Category Archives: Announcement

Author and Cancer Physician Siddhartha Mukherjee to Speak at Duke, Nov. 28

Author and oncologist Siddhartha Mukherjee

Pulitzer Prize-winning author and oncologist Siddhartha Mukherjee will discuss his book The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer at 6 p.m. Wednesday, November 28, in Duke University’s Page Auditorium. The event is free and open to the public.

Mukherjee is a leading cancer physician and researcher at Columbia University. Ten years in the writing, The Emperor of All Maladies is a magnificent, profoundly humane “biography” of cancer—from its first documented appearances thousands of years ago to the epic battles of modern times to cure, control, and conquer it. Mukherjee examines this shape-shifting and formidable disease with a cellular biologist’s precision, a historian’s perspective, and a biographer’s passion. The result is an astonishingly lucid and eloquent chronicle of a disease humans have lived with—and perished from—for more than five thousand years. The book won the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction and was named one of the 10 Best Books of 2010 by the New York Times.

A Rhodes scholar, Siddhartha Mukherjee graduated from Stanford University, the University of Oxford, and Harvard Medical School. He has published articles in NatureThe New England Journal of MedicineThe New York Times, and The New Republic. He lives in New York with his wife and daughters.

Mukherjee will be delivering the Weaver Memorial Lecture, hosted every other year by the Duke University Libraries in memory of William B. Weaver, a 1972 Duke graduate and former member of the Library Advisory Board. The event is co-sponsored by the Office of the Provost, Office of the Chancellor for Health Affairs, the Duke Department of Medicine, and the Duke Cancer Institute.

Copies of the book will be available for sale at the event.

Admission is free, but tickets are required and are available through the Duke Box Office. Visit tickets.duke.edu for more information.

EVENT PARKING: A limited number of free parking spaces will be available on a first-come, first-served basis on the West Campus Quad in front of Duke Chapel starting at 5 p.m. (Click here for map to the West Campus Quad). Parking will also be available in the Bryan Center Parking Garage (Parking Garage IV) for a $5 charge. (Click here for map to Bryan Center Garage.)

Media are invited to attend the event, but recording is not permitted. Members of the media interested in covering the talk should contact Aaron Welborn, Director of Communications, Duke University Libraries, at 919-660-5816 or aaron.welborn@duke.edu by November 26.

Fair Use Ascendant, Nov. 19

Date: Monday, November 19, 2012
Time: 10:00 a.m.
Location: Perkins Library, Room 217, Duke West Campus (Map)
Contact: Kevin Smith, kevin.l.smith@duke.edu

Fair Use Ascendant:
Where Do We Stand After the Recent Copyright Victories for Higher Ed?

A presentation and discussion for librarians and faculty
Lead by Kevin Smith, Director of the Copyright and Scholarly Communications Office

In the past four months, we have seen positive rulings in two major copyright cases brought against universities and their libraries, and the dismissal of a third.  These ruling have confirmed the importance of fair use in higher education, and they suggest that libraries and faculty members should feel more confident embracing fair use for certain kinds of online activities.

Come learn about these decisions—we will review each briefly and also discuss the ARL Code of Best Practices in Fair Use—and join a discussion about the opportunities they create.

Video Contest Submissions: Vote for Your Favorite!

The submissions are in! Last month, we challenged Duke students to “be our Super PAC” and make a short mock election video for the Duke University Libraries.

We want to thank everyone who participated. We received some great entries, each of which makes a compelling case for choosing the Duke University Libraries as your source for knowledge, inspiration, and fun.

Now it’s time to watch the democratic process in action.

Take a look at the three video entries below (each one is less than 90 seconds), and let us know which one is your favorite. You can vote here on our blog, or on our Facebook page by “liking” your favorite video.

Popular voting begins today (October 8) and ends October 22. The Library Administration and Library Advisory Board will tally the winning votes and announce the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place later this month.

What do our candidates stand to win? Here’s a look at the fabulous prizes…

1st Place: Two (2) student wristbands to the Duke vs. UNC men’s basketball game, February 13, 2013, at Cameron Indoor Stadium
2nd Place: $200 gift certificate to Sushi Love restaurant
3rd Place: $150 gift certificate to Cuban Revolution restaurant

So watch the videos, and help us pick a winner!


