The American Studies Department at the University of New Mexico recently announced a new service learning program with the New Mexico Office of the State Historian. The department received a grant from the national American Studies Association and the UNM College of Arts and Sciences to fund two paid interns to work in the Office of the State Historian.
The department plans to work with the state historian to develop additional internship opportunities for undergraduate and graduate students.
New Mexico State Historian Estevan Rael-Galvez said, “Through this program, there are several opportunities for students to engage in historical research, preservation planning and educational outreach, work we hope will contribute to our vision of making knowledge meaningful and accessible to the public.
"We are particularly excited about inviting the student interns to assist with the ongoing development of the New Mexico History Web Project, an interactive, multimedia and interdisciplinary website. This internship program is one of many collaborations we hope to develop, with a goal of establishing a satellite office based at the university.”
Two American Studies undergraduates, Annette Rodriguez and Ilse Biel, are serving as interns for the fall semester. They will be will be working with the state historian and Assistant State Historian, Dr. Dennis P. Trujillo, a UNM American Studies Ph.D. graduate, in content dvelopment for the Web site www.newmexicohistory.org. The goal is to synthesize many ources--archival documents, oral histories, and UNM Press publications to expand this project into a public resource.
The students will also be working with American Studies faculty advisors to integrate what they learn from service learning into academics. Rodriguez will continue research she’s done on the Grant County, New Mexico, mining district.
“My project attempts a social history of Mexican labor migration into the region between 1900 and 1920. I will continue oral history transcription, census data statistical analysis, and archival research with the goal of combining the collected primary materials into a conference paper, and in preparation for publication,” Rodriguez said.
For more information about the American Studies Department and its internship program, please contact, A. Gabriel Meléndez, chair, American Studies Department, at gabriel@unm.edu or 277-6356.
Contact: Carolyn Gonzales, (505) 277-5920
Posted by scarr at September 28, 2005 03:59 PM