Rutgers Researcher Developing Digital Bibliography of Black Authors and Print Work

From Rutgers Today:

A Rutgers researcher is teaming up with a professor from Yale to develop a digital database dedicated to the study of Black-authored and Black-published books, magazines, and newspapers.

The Black Bibliography Project (BBP), funded through a $1.7 million grant from the Mellon Foundation, seeks to remedy what scholars say is a dearth of accurate, organized data about Black print.

The project’s mission is to provide a central clearinghouse of information that will be easily accessible to scholars and students of literature, history, Black diaspora studies and other fields.

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McGill is co-director of the initiative with Jacqueline Goldsby, a professor of English, African American studies, and American studies at Yale.

The two professors said their work builds upon a history of efforts by scholars, librarians, and private collectors to identify, curate and provide access to primary source collections of writings by Black Americans.

But the project aims to go beyond collecting and curating: McGill and Goldsby want to revive the practice of descriptive bibliography – the study of books as physical objects – and apply it to Black literary studies.

Descriptive bibliography explores the production and circulation of books with the goal of uncovering insights into the role of print in human history.

Learn More, Read the Complete Article

Direct to The Black Bibliography Project (BBP) Website

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