Video 1: Submitted by DeAnne Georges (Undergrad, Class of 2013)

Video 2: Submitted by Jordan Thomas (Undergrad, Class of 2015) and Reem Alfahad (Undergrad, Class of 2015)

Video 3: Submitted by Yi Zhu (Undergrad, Class of 2013)

http://vimeo.com/50867572


Libraries Dramatically Expand Ebook Offerings

Image by Maximilian Schönherr, Wikimedia Commons

Duke library users and Duke alumni will soon have a trove of new ebooks at their fingertips.

Approximately 1,500 scholarly monographs by Oxford University Press and its affiliates are now available as ebooks in the library catalog, with approximately 9,000 more to come later this year.

The development is part of an innovative deal brokered by Oxford University Press and the Triangle Research Libraries Network consortium (TRLN).

The ebooks are fully searchable and allow for unlimited user access, so that multiple people can read them at the same time. In addition, one shared print copy of each humanities and social science title will be held at Duke’s Library Service Center and be available for use by all TRLN institutions (Duke, UNC-Chapel Hill, NCSU, NCCU).

“The partnership allows for expanded access to scholarly material, with less overlap, at a lower cost to each TRLN institution,” says Aisha Harvey, Head of Collection Development at Duke University Libraries. “It also gives researchers the option of using a print or digital copy, depending on their personal preference.”

This access agreement is one of the first of its kind to allow shared e-book access among cooperating libraries. Another noteworthy aspect is that the ebooks will be fully available to all Duke alumni. Most ebooks in the Libraries’ collection are not accessible to alumni, due to copyright and licensing restrictions. But the new arrangement expands the Libraries’ offerings to Duke graduates. (A variety of library services and resources are already available for free to all Duke alumni, including some of our most popular databases.)

“The Triangle Research Libraries Network has a very long history of successful collaboration in building print collections,” said Sarah Michalak, University Librarian and Associate Provost at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and chair of the TRLN Executive Committee.

Last year, with support from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, TRLN sponsored a “Beyond Print” summit to explore opportunities and challenges associated with ebook acquisitions and shared institutional access. The ebook deal with Oxford University Press is one outcome of those discussions.

“The agreement with OUP offers a welcome opportunity to experiment with approaches discussed at the summit, provide high-quality content to our users, and learn more about how students and researchers want to access scholarly output in a dual electronic-plus-print environment,” said Michalak.

Ebook and ejournal usage continues to rise in academic libraries across the country. In 2011, the Duke Libraries adopted an ebook advocacy model in order to guide collection decisions and advocate to publishers on behalf of researchers’ needs.

Watch the Presidential Debates at Lilly Library

Framing the Debate: Professors Mac McCorkle and Don Taylor

Date: Wednesday, October 3
Time: 8:00 p.m.
Location: Lilly Library, Room 103 (map)
Contact: Dave Munden, dave.munden@duke.edu, 919-660 9465

 

Mac McCorkle
Associate Professor of the Practice of Public Policy and Director of Graduate Studies, Master of Public Policy Program

 

 

 

Don Taylor
Associate Professor of Public Policy, Sanford School; and Associate Professor of Community and Family Medicine and Nursing, Duke Medical Center

 

 

Are you planning to watch the presidential debates? So are we! And we’re recruiting Duke’s own resident experts to help you understand the issues and deconstruct the sound-bites.

Mac McCorkle and Don Taylor of Duke University’s Sanford School of Public Policy will present “Framing the Debate,” a preview of the first Obama-Romney debate on domestic policy. Their talk begins at 8:00 p.m. in Lilly Library Room 103, followed by the live broadcast of the debate beginning at 9:00 p.m. Bring your friends, or meet some new ones!

The event is the first in a series—Election 2012: Debates, Results, and Beyond—focusing on the upcoming presidential debates and election. All events are free, open to the public, and held at Lilly Library on Duke’s East Campus.

For more information, visit Lilly Library’s Election 2012 website.

And if you just can’t get enough election fever, enter our “Vote for the Library” Video Contest. You could win two tickets to the Duke/UNC men’s basketball game! Deadline: October 5.

Text Mining Talk > TODAY at 2:30

Ryan Shaw is an assistant professor in the School of Information and Library Science, UNC Chapel HIll.

