Keynote Speakers

Starting this March, get ready to be digitally delighted each month with our stellar lineup of iPRES 2023 keynotes!

Quinn Dombrowski

Quinn Dombrowski is the Academic Technology Specialist in the Division of Literatures, Cultures, and Languages, and in the Library, at Stanford University. Prior to coming to Stanford in 2018, Quinn’s many digital humanities adventures included supporting the high-performance computing cluster at UC Berkeley, running a tool directory with support from the Mellon Foundation, writing books on Drupal for Humanists and University of Chicago library graffiti, and working on the program staff of Project Bamboo, a failed digital humanities cyberinfrastructure initiative. Quinn has a BA/MA in Slavic Linguistics from the University of Chicago, and an MLIS from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Since coming to Stanford, Quinn has supported numerous non-English digital humanities projects, started a Textile Makerspace, developed a tabletop roleplaying game to teach DH project management, explored trends in multilingual fanfic, and started the Data-Sitters Club, a feminist digital humanities pedagogy and research group focused on Ann M. Martin’s 90’s girls series “The Baby-Sitters Club”. A co-founder of Saving Ukrainian Cultural Heritage Online (SUCHO), Quinn has been working to preserve and augment Ukrainian digital cultural heritage since Russia's invasion in February 2022. Quinn also serves as co-President of the Association for Computers and the Humanities, the US-based professional association for digital humanities.

Sherry Williams

Sherry Williams was born and raised on the south side of Chicago in the Englewood Community. She is Founder and President of the Bronzeville / Black Chicagoan Historical Society. Williams led African American cultural programs at the Pullman State Historic Site on the Senator Stephen A. Douglas Tomb Site and Monument Park grounds from 2007-2017. In 2009, Williams was voted Vice President of the Pullman Civic Organization. She also served as a board member of the Chicago Cultural Alliance. 2000-2005. Williams is an active member of the Afro American Genealogical and Historical Society (Chicago Chapter); a board member of the Bronzeville Trail Task Force, Inc.; a board member of Chicago Coalition of Park Advisory Councils; an advisory member of Illinois State Historical Society; a former commissioner of the Amistad Commission of the State of Illinois (2010-2012); an institutional member of the Chicago Cultural Alliance; a parter institution of Choose Chicago; and a board secretary of the Burnham Park Advisory Council. In 2010, Williams developed the Chicago Freedom Tours with the guidance of Dr. Christopher Reed, and well noted historian and educator Mrs. Glennette Tilley Turner. Funding support for the project came from the Chicago Architecture Foundation. Williams trained volunteers to provide portrayals at historic sites in Chicago where Civil war era statesmen, ministry leaders, and abolitionists supported freedom seekers on the Underground Railroad.

Dr. Ricardo Punzalan

Dr. Ricardo L. Punzalan, associate professor at the University of MIchigan School of Information, is a scholar of archives and digital curation. He studies community access and use of anthropological data in archives, as well as the digitization of ethnographic records held in libraries, archives, and museums. His research has established and shaped practices of virtual reunification and digital repatriation of cultural heritage collections. To do this work, he designs and carries out community-based, participatory research projects, which incorporate the perspectives of cultural heritage stakeholders beyond academic researchers. His scholarship has brought to the fore the critical challenges faced by underserved and Indigenous communities and has created dialogs between communities and cultural institutions. He co-directs ReConnect/ReCollect: Reparative Connections to Philippine Collections at the University of Michigan, a project that develops the framework for, and the practice of, reparative work for Philippine collections acquired by the university during the US colonial period. He is currently co-chair of the Archival Repatriation Committee of the Society of American Archivists and on the Board of Trustees of the Library of Congress American Folklife Center. This keynote is sponsored by the Mortenson Center for International Library Programs, and Punzalan has been selected as the 33rd Annual Mortenson Distinguished Lecturer.