National Library of Scotland  - Uncovering Hidden Collections at the National Library of Scotland

Apply for this SGSAH-funded internship with National Library of Scotland, up to 12 weeks FTE, between January & October 2025.

The project is titled Uncovering Hidden Collections at the National Library of Scotland and will involve cataloguing the Library of Congress archives held within the National Library of Scotland collections, and carrying out research in order to help the library devise a communications strategy for the archive.

Deadline for Applications is 15th November 2024.

Location

This placement would primarily be based at our Causewayside building in Newington, with some scope for working at the main library on George IV Bridge. There would be potential for hybrid working if the candidate would find this helpful in the successful completion of the project.

Project

From c.1945-1995, the National Library of Scotland received around 45,000 items as an ongoing donation from the Library of Congress in Washington, DC. It's one of the largest collections of its kind outside of the United States, with material spanning Cold War politics, the Kennedy assassination, the Civil Rights movement and countless political, social and cultural changes from a pivotal period in United States history.

The problem? No-one knows this collection exists, because most of it has never been added to our catalogue.

The role of our SGSAH intern will be primarily to help with cataloguing the collection, so that members of the public will finally be able to access this material. The intern will also carry out research into the collection, in order to help us promote it to the public once it's been 'uncovered', and help us to devise a communications strategy.

Outputs

The primary goal for this internship is to work within our cataloguing team to create catalogue records for the uncatalogued serial publications within the United States Hidden Collection at the National Library of Scotland.

The intern will also work closely with the curator responsible for the collection, Dr Sarah Thomson, to develop a plan for promoting the collection to the wider public and relevant research institutions.

Timescale

Application Deadline: 15th November 2024

Start date (or must start by): Flexible

End date (or must end by): Flexible

Project can be worked full time, part time or flexibly in blocks

Benefits to the Researcher

This internship will offer an exciting opportunity to work with key stakeholders across the Library, including curatorial colleagues, our cataloguing and metadata teams, and potentially exhibition work at the end of the placement.

The intern will gain an insight into the workings of Scotland's largest library, and will have opportunities to meet colleagues from a range of types of work in the GLAM sector.

They will receive cataloguing training and develop project management skills, which would be especially beneficial if they sought work in this sector following their PhD.

Key Relationships

The intern will work primarily with the Published Collections curators (Sarah Thomson and Dora Petherbridge) and the Serials team at Causewayside (led by Jose Arango). There would also be scope to discuss future exhibition work featuring this material, if that would be of interest to the intern.

Beyond this, the intern will have control over which audiences they choose to promote the collection to. This could include networking with academic organisations like the Scottish Association for the Study of America, the US Consulate in Edinburgh, or local student organisations.

Person Specification

Apply here

Return to the Internships & Artists Residencies 2025 page to see other internship opportunities.

First published: 4 October 2024