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SULAIR NEWS – April 1, 2009
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
- Reference Forum - Wednesday, April 1 - What College Students Say about Research
- Collections Care Sessions Have Been Rescheduled
- CSAA Maps Come to Branner
- Super-Enlightenment Web Site Launched
- New Web Pages for the Music Library
- Stanford Global Gateway Call for Photos
- Sundial to Zimbra Calendar Migration Update: July 4th Weekend
- *** Reference Question of the Week ***
1. Reference Forum - Wednesday, April 1 - What College Students Say about Research
We will be doing something a bit different at this week's Reference Forum...
Please take the time to read the Project Information Literacy Progress Report: What Today's College Students Say about Conducting Research in the Digital Age (PDF), then join us for a discussion at the Reference Forum on Wednesday, April 1, 2-3pm in the SSRC Seminar Room.
We hope to have a lively discussion of the report and any implications we see for how we provide reference and instructional services to our students. All are invited.
If you would like to be on the email distribution list for future Reference Forum announcements, please go to https://mailman.stanford.edu/mailman/listinfo/libref-forum and Subscribe to the list.
--submitted by Chris Bourg
2. Collections Care Sessions Have Been Rescheduled
The Collections Care sessions originally scheduled to take place on Tuesday, March 31, Thursday, April 2, Tuesday, April 7, and Thursday, April 9 have been rescheduled. We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience.
The sessions will now be offered on the following dates:
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Monday, April 27, 1:00 - 2:30 p.m.
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Monday, May 4, 6:00 - 7:30 p.m.
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Tuesday, May 5, 1:00 - 2:30 p.m.
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Wednesday, May 6, 10:30 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.
All sessions will take place in the Social Sciences Resource Center, Room 121A, Green Library. To ensure adequate facilities, we request that attendees kindly RSVP in advance via email. Please respond to Heather Bolei in Preservation at hbolei@stanford.edu.
Collections Care Session
How do you deal with a wet book? What do post-it notes look like under a microscope, and why do they damage paper? When is a book too fragile to photocopy? These questions and more will be answered in an upcoming training session that explores common preservation issues in the collections at Stanford University Libraries. This 1.5 hour session is intended for all SULAIR staff who regularly process and handle general collections materials. Participants will learn basic strategies for extending the life of books, serials, CDs, and DVDs.
Topics will include:
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Primary factors that contribute to the deterioration of books, CDs, and DVDs;
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Changes in book and paper-making in the last two centuries that contribute to book and paper degradation;
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Identifying common types of damage caused by pests, moisture, mold, mutilation, and wear and tear, and what to do next;
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Shelving practices that will extend the usable life of books;
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Photocopying books without damaging bindings;
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Caring for CDs and DVDs; and
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What to do when patrons try to repair library materials themselves.
Throughout the session, we will discuss prevention as a time and cost-effective means to collections care, the role of the Preservation Department at SULAIR, and the ways in which preservation activities are carried out by staff in all areas of the library.
Please join us as we discuss the mating habits of silverfish, why the Industrial Revolution is to blame for much of the damage in our collections, and much more.
--submitted by Mary E Miller
3. CSAA Maps Come to Branner
Branner Earth Sciences Library & Map Collections recently accepted a large collection of maps from the American Automobile Association of Northern California, Nevada and Utah (also known as the California State Automobile Association). Included in the collection are nearly 7,000 AAA road maps from the mid-60's to the present, scribecoats used to create the maps, topographic maps from the United States Geological Survey, and Thomas Bros. maps by county. The CSAA's move from San Francisco to Walnut Creek precipitated the move of materials as the new building did not have room for the map collection and trimmed down cartographic unit.
Once processed, the maps will be available for use at Branner Library and will not circulate. They have already been used to help support an urban studies class studying neighborhood change and by a student following John Muir's transect from San Francisco to Yosemite.
For more details, see the March 18 Stanford Report article about the collection.