Date: Thursday, September 20
Time: 2:30-4:00 p.m.
Location: Perkins Library, Room 217 (map)
Contact: Liz Milewicz, (919) 660-5911, liz.milewicz@duke.edu

Today Duke University Libraries launches its new Digital Scholarship Series, Text > Data, with a talk by UNC SILS faculty member Ryan Shaw – 2:30-4:00 PM in Perkins Library 217. All are welcome to attend.

Ryan will provide an overview and a critique of text-mining projects, and discuss project design, methodology, scope, integrity of data and analysis as well as preservation. This presentation will help scholars understand the research potential of text mining, and offer a summary of issues and concerns about technology and methods.

This presentation will be an excellent introduction to text mining as a methodological approach. And if you’re a PhD student, you can earn 2 RCR credits (GS712) for attending this talk — just be sure to register your attendance: http://library.duke.edu/events/digital-scholarship/event.do?id=6321.

Open Access Week Talk: Altmetrics and the Decoupled Journal

Date: Monday, October 22
Time: 3:00 p.m.
Location: Perkins Library, Room 217 (map)
Contact: Paolo Mangiafico, (919) 613-6317, paolo.mangiafico@duke.edu

To celebrate international Open Access Week this year (October 22-28), the Libraries have lined up an exciting talk and you’re invited to attend. Jason Priem (http://jasonpriem.org/), a doctoral student at UNC-SILS and pioneer of the idea of “altmetrics” (alternative ways of tracking the impact of scholarly work), will be speaking about how open access and new measuring and filtering tools are changing scholarly publishing. Here’s how Priem describes it:

As the movement toward universal open access (OA) gathers momentum, the most salient OA questions are changing from “if” and even “when,” to “what will an OA world look like?” Is open access an incremental improvement, or will it lead to fundamental shifts in the way scholarship is communicated, filtered, and disseminated? In this talk, I’ll argue that the latter is the case: new ways of measuring scholarly impact on the social Web — “altmetrics” — will allow real-time, crowdsourced filtering of diverse scholarly products, leading to a new landscape of interoperable services that replace traditional journals. I’ll also demonstrate ImpactStory, an open-source tool for gathering altmetrics, and show how it can be used to promote OA, open data, and open source to faculty.

This event is  open to the public. We hope you can join us!

“Vote for the Library” Video Contest

It’s election season, and there are a lot of hearts and minds to win out there. We want yours.

We’re asking Duke University students to make a short “election” video for the Duke University Libraries.

Is Perkins your ideal of hope and change? Does Lilly have the cure for the knowledge economy? Should librarians rule the world?

Be our Super PAC. Help us make the case for the Duke University Libraries with a mock political campaign ad. Need inspiration? Check out some of the latest commercials by both political parties.

The rules are simple. You must be a registered Duke student. Your video must be 90 seconds or less. It should look, feel, and sound like an actual political commercial. And it should make a compelling case for choosing the Duke University Libraries as your source for knowledge, inspiration, and fun. 

Parody, irreverence, swelling music, patriotism, fear mongering, and nostalgia are encouraged.

The Duke University Libraries will select the best videos and post them on our Facebook page, where you can vote for your favorite. The top three winners will be announced November 2, 2012.

 

Big prizes!

Skip K-Ville and go straight to the game!

GRAND PRIZE: Two (2) student wristbands to the Duke vs. UNC men’s basketball game, February 13, 2013, at Cameron Indoor Stadium

2nd Place: $200 gift certificate to Sushi Love restaurant
3rd Place: $150 gift certificate to Cuban Revolution restaurant

 

Never made a video?

No problem! You can check out video cameras from the Link in Perkins Library. And the Multimedia Project Studio has everything you need to edit and produce your own videos. The Multimedia Project Studio has two locations, one in Lilly Library and the newly opened West Campus location in the lower level of Bostock Library, near the Link.

