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Carrie Russell writes: “The Senate Foreign Relations Committee held a hearing April 18 on the Marrakesh Treaty Implementation Act (S. 2559). If passed, the legislation would make available an additional 350,000 accessible books for people with print disabilities living in the US, according to Manisha Singh, assistant secretary of the Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs. Jonathan Band (right) spoke on behalf of the Library Copyright Alliance, a coalition consisting of ALA, the Association of Research Libraries, and ACRL.”...
District Dispatch, Apr. 19; Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, Apr. 18 |
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Diana Haneski (left), library media specialist at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, and Yvonne Cech, director of the Brookfield (Conn.) Library and a former library media specialist at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, have been awarded the 2018 Lemony Snicket Prize for Noble Librarians Faced with Adversity. Haneski and Cech will receive a cash prize and an object from Daniel Handler’s private collection during the ALA Annual Conference in New Orleans....
Office of ALA Governance, Apr. 17 |
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William Marden writes: “Five months ago, when the members of ALA’s Privacy Subcommittee met to decide on this year’s Choose Privacy Week theme, it’s a fair bet to say that only a tiny percentage of the general public had ever heard of Cambridge Analytica. In the wake of Mark Zuckerberg’s congressional testimony and the related explosion of public interest in how online personal data is collected, stored, shared, used, and misused, this year’s CPW theme—‘Big Data is Watching You’—is perfectly timed.”...
Choose Privacy Week, Apr. 19 |
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The latest edition of Keeping Up With…, ACRL’s online current awareness publication that features concise briefs on trends in academic librarianship and higher education, is now available. This month’s issue features a discussion of research data management by Cathryn F. Miller, Rebekah S. Miller, and Gesina A. Phillips....
Keeping Up With..., Apr. |
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Liz Leyden writes: “In 2013, Sandra Hayward quizzed the children she knew. What would persuade them to spend a Saturday learning about black history? Snacks and the freedom to speak their minds, they said. She promised both and set to work. Five years and thousands of bags of potato chips later, Hayward has created a monthly hub for black history in the basement of the Irvington (N.J.) Public Library. She realized that her education had left out many important stories and did not want local kids to miss out either.”...
New York Times, Apr. 18 |
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Jacob Nadal writes: “Every spring, libraries all across the US celebrate Preservation Week. The Library of Congress has a special role in this. Our vast scope of collecting requires us to support an extensive program of preservation services and research. From time to time, though, Congress gives the library special direction to attend to preservation issues of concern for the American people. It is a particular honor to share an example of this in the form of the Veteran’s History Project.”...
Library of Congress Blog, Apr. 20 |
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The Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library in Springfield, Illinois, announced April 19 that it is publishing “the most complete documentary collection ever produced” of the 16th president’s first 33 years. The digital collection covers much of Lincoln’s early years in Springfield, including the establishment of his law office and his four terms in the Illinois General Assembly. The oldest item archived is a “ciphering book” Lincoln used as a student that shows him learning how to do math....
Springfield (Ill.) State Journal-Register, Apr. 19 |
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Keturah Cappadonia writes: “Food insecurity is a growing problem across the US. Food security is a federal measure of a household’s ability to provide enough food for every person in the household to have an active, healthy life. Food insecurity is one way to measure the risk of hunger. Public libraries are increasingly stepping up to assist in combating food insecurity in their communities by collaborating with national and regional organizations that fight hunger.”...
ALSC Blog, Apr. 20 |
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Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani officially opened the new Qatar National Library in Doha on April 17 and symbolically presented its one-millionth acquisition, an 843-year-old manuscript copy of Sahih al-Bukhari. The building was designed by Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas’s firm, the Office for Metropolitan Architecture. The 42,000-square-meter facility, conceived as a single room that houses both people and books, also serves as a public library and university library....
Designboom, Apr. 17; The Peninsula (Doha), Apr. 17 |
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Mica Johnson writes: “Earlier this year, a few popular YA authors, illustrators, and editors found themselves caught up in the #MeToo movement. With accusations ranging from abuse of power to sexual harassment to sexual assault, some authors were dropped from publishers or professional organizations, had awards rescinded, and others have issued statements of regret and apology. For me, the problem is deciding how to move forward with books written by problematic authors. Beyond the ALA Library Bill of Rights, I also have a selection policy I follow.”...
Knowledge Quest blog, Apr. 18; Entertainment Weekly, Feb. 16, Mar. 1; Publishers Weekly, Feb. 14
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Earth Day is April 22. It began in 1970 and is now celebrated in more than 150 countries. The day is intended to raise awareness about the environmental issues facing the world. Writing on the environment has a long legacy. The genre took a dramatic turn in the 20th century with the publication of a series of books that highlighted the dangers faced by various environments and species. The 19th-century themes of appreciation and understanding were joined by concern for the environment’s future and demands for conservation....
AbeBooks’ Reading Copy, Apr. 16 |
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Sarah Laskow writes: “Used from the 14th to 17th centuries, girdle books were texts that their owners needed to keep close at hand—prayer books used by monks or law books used by traveling judges. Though they were valuable objects, these books were meant to be consulted and read. Girdle books had to be small and light. From the bottom edges of their bindings extended a length of leather, usually gathered into a knot at the end. This extension could be used to carry the book like a purse or tucked into a girdle or belt.”...
Atlas Obscura, Apr. 19 |
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