This fall, the Digital Resources Division of the Law Library of Congress is hosting its third consecutive remote internship program for the Herencia: Centuries of Spanish Legal Documents crowdsourcing campaign. Herencia interns are responsible for reviewing, transcribing, and promoting this collection of Spanish legal documents from the 15th – 19th centuries, with the goal of making these historical documents better understood and more accessible to researchers. You can find examples of original research performed by previous Herencia interns here. Here is a look at our impressive fall 2021 cohort!
Silvia Lopez is from Colombia and is currently an A.L.M. student in the field of anthropology and archeology at Harvard University. She received a B.S. in industrial engineering and co-founded a cybersecurity company in which she led the marketing department for over 10 years. Silvia is a believer in the power of combining technology and humanities for enriching organizations and societies. In particular, she is interested in how technology may facilitate and improve the analysis of traditional and contemporary subjects within the humanities, arts, and social sciences. Silvia is also an advocate of gender equality and diversity in the workplace. Outside of her academic work, she enjoys traveling, hiking, and learning about history and arts.
Alèxia Devin is a senior undergraduate student at the University of Barcelona (UB) in Spain. She is majoring in philosophy with a minor in classical literature, which allows her to explore two of her main academic interests: 20th century European philosophy and ancient Greek mythology. She’s using her dominion of Catalan, Spanish, and English to transcribe historical Spanish documents for the Herencia project at the Law Library. When she’s not in her local library, she can be found cooking for (and with) her friends, drawing, or hiking in the Spanish countryside.
Celine Huang is a recent graduate from NYU, who currently resides in the suburbs of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She received her B.A. in social science with a focus in political science in addition to a minor in creative writing. Celine has spent the summer interning at the Law Library of Congress and creating a Story Map and blog. This fall she is excited to continue her work at the Law Library by interning with the Herencia Crowdsourcing Campaign to transcribe the Spanish legal documents from the 15th to 19th century. In her spare time, she is writing her first science fiction novel, learning to cook, teaching herself how to draw digitally and with fountain pens, and traveling to new places.
Anna Weese-Grubb is a current third-year undergraduate student at the University of Virginia, majoring in medieval and renaissance literature in both English and Spanish and minoring in history and sociology. She is currently working as an intern for SHINE Systems, a Charlottesville-based government contractor, alongside the Law Library of Congress internship. When not working, she writes poetry, some of which is published in the V Magazine at the university.
Johannah Ball is currently a Master of Science in Library Science student at the University of Kentucky. In addition to the Herencia internship, she works as an archives assistant at the Louie B. Nunn Center for Oral History at the University of Kentucky. She received a Bachelor of Arts in political science with a Spanish minor at the University of Kentucky in 2019. Johannah also previously interned with the federal government at the State Department in 2018. Johannah is fluent in Spanish and enjoys lap swimming and reading.
Francesca Marquez is a recent alumnus of the University of Southern California, graduating with a degree in economics and a minor in English. She is interested in the intersections of law, economics, and gender, more specifically how gender equality laws can streamline a nation’s economic efficiency. Outside of her academic interests, she loves to read literary fiction and consume coffee with gusto.
Cameron Hub, a native of Oakland, California, currently lives in Washington, D.C., where he works as a research fellow for a nonprofit in the District. He received his bachelor’s degree from Seattle University, majoring in interdisciplinary liberal studies with minors in Spanish, economics, and philosophy. While a student, he studied abroad in Madrid, Spain, and worked as a research assistant studying American economic history. He is thrilled to have the opportunity to serve in an internship that ties together his own interests and experience and sheds light on a unique, fascinating collection.
Katherine DeFonzo is a recent graduate of The Catholic University of America, where she completed the joint masters degree program in history and library science. During this time, she served as the Graduate Library Preprofessional (GLP) in the Semitics/ICOR Library on campus, where her work focused on the digitization of manuscripts from the Near East. She holds a B.A. in history and Spanish literature from Fordham University, where she was also a member of the Rose Hill Honors Program. She previously worked as an intern in the Archives Center at The Museum of American History in Washington, D.C. Her research interests include Spanish colonialism and Spanish-American relations during the Early Republic.
Subscribe to In Custodia Legis – it’s free! – to receive interesting posts drawn from the Law Library of Congress’s vast collections and our staff’s expertise in U.S., foreign, and international law.