Previous Conferences

Check out the slides and recordings from previous Open and Engaged Conferences

Open and Engaged is an annual conference organised by the British Library during the International Open Access week. The inaugural conference took place in 2018 as an in-person only event. Since 2019 it has been run as either an online only or hybrid format. The slides and recordings of the previous conferences are available as a collection in the British Library’s Research Repository.

Open and Engaged Conference 2024

Empowering Communities to Thrive in Open Scholarship: Empowering Communities to Thrive in Open Scholarship centred leveraging the power of communities in the axis of open scholarship, open infrastructure, emerging technologies, collections as data, equity and integrity, skills development and sustainable models to elevate research of all kinds for the public good. We took a cross sectoral approach to the conference programme – unifying around shared-values for openness – by reflecting on practices within research libraries both in higher education and GLAM (Galleries, Libraries, Archives, Museums) sectors as well as the national and public libraries.

Open and Engaged Conference 2023

Community over Commercialisation: In line with this year’s #OAWeek theme - Community over Commercialisation addressed approaches and practices to open scholarship that prioritise the best interests of the public and the research community. The programme focused on community-governance, public-private collaborations, and community building aspects of the topic by keeping the public good in the heart of the talks. It underlined different priorities and approaches for Galleries-Libraries-Archives-Museums (GLAMs) and the cultural sector in the context of open access.

Open and Engaged Conference 2022

Climate Research in GLAM, Digital Infrastructure and Skills to Open Collections: In line with this year’s #OAWeek theme: Open for Climate Justice; Open and Engaged addressed intersections between cultural heritage and climate research through the use of collections, digital infrastructures and skills. A range of speakers from cultural heritage and higher education institutions answered these questions to shed light on the theme:

• What is the role of library collections and historical datasets to understand the impact of climate change?

• How to use digital infrastructure for more equitable knowledge sharing?

• What roles and skills are needed to make research from heritage organisations openly available?

Open and Engaged Conference 2021

Understanding the Impact of Open in the Arts and Humanities Beyond the University: In Higher Education contexts, discussions around openness are often focused on the pathways to make publications, data or cultural objects openly available online. It is often not known what impact open resources can have for various communities beyond the research community. The speakers at Open and Engaged 2021 explored the different impacts that open resources can have on people. They will seek to question how openness enhances the ability to engage with communities, how projects can be sustainable and make positive changes in the long-term, as well as some of the downsides to current approaches to open engagement.

Open and Engaged Conference 2020

Inequities in Scholarly Communications: This one-day, online conference brought together speakers working in libraries, museums, archives and publishers to further highlight and explore a number of these avenues, to critically assess whether the purported benefits of more open scholarly communications have been realised, and where possible to present practical ways forward.

Open and Engaged Conference 2019

On Tuesday 22nd October, The British Library celebrated Open Access Week with the event, Open and Engaged - Forging links between higher education and cultural heritage to foster open scholarship. This one-day event brought together representatives from Universities, Museums, research organisations, libraries and the private sector to examine how these links can be forged.

Open and Engaged Conference 2018

Open and Engaged: Open Access Week at the British Library: On Monday 22 October, the British Library celebrated the beginning of Open Access Week with the event, Open and Engaged (see #openengaged). It brought together representatives from higher education, funding organisations, libraries, charities, publishers, NHS, government, industry and independent research organisations such as museums and archives. The purpose of the event was to broaden the conversation around open access from a largely compliance-driven approach to one of engaging wider audiences through open research. Instead of just looking at issues relating to open access publishing, the focus was on the importance of public engagement and the public’s understanding of research. In the current climate of fake news and a mistrust of expert opinion, it is becoming even more important that the opening up of academic research leads to meaningful dissemination and confident public interactions with research results.