Bethany Aylward

BA (UCL), MA (Sheffield), PhD (Sheffield)

Information School

University Teacher

b.aylward@sheffield.ac.uk

The Wave

Full contact details

Bethany Aylward
Information School
The Wave
2 Whitham Road
Sheffield
S10 2AH

Profile

I joined the Information School as a Librarianship (MA) student in 2017. In 2018 I was awarded a scholarship to research the web archiving needs of activist archivists as a response to the use of digital media platforms by contemporary social movements. I joined the staff as a University Teacher in 2023 and completed my PhD Capturing social movements: Web archiving needs of activist collections in the north (UK) in 2024.

I am on the organising group of the Sheffield Feminist Archive, an intersectional and inclusive community archiving project documenting histories centring experiences of womanhood. Our physical collections, including interviews from our Oral History Project can be accessed at Sheffield City Archives.

I graduated from UCL with a BA in Russian and History in 2014 having spent my year abroad studying in St Petersburg. I am a trustee of the Society for Cooperation in Russian and Soviet Studies (SCRSS), a library, archive, and cultural hub in South London.

Research interests

My main research interest is the intersection of alternative archival praxis and networked social movements.

More generally I have supervised, conducted, and presented research relating to critical archive studies, community web archiving, digital inclusion provision, bias in library classification, and decolonisation in public libraries.

Research group: I am a member of the Digital Societies Research Group

Teaching activities

I contribute to modules on MA Librarianship, MA/PG Cert/PG Dip Library and Information Services Management (Distance Learning), MSc Information Management, and MSc Information Systems

INF6103 - Information Organisation

INF6503 - Information Organisation (DL)

INF6350 - Information Literacy

INF6553 - Information Literacy (DL)

INF6400 – Information Systems and the Information Society

INF6501 - Personal and Professional Development Portfolio (DL)

INF6513 - Leadership, Strategy and Change (DL)

INF6840 - Archives and Record Management

Professional activities and memberships: I am a member of the Association of Internet Researchers (AoIR) and Association for Information Science and Technology (ASIS&T).