The new Multimedia Project Studio location in Bostock Library

 

Contest rules

  • You must be a registered undergraduate or graduate student at Duke with a valid DukeCard in your name.
  • Videos will be judged according to the following criteria: creativity, persuasiveness, production qualities, and humor.
  • Your entry must obey all laws, including all applicable copyright and privacy laws. This also applies to any music samples used in your video.
  • You agree to let the Duke University Libraries place your entry on its website and use your video in its promotional and educational efforts.
  • If filming in a library, be courteous and respectful of people studying.
  • Your video should be no longer than 90 seconds, including credits. Videos longer than 90 seconds may be disqualified or returned for editing.
  • You are responsible for any tax implications if you win a gift card.
  • Students may work individually or in groups. Winning videos will receive only one prize. If you work in a group, you split the prize.
  • Entries must be submitted by midnight on Friday, October 5, 2012, to be eligible. No extensions. Anything submitted after this date will not be considered.
  • The Duke University Libraries reserves the right to reject or return for editing any video that doesn’t comply with these guidelines or violates the Duke University student code of conduct.

 

How to submit your video

You may submit your video one of two ways:

Online submissions
1. Upload your video to YouTube or Vimeo
2. Send an email to Aaron Welborn, Director of Communications, at aaron.welborn@duke.edu, including:

  • A link to your video
  • Your name and contact information (email and phone)
  • Your expected graduation date (indicate whether you are an undergraduate or graduate student)

3. We will send you a confirmation email that we received your video within 24 hours.

In-Person Submissions 
1. Save your video to a CD, DVD, or flash drive
2. Put it in an envelope addressed to: Vote for the Library Video Contest. Inside the envelope, please include:

  • Your name and contact information (email and phone)
  • Your expected graduation date (indicate whether you are an undergraduate or graduate student)

3. Deliver your entry to the Libraries Administration Office, Perkins Library Room 112, by 5:00 PM on October 5, 2012. (Note that in-person submissions must be dropped off earlier than online submissions.)

 

Contest Timeline

  • Deadline for Submitting Videos:  Midnight, Friday, October 5, 2012 (5:00 PM for in-person submissions)
  • Videos Posted on Libraries’ Facebook Page, Popular Voting Begins:  October 8
  • Library Administration and Library Advisory Board choose top three videos:  October 22
  • Winners Announced:  November 2

 

Questions?

For more information, contact:
Aaron Welborn
Director of Communications
Duke University Libraries
aaron.welborn@duke.edu
919-660-5816

Join Our Student Library Advisory Boards

The Duke University Libraries are now accepting applications for membership on the 2012-2013 Undergraduate Advisory BoardFirst-Year Advisory Board, and Graduate and Professional Advisory Board.  Members of these student advisory boards will help improve the learning and research environment for Duke University students and advise the Libraries on topics such as study spaces, research resources, integrating library services into academic courses, and marketing library services to students.

All three boards are now taking applications or nominations. Deadlines for applying are:

  • Graduate and Professional Advisory Board: September 7
  • Undergraduate Board: September 9
  • First-Year Board: September 10

Members will be selected and notified by late September, and the groups will begin to meet by early October.  More information is available on the Libraries’ website, where you will also find links to the applications and nomination forms.

For more information for any questions about these opportunities, contact:

 

Graduate and Professional Advisory Board

Robert Byrd
Associate University Librarian for Collections and User Services
robert.byrd@duke.edu
919-660-5821

 

 

Undergraduate Advisory Board

Jean Ferguson
Head of Research Services
Librarian for Global Health
jean.ferguson@duke.edu
919-660-5928

 

 

First-Year Advisory Board

Greta Boers
Librarian for Classical Studies and Linguistics
greta.boers@duke.edu
919-660-5864

 

 

Dave Munden
Evening Reference Librarian and Supervisor
dave.munden@duke.edu
919-660-5998

 

 

Work Advisory: Rubenstein Library Stairway, Aug. 23-24

One side of the staircase will be closed for maintenance, and contractors will be using a strong-smelling solvent.

On Thursday and Friday, August 23 and 24, a contractor will be working on one side of the stairs in the Rubenstein Library entrance that lead from the first to second floor.  One side of the staircase will be closed but the other side will be open.

The contractor will be using a solvent/cleaner that will produce a strong odor in the immediate area.  It will be vented outside, but if you have any allergy or odor sensitivity issues you may want to utilize the main Perkins Library entrance to keep some distance from the area.

Fire Drill and Alarm Testing, Aug. 10

 

Duke Fire Safety will be testing the fire alarm system in Bostock, Perkins, and Rubenstein libraries on Friday, August 10, from 8:30 – 9:15 a.m.

