Project Team
Permanent Staff
Beverley Park Rilett
Beverley Park Rilett, editor and inaugural director, is an Associate Research Professor and Digital Humanities Coordinator at Auburn University in Alabama, home of the George Eliot Archive and its sister projects, the George Eliot Review Online and George Eliot Scholars since 2021.
Rilett began her career in English and DH at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, where all three George Eliot projects were launched. Rilett has edited British Poetry of the Long Nineteenth Century: A Selection for College Students, and has published several journal articles and book chapters on aspects of George Eliot's life and works. She is honored to be a vice president and North American representative of the George Eliot Fellowship and the digital editor of the Fellowship’s George Eliot Review journal.
Current Research Assistants
Yue Cui
Yue Cui (2022-present) completed her Ph.D. in Computer Science and Software Engineering at Auburn University and now works as a faculty member at Auburn University at Montgomery. As the project's lead developer, Yue is developing TEI Assist, a toolkit for encoding George Eliot’s fictions, poetry and letters. She also works on re-designing and developing the George Eliot Text Explorer.
Audrey DeLuca
Audrey DeLuca (2025-present) is an English major at the University of Florida, expected to graduate in Spring 2026. For the George Eliot Archive, she has helped create a series of digital postcards featuring quotations from Eliot’s writings. She also works with the Alabama Authors project to collect, compile, and process book jacket images and their metadata.
Isabella Forero
Isabella Forero (2024-present) is an English major at the University of Florida expected to graduate with a BA in 2027. During her time with the Archive, Isabella collaboratively created teaching resource guides for Eliot’s novels, updated and uploaded cover pages in the Contemporary Writings section, and contributed to the alt-text descriptions for the Illustrations Gallery. Isabella also processed images and metadata for the Alabama Authors project as part of her internship.
Monique Heelam
Monique Heelam (2025-present) is double majoring in English and Political Science with a minor in History at the University of Florida, and is expected to graduate with a bachelor's degree in 2027. During her time as a digital humanities intern, she has collaborated with the Archive’s social media platform and designed illustrated postcards of quotations from George Eliot’s writings.
Barbara Kaklias
Barbara Kaklias (2024-present) is an English major with a minor in Communication Sciences and Disorders, pursuing a Bachelor's degree in English at UFL, expected to graduate in December 2025. She has contributed to various projects of the Archive, including uploading George Eliot’s reading files to Omeka, compiling novel resource guides for The Mill on the Floss and Romola, and updating the image descriptions for the Illustration Gallery.
Lena Larsen-Bourdeau
Lena Larsen-Bourdeau (2024-present) is a History major with a minor in English, pursuing a Bachelor of Arts degree at the University of Florida, expected to graduate in 2027. Her projects with the Archive include writing descriptions for documents in the Contemporaries section, compiling teaching resource guides for George Eliot’s novels, and creating tutorial videos for the Archive’s Text Explorer and Voyant Tools features. She also assisted on the George Eliot Library Project and contributed alt-text descriptions for the Illustration Gallery.
Abby Mencner
Abby Mencner (2025-present) is double majoring in Nursing and English with a minor in Spanish at the University of Florida, is expected to graduate in 2027 with two BA degrees. During her time with the Archive, she has worked on designing digital postcards featuring quotations from George Eliot’s novels. She is also compiling metadata and processing images for the Alabama Authors project.
Em Petlev
Em Petlev (2025-present) is triple majoring in English, History, and Women's Studies at the University of Florida, and is expected to graduate in 2027 with a Bachelor of Arts degree. During their digital humanities internship with the Archive, they edited the Gallery of Illustrated quotations subproject, not only designing postcards but also standardizing the metadata for the complete collection of nearly 400 items.
Angelina Ramos
Angelina Ramos (2024-present) graduated from the University of Florida in 2025 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in English. Her past projects with the Archive include collaborating on the creation of teaching resource guides, developing cover pages, assisting with contextualized descriptions for the Illustrations Gallery, and adding descriptions to Omeka for contemporary reviews of Middlemarch. She is currently editing final copies of the Teaching Resource Guides for all of Eliot’s published novels.
