I’m in the last year of my CLIR Postdoctoral Fellow in Caribbean Data Curation, and I’ve learned a lot about librarianship and critical digital pedagogy in Caribbean Studies. I presented at several conferences hosted by variety of professional organizations including the Haitian Studies Association (New Orleans, Louisiana), Caribbean Studies Association (Havana, Cuba) , and the Digital Humanities (Mexico City, Mexico). I served as an invited panelist for the International Studies/Digital Humanities Symposium at the University of North Florida (Jacksonville, Florida), and I also participated in a NEH Summer Institute on digital pedagogy and an intensive workshop on RAPID equipment at the University of Washington.
For the fall 2018, one of my main goals is to finish writing my article on digital pedagogy in Haitian Studies. Different points from the paper will be shared at the conferences noted below.
- Joint Conference of Librarians of Color (JCLC), Albuquerque, New Mexico. September 2018.
- Digital Library Federation (DLF) Forum. Las Vegas, Nevada. October 2018.
- The Unexpected Caribbean Symposium, the University of Kansas. Lawrence, Kansas. October 2018. (invited speaker)
- Haitian Studies Association Conference. Port-au-Prince, Haiti. November 2018
- American Anthropological Association. San Jose, California. November 2018
As you can see, I have a lot of traveling ahead! For the Haitian Studies conference, nine students from my Haiti course (spring 2018) shared their interests in attending/presenting. I submitted a proposal and it was accepted!! My students will accompany me to the conference to present their websites, so I will share more about their presentation in November.
I’m preparing my application materials for the job market, and I feel I’m more prepared and confident in my research and skills. I’m considering both academic and industry jobs so I’m excited to see where my next journey takes me.
Dr. Crystal A. Felima 