As Cartographic Resources Cataloger, Ronda L. Sewald is responsible for cataloging the Libraries’ many maps, atlases, and geospatial datasets. In addition to updating and creating MARC records, she also monitors changes in user needs, geospatial metadata standards, and best practices for cartographic resource description to help enhance the discoverability of the materials in IUL’s rich cartographic collection and to support their repurposing through georeferencing and vectorization.
Ronda first came to IU in 2000 to pursue a Ph.D. in Folklore and Ethnomusicology (2009) and a Master's in Library Science (2004). Before joining Technical Services as the Cartographic Resources Cataloger in March 2020, she worked for the Archives of Traditional Music, the MLA Folklore Bibliography Project, Sound Directions (the precursor of the Media Digitization and Preservation Initiative), the Archives of African American Music and Culture, and the Black Film Center/Archive.
As a former project manager and archivist for three different archives dedicated to serving the needs of marginalized communities, and particularly those of African American communities, Ronda has experience with DE&I initiatives. She has had the extreme pleasure of supporting the research endeavors of African American scholars and artists exploring a broad range of topics, and she has embraced each encounter as an opportunity to learn more about the barriers preventing the amplification and distribution of their work.
Ronda has led primary source immersion activities related to intersectionality and issues of racism in the film, television, and music industries on demand. In addition to exploring how to make IU's cartographic treasures more discoverable and usable by researchers, she is also actively exploring how these materials may be used to support and be supported by DE&I initiatives.
While her skillset includes everything from processing and digitizing large archival and multimedia collections to newsletter editing and exhibit curation, Ronda is particularly passionate about assisting researchers and students in discovering IU’s many treasures. She is equally fluent in MARC and EAD, and her experience with archival and audiovisual collections has allowed her to fully explore collection-, item-, and sub-item level cataloging while determining the degree of granularity best suited for supporting user discovery across a wide range of delivery systems. More about these skills, projects, and Ronda's list of publications is available at her website.