Library News

Tent Library Occupies Boston

The branches of the Occupy movement, including Occupy Boston, have been making headlines in the news for over two months now. However, one aspect of the Occupy Boston movement that has garnered little media attention is its library. Located at the Occupy Boston headquarters in Dewey Square, the library is set up in a military tent in the middle of the movement’s encampment area. The library, run by a bookstore owner and librarians who support the Occupy cause, has over 500 books available for the protesters to check out. The bookstore owner is John Ford, who temporarily shut down his alternative bookstore in Plymouth, Mass. to start the tent bookstore instead. Ford says having a library at the protest site helps people involved with the movement learn more about the system they are fighting against and become more educated about possible alternatives. Along with a growing collection of books, the library also features an archive of Occupy Boston’s meeting notes and proposals, as well as an expanding program of speakers and writing workshops. For example, the famous linguist and philosopher Noam Chomsky spoke to the protestors of Occupy Boston this past Saturday. Although the Occupy Boston library is in a tent, in actuality it is not so different from Snell Library here at Northeastern. Patrons can check out books, learn more about subjects they are interested in, and converse with others. Of course, Snell Library is lucky enough to be indoors and librarians do not have to protect the books from the elements. Next time you’re curled up in a chair at Snell reading a book, be thankful that you can enjoy reading and relaxing without having to worry about the wind or rain. To read more about Occupy Boston’s tent library, check out the NY Times article.

The Arader Galleries Collection now on display at Snell

Northeastern University’s recent acquisition of works from the Arader Galleries Collection has enabled Snell Library to exhibit a number of historically significant maps and botanical water colors. These works, ranging from the 16th to 19th centuries, can be viewed outside of Snell Library Study Rooms 291 and 293 and in Classroom 295. For more information on the collection and its incorporation into NU coursework, you can check out the article featured by news@Northeastern.

Snell Library Welcomes the Emma Lazarus Exhibit and Opening Program!

Come join Snell Library in opening the Emma Lazarus: Voice of Liberty, Voice of Conscience Public Exhibit on October 27th. The exhibit will run until December 16 on the first floor of Snell Library and will illustrate the fascinating life of Emma Lazarus. Through her poetry, criticism, and advocacy for the poor, immigrants, and refugees, Emma Lazarus has left a lasting impression. The exhibit was created to recognize her influence, her life, and especially her poetry.

To kick off the exhibit, there will be an Emma Lazarus Opening Program and Panel Discussion, Issues of Immigration in Today’s America, on Thursday, October 27, 2011 from 6-8PM at the Snell Library Lobby. Moderated by NU’s Ruderman Professor of Jewish Studies, Lori Lefkovitz, the program and discussion will feature Silvia Dominguez, Northeastern University Assistant Professor of Sociology; Kitty Dukakis, social activist, author, and wife of former Governor of Massachusetts Michael Dukakis; Barbara Gottschalk, Executive Vice President of Seeds of Peace; and Ragini Shah, Associate Clinical Professor of Law at Suffolk University.

Admission is free, and a reception will follow after the discussion. Hope to see all you Huskies there! For more information about the exhibit and related programs click here! For information on other Meet the Author programs and events, click here!  

Extra! Extra! Read all about Library Press Display!

Library Press Display is a great but little-known resource available through Snell Library. If you are looking for international or U.S. newspapers, Library Press Display is a convenient and easy to navigate tool that has a large collection of world newspapers from the past 60 days. The Library Press Display home screen shows the last 7 days of important world news and events. This resource has tabs that allow you to search or browse newspapers by country, by language, or alphabetically. For most papers there are two ways to read each paper: you can click on the heading and an easy to read digital version of the article will appear, or you can choose to zoom in on the actual pages of the paper and read the articles as you would if you had the paper copy of the newspaper in your hands.  For international users who prefer to navigate Library Press Display in their first language, the display can be switched to Arabic, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Russian, Spanish, and Traditional Chinese. The language can be switched on the labels, tabs, and buttons. Don’t forget, Snell Library also has several other news and newspaper resources available! For general news try Access World News. For other newspapers, including historical newspapers, check out Snell Library’s newspaper resources page.

OCLC student focus group – free pizza and $25!

Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) is working with libraries in an important study of online library information services and WorldCat. They are inviting students to participate in a focus group to enable them to better understand how you search, find and use information for both your personal and study needs. Students should share their opinions and insights about how they get and use information on OCLC’s WorldCat database. OCLC will select students for the focus group interviews who have used WorldCat or are willing to try to use WorldCat. The focus group session will take approximately 1.5 to 2 hours and will be held in Snell Library Room 421 at 2:30-4:30pm on Wednesday 26th October 2011. **As well as providing pizza, we will also give $25 cash to all students that attend.** If you are interested in participating, please respond to Simon Wakeling at s.wakeling@sheffield.ac.uk. Numbers are limited so he will accept replies on a first come first served basis. All responses will be kept strictly confidential. The principal investigators of the project are Dr. Lynn Silipigni Connaway (Senior Research Scientist OCLC) and Simon Wakeling (Doctoral Student, Information School, University of Sheffield).