Competitive and strategic, “superclusters” are research clusters that receive additional seed money and logistical support from the DHI to fund a project that will engage a broader audience and serve as a springboard to a larger initiative.
In 2007-08 academic year, the Technoscience, Culture, and the Arts research cluster was selected as the first in this program; the resulting a one-day conference – “Beyond the Book” – sparked significant interest in raising the profile of digital humanities projects at UC Davis and led to the creation of DHI2 – the Digital Humanities Initiative at the Davis Humanities Institute.
In spring 2008-09, the Environmental Humanities research cluster held a one-day conference, “California, the University, and the Environment,” highlighting the many ways that university researchers, communities, campuses, and systems have helped physically and ideologically reshape the California environment into the complex political and cultural entity it is today.
In October 2009, the Estudios Culturales en las Américas research cluster hosted a three-day teleconference linking scholars at UC Davis to colleagues in Mexico, Brazil, and Peru.