How might scholarly societies, libraries, and other nonprofit partners work together towards an expansive vision
of scholarly communication outreach and dissemination that goes beyond institutional and national boundaries?
Nicky Agate, head of digital initiatives at the Modern Language Association, will discuss the society’s collaboration
with Columbia University Libraries on CORE, or the Commons Open Repository Exchange. Like other
repositories, CORE facilitates open-access distribution, discussion, and citation of the many products of humanities
research, including pre- or postprints, conference presentations, data sets, and learning objects such as syllabi
and slide decks. What makes CORE stand out, however, is its social facet, the fact that it is not an independent
entity but an integral part of the much broader Humanities Commons network.
Nicky will discuss the process of building and refining the repository and what both the MLA and Columbia University
Libraries have learned—and continue to learn—from one another. She will posit that we could take the
success of CORE as an indication of the potential for scholarly societies, libraries, and other nonprofit entities to
work together towards more useful (and more used) open access repositories.