Kel R. Karpinski (they/them) is an Assistant Professor and the Information Technology/Interlibrary Loan (IT/ILL) Librarian at NYC College of Technology, CUNY. They have held this position since 2018.
In their functional position, they are responsible for interlibrary loan requests from the CityTech community, which is crucial to both faculty and student scholarship, as well as those from other libraries requesting access to our materials. Kel manages technology for the library including the backend library systems, which are required for ordering, cataloguing and circulating materials, so we are able to get materials into the hands of students.
Their research focuses on mid-century queer films and novels as they relate to sailors and hustlers in Times Square, the performance of masculinity and how these texts map queer desire onto the city. Kel has published on these topics as well as co-authored pieces on the place of queer research in the library and on the subject of adapting this Teaching Portfolio for non-instructional faculty. They are Vice President of the NY Metro Chapter of the American Studies Association. They are also a zine maker and a NY Queer Zine Fair organizer.
Kel sees education as foundational to the role of librarians as through their work librarians provide access and guidance to information resources and are actively in engaging in information literacy as they support student learning and research.
Through overseeing our essential IT and ILL services, I am connecting students with necessary educational resources to do the most basic functions to the most complex research projects.
