Monthly Archives: October 2020

Author & Activist exhibit

Posted by on October 27, 2020 1 comment

Visit this exhibit at https://rosenbach.org/virtual-exhibits/

“ALICE DUNBAR-NELSON (1875–1935), poet, novelist, journalist, teacher, diarist, women’s suffrage organizer, civil rights leader, lecturer, political leader, and survivor of intimate partner violence, is a hero for our time. She combined her skills as an author and political activist to fight for social change.

“Born into the first generation of Black Americans after the end of slavery, Dunbar-Nelson represents a bridge between the Reconstruction Era following the Civil War and the civil rights movement of the mid-1900s. Her writings and social causes, which centered on race, gender, and power, feel as urgent today as they did during Dunbar-Nelson’s lifetime.”

As you explore the exhibition, we invite you to consider how Alice Dunbar-Nelson’s life and work can inspire residents of the United States today. How much has changed for women (especially women of color), LGBTQ+ people, Black Americans, and other people of color since Dunbar-Nelson pursued her activism in the early 20th century? How can we carry on the work she started? How can artifacts found in museums, libraries, and archives help us discover previously overlooked historical figures?

Thematic sections structure “I Am an American!,” meaning that the exhibition offers interpretive views into the life, times, and work of Alice Dunbar-Nelson.Thus, the documents and objects on view are not organized chronologically.

Open Access Week: Understanding the Connections Between Open Access, Equity, and Inclusion

Posted by on October 23, 2020 No comments

October 19-25 is designated as International Open Access Week. Open access is defined as the free, immediate, online availability of research articles combined with the rights to use these articles fully in the digital environment. The open access movement began in the 1990’s and has grown and matured along with the internet. The theme of this year’s Open Access Week is: “Open with Purpose: Taking Action to Build Structural Equity and Inclusion.”

Those unfamiliar with open access, might wonder if tying improving open access to making any sort of real dent in the deep and systemic problems related to equity and inclusion isn’t just an attempt to co-opt an important nationwide movement.  In 2008, Aaron Swartz, a young programmer and open access visionary wrote a Guerrilla Open Access Manifesto which includes the following: “Those with access to these resources – students, librarians, scientists – you have been given a privilege. You get to feed at this banquet of knowledge while the rest of the world is locked out. But you need not – indeed, morally, you cannot – keep this privilege for yourselves.”  As Swartz makes clear, information is power, but if this power (in the form of access to information) is not the same for everyone, then inequity is the result. Knowledge builds upon knowledge, so the only equitable way forward is to reduce discrepancies in who has access to information.

Open access is one component of a broader “open” movement that also includes open source software, open educational materials (OER), and open data. Together these initiatives are beginning to re-shape who has access to information and who doesn’t, pointing the way to a more equitable and inclusive future.

Stop by and see the Open Access display in the Ames library and check out The Ames Library’s guide related to Open Access and Open Educational Resources.

Free images to use and reuse and Happy OA Week!

Posted by on October 22, 2020 No comments
Olveritas Village

Olvera Street in the oldest part of downtown Los Angeles, California

Here’s a seasonal and timely message from the Free to Use and Reuse collection at the Library of Congress.

The seasonal part of the message is they are profiling images of autumn, Día de Muertos and Halloween in this subset of their collection.

The timely part is that this is also Open Access Week, a global event for the academic and research community to continue to learn about the potential benefits of Open Access, to share what they’ve learned with colleagues, and to help inspire wider participation in helping to make Open Access a new norm in scholarship and research. This year’s emphasis is on examining who the knowledge-sharing and information spaces and systems are designed for, who is missing, who is excluded by the business models we use, and whose interests are prioritized.

OA 2020 banner logo

 

Congratulations to Chris Sweet!

Posted by on October 14, 2020 No comments

Chris Sweet, Information Literacy Librarian

Congratulations to Chris Sweet, Information Literacy Librarian, for completing the Open Education Network’s Certificate in Open Educational Resources (OER) Librarianship! Funded with a grant from the Consortium of Academic and Research Libraries of Illinois, this highly competitive program aims to develop leaders within academic librarianship to aid in the creation and implementation of OERs at participants’ institutions. Chris has also been appointed to CARLI’s OER Committee, which will create a plan for supporting OERs across the consortium.

To learn more about OERs, please check out our guide.

Design on Display: COVID Runaway Fashion Show

Posted by on October 7, 2020 1 comment

Last week, students in Professor Lozar’s Foundations of Art and Professor Bullock’s Beginning 3D Design courses competed in a COVID Runaway Fashion Show, displaying designs with the goal of promoting social distancing and experimenting with building wearable constructions out of cardboard. The winning design, “Building/Burning” by Andrew Browne is now on display on the Minor Myers jr statue in front of The Ames Library. More coverage and photos of the students’ creations are available on the Pantagraph’s website.