We are seeking participants for the Fall 2017 Collaborative Research Seminar on Archives and Special Collections, a two-part seminar on special collections and archival research methods, in its second iteration. Open to graduate-level students, faculty, and staff at CUNY by application.

Click here for Application Form (open until Tuesday, September 19th, 2017).

Eligibility: Students of all levels, faculty, and staff of CUNY are invited to apply. We encourage participation from a wide array of disciplines.

When / Where: The Seminar will occur over the course of two sessions:

• October 13th, 2017 from 6:00pm – 8:00pm [hosted at The Graduate Center, CUNY Library]

• October 27th, 2017 from 5:45pm – 8:00pm [hosted at The New York Public Library, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building]

The Seminar: Through discussions, presentations, and hands-on archival activities, this two-part seminar provides space for CUNY students, faculty, and staff to engage the praxis of incorporating archival and special collections research into their work. Together, we will develop research methods that unite the resources of both the Graduate Center Library and the archival and special collections holdings of the New York Public Library. To learn more about this experience and the scholarly work it generates, please visit The Center for the Humanities’ blog to read more from Collaborative Research Seminar participant Iris Cushing.

Why: Together as archivists, librarians, curators, students, faculty, and staff of The Graduate Center, CUNY and The New York Public Library, we will work to foster a community of primary-source research practice across our institutions. We will collectively consider how both sides of the reference desk can collaborate to promote preservation and access for the materials that hold our stories, histories, and traces.

How to apply: To indicate your interest, please complete our brief Google Form here. We request that you submit your form before 11:59pm on September 19th, 2017. We will be in touch  by the end of September to confirm your participation.

Deadline to apply: Tuesday, September 19th, 2017, 11:59 pm.

While your application is a vote for the necessity of this type of programming, we can only support limited participation capacity in the initial iterations of this seminar. To that end, we encourage a clear statement of interest and commitment to both sessions. We particularly encourage applicants from Spring 2017 to re-apply and to indicate this on their application.

For general research support and community on archival, special collections, and primary source work, we invite participants to join Primary Source: A Working Group for Special Collections, Archives, and Libraries, sponsored by the Center for the Humanities. All are welcome to participate in this evolving collective, and may sign up for the mailing list here.

We welcome questions on the Collaborative Research Seminar and/or Primary Source; please contact the seminar’s coordinator, Mary Catherine Kinniburgh, at marycatherinekinniburgh [at] nypl [dot] org.

Sponsored by the Graduate Center Library and The New York Public Library, with support from the Early Research Initiative, The Center for the Humanities, Lost and Found: The CUNY Poetics Document Initiative, and GC Digital Initiatives.