The new position of Copyright and Digital Humanities librarian was filled by Roger Gillis when he joined the Dal Libraries on December 1. Roger has been in the information management field since 2002, having worked on digital humanities projects such as the Atlantic Canada Virtual Archives, and holding positions in archives and records management in the academic and non-profit sectors.

From 2009 to 2015, he was the Archivist, and later the Archives & Scholarly Communication Librarian, at Mount Saint Vincent University. Roger was responsible for the operations of the University Archives, and led Open Access initiatives such as managing the institutional repository and online journal hosting services, as well as developing other digital projects. He has also been involved in the Open Access publishing world as part of the Public Knowledge Project. Roger has taught credit and non-credit information literacy courses, and served as a liaison librarian for the humanities departments at MSVU.

“Digital Humanities is a diverse and growing field of research and teaching that intersects computing and a variety of the humanities disciplines that the Dalhousie Libraries’ Centre for Digital Scholarship sees as a major focus of its activities along with its support for digitization, research data management, digital preservation, GIS and open access initiatives.  The growing of the Libraries’ digitization and computing capabilities and the hiring of a Digital Humanities Librarian are only the initial steps in our growing support and involvement of the digital humanities at Dalhousie,” said Michael Moosberger, the University Archivist and Associate University Librarian for Research and Scholarly Communication.

Roger’s key responsibilities at the Dalhousie Libraries include:

• Working as a member of the Copyright Office to develop copyright training and awareness initiatives, monitor developments in copyright and related matters such as Open Access, author rights, and other intellectual property matters;
• Developing and supporting digital humanities and other digital initiatives at Dalhousie, in conjunction with the Libraries Research and Scholarly Communications team.
• Serving as liaison librarian to the History Department;
• Developing and delivering information research instruction;
• Developing the Libraries’ collections and information resources, especially for the humanities;

“In the short time that I’ve been here, I have already been fortunate enough to be making it around to a number of different departments at Dal talking about copyright and related issues — it’s exciting to see and learn about the wide array of research and teaching that goes on here. I am really looking forward to getting to know and work with faculty, staff, and students and working with them in this capacity; I am very excited to be joining the Dalhousie Libraries in this role!” said Roger.

Roger holds a Master of Arts degree in History from the University of New Brunswick and a Master of Library and Information Studies from Dalhousie University. We’re very pleased this alumnus is back at Dalhousie.

Have a question about Open Access, copyright, or the humanities’ collection? Roger can be reached at Roger.Gillis@dal.ca or at 902-494-2003.