Welcome to our newest Data Librarian, Neil Aitken!

We are very pleased to welcome Neil Aitken to the MDL Team as of February 1, 2026. Neil is a Data Librarian who will work with the MDL team to support a range of services, with a focus on support for programmatic data analysis methods including TDM techniques.

Neil has a BS in Computer Science from Brigham Young University, an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of California, Riverside, a PhD in Literature and Creative Writing from the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, and an MLIS from the University of British Columbia. Neil has experience as a computer programmer developing children’s educational games, and has held roles as a writing coach, consultant, teaching assistant, and instructor. Most recently, Neil has worked as a Digital Projects Specialist at the University of British Columbia, where his role involved consulting with researchers on text & data mining (TDM) projects. He is the author of two books of poetry: The Lost Country of Sight and Babbage's Dream, and is also the librettist for Star Singer, an opera about cultural memory, loss, and grief composed by Juhi Bansal, which will debut in Los Angeles in late 2027. He was a co-founder of the De-Canon project, an archive of the works and voices of writers and artists of color.