The phrase “Human-in-the-loop” that we often hear in current debates in AI research, invites scholars to critically engage with the role of human actors in AI systems and place stronger focus on users, participants, and stakeholders – placing humans at the center of every phase of AI design and deployment, including human labor behind AI systems. This is a given for researchers in the humanities and social sciences, but this expression can also be critically approached in many ways.

With the theme Human(ities) in the Loop, we want to emphasize not only our disciplines’ long tradition of methods that do indeed put many different kinds of “humans” in the loop, but also the many loops that our disciplines study, before and beyond AI.

Above all, we invite examples and reflections on the role of the Humanities for understanding not only AI-related changes, but also transformations driven by digital perspectives, methods and practices, in particular how they impact and influence our everyday life, teaching and research practices.

We look forward to contributions showcasing examples, challenging our taken for granted assumptions in digital humanities, and developing approaches to advance our understanding of a fast-paced changing world.

Possible topics include, but are not limited to:

• Critical and ethical reflections on the development, applications and uses of digital and AI technologies
• Social, cultural and environmental sustainability perspectives on digitalization and digital transformation
• Interdisciplinary and/or experimental research, for instance in digital methods and computational approaches
• Artistic reflections, explorations and contributions involving technology
• GenAI disinformation and political participation
• Algorithmic transparency and the black boxing of machine learning
• Data capitalism, human labor, digital extractivism and decolonial perspectives
• AI, human heritage and memory

Developmental track for works-in-progress

This track is designed for scholars who wish to present ongoing projects and receive constructive input to help shape the next stages of their work. Each presentation in this track follows a 30-minute slot, consisting of up to 15 minutes for the presenter’s introduction to the topic and the aspects on which feedback is particularly sought, followed by up to 15 minutes of discussion (during which the presenter may also show additional material as needed). Sessions will be organized in smaller groups to foster in-depth, collegial, and supportive dialogue, while remaining compatible with the broader conference schedule. Submissions to the Works-in-Progress track are accepted as abstracts of 500-1000 words. When submitting to this track, authors should already in their submission clearly outline the aspects on which feedback is particularly sought.

Doctoral Consortium

DHNB 2027 renews the Doctoral Consortium track debuted at DHNB 2025 with the idea that doctoral students could present their ongoing studies and get mentored by more experienced scholars. This consortium will take place during the pre-conference events. To encourage young researchers to participate in the conference, DHNB will provide up to six bursaries to cover reasonable travel and accommodation costs (up to 500€) for participating in this event. You can apply for the bursary at the same time as submitting your proposal. Please spread the word among your colleagues, friends, and students! Submissions to the Doctoral Consortium track are accepted as abstracts of 500-1000 words.

Workshops and Tutorials

Workshops can take many forms, from community hacking sessions to thematically focused mini conferences attached to the main one, whose presentations are either pre-selected or sourced through separate calls for proposals solicited by the workshop coordinators. Tutorials on the other hand present tools, technologies, or practical exercises of interest to DH researchers. Workshops and tutorials may be proposed as either half-day (up to four hours) or full-day (up to eight hours) events. Submissions should be 1000-2000 words in length and include an introduction of the topic/idea of the workshop/tutorial and its importance, information on the intended target audience, as well as details about the expected outcome(s). Proposals for workshops and tutorials are evaluated in an expedited fashion by the Programme Committee to ensure their organizers have enough time themselves for e.g. separate workshop calls for papers.

General Track

This traditional conference track accepts proposals for long papers, short papers, posters, and demos, as well as panels. Between the proposal categories, the following conceptual divisions apply:

• Long papers:
  • Are expected to present mature research with a clear research question, theoretical framing, methodology, results, and discussion.
  • Will be presented for 20 minutes, followed by 10 minutes for Q&A
  • Can be submitted as either abstracts of 1000-1500 words excluding references or as full text papers of 8-16 pages excluding references
• Short papers:
  • May present preliminary results or innovative methods, but should still outline the research question, materials, and methodology in sufficient detail to allow evaluation.
  • Will be presented for 15 minutes, followed by 5 minutes for Q&A
  • Can be submitted as either abstracts of 500-1000 words excluding references or as full text papers of 4-8 pages excluding references
• Posters and demos:
  • Posters can either present small self-contained works, work-in-progress or be general project descriptions. Demos are interactive demonstrations of tools, services or techniques.
  • Will be presented in the conference poster session, prefixed by 1-minute lightning talks
  • Can be submitted as either abstracts of 250-500 words excluding references or as full text papers of 2-4 pages excluding references
• Panels are free-form proposals for pre-built, thematically coherent 60–120-minute slots within the general conference programme (typically consisting e.g. of multiple individual contributions and joint discussion).

All submissions to general track should be explicit in their scholarly contribution, regardless of the format and maturity of the research. Submitted proposals will undergo a single-blind peer-review process whereby the reviewers know the names/affiliations of the abstract authors and co-authors. Based on the reviews, authors may be asked to also make revisions before publication.

All full-text submissions must be formatted according to the DHNB PUB template, as they will be published in a citable conference proceedings collection  (https://journals.uio.no/dhnbpub/). The abstracts, on the other hand, will be gathered into a book of abstracts. After the conference, a separate call for post-proceedings will be issued, with its own deadlines for submissions, reviews and revisions, aimed primarily at publishing research that went into the conference as abstracts.

Submission Deadline: October 16, 2026
Conference Dates: March 1–5, 2027
Location: Umeå, Sweden

How to submit: All proposals must be submitted in English via the ConfTool conference management system by 16 October 2026. Link will be provided here in due course. (Please note: You need to create a new user, even if you have previously had a ConfTool account.