There has been a recent surge in studying surfaces of infinite type, i.e. surfaces with infinitely-generated fundamental groups. In this talk, we will focus on their mapping class groups, often called big mapping class groups. In contrast to the finite-type case, there are many open questions regarding the basic algebraic and topological properties of big mapping class groups. I will discuss several such questions and provide some answers. In particular, I will focus on automorphisms of pure mapping class groups and topological generating sets. This work is joint with Priyam Patel. Speaker(s): Nicholas Vlamis (UM)