Juan Angarita Bernal, Wolfson
Course: DH
Supervisor: Professor Caroline Bassett
Dissertation Title:
Public Libraries as knowledge bridges: hybrid mediations of cultural and environmental local heritage in Latin America (1994-2024)
Biographical Information
Originally from Colombia, Juan Pablo a PhD student in Digital Humanities at Wolfson College, University of Cambridge. His research explores how GLAM institutions – particularly libraries and archives – in Colombia and Brazil have functioned as sociotechnical infrastructures for cultural heritage since the 1990s. He focuses on how these institutions have used digital culture to connect institutional and community knowledge, reshape digital practices, and reinterpret the social and environmental value of heritage.
Juan Pablo’s doctoral project builds on his MSc in ‘Cultural Heritage Futures’ at the Edinburgh Futures Institute, University of Edinburgh, supervised by Dr Andrea Kocsis, where he studied how participatory methodologies in Colombian libraries expanded gender representation within digital collections. Generously funded by the Open-Oxford-Cambridge AHRC DTP through the Vice-Chancellor’s Award and the International Fee Bursary, his work bridges research, cultural mediation, and digital practice. Before Cambridge, he coordinated the ‘Digital Library of Bogotá’ and the ‘Virtual Library of the Central Bank of Colombia’, and taught in the MA in Journalism and the undergraduate programme in Digital Narratives at Universidad de los Andes (Bogotá). Juan Pablo has also worked as a curator, radio producer, and concert producer, and has contributed to Wikimedia and heritage projects in Uruguay, Denmark, and Mexico. In his free time, he enjoys playing guitar and singing, walking in nature, and watching films.
Supervisor: Professor Caroline Bassett
Research Interests
Research Topic: Public Libraries as Knowledge Bridges: Hybrid Mediations of Cultural and Environmental Local Heritage in Colombia and Brazil (1994–2024)
Selected Publications
