Visiting Clinical Assistant Professor

The Ray Bradbury Center in the School of Liberal Arts at IU Indianapolis invites applicants for a Visiting Assistant Clinical Professor position in the American Studies Program in the Department of Interdisciplinary Studies. The person in this position will bring expertise as an experienced Project Archivist to lead the arrangement, description, preservation, and public-access preparation of approximately 186 linear feet of unprocessed manuscript materials from the Ray Bradbury Collection. The Center holds over 150,000 manuscript pages, four decades of correspondence, Bradbury’s working library of nearly 4,000 volumes, and the contents of his home office. This role requires prior archival processing experience, knowledge of archival metadata standards, and hands-on ArchivesSpace (or comparable) experience. Bradbury’s filing practices were often associative and inconsistent, so the archivist must exercise sound professional judgment when original order is unclear. The Project Archivist reports to the Center’s Director and collaborates with IU Libraries, University Collections, and the IU Indianapolis Arts and Humanities Institute.

Established in 2007, the Ray Bradbury Center is the only public archive dedicated exclusively to Ray Bradbury (1920–2012), preserving manuscripts, correspondence, artwork, AV materials, and memorabilia documenting his creative and professional life. IU Indianapolis is opening a purpose-built reference library, reading room, and archival storage facility for the Center in October 2026. This position offers the opportunity to establish lasting intellectual and physical control over a major American literary archive and make it available for scholarly and public use.

The initial appointment for this grant-funded visiting position is December 1, 2026, through August 31, 2028. This position requires regular on-campus presence.

As the state’s premier urban research institution, IU Indianapolis is a dynamic campus of over 20,000 students and has been recognized for excellence in civic engagement and community partnerships. IU Indianapolis is committed to being a welcoming campus community and we seek candidates whose scholarly efforts contribute to robust learning and working environments for all students, staff, and faculty.

Basic Qualifications

Required Qualifications

• Master’s degree from an ALA-accredited LIS program, or equivalent graduate degree with substantial archival training.

• Professional experience arranging, processing, and describing archival or manuscript collections, including applying archival metadata/descriptive standards.

• Hands-on experience with ArchivesSpace or a comparable collection management system; working knowledge of DACS and EAD.

• Experience with structured data, spreadsheets, CSV files, or metadata migration workflows.

• Demonstrated understanding of provenance, arrangement, description, preservation, and access; ability to make defensible arrangement decisions independently.

• Strong written communication, organizational, and project-management skills; ability to handle fragile and sensitive materials appropriately.

Preferred Qualifications

• Multiple years processing large or complex personal papers, literary manuscripts, or 20th-century cultural collections.

• Experience with complex, multi-level finding aids; advanced ArchivesSpace and CSV/batch-import experience; legacy metadata normalization.

• Experience with restricted records, authority control, and mixed-format collections (photographs, art, AV, oversize).

• Familiarity with 20th-century American literature, science fiction, or publishing history; experience on grant-funded processing projects.

Department Contact for Questions

Jason Aukerman ([email protected])

Additional Qualifications

Salary and Rank

Special Instructions

For Best Consideration Date

10/15/2026

Expected Start Date

12/01/2026

Posting Number

IU-101670-2026