Luther Seminary Library

Free Internet Resources — Who Can You Trust?

Whenever I hear someone talking with persuasive intent about information they “found on the internet,” the prickles at the back of my neck go up. This confidence invites a closer look at the website. This may seem cynical but you have probably heard the phrase, “lies, d--mn-d lies, and statistics.”Growing up it was not unusual during dinner table conversations to hear my father, a statistician, illustrate how someone had used numbers to draw faulty conclusions and mislead people.

There are many excellent, free sites on the web. You may find exactly what you need as you search...but if you aren't familiar with a site, take the time to play detective and find out who or what lies behind them. Are they trustworthy?

Several libraries have pulled together evaluative criteria and checklists to evaluate web resources. Take a look at what Cornell has to say about “Accuracy, Authority, Objectivity, Currency, and Coverage.” Southwestern Oregon Community College  goes with a more standard, “Who, What, When, Where and Why?”

We are confident that the subscription databases we offer through the library’s website are good quality and provide excellent resources for your research. It's also possible that you may be seeking information that is available in its most current form on the web. Government agencies, academic institutions, and private foundations all offer wonderful, yet sometimes hidden treasures on the web. Seek and ye shall find!

Random examples

The Dictionary of North American Hymnology

Minnesota Digital Collections: Search this collection for 48 images of Luther Seminary buildings, faculty and students. 

ELCA archives

Wabash Center's Internet Guide to Religion

Luther Seminary Archives: The Prodigal Son art collection (High-quality JPEG images) are available for educational use to anyone with a Luther Seminary login.

Luther Seminary has www.EntertheBible.org  and www.workingpreacher.org

Academic digital repositories:

UCLA’s The Encyclopedia of Egypt

Yale Divinity's digital image collections

Harvard Divinity

— JKB

 

This image comes from Wordle—a fun way to create word clouds out of text you've written. It's an interesting compromise between image and text.

Architects of Grace

I used to confuse Christopher Wren with Christopher Robin.  When I heard Wren I thought Robin and in my mind I would see Winnie the Pooh and his friends, only to be more confused when the context just didn’t fit.  I haven’t made that mistake for quite awhile, but I have to admit that, until recently, I probably knew more about Pooh, Piglet, Eeyore, & company than the famous architect of St. Paul’s Cathedral and many other notable parish churches in and around London.

My knowledge deficit has been swiftly and surprisingly remedied, however, by the wonderful gift to the library of a collection of books all having to do with the life, times, and accomplishments of Sir Christopher Wren.  Wren (1632-1723) was a Renaissance figure.  As professor of astronomy at Oxford, he was also skilled in mathematics and engineering.  He gradually made his way to architecture.  Having successfully designed buildings for several Oxford colleges, the Great London Fire of 1666 afforded him the opportunity to design 52 of the 87 London churches destroyed in the fire.  Wren’s crowning achievement was the design for the rebuilding of St. Paul’s Cathedral.  The Cathedral, whose 300^th anniversary is fast approaching (January, 2011), was constructed over a 35-year period, “the sole English cathedral built from start to finish under the supervision of its original architect.” (Judith Dupre, Churches, 68).

On Thursday, October 29th, a number of these volumes of Wreniana will be on display as the object of the library’s annual Special Collections open house, 10:30 am-2:00 pm.  Included in the showing will be several rare and unusual items, one among them being an elephant folio or “elephantine” size volume of “the dimensions, plans, elevations, and sections” of Wren’s London parish churches.  You wouldn’t lose this book under the sofa cushions.

The books are a gift from Mr. and Mrs. Edward Sovik of Northfield, MN.  Ed Sovik, himself an architect, had developed a strong interest in the life and work of Christopher Wren and collected these pieces throughout a distinguished career in architecture.  We are extremely grateful for this exceptional gift from Ed and Anne Sovik, a delight for the eye, the mind, and the spirit.

BE

KINDLE 2 REVISITED

I don't make a habit of quoting myself, but since this is a return to an earlier topic, let me make an exception.

I said, on this very blog, back on February 27 of this year, that

"there is no reason not to wish Amazon well [with its release of the Kindle 2), but for now what they are doing and what libraries like ours are doing are complementary, not in competition."

Ten months have passed, during which I have made pretty frequent use of the library's Kindle 2. How does that earlier claim stand up now?

A few observations, unscientific and anecdotal:

1. I'm increasingly comfortable reading off a Kindle screen. In other words, it feels less and less like a "transition" from printed page to digital display.
2. I'm curious to know if I actually find reading easier from a Kindle than from a printed book.
3. I find at least some of the features of reading from a Kindle (e.g. the capacity to create notes on the Kindle as I read) intriguing.
4. When traveling, I value the small size and weight of the Kindle.

There is nothing particularly surprising or earth-shattering in this. It's just my notes to myself as I make yet another adjustment to a new medium, the sort of shift that is required of all of us, with increasing frequency.

The main issue, at least for me, is resisting the either/or mentality.

