Rafia Mirza

Humanities Librarian.

Currently

Rafia Mirza is currently a Digital Scholarship Librarian at SMU. She helps provide research and instructional support for students and faculty who are interested in digital scholarship projects and led the Digital Humanities Research Institute at SMU. She did graduate coursework in American studies at the University of Minnesota and received her MSI from the University of Michigan.

Research interests

Her research focuses on digital humanities, library pedagogy, project planning and infrastructure in libraries as well as race, gender and labor in librarianship.

Education

2023- Present Southern Methodist University (Dallas, TX)

2008 University of Michigan, School of Information (Ann Arbor, MI)

2006 University of Minnesota (Minneapolis, MN.)

1999 State University of New York (SUNY) at Buffalo, NY.

Honor Societies

Affiliations & Service

Spring 2021 Reviewer, NEH’s Office of Digital Humanities, Digital Humanities Advancement Grants.

2018 Digital Library Federation (DLF)

2016-2017 Digital Frontiers (DF)

2016-2018 Cross Timbers Library Collaborative (CTLC)

2014-2018 Texas Digital Humanities Consortium (TXDHC)

2007-2014 American Library Association (ALA) member

2007-2012 Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) Division member

2011 Library Orientation Exchange (LOEX)

2007-2008 Michigan Library Association

2000-2002 Smithsonian Museum of American History, Washington, D.C.

Continuing Education

2023 Equity-Centered Instruction, Library Journal

2022 IDEA AI 2022 cohort

Feb 28th - April 15, 2022 Prioritizing Privacy Spring 2022 cohort

June 11-20, 2018 DHRI (Digital Humanities Research Institute)

October 2015 Library Juice Academy workshop

May 2014–May 2015 Trailblazers: Pathways to Successful Supervision Staff Development Supervisory Program

2001 Cutting the Red Tape: Finding and Using E-Government Tools and Resources

2009 University of Maryland University College

Publications

A list is also available through Google Scholar.

Articles

2020 Seale, M., & Mirza, R. (2020). The Coin of Love and Virtue: Academic Libraries and Value in a Global Pandemic. The Canadian Journal of Academic Librarianship 6, 6 (December), 1-30. https://cjal.ca/index.php/capal/article/view/34457

2019 Seale, M., & Mirza, R. (2019). Empty Presence: Library Labor, Prestige, and the MLS. Library Trends 68(2), 252-268. https://www.muse.jhu.edu/article/746747

2019 Mirza, R. & Seale, M. (2019). Speech and Silence: Race, Neoliberalism, and Intellectual Freedom. Journal of Radical Librarianship. 5.

2017 Currier, B. D., Mirza, R., & Downing, J. (2017). They think all of this is new: Leveraging librarians’ project management skills for the digital humanities. College & Undergraduate Libraries, 1-20. doi:10.1080/10691316.2017.1347541

2018 Research Planning and Review Committee, A. (2018). 2018 top trends in academic libraries: A review of the trends and issues affecting academic libraries in higher education. College & Research Libraries News, 79(6), 286. doi:https://doi.org/10.5860/crln.79.6.286

Published Panels

2019 Walker, S, Beilin, I. & Mirza, R. (2019). Research Agenda Conversations, ACRL Instruction Section Research & Scholarship website.

Book Chapters

2023 Mirza, R., Nicholson, K., & Seale, M. (2023). Acting “As If”: Critical Pedagogy, Empowerment, and Labor. In Y. Mery & A. Sanchez (Eds.), The Critical Librarianship and Pedagogy Symposium: Reflections, Revisions, and New Works.(pp.111-126) ACRL.

2023 Keralis, S., Mirza, R. & Seale, M. (2023).Librarians’ Illegible Labor: Toward a Documentary Practice of Digital Humanities. In Klein, L.F., & Gold, M.K. (eds.), Debates in the Digital Humanities 2023. (pp. 305-323) Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

2017 Mirza, R. & Seale, M. (2017). Who Killed the World? White Masculinity and the Technocratic Library of the Future. In Schlesselman-Tarango, G. (ed.), Topographies of Whiteness: Mapping Whiteness in Library and Information Science (pp. 175-201) (Series on Critical Race Studies and Multiculturalism in LIS). Sacramento: Library Juice Press.

2015 Ossom Williamson, P. & Mirza, R. (2015). Does Google Scholar help or hurt institutional repositories? In C. Smallwood (Ed.), The complete guide to using Google in libraries: instruction, administration, and staff productivity (pp. 211-222). Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefiend.

2011 Mirza, R. & Seale M. (2011) Watchers, Punks and Dashing Heroes: Representations of Male Librarians in Generation X Mass Culture.In M. Wallace, R. Tolley-Stokes, and E. S. Estep (eds.), The Generation X Librarian: Essays on Leadership, Technology, Pop Culture, Social Responsibility and Professional Identity (pp.135-146). Jefferson, N.C: McFarland & Co.

Workbooks

Currier, B. D., Mirza, R., & Ossom Williamson, P. (2016). Memorandum of Understanding Workbook, Version 1.0, Memorandum of Understanding Collection. Arlington, TX: ResearchCommons. https://rc.library.uta.edu/uta-ir/handle/10106/25646 DOI:http://doi.org/10.32855/utalibraries.2016.01

Conference Proceedings

2013 Bailey, J., & Mirza, R. (2013). LibGuides, videos, and screencasting: Technologies to enhance and promote digital wisdom in information literacy instruction. In B.Sietz (Ed.), Fort Worth, Texas, May 5-7, 2011 (pp. 71-74). Ypsilanti, MI: LOEX Press.

