Welcome to the main website of author, editor, scholar, poet Myriam Diaz-Diocaretz, also known as Myriam Diocaretz. Since 2007 she holds the Socrates Chair in Humanism and the Digital Society (Socrates Leerstoel, “Humanistische visies op de electronische samenleving”). She first held this post until December 2008 at the Maastricht ICT Competence Centre – MICC, at Maastricht University; in January 2009 she was appointed as Extraordinary Professor at Tilburg University to continue her Socrates Chair at the Tilburg centre for Cognition and Communication – TiCC in the Faculty of Humanities. Her current trans-disciplinary research relates philosophy, humanism, ICT, Artificial Intelligence, Social Robotics, and Future and Emerging Technology. She is also the Secretary-General of the European Writers’ Council / la Fédération des associations européennes d'écrivains since April 2006, «EWC-FAEE A.I.S.B.L.» (Brussels), the federation of authors’ (writers and literary translators) national and trans-national associations in 32 European countries. EWC’s mission is to advocate the authors’ and creators’ moral, legal and economic rights in the 21st century, with a special focus on copyright the digital age.
Myriam Diocaretz, Secretary-General of the European Writers' Council, with European Commissioner Michel Barnier, Directorate General for Internal Market. Signature of a Memorandum of Understanding on greater access to books for the visually and print-impaired, 14 September 2010, Brussels. Other participating stakeholders included European publishers' associations, collective management organisations, associations and foundations representing the visually, print-impaired and other reading disabilities in Europe.
The European Prize for Literature for emerging writers (contemporary fiction)
As the consortium selected by the Commission to coordinate the initiative, the European Booksellers Federation (EBF), the European Writers' Council (EWC) and the Federation of European Publishers (FEP) are jointly responsible for the setting up of the national juries and the practical organisation of the award ceremony. Myriam Diocaretz, as EWC Secretary-General, coordinated the establishment and functioning of the national juries, and supervised the selection process of each winner in the first cycle of the prize, covering the 35 countries participating in the EU Culture Programme (2009-2011). Each year the juries of eleven or twelve of the 35 countries participating select one emerging fiction writer from their own country.
The new cycle begins in 2012, in which Myriam Diocaretz will act as general supervisor of the national juries and selection process. The selected countries are:
Austria , Croatia , France , Hungary , Ireland , Italy, Lithuania, Norway, Poland , Portugal, Slovakia and Sweden
The prize is financed by the Culture Programme of the European Union whose objective is to achieve three main goals: to promote cross-border mobility of those working in the cultural sector; to encourage the transnational circulation of cultural and artistic output; and to foster intercultural dialogue.
The 12 winning authors from the participating countries in 2011 received the award for their work by Mrs Androulla Vassiliou, the Commissioner in charge of Culture, Education, Multilingualism and Youth, in the presence of HRH Princess Laurentien of the Netherlands, Mrs Doris Pack, MEP, and Mr Bogdan Zdrojewski, Polish Minister for Culture and Heritage, and other public figures from the fields of culture, literature and politics.
In the photo below, the winning authors, escorted by Myriam Diocaretz, are invited to go on stage at start of the ceremony (Brussels, November 28th 2011).
Myriam Diocaretz has lectured extensively on critical studies, digital subjects, eCulture, the digital age and authors’ rights, digital libraries, and on Humanism and Converging Technologies. She is the author, editor, and co-editor of over 18 books and over fifty scholarly essays in English, French and Spanish on poetics, translation studies, gender, and dialogical criticism. Selections of her poetry (originally written in Spanish) and essays (originally in English) have been translated into several languages including Italian, Croatian, Portuguese, Romanian, and Dutch. In the last five years she has published research and reports on ICT innovation, e-publishing, e-content, mobile Internet services, rich media authoring tools and LivingLabs innovation. As an academic editor she has established five scholarly book series in French, English and Spanish respectively, including Critical Studies (Rodopi, Amsterdam/New York), which she directs since 1989.
Since 2004 she has been selected as Independent Expert for the European Commission DG Information Society, DG Research and Innovation, DG Education and Culture, on digital culture and cultural heritage, access to and preservation of cultural and scientific resources, and e-learning, under the Sixth and Seventh Framework Programmes. She was a member of the i2010 digital libraries High Level Expert Group—Copyright Subgroup (INFSO & Media, 2006-2008) and is a member of several steering groups and international committees.
Studies: PhD. in Comparative Studies, State University of New York; M.A. Stanford University; Lic. en Letras, University of Concepcion, Chile. Previous work experience: Senior Researcher, Head of the eCulture Unit, European Centre for Digital Communication/ Infonomics, 2001-2006, Maastricht; Worldwide Training Manager at WorldCom, Amsterdam; Training Co-ordinator at Stream International, Amsterdam. Several academic positions and guest lectures at universities in the USA and Europe.
