Edward Benoit III

Interim Director & Associate Professor Louisiana State University

  • Baton Rouge LA

Dr. Benoit coordinates the archival studies and cultural heritage resource management programs at LSU.

Contact

Louisiana State University

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Biography

Edward Benoit, III is the Interim Director and Associate Professor in the School of Information Studies at Louisiana State University. He coordinates the archival studies and cultural heritage resource management programs. He received an MA in History, MLIS and PhD in Information Studies from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. His research focuses on participatory and community archives, non-traditional archival materials, climate change, and archival education. He is the founder and director of the Virtual Footlocker Project, which examines the personal archiving habits of the 21st century soldier in an effort to develop new digital capture and preservation technologies to support their needs. He also directs PROTECCT-GLAM, an IMLS-funded project focused on identify climate-change-related risks for GLAMs.

Dr. Benoit is also an affiliated faculty member in the LSU College of Art & Design's Doctor of Design in Cultural Preservation program.

Areas of Expertise

Community Archives
Participatory Archives
Archival Pedagogy
Non-traditional Archival Materials
Climate Change

Research Focus

Participatory & Community Archives

Dr. Benoit’s research focuses on participatory and community archives, non-traditional digital collections, and climate-change risks to cultural heritage. He pairs Virtual Footlocker personal-archive studies, GLAM risk modeling, and immersive archival-education methods to craft preservation frameworks that protect born-digital artifacts and empower communities to steward their own records.

Education

University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee

Ph.D.

Information Studies

2014

University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee

M.A.

History

2009

University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee

MLIS

2009

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Accomplishments

LSU Distinguished Faculty Teaching Award

2024

LSU Distinguished Teaching Award

2024

ALISE Excellence in Teaching Award

2023

Media Appearances

Dr. Ed Benoit, New Interim Director at the LSU School of Information Studies

Listen with LOUIS  online

2025-02-28

In this episode we interview Dr. Ed Benoit, who was recently named Interim Director of the LSU School of Information Studies (SIS). Dr. Benoit discusses what makes the LSU SIS a unique and growing program, what makes him excited about directing the program, what discussions they are having about the future of information science, and more!

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How LSU researchers could help protect Louisiana, nation’s cultural heritage from climate change

LSU Reveille  online

2023-01-21

This will be done using geographic systems analysis, which means “instead of looking at physical maps, you’re overlaying data on top of maps so that you can see how things interact,” explained Edward Benoit III, one of the researchers and an associate professor in the LSU School of Library and Information Science.

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LSU professor developing 'virtual footlocker' to store soldiers' memories

The Advocate  online

2019-08-19

“What’s going to happen to all these digital records because they’re much more ephemeral than a physical photograph or a letter?” Benoit said. “How do you pass down a bunch of emails?”

The assistant professor at LSU’s School of Library and Information Science is hoping to come up with the answer.

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Articles

Mapping GLAMs: creating a national dataset of GLAMs to develop a categorical climate-change risk assessment scale

Information Research

2025

Introduction
The PROTECCT-GLAM project aims to assess and address climate risks for US galleries, libraries, archives, and museums (GLAMs). The project team began with creating a national dataset of GLAMs.

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An opportunity to stay connected: documenting personal communication records of military personnel

Archival Science

2024

While service and operational records of the US armed forces have been previously investigated, personal communication records of military personnel have received less attention in archival scholarship. Specifically, we are concerned with the ways that changes in technology challenge the preservation of personal communications records. This issue is important because personal communication records of service members, both active and retired, can support military personnel and their families in managing the stress of deployment.

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The genre of love-me binders: US military veterans documenting their service

Archivaria

2023

The US government lacks robust and accurate records of its military personnel. In this context, we argue that attending to veterans’ recordkeeping practices matters to honouring their service to the nation. However, recordkeeping skills are not currently part of the official curriculum of active service members or veterans. Considering this situation, we ask, How do veterans in the US document their service? What are the uses of veterans’ records and recordkeeping practices?

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Event Appearances

Inventing and Implementing Future-Ready Archival Education

2021 | Association for Library and Information Science Education  Online

Love Me Binders: Personal Information Collections for the Modern Soldier

2021 | Society of American Archivists Research Forum  Online

The Virtual Footlocker Project: 2021 MARS Update

2021 | Society of American Archivists  Online

Research Grants

PROTECCT-GLAM: Risk of The Environment’s Changing Climate Threats for Galleries, Libraries, Archives and Museums

Institute of Museum and Library Services

2022

Virtual Footlocker Project: Developing a User-Centered Framework for Digital Preservation of Active Duty and Veteran Personal Records

Institute of Museum and Library Services

2018

Social Tagging of Amateur and Professionally Produced Moving Images

Society of American Archivists Foundation

2016

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