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What's New in Special Collections

Latinx Voices: Laurents Bañuelos-Benitez

By skennedy on December 12, 2018 1:28 PM | Permalink

Fans of KUNV Radio may recognize Laurents Bañuelos-Benitez's voice. The UNLV alumnus and current UNLV graduate student developed his first passion at UNLV while working at the campus radio station. Now as one of the students working on the Latinx Voices of Southern Nevada project in the University Libraries, Bañuelos is embracing his passion and understanding for Latinx cultures while collecting oral histories from Latinx residents in Las Vegas and Southern Nevada. A native Nevadan, Bañuelos is the son of Mexican and Salvadoran immigrants. He was born at University Medical Center and grew up in east Las Vegas. He graduated from Clark High School before attending UNLV. The first person in his family to graduate from a four-year university in the United States, Bañuelos earned his Bachelor of Arts in Journalism in 2017. He is currently pursuing a master's degree in education, with hopes of working with underserved youth in the Clark County School District.

New from Digital Collections: Learn how to collect Twitter data by Miranda Barrie

By Su Kim Chung on December 3, 2018 3:07 PM | Permalink

Why We Archive: Preserving the stories of a community coming together By Miranda Barrie

You can access the first tutorial in the 1 October Twitter Collection series here.

On October 2, 2017 I woke up in Santiago, Chile to a notification that there had been a shooting in my hometown of Las Vegas. I opened the Twitter application and began scrolling through my timeline, looking for mentions of the size and scale of the shooting. I started to see the numbers of injured persons rise as I repeatedly swiped down to refresh the site. I had no idea where my family members were, and no one was picking up the phone. Feeling panicked, I began doing the only thing I felt I could do at the time: amplifying the needs of the community by retweeting calls for blood donations from the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department.

Latinx Voices: Marcela Rodriguez-Campo

By skennedy on November 19, 2018 2:57 PM | Permalink

Marcela Rodriguez-Campo

Now in the second-year of her doctoral program at UNLV, Marcela Rodriguez-Campo is the senior-most students working on the Latinx Voices of Southern Nevada projects in the Oral History Research Center at UNLV University Libraries Special Collections & Archives. Rodriguez-Campo, who identifies as a Colombiana, a Latina, and a dual citizen, joined the project to help elevate the voices and experiences of Latinx people in our region's historical record.

Book. Art. Object. by Peter Michel

By Su Kim Chung on November 15, 2018 5:01 PM | Permalink

Curator Peter Michel reflects on the collection of Artists' Books held in UNLV Special Collections and Archives. Photography by Aaron Mayes, Curator of Visual Materials. 

Collection highlight: John Levy Lighting Productions Records and the Roman temple by Jimmy Chang

By Su Kim Chung on November 5, 2018 2:38 PM | Permalink


 Roman interpretation of classical Greek architecture, or Las Vegas’ interpretation of a Roman interpretation of classical Greek architecture?
Image Credit:Caesars Palace cabana artist’s rendering, John Levy Lighting Productions, Inc. Records, 1992-2017. MS-00832. Special Collections and Archives, University Libraries, University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

In 2016 John Levy, founder of John Levy Lighting Productions, Inc. donated to UNLV Libraries Special Collections & Archives his company’s records, which feature architectural lighting design drawings from concept to completion, demonstrating the expressiveness and technological possibilities of light in Las Vegas, Nevada. His earliest project in Las Vegas was Caesars Palace, the famous Forum Shops sky scape ceiling which through innovative lighting design mimics the changing light of the Roman sky.