ELL’s founder and Director, Dene Grigar, was honored at the 2024 Electronic Literature Organization (ELO) conference with the Marjorie C. Luesebrink Career Achievement Award.
Grigar has served on the ELO Board of Directors since 2006, first as its Treasurer, then as Vice President, and finally as its President for two terms (2023-2016, 2016-2019). After stepping down from this leadership role, Grigar, continued working on behalf of the organization to archive and preserve works of born-digital literature, art, and games, dedicating expertise from her lab for these purposes. In 2018 she led the development of the ELO Repository, a project that evolved into The NEXT, the virtual museum and library that hosts the files for close to 3000 works. She also led the creation of the extended metadata system used by The NEXT that makes it possible for people with disabilities and sensory sensitivities to know in advance how best to experience a work in The NEXT. She has also led the reconstruction and restoration of 10 major works of electronic literature, including such hypertext narratives as Stuart Moulthrop’s Victory Garden, Bill Bly’s We Descend, Sarah Smith’s King of Space, and Christy Sheffield Sanford’s Red Mona.
She has been awarded funding for her projects by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Society of American Archivists and has also been supported by Triangle SCI.