I'm a librarian, and it could be argued that I therefore have a bigger state than most people in how the relationship between print/digital plays out.
But from my experience so far, I am less concerned all the time about what the medium is, and more interested in what medium/media foster more and better reading.

Isn't that what matters most?

DRS

Wikipedia as Punching Bag

When the subject of Wikipedia comes up among academics, I've seen lots of different responses (almost all of them negative): rolling-of-the-eyes, tisk-tisking or harrumphing, hasty disavowals are among the most common.

If responses of this variety demonstrated only the view that Wikipedia was less-than-perfect, or that Wikipedia is no substitute for a library, I'd have no objection. But what I am usually picking up is far more disdainful than that, and (what's worse), responses that often don't seem suggest an accurate sense of what Wikipedia is (and isn't), or of how it works.

I can almost hear the shouts of "heresy" already, but let me offer a good word or two, if not in praise of Wikipedia at least in favor of critiquing it more insightfully.

All resources - whatever their pedigree, whoever is responsible for them, and in whatever medium they appear – are fair game for informed scrutiny, but if we are going to judge Wikipedia,

• Let it at least be on its own terms – as a colossal co-operative venture, which at least potentially draws together a vast community of people with an interest in a given topic.
• Let's be clear which version or edition we are judging. Because, unlike even the most distinguished reference source in print, Wikipedia is not the same today as it was yesterday.
• If we are going to use comparisons, let's at least make them reasonable and balanced. Far too often I find that some randomly-selected weak item from Wikipedia is held up against an exceptionally fine entry from a print volume. These comparisons prove very little.
• We ought to bear it in mind that when a given entry is incomplete or still in development, at least an effort is made to tell us so.
• We have access to a much broader community of learning than when we limit ourselves to print. There is a growing understanding of the value of the "community of enthusiasts," as well as of the better-known "community of scholars."

Is Wikipedia an alternative (intentional or not) to a library? Nope, but it doesn't claim to be, either.  It's just another resource to evaluate (the kind of evaluation the library community is supposed to excel at), though it just happens to be a resource which is extremely convenient, as well at least capable of being continually improved (have you tried authoring or editing an entry? Or tracking its history ?), and continues to expand dramatically.

In other words, a resource that merits critique that is balanced and well-informed.

DRS

 

 

 

 

"I have always imagined..."

"I have always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library."
  —Jorge Luis Borges, "Poema de los Dones"

What is paradise? What is heaven?

These questions have teased theological minds, great and small, for millennia. Though Jesus answered Pilate, "My kingdom is not from this world" (John 8:36 NRS), there are earthly places that offer a taste of the serenity and riches we imagine heaven offers. Some are libraries, some are bookstores. Enjoy. -jkb

Our New Fall Line-up

The coming of fall carries with it a certain anticipation of newness, of difference from what has gone before.  From new fall fashions, to a new football season, to the unveiling of new television programs, to a new school year, fall brings a feeling of freshness, a revived desire for engagement,  perhaps even the hope of improvement.

No less so in our library where, after a summer of mostly behind the scenes activity, a bouquet of new features, products, and services stand ready to add freshness and, we hope, improvement to the resources we offer and how the library connects you, the users, with the material you need.  Here, in brief, is what’s new for fall:

• New Connectivity – Connecting to all of our most frequently used electronic resources from off campus can now be done without going through HomeLab. The new method is quick, requires no special set-up, and preserves access to your destop, email, printer, etc.
• New Look to the ATLA Religion Database – A new vendor brings a fresh look and improved search functionality to our primary index of religious/theological literature.
• New Full Text Resources – A cornucopia of online content

§  iPreach – a bundle of biblical dictionaries, commentaries, exegetical guides

§  Oxford Biblical Studies Online – six English study Bibles with introductions, textual notes, maps, and more

§  Oxford Dictionaries & Encyclopedias – A host of online in-depth resources, paralleling our print reference volumes

§  CAMIO – an art image database representing works of art from museums around the world (requires HomeLab)

• New Databases – extending our reach in the social sciences and human services

§  Family & Society Studies Worldwide

§  Child Development & Adolescent Studies

   Enjoy the fall, and our new fall line!

   BE

An Eminent Book Bully

2009 is the tercentenary year of the birth of Samuel Johnson, renowned lexicographer, conversationalist, man of letters, and much more. It would have seemed a shame to let this year pass without my learning more about this legendary bookman, and so, undaunted by my lack of expertise, I offered to do a presentation on the great man at a conference in June.

There are at least two new Johnson biographies out this year. I read them both, and did I ever learn a thing or two. Johnson was a man of great tensions and contradictions: his literary output seems prolific to us (he wrote Rasselas in a week, to pay for his mother's funeral), but a deep sense of personal laziness and procrastination never left him; he was kind to the coterie of misfits and outcasts he shared a house with, but could be devastatingly cruel in personal conversations; he craved and treasured friendship, but it was not difficult to offend him deeply; he will always be remembered to us as "Doctor" Johnson, but every one of his degrees was honorary, granted by eminent places like Oxford and Trinity College, Dublin only after he had won fame and respect on his own.

