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Oct 31 2014

Trial Subscription: Kiss, Bow, or Shake Hands

Kiss, Bow, or Shake Hands delivers essential knowledge for business people who are working abroad, traveling for business, or managing global teams from a domestic location. Measurable success in the global marketplace begins with an expert understanding of international protocols, practices, and cultural cues. Without it, businesses and organizations cannot develop a competitive network of customers, suppliers, and, most important, talent.

NB: You will be asked to first input your name and email address.

Please send addtional comments to Kim Bloedel.

[Text by Lisa Martincik]

Oct 31 2014

30th Anniversary Benefit Auction: Shanna Leino

Shanna LeinoAbout the Tools:

While working on books, I found myself needing simple but special tools to carry out the work on leather, wood, and bone. That set me on the road to making folders, awls, punches, and hooks. It is satisfying to me to see others making skillful use of the tools I have made.

Tool making itself satisfies a need I have to keep my hands moving. I like the focus it provides.

Make beautiful work with good tools!

Hand-Built Tools by Shanna Leino
– Leather tool roll
– 2 leather polka dot paper weights
– Elk bone awl –for blind tooling leather
– Double ended steel awl – for marking, scribing, hole punching
– Elk bone folder – for general folding and burnishing
– Old stock Japanese snips – etched and dipped by Shanna
– Fine elk bone folder – for tighter, delicate work
– Steel micro-chisel – for punching and chiseling wood, board, and paper
– Elk bone and steel pin awl – for piercing paper
– Kelm stainless steel folder – for heavy duty scoring

Steel Tools: The steel tools are made from high carbon steel and have been heat treated for strength and durability. The steel tools are patterned by hammer blows or embellished with hand-cut steel stamps.

Carved Elk Bone Tools: The shape, size, and feel of the bone tools are in part determined by the bone it comes from. Each is unique. All of the folders I make are from elk bone, an exceptionally dense, white bone that carves wonderfully and polishes well. I receive clean, whole leg bones (an otherwise unused by-product of hunting) and spend a lot of time working it to shape with a band saw, sander and numerous hand tools. The shaped bone is then ornamented with hand carving, either a pattern made up with lines and dots, or carved flower. Hand sanding and buffing polish and complete the tools.

Estimated Value: $425

Shanna Leino

About the Artist:

Shanna grew up in Harrisville, New Hampshire. She returned after completing her BFA at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and spending a number of invaluable years of learning with the good book people in Iowa City, Iowa.

She continues to travel in search of conferences, seminars, and teaching opportunities to continue/enrich her own learning.

To bid on any of the bindings, please email us at lib-prescons@uiowa.edu. Bids will be accepted until the end of the silent auction, 7 pm CST on Thursday November 13th.

Oct 31 2014

Celebrating LGBT History Month

pink

This post was written by Christina Jensen, Student Assistant in the Iowa Women’s Archives and graduate student in the UI School of Library and Information Science.

October is LGBT history month!  To celebrate, we’re taking a look at some of the eye-catching cover art of Better Homes and Dykes, from the Jo Rabenold papers.

 

white

movie

Royal

Better Homes and Dykes was a newsletter published in Iowa City by the Lesbian Alliance between 1972 and 1982. Issues featured editorials, satirical essays, and community information. In the inaugural issue, a welcome message proclaimed:

Who are we? We are those of you that have been working women, old maids, housewives, unmarried aunts, women’s libbers, students, career women, et al. No longer content with being in the Shadows of the Feminist Movement, much less shadows to each other […] Better Homes and Dykes is for all lesbians here in Iowa City and elsewhere.

LGBT periodicals like Better Homes and Dykes were often created by independent publishing collectives, targeted a narrow regional distribution, and often existed for short periods of time. Better Homes and Dykes is one of the many examples of independent LGBT press preserved in the Iowa Women’s Archives. These documents were critical tools in early LGBT community building and remain important artifacts of LGBT history, capturing the birth and growth of the gay rights movement.

