by Carling McQuinn ’25
For this month’s edition of The Words, we reached out to Carling McQuinn ’25 about her experience as a summer intern for the publisher Thames and Hudson. Read on to hear her thoughts about the position!
I had the privilege of spending last summer interning with the college textbook division of London-based publishing company Thames & Hudson. My internship was part time and in person at their Manhattan office, and while the team was much smaller there than in London, the building itself—at the corner of Bryant Park and across the street from the NY Public Library—was pretty impressive.
I found out about the opportunity through Macalester alum Priscilla McGeehon, who is the head college publisher there. After an informational Zoom meeting with her, where I learned about T&H’s mission as a textbook publisher and a little about the work they did, I decided to apply for their summer internship. The application and interview processes were straightforward, and I started the internship after the Spring ’23 semester ended in mid May.
The college team shares an office with the T&H trade team. While I worked on textbooks marketed toward college professors, the trade group publishes books that will be sold directly in bookstores. We were located just one floor above the W.W. Norton offices. This was a much, much bigger publisher and physical space; T&H uses them as their distributor and as their sales representatives. As an intern, however, I worked primarily with the Manhattan college division and communicated via email with the London office.
My tasks were incredibly detail-oriented. Each picture you see when you open a textbook must be accurately cross-referenced with its corresponding image credit in the back of the book. Each bolded glossary term must be cataloged by chapter and page and must directly match its definition listed in the book’s index. When a professor adopts a T&H textbook, they also receive a large selection of online materials, like pre-made image and term flashcards. My job was to ensure all of this behind-the-scenes work was done accurately. I proofread, organized, and edited these supplemental materials including image spreadsheets, class presentations, test banks, and eBook bundles for a variety of art history textbooks.
I was able to attend a few days of the Norton College Publishing Sales Conference at the end of my internship, which was an opportunity to meet sales representatives from across the country and learn how each individual textbook is marketed to college professors. One of the T&H presentations used data that I had collected to highlight the increased diversity of artwork featured in a new edition of a T&H textbook in comparison to its major competitor. It was pretty cool to see how the specific details I’d compiled into a spreadsheet came together to support a sales package.
This internship was a great experience I’d recommend for students interested in learning the minute steps that go into the publishing process. A knowledge of and passion for art and art history is a plus, too!
Thanks for sharing, Carling! It was great to hear about this awesome opportunity.