midi CM 2 267 Station 10 CH-1015 Lausanne

@EPFLcdh cdh.epfl.ch


Turn static files into dynamic content formats.

Create a flipbook
Issuu converts static files into: digital portfolios, online yearbooks, online catalogs, digital photo albums and more. Sign up and create your flipbook.