You might have noticed the small Facebook icon on the navigation of the WLA web page, and yes, it is true. The Women and Leadership archives has finally joined up. We will be posting regularly items of interest from the archives, but also other relevant news about women's archives and women's issues in history. Please "LIKE" the WLA on Facebook.
New Interns Join the WLA for the Spring Semester
Bushra Alam (Loyola University Chicago), Grace Pekar (Loyola University Chicago), Elias Pera (Dominican University) and Dean Ramos (Dominican University) have joined the staff of the WLA for the spring semester. Bushra is working on processing the papers of the Gannon Center for Women and Leadership. Grace will be adding additional content to our digital collections and processing a collection. Elias has already been instrumental in setting up the WLA Facebook page, while also doing research to support the to-be-announced outreach campaign of the WLA. Elias has also already added photographs to the Mundelein College Photograph Digital Collection. Dean is working on a soon-to-be unveiled exhibit on "Women in the Sciences" that ties in with the Gannon Center's Women's History Month theme of women and the environment. The exhibit will be both physical (display cases on the first floor of Piper Hall) and digital.
Phyllis Zagano Papers Opening a Great Success!
On Thursday, October 27th, Dr. Gary Macy, Deacon William T. Ditewig, PhD, and Dr. Phyllis Zagano presented their research on women deacons to a full-capacity crowd of 200. The lively discussion framed the issue of women deacons and was based on their newly published book, Women Deacons: Past, Present, Future. This event offered and opportunity to officially open the papers of Dr. Zagano where she was presented with a ceremonial copy of her finding aid.
Guests enjoying the Zagano Papers displays Dr. Zagano (standing) taking questions from the audience
WLA becomes "Reanimated" in the WSGS Digest
Women's Studies and Gender Studies at Loyola recently developed a new outreach tool, the Digest. This digital magazine's mission is "to connect the WSGS program with communities of students, faculty, and staff at Loyola and beyond, continuing and extending the program’s mission...[to] provide space and support for a variety of voices while bridging communities of scholars, artists, and activists." Featured in the digest is a special section:
On March 10th the Women and Leadership Archives hosted a second meeting of local area women artists. Planned by former Artemisia President, Barbara Ciurej and WLA Director, Beth Myers, the event featured Dr. Joanna Gardner-Huggett, Art Historian from DePaul University. The purpose of this event was to build on the information sharing and archives awareness of the first meeting held in June, 2010. Dr. Gardner-Huggett spoke about her research on Artemisia and the need for scholars to have access to archival sources. Further, local artists were encouraged to bring in materials to start their own collections. Over 18 collections were begun that night!
If you are an artist interested in building a collection at the Women and Leadership Archives, please contact Beth Myers at 773-508-8837 or emyers@luc.edu. Former members of Artemisia are especially encouraged to donate, but manuscript collections are welcome from any women artists (local, regional, national, or international). Photographs by Mary Ann Johnson.
Artemisia artists in the WLA reading room Artist Barbara Ciurej welcoming everyone
Dr. Joanna Gardner-Huggett WLA graduate assistant Maria Wagner and and an Artemisia artist artist Mary Ellen Croteau in the WLA archives
Catholic Research Resource Alliance (CRRA)
The WLA is proud to announce our formal partnership and participation in the Catholic Research Resources Alliance, or CRRA. This is an effort to identify all Catholic related research resources at various colleges and universities and to share those resources through a searchable database. CRRA is especially interested in materials that are rare and unique. Please visit the CRRA website for more information.
BVM Grant Helps Support the Archives!
I am pleased to announce that the Sisters of Charity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, better known as the BVMs, recently awarded a $4,000 grant to the Women and Leadership Archives. The seed grant is intended to help digitize a portion of the Mundelein College audiovisual collection. The digitization project, which focuses on the most important and fragile items in the AV collection, will be executed this fall. As soon as possible, selective short excerpts from the digitized material will be made available through the University Libraries digital collections (Content DM).
WLA Collections in World Cat, Pegasus!
Thanks to the extraordinary efforts of temporary staff member Dolores Barber, substantial help of Ling-li Chang (Head of Monograph Acquisitions, Cataloging) and the generosity of the Gannon Center for Women and Leadership, 70 catalog records of WLA collections have been added to World Cat and Pegasus. This monumental task will allow people, both on campus and off, one more access point to the discover of the fantastic collections of the WLA. We hope this new development will encourage even greater use of the materials.
