Social Networks and Archival Context: From Project to Cooperative Archival Program

This article highlights the objectives and outcomes of the multi-year Social Networks and Archival Context (SNAC) research and demonstration project and discusses related developments to establish a large-scale sustainable cooperative for maintaining information about creators of archival collections, leveraging the Encoded Archival Context—Corporate Bodies, Persons, and Families (EAC-CPF) standard. The article discusses processes developed to derive EAC-CPF records from existing EAD finding aids, MARCXML records, and original authority records, enrichment of those records from other sources, and the creation of a prototype research resource, providing integrated access to dispersed archival collections and the social-historical context of the collections.     

Tracing Johnson's Circle: Practical Experiments With EAC-CPF

Interested in collaboratively exploring the potential of EAC-CPF, the Beinecke Library at Yale and the Houghton Library at Harvard embarked on a year-long project to gain experience with the new standard and, in the process, strengthen connections between disparate but deep holdings of lexicographer Samuel Johnson (1709–1784) and his circle. The project team set out to document metadata best practices while developing and maintaining one set of records and to discover the practical limits and possibilities of rich content within the EAC-CPF context. This article outlines the project's challenges, lessons learned, and remaining questions.     

Accessing the Old and the New

Summary

The University of Arizona Library's tradition of outreach to the surrounding community is reflected in two examples of projects detailed here. The first project is a series of Web exhibits created by librarians and individuals from the community that explore the history of Tucson and southern Arizona. Some of the Web exhibits detail the experiences of immigrant and Native American cultures in the area while other Web exhibits deal more generally with the history of the area. The second project involves a Federal grant that will make certain parts of library's Special Collections more accessible to the community by building new facilities that are open longer hours, digitizing some of the materials and adding computer workstations for users.     

Reducing Journal Stacks: How Tufts University's Hirsh Health Sciences Library Made Electronic Journals Work for Them

In 2007, the Collections Management department at Tufts University's Hirsh Health Sciences Library (HHSL) reduced journal stacks to make room for additional seating and classrooms as part of a renovation to the Medical School's Sackler Center for Medical Education. Additional space was necessary to accommodate the library's increasing role in education and research at the medical school and a growing student population. Offsite storage with compact shelving was under construction nearby. Journals were identified for offsite storage by focusing on print titles that came with an online equivalent rather than using chronology to shift journals offsite. The goal was to keep storage retrieval requests to a minimum for patrons and staff.     

基于实体-关系模型的档案类资源本体构建研究——以复旦大学图书馆藏当代中国社会生活资料为例

档案类资源因多以汇集资料形式存在,且文件之间存在层级结构关系,故难以采用图书馆和博物馆对资源的描述方式.本文以复旦大学馆藏当代中国社会生活资料为例,通过对档案领域本体OAD和EAC-CPF的研究,并对BIBFRAME2.0模型适用档案类资源的可行性进行分析,最终选择以BIBFRAME2.0为基础,引入OAD本体中的部分...     

Playing in the Sandbox: EAC-CPF Projects at Duke University

The Rubenstein Library at Duke University holds several large, complex collections. Describing these collections and making obvious the interconnectivity of each collection's various components has proven difficult within the framework of the archival collection guide, and as such can be perceived as daunting. Patrons can miss important connections or fail to understand the creator's role across collections. To address the particular needs of these collections, staff from Duke University has experimented with EAC-CPF during the past 2 years with the intent of supporting patrons in navigating the collections and therefore having greater success in finding all relevant and related materials.     

论北宋国家藏书制度的发展——以《麟台故事》所载为主

介绍三馆迁入崇文院后,随着崇文院从一个依托馆阁藏书为主的文化服务部门发展成为职能更为丰富的文化管理机构,北宋以馆阁为核心的国家藏书制度得到较为全面的发展,并出现宋人称道的“景徳之制”,也迎来北宋国家藏书“一盛于庆历”的实况。同时随着崇文院时期馆阁地位的日渐显赫,它已成为国家高层次文化活动的中心场所和天下士人向往的琼楼玉宇。尤其在北宋国家藏书制度发展的过程中,其自身发展中的一些特点也益加显著。     

Assessment of KU Libraries’ Slavic & Eurasian Collection: Purpose,Process, and Potential

This paper discusses collection-related assessment projects that were conducted in 2013–2014 by the University of Kansas (KU) Libraries’ International Collections librarians in cooperation with librarians for assessment and resource sharing. While these assessment projects were undertaken in an effort to strengthen the library reports for KU’s Title VI National Resource Center (NRC) grant applications, which were submitted by KU’s area studies centers, the results also have implications for collection development work. The article begins with background about the NRC grants and explains why and how these assessment projects developed. Highlights of results from each assessment project are presented in the following order: assessment of the research needs of area studies faculty and graduate students at KU; citation patterns (2005–2013) of area studies, and more specifically, Slavic and Eurasian studies faculty at KU; and resource sharing data for the Slavic and Eurasian collection 2011–2013. The article concludes with a discussion about how the assessment data inform collection development practices and decisions.     

Academic status for medical school librarians

Results of a survey conducted indicate that most medical schools grant academic status in some degree to their professional librarians. Faculty appointments and benefits are not always awarded. In order to upgrade the stature and effectiveness of the medical school librarian in relation to his institution and to the teaching faculty, his having faculty status is desirable. It is the medical school's responsibility to grant faculty status to librarians who possess necessary qualifications; likewise, it is the responsibility of the medical school librarian to merit faculty rank on a basis with other teaching faculty. In three new medical schools, the library is considered an academic department, and other schools are considering such designation.     

Special collections in the classroom: embedding special collections in an undergraduate history writing class

Abstract

This article describes a 12-year collaboration between a special collections librarian and history faculty for an undergraduate history writing course at Vanderbilt University. Originally taught as a one-shot session, the final 9 years of the course embedded the class into Special Collections for 10 weeks of primary source research. This article describes the evolution of the course from a one-shot session to full embedding, the mechanics involved in managing the sessions in Special Collections, student support considerations, and tips for other librarians offering such sessions.     

“Snow Fall”-ing Special Collections and Archives

“Snow Fall” is a Pulitzer Prize winning, digital storytelling project produced by the New York Times. It represents the next step in long-form digital journalism. The web application tells a compelling story about the fate of sixteen skiers and snowboarders during an avalanche. The textual element of the story is wrapped in a slick interface with gently appearing and disappearing images, strategically positioned HTML5 video and image slideshows, maps, and 3-D visualizations. Its title, “Snow Fall,” has become a verb in the digital journalism world. Upon seeing “Snow Fall” and other similar projects, the authors started to make the connection between this form of storytelling and Special Collections. Special Collections are full of interesting, rich, and unique stories. Their digital representation, however, while widespread in systems such as ContentDM, can be lacking in sensory appeal. Because of this, the authors developed a “Snow Fall”-like application for a Special Collections’ exhibit, “Cradle of Coaches,” in the fall of 2013. In addition to this exhibit, they have developed two more using the same template. They feel that this is a new and exciting medium to tell the stories within special collections and archives, as well as general stories about libraries themselves.     

Book Reviews

Book reviewed in this article: Museum Careers and Training: A Professional Guide By Victor J. Danilov. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. 1994. 546 pages. Guidelines for Institutional Policies & Planning in Natural History Collections Edited by K. Elaine Hoagland. Washington, DC: The Association of Systematic Collections, 1994.