--submitted by Julie Sweetkind-Singer
4. Super-Enlightenment Web Site Launched
We are pleased to announce that the Super-Enlightenment Web site has just been launched in beta version at:
http://collections.stanford.edu/supere/
This collection assembles about three dozen rare works in French written
between 1716 and 1835, covering mythology, alchemy, religion,
free-masonry, science, and other topics. Rather than rejecting what we
commonly think of as Enlightenment ideas and paradigms, these esoteric
texts explore many of the same themes, representing what Dan Edelstein,
assistant professor of Stanford's French and Italian department and faculty
coordinator of this site, calls "the dark side of the Enlightenment" -- or "Super-Enlightenment." We hope that making these works available as a searchable corpus (after they have long been pushed to the margins) will open up new paths of research for scholars at Stanford and around the world. Historians, literary scholars, and art historians are some of the target audiences for this resource.
This text collection currently consists of 64 volumes both held by
SULAIR and gathered from other library collections, presented as
searchable PDFs. Yet Super-E is not only a collection of primary
sources, it also offers scholarly materials for the researcher and
teacher. Nine bio-bibliographical essays by specialists in the field and
Professor Edelstein’s brief introduction offer historical and
theoretical background to the project and to the works and authors that
it showcases. Users can also sort the texts by author, date, and by the
following thematic topics: Art and Architecture, Illuminism and Science,
Masonry, Mythology, Orientalism, and Reform and Revolution.
The current beta release does not offer full-text searching across all
volumes, however current users can download the PDFs for each volume
and search them separately. Future releases will include the search
capabilities currently under active development by Digital
Library Systems and Services that will allow searching across all of
SULAIR's scanned texts.
Several staff deserve thanks for their hard work and collaboration in
bringing the Super-Enlightenment project to fruition: Dan Edelstein and
Sarah Sussman for curatorial and scholarly work; Zach Chandler for the
site's stunning graphic design; Cathy Aster for project management;
Jessie Keck for building the site; Glen Worthey and numerous Digital
Production Group & Web Team staff for editing and technical contributions.
--submitted by Stuart Snydman
5. New Web Pages for the Music Library
Following in the footsteps of Biology and Engineering, the Music Library introduces its new Drupal-based Web pages:
http://www.stanford.edu/dept/sulair/web/music
We hope you’ll take a moment to explore. Feedback is encouraged! Please send comment to Ray Heigemeir (raymondh@stanford.edu).
--submitted by Ray Heigemeir
6. Stanford Global Gateway Call for Photos
Stanford Global Gateway, a new interactive Web portal and resource for international Stanford activities on campus and beyond, is coming soon and needs captivating images from around the world. Have your photo or artwork featured and credited!
Submit digital images of your original photography or artwork that depicts:
- An international landmark, custom, culture, or environment
- Stanford faculty and students at work or studying abroad
- Artwork reflecting a foreign tradition
Please submit your photos and artwork so we can ensure that SULAIR is well represented on the Stanford Global Gateway site when it goes live. See Stanford Global Gateway Call for Photos for details and submission guidelines.
--submitted by Chris Bourg
7. Sundial to Zimbra Calendar Migration Update: July 4th Weekend
IT Services is continuing to work with Zimbra, the maker of Stanford's integrated email & calendar product, to ensure the calendaring system is ready for campus-wide adoption. Based on the latest set of testing results and the progress Zimbra has made on addressing Stanford's functional needs, ITS has now set a firm date for the migration from Sundial to Zimbra: the cutover will happen over the July 4th weekend this summer.
More details about the migration, including the best way to prepare yourself and your data for the switch, will be coming this Spring.
--submitted by Tom Cramer
8. *** Reference Question of the Week ***
Question: Do you have new books displayed somewhere in Green Library?
Answer: Yes. For a selection of recent fiction, go the Lane Reading Room
and look to your left after you enter to see HAS-Fiction. If you look
to your right, you will find HAS-Newbooks which include new books in
the humanities and area studies.
For selected new books in the social sciences, see the bookshelves near the reception desk in the Social Sciences Resource Center (SSRC).
All of these new books can be checked out.
Read more about browsing for fiction collections.
You can find more reference questions and answers at the Information Center Web site.
To contribute to the Reference Question of the Week feature of SULAIR News, submit your question
and answer through the SULAIR News online submission form.
--submitted by Editorial Staff
SULAIR News is an electronic publication of Stanford University
Libraries and Academic Information Resources issued weekly. Copy deadline is
12:00 NOON Friday for publication on the following Wednesday. Submit items for
publication via the online submission system.
Editor: Eleanor Brown, Eleanor.Brown@stanford.edu