Want more? Visit the Iowa Women’s Archives!  We’re open weekly Tuesday-Friday, 10:00am to noon and 1:00pm to 5:00pm.

A list of collections related to Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Iowans can be found here.

 

Oct 31 2014

Database of the Week: Web of Science

Each week we will highlight one of the many databases we have here at the Pomerantz Business Library.

The database: Web of Science

Where to find it: You can find it here, and under W in the databases A-Z list. WebOfScience

Use it to find:

  • Articles from over 12,000 different journals in the fields of: science, technology, social sciences, arts and humanities
  • Citation tracking information
  • Coverage from 1900 – present
  • Full-text using the InfoLink button

Article

Tips for searching:

  • Use the quick search bar or do an Advanced Search
  • Use drop down menu to search by: Topic, Title, Author, Editor, Publication, Year, Document type, etc.
  • Use the left-hand bar to refine your searchWebOfScience2

Demos: Check out the following demo:

Want help using Web of Science? Contact Willow or Kim and set up an appointment.

Oct 31 2014

Creating a New Model for the Scholarly Monograph

The mission of Knowledge Unlatched (KU) is to explore and change the current system for publishing scholarly books. By working together, libraries can create a sustainable route to open access for the scholarly monograph and secure long-term cost savings.  Scholars, students, higher education institutions, and the public benefit. And authors benefit because their books are available to anyone in the world who has access to the internet (and access=citations=impact).

The University of Iowa Libraries is a charter member of KU, whereby we supported the publication of a pilot collection of 28 scholarly titles, published by a variety of established publishers. Since March (in merely 8 months), the books in the collection have been downloaded nearly 13,000 times, and readers in at least 139 countries have been accessing the titles via HathiTrust or OAPEN, trusted digital repositories that archive content in perpetuity.

Some additional, and amazing, statistics on the usage of these 28 titles:

  • Total number of downloads: 12,763
  • Mean average number of downloads per week: 1,064
  • Mean average number of downloads per book/week: 40
  • Mean average number of downloads=473 per book

 

 

 

Oct 31 2014

Creating a New Model for the Scholarly Monograph

The mission of Knowledge Unlatched (KU) is to explore and change the current system for publishing scholarly books. By working together, libraries can create a sustainable route to open access for the scholarly monograph and secure long-term cost savings.  Scholars, students, higher education institutions, and the public benefit. And authors benefit because their books are available to anyone in the world who has access to the internet (and access=citations=impact).

The University of Iowa Libraries is a charter member of KU, whereby we supported the publication of a pilot collection of 28 scholarly titles, published by a variety of established publishers. Since March (in merely 8 months), the books in the collection have been downloaded nearly 13,000 times, and readers in at least 139 countries have been accessing the titles via HathiTrust or OAPEN, trusted digital repositories that archive content in perpetuity.

Some additional, and amazing, statistics on the usage of these 28 titles:

  • Total number of downloads: 12,763
  • Mean average number of downloads per week: 1,064
  • Mean average number of downloads per book/week: 40
  • Mean average number of downloads=473 per book

 

 

 

Oct 31 2014

Appeals Court Rules on Georgia State’s E-Reserves Case: Back to Lower Court

Last week a federal appeals court reversed the a judge’s decision from May 2012 that ruled in favor of Georgia State University, whose library wanted to be able to make freely available as much copyrighted material as possible via electronic reserves. This is actually not bad news for libraries, as attested to by several copyright experts.  Kevin Smith, scholarly communications officer at Duke, points out in a recent blog post:

  • The court agreed that potential copyright violations should be addressed on an “item by item” basis, which allows universities to make individualized fair use decisions.
  • The court agreed that when evaluating whether e-reserve copying counts as fair use, it should be relevant that university libraries are nonprofit, educational institutions and are not making money off of course reserves.
  • The court rejected the lower court’s 10% or one chapter rule.  The appellate judges instead advocated for “a more flexible approach that takes into account the amount appropriate for the pedagogical purpose.”
  • The court agreed that if a publisher had not made it possible for libraries to license excerpts of a copyrighted work, then libraries do not harm the market for the publisher’s products by copying the desired excerpts and making them freely available.

