Enhancing, streamlining and maintaining the glottospace R package and creating educational content

For the NWO project Disentangling the roles of social and biophysical factors in the evolution of linguistic diversity in South America, we are looking for a research assistant (MA level) for 0.4 FTE (2 days per week) initially for 3 months, with possibilities for extensions. Task will consist of 2 parts: developing an existing R package (glottospace), and developing educational material for a few R packages for students of linguistics.

Project description glottospace

The glottospace R package (Norder et al. 2022) was developed to facilitate geospatial analysis of linguistic and cultural data. It is a popular and widely used package; so far it has been downloaded over 8000 times. However, since the package was launched in 2022, we’ve had limited time to update and maintain the package. The package now does four different things:

1. Data access to online global databases (e.g. glottolog, WALS, etc.)
2. Facilitate organizing/set-up of local (user-defined) databases following the glottodata structure
3. Statistical analysis and visualization (NMDS, etc.)
4. Geospatial analysis and visualization (mapping, etc.)

To make the package up-to-date, and to ensure long-term functionality, there are five things that need to be done:

1. enhance and improve existing functionality. This involves, amongst other things
   1. integrating access to new polygon databases (e.g. Glottography).
   2. modify some functions to match updates of dependencies (e.g. tmap V4 and ggplot2)
   3. improve visualizations (maps/figures) to be more publication-ready
2. simplify and split up the package into multiple related packages (to facilitate future maintenance)
3. fix bugs and implement feature requests (https://github.com/glottospace/glottospace/issues)
4. update README accordingly (https://github.com/glottospace/glottospace)
5. upload the package(s) to CRAN.

Project description creating educational content

Programming in R is only a small part of the descriptive track of Linguistics, but in we provide some of this in the Advanced Typology course. There is already some educational content for some basic steps in R (e.g. working with base R, dplyr, making maps). The idea would be to, in conversation with the supervisors, develop several step-by-step guides for MA students to create some visualizations and perform certain tests, mainly (but not only) focused on categorical data. The idea is to integrate (among other things) glottospace into these guides.

Job requirements

We are looking for an MA who has a solid background in programming (in R) and (geospatial) data analysis, and the desire to become more skilled in package development, as well as someone who is interested in translating this knowledge into educational materials. For package development, the candidate will follow the logic outlined in this book which provides concrete guidelines. The work can either be done remotely or on campus, regular meetings will be held with the supervisor(s). The job may also involve co-supervising interns. This project is an opportunity to contribute to open science, education, and to further develop your programming skills. The work relates to several ongoing (inter)national research projects.

If you are interested, send an email to e.van.gijn@hum.leidenuniv.nl where you outline your skills in relation to the job requirements.

Stageopdracht: verbetering van de Databank verkiezingsuitslagen van de Kiesraad

zie https://www.verkiezingsuitslagen.nl/ en

pdf Stageopdracht Databank

Wat bieden we?
Dienstverband: onderzoeksstage, bij voorkeur in de tweede helft van 2026
Aantal uren in de week: 32-40 uur
Stagevergoeding: 800€ per maand bij een 40-urige werkweek.

Wat zoeken we?
Je bent een WO-student (m/v/x) in de laatste fase van de master. Je bent bedreven in historisch
bronnenonderzoek, zowel in archieven als in digitale collecties. Daarnaast beschik je over
(basis)vaardigheden met Excel en dataformaten als .csv, zodat je deze data kunt combineren,
opschonen en samenvoegen. Tot slot zoek je graag vanuit het gebruikersperspectief naar manieren om
data toegankelijk te maken. Dat doe je op basis van jouw eigen (basis)kennis van datavisualisatie en/of op basis van gesprekken met gebruikers.

Bij voorkeur heb je een achtergrond in Digital humanities. Een achtergrond in Data science is ook mogelijk, mits je een duidelijke affiniteit met historisch onderzoek hebt. Doe je een andere opleiding, maar ben je gedreven en denk je dat deze stage bij je past? Solliciteer dan vooral.
Neem bij vragen contact op met Tim Schijvenaars (data scientist, tim.schijvenaars@kiesraad.nl) of Joris Gijsenbergh (senior onderzoeker; joris.gijsenbergh@kiesraad.nl).
Solliciteren kan tot en met 30 juni 2026 via Stage: Stageopdracht: verbetering van de Databank verkiezingsuitslagen van de Kiesraad, Bureau Kiesraad (Ministerie van BZK) - Werken voor Nederland

De startdatum en duur van de opdracht zijn flexibel, maar zullen wel plaatsvinden in de tweede helft van 2026.

Neem bij vragen contact op met Tim Schijvenaars (data scientist, tim.schijvenaars@kiesraad.nl) of Joris Gijsenbergh (senior onderzoeker; joris.gijsenbergh@kiesraad.nl).

Solliciteren kan tot en met 30 juni 2026 via Stage: Stageopdracht: verbetering van de Databank verkiezingsuitslagen van de Kiesraad, Bureau Kiesraad (Ministerie van BZK) - Werken voor Nederland

The VALUE Foundation aims to design, facilitate, and conduct worldwide research, development, and outreach on the crossroads of gaming and academia. They are open to many types of collaborations at the interface of play and knowledge, whether volunteer or professional, from the gaming community and industry or research and education field. To get in touch please use their contact page.

PlayTime https://playfultimemachines.com/ is embedded in a lively community of play, game and heritage scholars at LUCAS, Leiden University’s Centre for the Arts in Society, and beyond. All team members are also members of the LUCDH, Leiden University’s Centre for the Digital Humanities.

See also Vidi grant award to Angus Mol for the research project 'A Study of the Mechanics, Dynamics, and Aesthetics of the Past in Video Games'