Author: Monica L. Mercado

Academic Libraries in a Digital World

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* cross posted from Educating Women *

Earlier this month, I spent 10 days at the Council on Libraries and Information Resources/Digital Library Federation (CLIR/DLF) postdoctoral fellows orientation seminar, an experience many of us fondly termed “library boot camp,” and others “Hogwarts School of Data Curation and Wizadry,” given the setting here at Bryn Mawr. In its tenth year, the CLIR/DLF postdoctoral fellows orientation gave twenty-seven new fellows (the biggest cohort yet!) an introduction to theories and methods in library and information studies, and data curation. As recent Ph.D.’s in fields ranging from comparative literature to biomedical informatics and everything in between, we’ll be taking a diverse array of positions in academic libraries across North America.

Continue reading “Academic Libraries in a Digital World” →

A New Start: First Days at the Greenfield Digital Center

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Book of Bryn Mawr Stories (1901)
Book of Bryn Mawr Stories (1901)

* cross posted from Educating Women *

I’ll be starting to blog regularly in my new role as Director of The Albert M. Greenfield Digital Center for the History of Women’s Education at Bryn Mawr College (where I will also be teaching in the History Department come January). My first week on campus has been a blur, but I’m excited to be here: #wmnhist everywhere you turn!

Read more about the Greenfield Digital Center’s current projects on the blog Educating Women and follow our work on Twitter @GreenfieldHWE.

My first post is linked here:

A New Start: Monica’s First Days at the Greenfield Digital Center

Moving On

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I went to graduate school and all I got ...were these t-shirts?

 

I’m taking a break from packing boxes to show off two new t-shirts: one, from my first trip to the (16th Annual) Berkshire Conference of Women Historians, the other, my official University of Chicago History Department Alumni t-shirt (not available for sale, they’ll have you know).

About that alumni tee? Yes, I passed my dissertation defense on May 19! So with that, Dr. Monica, Ph.D., will see you in Philadelphia on July 1. Now, back to those boxes…

Recent Publications

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Spring Quarter is here, and with it comes my dissertation defense and move to Philadelphia so this space will be pretty quiet for the next two months or so. In the meantime, I’m happy to have some new writing out in the world:

  • ” ‘Have You Ever Read?’ Imagining Women, Bibles, and Religious Print in Nineteenth-Century America,” in U.S. Catholic Historian 31.3 (Summer 2013): 1-21 [link to Project Muse]
  • “Demystifying Catholic Sisters in a Digital Age” for Sightings [link]

See you on the other side!

“Research in a Digital Age” Links

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unnamedAre you interested in making your research available to a wider audience using digital resources? Have you considered the possible benefits of using social media, blogs, or video to expand your reach? The use of online resources for academic and professional research purposes is a growing yet largely underdeveloped and oftentimes ambiguous field. This workshop will discuss different avenues for disseminating your research beyond the traditional route of journal or manuscript publication, why development of these skills is becoming more important in a competitive job market, and pitfalls to avoid…

[update: view my presentation on YouTube]

When the SSD asked me to participate in Friday’s Leadership Lab conversation, Research in a Digital Age, it provided an opportunity to reflect on the choices I made (and continue to make) about building a web presence and sharing my work online. The following links are a useful reading list for graduate students weighing similar decisions:

Have anything to add? Leave a reply!

“Lady Historian with a Futuristic Job”

Monica L. Mercado2 Comments
dinosaurs!
“Are these Bryn Mawr Students America’s Brainiest Girls?” n.d., courtesy Heather’s Blog.

I’m delighted to announce that on July 1, 2014, I’ll be joining Bryn Mawr College Libraries as Director of The Albert M. Greenfield Digital Center for the History of Women’s Education – or, as a dear friend has described, “Lady Historian with a Futuristic Job.” [Then again, I recently found the women’s history website I made my first year of college, so maybe I’ve been a digital historian this whole time and I just didn’t know it!]

Readers of this site may remember I first got involved with the Digital Center as a presenter at the inaugural conference, “Women’s History in a Digital World,” last March. You can find my paper, and the work of so many brilliant people working at the intersection of women’s and gender history, feminisms, and digital history in the conference’s online repository – a part of the College’s larger open access project, Scholarship, Research, and Creative Work at Bryn Mawr College, which was established in 2012. I’m energized by the Digital Center’s mission, and I can’t wait to get started this summer.

For more on my appointment, check out the Digital Center’s blog: Educating Women. And be sure to follow the Digital Center on twitter (@GreenfieldHWE) – there’s much more to come!

Generations of Women’s History at AHA 2014

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The AHA has come and gone for another year, and as I recover from the inevitable post-holidays/post-travel/post-conference flu, I’ve been catching up on some of the sessions I missed. Over on Prof. Hacker, Jennifer Guiliano posted a great recap of digital history offerings at the conference, asking readers to think critically about the frequent slippage between digital history and public history. It’s worth a read. [link]

This year, for the first time, I was able to attend the Coordinating Council for Women in History Friday night reception as well as the Saturday awards luncheon, where Crystal N. Feimster blew us all away with her talk, “‘The (Civil) War on Women’: A Case for Women’s History.” I went home and renewed my CCWH membership right away; 2014 marks its 45th anniversary year:

CCWH luncheon tweets

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A “Desire for History” at UChicago

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How does queer studies engage with the archive? Since 2007, students and faculty affiliated with the University of Chicago Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality have worked to build archival collections documenting the experiences of women and LGBTQ individuals and communities at UChicago. This talk gives a brief history of the project’s origins in feminist and women’s history, and addresses what it means to once-marginalized communities to have a place in the University archives.

Last month, I had the chance to speak about our work creating a LGBTQ archive on campus for the University of Chicago’s annual Humanities Day celebrations. Watch, learn, and contribute to our project:

A “Desire for History” at UChicago

Monica L. MercadoLeave a comment

How does queer studies engage with the archive? Since 2007, students and faculty affiliated with the University of Chicago Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality have worked to build archival collections documenting the experiences of women and LGBTQ individuals and communities at UChicago. This talk gives a brief history of the project’s origins in feminist and women’s history, and addresses what it means to once-marginalized communities to have a place in the University archives.

Last month, I had the chance to speak about our work creating a LGBTQ archive on campus for the University of Chicago’s annual Humanities Day celebrations. Watch, learn, and contribute to our project.

If it’s November, it’s Conference Season

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NWSA WoCLP

Photo by Meghan McInnis.

It’s November, which means conference season is up and running! I had a great time in CIncinnati for my first National Women’s Studies Association annual meeting, where I took part in the Women of Color Leadership Project. That’s us above, ready to get to work on Day 1.

There’s always more work to do, so this weekend I’m off to the American Studies Association in DC, where I’ll be giving a lightning talk tomorrow morning as part of the Digital Humanities Caucus event “Digital Shorts: New Platforms of Knowledge and Dissent.” Follow along on Twitter: #2013ASA.

Of course, what would the weekend before Thanksgiving be without AAR? Luckily it’s in Baltimore this year, giving me the opportunity to conference-hop and catch up with American religion friends. There’s a hashtag for everything: #AARSBL.