Jim English is the founder and Faculty Director of the Price Lab. A former chair of Penn's English department and Director of the Wolf Humanities Center, he launched the Price Lab from a two-year pilot initiative, the Digital Humanities Forum, funded by the Mellon Foundation in 2012-14.  His interests in computation date back to childhood, when he built a digital computer for a sixth-grade science project (see photo at right of geeky 6th grader).  Much of his research and writing have focused on the relation between literary studies and sociology.  Current projects include a book about rating and ranking systems in literature and the arts, a mixed-methods study of the Goodreads social reading site, and a volume of essays on Literary Studies and Human Flourishing.

Jim works alongside Stewart Varner to oversee the Price Lab's many events, projects, partnerships, and curricular initiatives.  He views DH as a way to narrow an excessive gap in our educational system between the humanities and the sciences and to promote a more integrative liberal arts curriculum and more ambitiously interdisciplinary programs of research.  

Jim maintains a website with more information about his activities.  He tweets occasionally as @JimEnglishPenn.