Smith concludes that the publishers in the case have lost big for what were fighting for, that is to “radically change the landscape.”

Read more:

Ga. State’s Loss in ‘E-Reserves’ Case Might Actually Be a Win for Librarians, Chronicle of Higher Education, Oct. 20, 2014

Nancy Sims, of University of Minnesota, has an astute analysis of the case.

There is a thorough and smart analysis of the ruling from Nancy Sims of the University of Minnesota found here. – See more at: http://blogs.library.duke.edu/scholcomm/#sthash.IEno3aYH.dpuf
There is a thorough and smart analysis of the ruling from Nancy Sims of the University of Minnesota found here. – See more at: http://blogs.library.duke.edu/scholcomm/#sthash.IEno3aYH.dpuf
There is a thorough and smart analysis of the ruling from Nancy Sims of the University of Minnesota found here. – See more at: http://blogs.library.duke.edu/scholcomm/#sthash.IEno3aYH.dpuf
Oct 31 2014

Appeals Court Rules on Georgia State’s E-Reserves Case: Back to Lower Court

Last week a federal appeals court reversed the a judge’s decision from May 2012 that ruled in favor of Georgia State University, whose library wanted to be able to make freely available as much copyrighted material as possible via electronic reserves. This is actually not bad news for libraries, as attested to by several copyright experts.  Kevin Smith, scholarly communications officer at Duke, points out in a recent blog post:

  • The court agreed that potential copyright violations should be addressed on an “item by item” basis, which allows universities to make individualized fair use decisions.
  • The court agreed that when evaluating whether e-reserve copying counts as fair use, it should be relevant that university libraries are nonprofit, educational institutions and are not making money off of course reserves.
  • The court rejected the lower court’s 10% or one chapter rule.  The appellate judges instead advocated for “a more flexible approach that takes into account the amount appropriate for the pedagogical purpose.”
  • The court agreed that if a publisher had not made it possible for libraries to license excerpts of a copyrighted work, then libraries do not harm the market for the publisher’s products by copying the desired excerpts and making them freely available.

Smith concludes that the publishers in the case have lost big for what were fighting for, that is to “radically change the landscape.”

Read more:

Ga. State’s Loss in ‘E-Reserves’ Case Might Actually Be a Win for Librarians, Chronicle of Higher Education, Oct. 20, 2014

Nancy Sims, of University of Minnesota, has an astute analysis of the case.

There is a thorough and smart analysis of the ruling from Nancy Sims of the University of Minnesota found here. – See more at: http://blogs.library.duke.edu/scholcomm/#sthash.IEno3aYH.dpuf
There is a thorough and smart analysis of the ruling from Nancy Sims of the University of Minnesota found here. – See more at: http://blogs.library.duke.edu/scholcomm/#sthash.IEno3aYH.dpuf
There is a thorough and smart analysis of the ruling from Nancy Sims of the University of Minnesota found here. – See more at: http://blogs.library.duke.edu/scholcomm/#sthash.IEno3aYH.dpuf
Oct 31 2014

Enhanced Electronic Grammars (EEG) – Trial ends 1 December 2014

Enhanced Electronic Grammars (EEG) features comprehensive descriptions of languages from around the world. This unique online resource makes full grammars available together in an interlinked and semantically-annotated format, allowing granular access to the grammatical data and enabling cross-language research of several grammars at the same time. In addition to cross-linguistic queries, each grammar can also be read and researched individually.

Please send additional comments to Edward Miner.

Oct 31 2014

Kiss, Bow, or Shake Hands – Trial ends 20 November 2014

Kiss, Bow, or Shake Hands delivers essential knowledge for business people who are working abroad, traveling for business, or managing global teams from a domestic location. Measurable success in the global marketplace begins with an expert understanding of international protocols, practices, and cultural cues. Without it, businesses and organizations cannot develop a competitive network of customers, suppliers, and, most important, talent.

NB: You will be asked to first input your name and email address.

Please send addtional comments to Kim Bloedel.