And I can't neglect to mention that while The Doctor was a great friend of learning, he was an unholy terror with respect to books themselves. One of his recent biographers observed that "he wrote in them, bent their spines, threw them face down on the dirty floor, stained them with food, and failed to return them to their owners." One volume, borrowed on his behalf from an Oxford library in 1734, turned up Johnson's London residence after his death, fifty years later!

Nobody's legacy is perfect, and not even a librarian would want Dr. Johnson to be remembered primarily as a "problem borrower." All the same, he was a great one for seeing the contradictions in others, but this one of his own – love of learning mixed with near-contempt for books themselves – seems to have escaped his notice.

What's Old Is New Again

The Encyclopædia Britannica has been around a long time.  First published in Edinburgh, Scotland a few years before the American Revolution, it is the oldest English language general encyclopedia still in print.  A fixture in libraries and, for those so fortunate, private homes for generations, a sight of its richly bound volumes standing in stately array on bookshelves communicated a sense of erudition, of almost comprehensive knowledge -- whether or not they were ever touched, save for the occasional dusting.  But touched they often were, particularly in libraries, as students by the millions used the encyclopedia to help them write their “reports.”  Librarians, for that matter, became used to the regular, annual visits of the Britannica sales representative who dropped by to inform the conscientious librarian of new features and revised, updated content – manifestly suitable for library patrons anxious for the latest and best.

Then, slowly at first, those cordial visits became less frequent, more often replaced by a phone call, or possibly a postcard.  After awhile even the phone stopped ringing.  For many libraries, including our own, where the time-honored, indispensible Encyclopædia Britannica was concerned, an eerie silence, a strangely becalmed feeling, reigned.

Jump to July, 2009.  Now, thanks to the efforts of the sagacious Minnesota librarians involved in choosing (and committing state funds to pay for) resources for the Electronic Library for Minnesota (ELM), Britannica is back, this time with a digital aura.  Now, Encyclopædia Britannica Online: Academic Edition is available to libraries throughout the state, including our own.  It is the traditional Britannica repackaged for the digital age, including video and audio content imbedded in articles, links to websites, headlines from the NYT and BBC, side-by-side country comparisons, “this day in history” and “biography of the day” features and more.  At this point you may be thinking, what will be the fate of the old print volumes in the Reading Room once students have seen this new online version?  The good news is they will still be there, their authoritative content at the ready for those who may prefer to get their information from staunch columns of text on wispy paper.  But even if these volumes receive only barest use, they will still look great on the shelf.  We just have to remember to keep them dusted.  We hope you enjoy the old/new Encyclopædia Britannica.

Summary Summer Tech Talks

Learning, Design and Technology (Kris Payne, Dan Ruth, Ryan Torma) is collaborating with the library (Jennie Bartholomew) to bring you a series of 30 minute discussions about some new, exciting, curious or interesting aspect of technology. We give a brief presentation on how to use the technology, and follow it with a round-table discussion to answer questions and generate ideas for using it.

 

Luther Seminary students have many wonderful tech tools to play and learn with. This week we debuted the summer presentations with BibleWorks 8. Coming up the week of July 21st is PowerPoint; GoogleApps the week of August 4th; Endnote the week of August 18. Click here for the full schedule. Talks are in Northwestern on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

The Tech Talks are a good place to get your feet wet. Come and hear the general overview. Find out what you might want to learn more about. Pick up a few tips, say hi, and tell us what your tech needs are at Luther.

New View of New Books

New Books Widget

Our new books are now on display on the library webpage. Take a look at the bottom right of the screen, and you will see a revolving display of the covers of many of the new books that have come in. This display is courtesy of a widget from LibraryThing, and we found it thanks to our electronic services librarian Jennie. I like it in particular because, while we have a tab in our catalog, MARTIN, which allows you to see the lists of recent acquisitions, this widget's graphical display of the book's cover evokes the book as an object. While we all have heard the maxim, "don't judge a book by its cover," I think that seeing a representation of the book itself is more likely to make us think of coming in and browsing the new books display in the library, of holding the object and examining it, and eventually perhaps of reading it.

"The Hermeneutics of Reading"

This idea of the importance of the book as an object in our process of relating to and understanding the text of the book was addressed in a presentation at the recent American Theological Library Association conference by Anthony Elia. His suggestion was that, for students of theology whom he interviewed, the physical book was important to their experience of coming to the text to find meaning, or, to use his phrase, the hermeneutics of reading. For instance, students who picked up a work printed in the 1800's might consider the contents to be a bit stodgy because of the appearance of the book, or, as one student suggested, because old books smell funny; on the other hand, more positively, some students considered the process of approaching a book to be related to their concept of approaching theology in a creative and physical way, so that the moment of encounter with the text became a theological encounter as well, even at times imbued with a certain holiness. Implicit in this presentation was the idea that this encounter could not occur in the same way in an electronic environment.

Whether this distinction holds or not, using the digital world to aid us in more meaningful encounters with the physical world is, I think, an important aspect of theological librarianship and something which even a simple LibraryThing widget can be a small part of.

Will Keillor, Acquisitions