Hailee Spoor
Hailee Spoor (2025-present) is is double majoring in English and Advertising at the University of Florida, and is expected to graduate in 2027 with a Bachelor of Arts in English and a Bachelor of Science in Advertising with a focus on Persuasive Messaging. During her time in the internship, she has contributed to the Archive's social media platform, collecting quotations from Eliot's writing and creating illustrated digital postcards.
Libo "Donald" Sun
Libo "Donald" Sun (2022-present) is a PhD student in Computer Science at Auburn University. He developed the Archive's GitHub resources and used React to create a mirror site, ensuring the existence of a backup and a sandbox for developers. He also updated and debugged the visualization "George Eliot's Social Network" and currently continues development on the Text Explorer application.
Isa Ward
Isa Ward (2025-present) is an English major with a minor in Anthropology, with her Bachelor of Arts degree expected in spring of 2027. Her main project with the Archive involves designing illustrated digital postcards featuring quotations from George Eliot’s writing, and processing the associated Dublin Core metadata.
Former Research Assistants
Mavis A. Adam-Moses, 2022, helped build the beta version of the Alabama Authors of the 19th & 20th Centuries project and processed files and metadata for the George Eliot websites
Olivia Ainooson, 2022-23, helped to build Alabama Authors of the 19th & 20th Centuries and process files and metadata for the George Eliot websites
Vennela Akula, 2023-24, worked on the "Transforming Middlemarch" project, an adaptation of the AHRC-supported project begun at DeMontfort University, and other Natural Language Processing (NLP) projects
Dr. Antje Anderson, 2019-21, created the interactive maps of George Eliot's trips to Italy as part of a Master’s thesis in Art History
Sydney Baty, 2018-19, drafted short biographies summarizing Eliot's relationships; mined periodicals databases to find previously unknown contemporary articles on GE; presented research at an academic conference
Susannah Boyer, 2018-19, located public domain sources of Eliot-related images and verified information for the Social Network relationship summaries
Michaela Brown, 2020, located and added documents to the Archive's Commentary by Contemporaries section; developed content and metadata for its sister site, George Eliot Scholars
Mackenzie Burch, 2019-20, collected data and researched terms and accessibility for our new sister site, George Eliot Scholars, which was integral to her Honors thesis; presented research at an academic conference and poster sessions
Yuxiang Chen, 2022-24, helped develop the George Eliot Text Explorer subproject, incorporating AI, natural language processing, machine learning, and web application development; also chunked text and processed results for the collection of AI-Assisted Summaries of Eliot's fiction
Bryan Christman, 2020-21, assisted with the revisions of the Social Network summaries and researched books Eliot read for a new subproject, "George Eliot's Reading"
Shane Clegg, 2019, improved website functionality; created (with Riley Jhi) the original branching Chronology visualization for the George Eliot Archive; presented poster at undergraduate research fair.
Sara Duke, 2017-18, researched grant opportunities, developed the early database of contemporary reviews, presented posters and conference papers
Megan Ekstrom, 2017-2019, database development and document preparation; researched Eliot's female friendships; presented posters and conference papers
Grace Erixon, 2019-2020, helped build interactive maps of George Eliot's trips to Italy (in collaboration with Antje Anderson); contributed blurbs to the social network subproject; assisted with metadata standardization and website maintenance
Hailey Fischer, 2020-2023, developed descriptions and identified coordinates for "George Eliot's England," the Archive's born-digital geospatial exhibit, as part of her MA thesis
Rachel Gordon, 2017-19: collected images for the initial George Eliot portrait gallery; developed the Published Writings database with all Cabinet Edition texts; presented at conferences and poster sessions
Ram Guttikonda, 2022, developed an early prototype for the "George Eliot's People and Places" subproject, utilizing libraries such as React to create an interactive, accessible, and navigable data visualization from data cleaned and edited by earlier team members.
Sarah Guyer, 2020-21 & 2023-25, transitioned the George Eliot Review Online files to a new metadata and file storage system; organized and transcribed unpublished manuscript correspondence; processed George Eliot Scholars submissions; and, most significantly, completed and launched the George Eliot’s Reading subproject.
