CETH, electronic text centers, and the humanities communitiy

To a great extent the work of humanists and electronic text center librarians is at the forefront of realizing the potential of new media for research and instruction. It goes beyond how the library typically is viewed in the digital arena, which is providing access to digital content for information retrieval. The skills that electronic text center librarians have developed have much to offer other disciplines about the potential of the text for creative exploration and the overall development of the digital library. These include the understanding of interoperability, knowledge of standards, text markup and quality control, connection with users and disciplinary needs, technical skills for text creation and scanning and an understanding of the intrinsic qualities of the material to be studied. CETH and electronic text centers have helped to create a community of users by focussing attention on common goals and themes. These goals and themes now can be encompassed in a larger arena.