I’m Edith Campbell. When I began blogging in June 2006, I wanted to name my blog in a way that would signify the uniqueness of my work while blending in a bit of my personality. I’m a quilter, mother, gardener, librarian, traveler, and a literacy activist.
I’m a Black, able-bodied, cis gendered woman. I’m an academic librarian who works particularly to improve the representation of People of Color and Native/First Nations people. I try to be an ally for all marginalized young people. I began my professional career as a social studies teacher teaching World Geography, US History, Economics and African American History. Through a generous grant from Indianapolis Public Schools, I earned my Master in Library Science and began my career as a school librarian. Currently, I work as a reference/instruction librarian at Indiana State University. Here, I advocate for students; work to remove barriers to information and fight to maintain user’s privacy, I am a librarian who strives for liberation: literarcy is critical to personal and collective liberation. I incorporate these principles into collection development, instructional sessions and outreach
I work to improve the literacies of teens of color, particularly by providing them with stories that relate to their lived experiences and help them establish their place in the world. Reading multiple varieties of text – reading the word and the world – is the foundation for all literacies and in becoming literate, we learn how to navigate the world around us.
In addition to this, I also work as a speaker and consultant. I am available to work as both an expert and a sensitivity reader. Being asked to comment on pre-published material for monkey content is asking me to serve as an expert reader and there is a fee for that work.
I curently write reviews for teh Journal of Children’s Literature. I am the founder of the We Are Kidlit Collective that has been collating summer reading lists based in critical multicultural literacy since 2015. I’m also a founding member of See What We See. I serve on the Advisory Board for the Research on Diversity in Youth Literature journal and on the Executive Board of the Indiana State Literacy Association. In 2016, I served as a Faculty Fellow to the ISU Faculty Center for Teaching Excellence’s Multicultural Curriculum Learning Community. I was a member of the 2020 Sibert Award Committee; 2020 Indiana Authors Award committee for young adult literature 2018; Michael A. Printz Committee; 2016 WNDB Walter Award Committee and 2014 YALSA’s Best Fiction for Young Adults selection committee. My research interests include the visibility of Black girls in young adult literature and the dehumanization of Blacks in children’s picture books.
I can be contacted at crazyquilts at hotmail dot com . I’m found in several places around the web.
My writings have appeared in Voya, Children and Libraries, Indiana Libraries and Library Media Connections. Citations of my writings be found here.
Edi Cotton Quilts 