Navigating Social Networks at the Margins: Women in Science Archives, Then and Now

Bethany G. Anderson; Mary Borgo Ton; Kristen Allen Wilson

doi:10.5860/rbm.26.2.%p

RBM: A Journal of Rare Books, Manuscripts, and Cultural Heritage is the Association of College and Research Libraries' journal covering issues pertaining to special collections libraries and cultural heritage institutions.

About The Authors

Bethany G. Anderson is the Natural and Applied Sciences Archivist and
Assistant Professor in the University Archives at the University of Illinois
Urbana-Champaign. She is also a PhD student in the History of Science at
the University of Illinois. Her research focuses on the history of anthropology,
science and technology studies, cybernetics, scientific archives, data and
recordkeeping histories in anthropology, and women and gender in science.
She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Anthropology from the University of Michigan,
a Master of Arts in Near Eastern Art and Archaeology from the University
of Chicago, and a Master of Science in Information Studies from the
University of Texas at Austin

Mary Borgo Ton is an Assistant Professor and Digital Humanities Librarian
at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, where she is the chair of the
Library Emerging and Integrated Technology Coordination committee. In
her research, she uses machine learning and critical making to study the long
history of scholarly communication, placing technologies like nineteenthcentury
projection equipment in conversation with hybrid workshop programming.
She holds a PhD in British Literature and a Graduate Certificate
in Digital Arts and Humanities from Indiana University as well as a Master
of Science in Library and Information Science from the University of Illinois
Urbana-Champaign

Kristen Allen Wilson is the Illinois Distributed Museum Coordinator
at the University of Illinois Archives at the University of Illinois Urbana-
Champaign. Her research interests include women in science, digital learning
and public history, and outreach and engagement in museums. She holds a
Bachelor of Arts in History and Anthropology and a Master of Education in
Curriculum and Instruction, both from the University of Illinois Urbana-
Champaign

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Navigating Social Networks at the Margins: Women in Science Archives, Then and Now

Bethany G. Anderson, Mary Borgo Ton, Kristen Allen Wilson

Abstract

“No Longer at the Margins: A Digital Project to Amplify Access to the Archives of Women in Science,” draws on feminist approaches and text-mining technologies to surface stories about women in the domestic science movement at the University of Illinois. This article describes approaches used to digitize the domestic science collection in its conceptualization and initial stages. The project was originally funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities in August 2024; the grant’s cancellation in April 2025 foregrounds the role of social networks to support archival work in moments of disruption in ways that parallel the strategies adopted by the women represented by the materials digitized