#DULibIntroducing Martin Gleghorn

In the next of our series introducing members of staff, #DULibIntroducing meets Repository Coordinator Martin Gleghorn.

Please state your name, full job title, and a brief description of what that entails:

Martin Gleghorn, Repository Coordinator. Which means I coordinate the repository… Alongside the legend that is Kelly Hetherington, and working as part of the Scholarly Communications team, I help look after the University’s open access repository, Durham Research Online. Day-to-day, this involves a lot of liaising with academic staff, providing training for whoever might need it, advocating for open access research more generally, working with metadata, and – ultimately – making sure that the research being published at Durham is as widely accessible as physically possible. I’m also one of the people behind the @DROdurham twitter account, which we use to promote that research.

How long have you worked in the library?

I’ve just passed the two-year mark. I joined as a Library Assistant in the e-Resources team back in November 2019, which meant that I’d spent just enough time here to start feeling confident enough in blagging stuff at the Help and Information desk when Covid came along and everything changed. I’ve been in my current role since March 2021.

What’s the most interesting/enjoyable aspect of your job?

As a naturally nosey person, getting an early glimpse of the research being carried out at Durham is right up my street, and I don’t think I’ll ever get over how much mind-blowingly good research is being done here (even if much of the work in the STEM disciplines goes way over my head…). Aside from that – and at the risk of sounding dreadfully sincere – it’s incredibly rewarding to be able to make research that wouldn’t otherwise be accessible available to anyone who might need it. Lastly, the people: be it my library colleagues, the academics I work with, or the library users – dreamboats, the lot of them.

What was the last film you saw, and what would it rate out of 10?

I thought about swerving this question, as I’m nowhere near as much as a film buff as I know a lot of my colleagues are. Case in point is that going back to the cinema is one of the few ‘normal’ things I haven’t yet done post-lockdown, so the last film I saw at the pictures was Parasite, back in early 2020. It justified the hype for me – a solid 8.5.

That aside, the realisation that it’s coming up to the first anniversary of Diego Maradona’s death prompted me to re-watch Asif Kapadia’s Diego Maradona. I love it, and while obviously not the point of the film, it just makes me want to run around 1980s Naples, getting up to mischief and being the best footballer in the world – another solid 8.5.

What are you reading at the moment, and would you recommend it?

I’m re-reading The Offing by Benjamin Myers, off the back of seeing a stage production of it at the Live Theatre in Newcastle earlier this month. I’d recommend the play, but it is closing in a few days and may have already done so by the time this blog post sees the light of day. Failing that though, I’d absolutely recommend the novel as well – not least because it contains a passage about my favourite Durham-based urban legend (you probably know the one: the one about the statue of the horse in Market Square…).

If you had unlimited budget, what addition would you make to the library?

Not the most imaginative suggestion, but I’d have that revolving front door out of here straight away. Once I’ve fixed the doors, I’d probably invest in a few more life-sized cardboard cut-outs of Bill Bryson – I believe we only have the one at the moment, which quite frankly isn’t enough.

The library tannoy system has just been turned into a massive karaoke machine. What would you sing to the library?

‘Don’t You Want Me’ by The Human League. Both parts. Obviously.

What is the best piece of advice you could give to our library users?

Shy bairns get nowt? Seriously, as I mentioned, my library colleagues are great, and I can say with some confidence that every single one of them gets a massive buzz off helping our users. So take advantage of that!

If we want to know more about your role in the Library, where can we find more information?

There’s a comprehensive overview of Durham Research Online here, and you can always email us at dro.admin@durham.ac.uk. Alternatively, buy me one of those stripy doughnuts they have in Small Island Coffee, and I’ll tell you anything you want to hear.