Maria Bonn, who currently serves as the director of the Scholarly Publishing Office at the U-M Library, has been named associate university librarian for publishing. Bonn’s appointment, which is effective immediately, comes after a national search to fill the position.
“Scholarly publishing and libraries are both in tremendous upheaval as a result of major technological change,” says Paul Courant, dean of libraries, who notes the new post has been created to oversee the library’s growing suite of publishing and scholarly communications initiatives.
“We need leaders with the vision and insight to help us thrive in this new environment, and find new ways to support the academy’s mission of communicating its discoveries and ideas,” Courant says. “Maria Bonn is the right person to play this new and exciting role on behalf of Michigan and the academy more broadly.”
For the last 10 years Bonn has pioneered the production of electronic books and journals. Her role has included developing the profile of the library in scholarly communication. Under Bonn’s leadership, the Scholarly Publishing Office was created.
“Creating this new position signals a unique awareness on the part of the University of Michigan that the University’s publishing activity can best be supported and grown in the context of the library,” Bonn says.
The experimental publishing unit provides electronic publishing tools and systems for both born-digital and converted publications, publishes a reprint series of public domain works from the library’s collections.
Bonn also will serve as an advisor to the university community on issues surrounding scholarly publishing and communication policy.
She has a doctorate in American literature from SUNY Buffalo and a master’s in information and library science from U-M.
