Mary Newberry

Profile

Since 2000, after earning a BA in political science and an MA in English, I've worked as a freelance editor, indexer and teacher. My first career was dancing, and it’s the self-discipline I learned then that is probably my greatest indirect asset now.

My work is in the humanities, on academic, government, literary, creative arts and general interest texts and, lately, in memoir. My clients are individuals as well as publishers, governments and institutions. I have a long-term relationship with collaboration, social justice and diversity and enjoy working in these arenas. 

Scholarly editing is one of my specialties, as a copy editor and for substantive and stylistic work. I enjoy complex materials, helping to bring clarity and concision to emerging ideas.

About half of my time is spent indexing for books and online. I teach indexing in a course I developed for the Ryerson’s Publishing Program and have a contract with the Alberta government, editing and updating metadata for one of their websites. I was one of the indexers working on the Final Report of the Truth and Reconcilliation Commission of Canada.  

In 2016, I won the Ewart-Daveluy Award for excellence in indexing.