John Harkendorff, 2019-20, web developer, focused primarily on the George Eliot Scholars site, improving the website's functionality, developing the site's contribution interface, and facilitating an email outreach to potential contributors
Abby Heinzen, 2022, helped to develop the George Eliot Archive's Twitter account, collecting quotations with their citation information; also verified copyright status for contributions to the Scholars project
Jorryn "Jojo" Hensley, 2021-22, launched the project's first TweetDeck in 2022, combining quotations, illustrations, and news in regularly Tweeted segments.
Brad Hughes, 2021-23, a full-time web developer for Auburn University Libraries, was lead developer for the project’s first two years at AU. He mentored the computer science students to integrate their applications with our Omeka platform, guided them through programming difficulties, and ensured our websites were optimally functioning.
Riley Jhi, 2017-2020, our first web developer, designed and programmed the first iteration of the George Eliot Archive using Omeka Classic, customized with JavaScript, HTML, and CSS. Riley created the social network data visualization model, and, in collaboration with Shane Clegg, the interactive chronology; conference, and poster presentations
Caitlin Jones, 2022-23, served as an editorial assistant for Alabama Authors of the 19th and 20th Centuries and assisted with Dr. Rilett's undergraduate honors class, mentoring students in their projects and organizing communication between the George Eliot Archive and Alabama Authors teams
Ravindra "Ravi" Joshi, 2022-23, developed an early prototype for the "George Eliot's People and Places" subproject
Yubaraj Karki, 2023-24, worked on Natural Language Processing (NLP) and text analysis applications, particularly the AI-assisted summaries for George Eliot’s nonfiction texts
Bailea Kerr, 2016-18, a founding team member, developed the earliest project databases, processed images, researched comparable digital projects and the GEF history, presented at conference and poster sessions
Rose Kottwitz, 2020, prepared metadata for the 896 "Cross Letters" and uploaded them to the Omeka platform; compared a sample set of the Cross letters with Gordon Haight's George Eliot Letters
Wesley Lowman, 2022-24, collaborated with CSSE Senior Design students to create and adapt software for the George Eliot Chronology and created the "George Eliot in Weimar" interactive mapping experiences for his Auburn Honors College Apogee project.
Yash Mahajan, 2022, used AI and natural language processing to help develop a toolkit for the George Eliot Text Explorer subproject
Mckenzi Marlow, 2021-22, compiled and added articles to the Commentary by Contemporaries section of the Archive and new open-access materials to George Eliot Scholars
Breanna Martin, 2022, redesigned brochures reflecting the projects' new home at Auburn; also helped launch the Archive's new Twitter feed of compiled quotations
George Martin, 2022-23, programmed the initial George Eliot's Journals application, which allows users to query the database by date or keyword
Kaylen Michaelis, 2020-21 and 2023-25, developed the Commentary by Contemporaries section including standardizing the metadata across all files; improved accessibility through the creation of alt-text for the illustrations gallery, and edited the "George Eliot in Weimar" map project. Kaylen also led the team as assistant editor.
Thara Michaelis, 2020-21, developed the Commentary by Contemporaries section; helped prepare the Journals and Notebooks section for publication, and added George Eliot-related information and links to Wikipedia
Anne Nagel, 2019-20, transposed the "George Eliot Portrait Gallery" section to the Central Online Victorian Educator (COVE) site; researched and co-authored (with BPR) the editorial introduction, “The George Eliot Portrait Gallery: Perspectives on the Writer”
Matthew Nagle, 2023, worked to incorporate AI technology into the George Eliot Archive and initiated the alt-text subproject adding simple descriptions to the illustrations gallery, to improve our project’s accessibility
Harrison Patten, 2021-22, created the first dataset of Alabamian authors for the Alabama Authors project, prior to its launch, modeled on the George Eliot Archive
Nayanika Reddy Rajioli 2023-24, worked on the "Transforming Middlemarch" project, an adaptation of the AHRC-supported project begun at DeMontfort University, and other Natural Language Processing (NLP) projects
Chaohui (Jennie) Ren, 2022, has expertise in UI and UX design and front-end development. She helped to improve the design and accessibility of the George Eliot websites
Lindsay Roberts, 2020-21, proofread and added to the Social Network summaries; monitored contributions and prepared them for publication on George Eliot Scholars
Maxwell Robeson, 2020-21, edited and contributed to the biographical commentary for "George Eliot's Social Network;" also helped to edit "George Eliot's Reading" subproject
Kayleigh Ryan, 2020-21, primarily responsible for curating and processing the Image Gallery's Illustrations collection depicting scenes and characters from George Eliot's works
Devyn Sanderson, 2021, collected and processed illustrations of George Eliot's works and scanned fragile primary documents
Cara Shade, 2023, used her graphic design skills to create “postcards” with quotations by George Eliot for use on the Archive’s social media accounts
Kevien Shelton, 2022-24, compiled the data for the Dictionary of "George Eliot's People and Places" sub-project, and worked with Wesley Lowman to develop the map for the "George Eliot in Weimar" project.