Instruction

2023 Software Carpentry Instructor

2023 Resources and Information Services in Professions and Disciplines - Data Services in Libraries INFO 220

Presentations & Workshops

National presentations & workshops

2019 Expanding Communities of Practice Pedagogy Showcase

2018 Towards of a Praxis of Library Documentation

2018 Valuing Labor When You’re “The Man” (kind of): Q&A

2018 Overcoming the Curse of Knowledge with Cross-disciplinary Collaboration: Applying User Experience Approaches to Digital Humanities

2017 Dudes Code, Ladies Coordinate: Gendered Labor in Digital Scholarship

2017 Modifying a Project Memorandum of Understanding for Reuse

2016 Memorandum of Understanding Workshop: Creating a Process for Successful Digital Collaboration.

2015 Using Omeka as a Gateway to Digital Projects

2014 Developing Library Services for Digital Humanities & E-Science Support Using Qualitative Research

2013 Plugged into User Behavior: Low-Budget, High-Impact Usability Testing of Library Subject Guides –Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) Annual Conference. (2013, April).

2012 Digital Learning: Teaching Information Literacy through Online Research Guides

2011 LibGuides, Videos, and Screencasting: Technologies to Enhance and Promote Digital Wisdom in Information Literacy Instruction

2011 If a Picture Paints a Thousand Words, Imagine What a Video Can Do: Making Promotional, Advocacy, and Instructional Videos on a Shoestring

2010 Supercharged, Integrated, and On Demand

2010 Rising (and Raising) Expectations: Expanding the Academic Cyberinfrastructure at Academic Libraries

2010 Project J: How Web 2.0 Should ALA Go?

2110 LibrarySTEW:Fortifying Staff and Services

2009Techno Scholar: The Librarian as Digital Professional

2005 The Terror Within: Militia Terrorism in Arlington Road

2004 America Under Siege: The Terrors of Race, Religion and Culture in Hollywood’s The Siege

2003 America Under Siege: The Terrors of Race, Religion and Culture in Hollywood’s The Siege

2000 Feminism and Islam

Virtual presentations & workshops

2021 Mirza, R., & Seale, M., et al. (2021). Academic Libraries and the Irrational – A Discussion with CJAL Special Issue Authors and Editors (CJAL). May 25, 2021. Online.

2017 Mirza, R., & Ossom-Williamson, P. & Currier, B.D., (2017). The MOU — Your Blueprint for Managing Collaborative Projects. [Webinar]. The Library Leadership & Management Association (LLAMA). Oct 18, 2017. Online.

2017 Mirza, R. & Currier, B.D. (2017). Memorandum of Understanding: Process for Successful Digital Collaboration. [Lightning Talk]. Annual Meeting, WiLs’. February 16, 2017. Online.

2016 Mirza, R., & Ossom-Williamson, P. & Currier, B.D., (2016). Memorandum of Understanding Workshop: Process for Successful Digital Collaboration. [Webinar]. The Digital Curation Interest Group of the Association of College and Research Libraries. May 23, 2016. Online.

Regional presentations & workshops

2022 Develop Your Own Digital Humanities Research Institute

2022 Storytelling with Data: A Hands-on Workshop for Beginners

2019 Collaborative Digital Project Management in Libraries

2017 How to Bring Digital Humanities in the Classroom

2017 After the Mandates & Manifestos, What Next? The Denton Declaration at 5

2017 Introduction to MOU Workbook

2015 Encouraging Digital Scholarship in Graduate Education

2013 Libraries as Digital Humanities Partners on Campus

2014 Wonder Women! The Untold Story of American Superheroines

2013 What Are the Digital Humanities and What Do They Want from Libraries?

2013 ALTMETRICS: What is it and how is it relevant to librarians?

2012 Re/searching on the Web

2012 Digital Age Copyright & Your Rights as an Author

2011 Social Networking at UTA Library

Professional Experience

SMU

2023-Current Librarian IV (June 2023- Current)

2019-2023 Librarian III (July 2019- May 2023)

2017-2019 Librarian II (August 2017- July 2019)

2022-Current Title: Digital Scholarship Librarian.

2017-2021 Title: Humanities Research Librarian.

2018 Participant in initial cohort (2018) of NEH grant funded Digital Humanities Research Institute (DHRI)at CUNY to train in becoming local Community Leader

Committees at SMU (2017-Present)

University of Texas at Arlington

2008-2017 Librarian

October 2013- August 2014

Assistant Librarian, University of Texas at Arlington

August 2008- September 2012 Reference and Instruction Liaison

Grant support

2013 Muslim Journeys grant.

Public Services University Library Associate, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor

September 2006- June 2008 University Library Associate, Harlan Hatcher Graduate Library Public Services Associate

2007University of Michigan, Donald Hall Collection Summer 2007 Internship

The University Of Minnesota, Minneapolis

Summer 2005 Graduate mentor

2002-2005 Graduate Teaching Assistant, American Studies Department

Last updated: Jan 2024