The Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) has named Association of Research Libraries (ARL) staff member Elizabeth Waraksa as a Distinguished Presidential Fellow for a two-year term, effective June 1, 2018. Waraksa is program director for research and strategic initiatives at ARL. CLIR is an independent, nonprofit organization that forges strategies to enhance research, teaching, and learning environments in collaboration with libraries, cultural institutions, and communities of higher learning.
At the Association of Research Libraries, Waraksa works on projects in workforce development, scholarly communication, and innovation. Prior to joining ARL in 2015, she served as librarian for Middle Eastern studies and lecturer in Near Eastern languages and cultures and the study of religion at UCLA. From 2007 to 2009, she was a CLIR postdoctoral fellow at the UCLA Library, where she worked on the open access UCLA Encyclopedia of Egyptology among other projects. She has participated in archaeological excavations in Egypt, Italy, and Israel, and published on topics ranging from Egyptian female figurines to the benefits of collaboration.
Waraksa’s new CLIR fellowship will focus on global digital resources, particularly those highlighting the cultural heritage of the Near and Middle East, and the opportunities that these resources offer scholars, library and information studies professionals, local and heritage communities, and all who are curious to learn more about our shared human history. She will explore how global digital collections are being leveraged in research, teaching, and learning today, and the kinds of new questions we can ask of these increasingly large and complex digital collections. She will also consider how data creators and stewards like librarians, archivists, curators, oral historians, community leaders, developers, and others can best exchange their knowledge and expertise.
“Dr. Waraksa’s contributions to the Digital Library of the Middle East have been integral to that project’s success thus far,” said CLIR president Charles Henry. “Her research as a Fellow represents an extensible, encompassing exploration of her interests that should prove essential to our understanding of the design and aspirations of a global digital library.”
For more details, see the May 17, 2018, CLIR news release, “CLIR Appoints Presidential Fellows Herman Pabbruwe, Elizabeth Waraksa.”
About the Association of Research Libraries
The Association of Research Libraries (ARL) is a nonprofit organization of 125 research libraries in Canada and the US whose mission is to advance research, learning, and scholarly communication. The Association fosters the open exchange of ideas and expertise, promotes equity and diversity, and pursues advocacy and public policy efforts that reflect the values of the library, scholarly, and higher education communities. ARL forges partnerships and catalyzes the collective efforts of research libraries to enable knowledge creation and to achieve enduring and barrier-free access to information. ARL is on the web at ARL.org.