CJ Short, 2022, researched analytics data, cloud server options, Omeka plug-ins, and other aspects of website development to improve our site; encoded texts using TEI standards
Tanima Shrivastava, 2020-21, maintained and improved the functionality of the three websites, especially enhancing the navigation options available with the Omeka CMS
Minh Smith, 2022, a graduate student in CSSE interested in AI and natural language processing. Minh launched the TweetDeck subproject and helped develop the Text Explorer application
Hannah Stefancik, 2021-22, cleaned and standardized Dublin Core metadata for numerous collections within the Archive
Alexis Stoffers, 2020-21 and 2023-25, redesigned our logo to add Eliot's signature; helped develop an early version of the "George Eliot's England" image gallery (completed by Hailey Fischer), designed a print edition of George Eliot in England, designed a series of promotional brochures, and cleaned text files of George Eliot's works for the Text Explorer subproject.
Xianming Tang, 2022-23, curated, extracted, and cleaned files and metadata for both the George Eliot Archive and Alabama Authors of the 19th & 20th Centuries
Rosamond Thalken, 2016-17, a founding team member, scanned and processed documents and images, developed the first databases, and helped organize the initial project; conference, and poster presentations
Hollie Tucker, 2021-22, reorganized the Trello team task board, streamlining the website's tagging system, reworking metadata for the Beinecke Letters project, and editing "George Eliot's Social Network"
Brandon Unverferth, 2020-21, prepared a plain text edition of the Dictionary of George Eliot's Scenes and Characters for our website from the original reference published by Mudge & Sears in 1924.
Abraham "Abe" Velasco, 2023, used Excel, Python, and json coding languages to clean, manipulate, and manage project data and served as a bridge between the Alabama Authors of the 19th and 20th Centuries and George Eliot Archive teams
Derek Wagner, 2016-18, a founding team member, located and digitized many of the reviews of George Eliot's works by her contemporaries
Jacob Walker, 2021-22, created an interactive map on George Eliot’s 1880 Honeymoon Trip using ArcGIS. He also created a similar multi-media presentation for the Liquid Galaxy digital wall in RBD Library
Student Interns
Project-based learning for course credit
Summer 2025
EDITORS: Audrey DeLuca, Isabella Forero, Monique Heelam, Barbara Kaklias, Lena Larsen-Bourdeau, Abby Mencner, Em Petlev, Angelina Ramos, Hailee Spoor, Isa Ward
DEVELOPERS: Mandeep Ansley, Amee Kivette, and Keanna Tennyson
Spring 2025
EDITORS: Barbara Kaklias, Isabella Forero, Angelina Ramos, Lena Larsen-Bourdeau, Alyss Santiago
DEVELOPERS: Mandeep Andey, Madison Champion, Jenna Chiarella, Evan Ginos, Maci Hadley, Amee Kivette, Michael McInnes, Alex Nolin, Colin Patrick, Skylar Reichle, Keanna Tennyson, and Traevon Wright
Fall 2023 - Fall 2024
EDITORS: Brooke Arnold, Josh Baskaran, Carter Deriso, Sophia Halstead, Wesley Lowman, Molly Myrick, Logan Phelps, Lucy Mills Sammataro, Cara Shade, Ty Taylor
DEVELOPERS: Nathan Bradshaw, Ben Buckley, Spencer Dunn, Yubaraj Karki, Brooke Kirkham, Amee Kivette, Shataydrian Marshall, Talon Mason, Cady Pridgeon, Alden Snajder, Keanna “Kat” Tennyson, Will Tobens, Laura Wilson