The test will also be a fire drill. If you are in any of these buildings when the alarm sounds, you must evacuate the building. Fire Safety staff will be taking inventory of every alarm in Bostock, Perkins, and Rubenstein libraries to ensure that they are functioning during the test. We apologize for any inconvenience.

Duke Fire Safety conducts fire drills on a routine basis around campus in order to ensure that all Duke students, faculty, and staff know how to make an efficient and orderly escape from campus buildings in an emergency. For more information on campus fire safety, visit the Duke Fire Safety website.

 

Duke Acquires Papers of Rabbi Heschel, Influential Religious Leader

Note to editors: A high-resolution photo of images from the Heschel collection is available here: http://today.duke.edu/showcase/mmedia/hires/heschel.jpg.

DURHAM, N.C. — Duke University has acquired the papers of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, a scholar, writer and theologian who is widely recognized as one of the most influential religious leaders of the 20th century, the school announced Monday.

Heschel was a highly visible and charismatic leader in the civil rights and anti-Vietnam War movements. He co-founded Clergy Concerned About Vietnam and served as a Jewish liaison with the Vatican during the Second Vatican Council, also known as Vatican II.

Rabbi Heschel marching with Martin Luther King, Jr., and other civil rights activists in Selma. All images are from the Abraham Joshua Heschel Papers, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Duke University.

The collection, which has never before been available to scholars, consists of manuscripts, correspondence, publications, documents and photographs spanning five decades and at least four languages. Included among the papers are notes and drafts for nearly all of Heschel’s published works, as well as intimate and extensive correspondence with some of the leading religious figures of his time, including Martin Buber, Thomas Merton, Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy and Reinhold Niebuhr.

The papers also contain extensive documentation on Heschel’s life-long commitment to social justice, including planning documents, correspondence with organizers, speeches and even hate mail.

“The presence of the Heschel archive is a significant opportunity to draw together Duke’s traditional strengths in Jewish studies, American history and human rights,” said Laurie Patton, dean of Duke’s Trinity College of Arts and Sciences. “One of Duke’s paramount values is ‘knowledge in the service of society,’ and Heschel embodied that value in every sphere of life. We are thrilled to be able to house his papers at our university, and hope to create numerous opportunities for ethical and historical reflection on this extraordinary man’s work and life.”

Photographs and other items from the Heschel archive, including a 1935 Nazi-issued work permit.

The archive will open for research after conservation review and archival processing are complete. The opening will be announced on the websites of the David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library and the Center for Jewish Studies at Duke, which partnered to acquire the papers.

“The acquisition of the Heschel papers assures scholars that the legacy of social activism, human rights and the highest standards of Judaic scholarship will be central to the pursuit of Jewish studies at Duke and many other places,” said Eric Meyers, the Bernice & Morton Lerner professor of religion and director of the Duke Center for Jewish Studies.

“I am delighted that my father’s papers have found a good home at Duke, which has long had an important research program in the fields of Jewish studies and religious studies,” said Susannah Heschel, daughter of Abraham Heschel and the Eli Black Professor of Jewish Studies at Dartmouth College. “Duke’s strong commitment to archival holdings related to Judaica and to human rights places my father’s papers together with those of his beloved student, Rabbi Marshall Meyer, and I know that Duke’s magnificent Rubenstein Library will make the material easily accessible to scholars from around the world.”

Notes and related materials from Heschel’s audience with Pope Paul VI during the Second Vatican Council (Vatican II).

Rabbi Marshall Meyer, whose papers are already placed at the archive, was a student of Heschel’s and credited him with profoundly influencing his human rights work in Argentina.

“Together, these two collections represent almost a century of social justice thought and action and provide an important connection between the civil rights and human rights movements,” said Patrick Stawski, human rights archivist at the Rubenstein Library.

Born in 1907 in Poland, Heschel was descended from a long line of distinguished rabbis. Heschel believed that prayer and study could not be separated from public action. He famously marched side-by-side with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in Selma, Ala., and is credited with coining the civil rights slogan, “We pray with our legs.”

Heschel’s theological works include The Sabbath (1951), Man is Not Alone (1951) and God in Search of Man (1955). His writings continue to influence contemporary discussions of religion and social justice.

For more information, or for press inquiries, please contact: Patrick Stawski, Human Rights Archivist, (919) 660-5823, patrick.stawski@duke.edu 

Furniture Cleaning in Perkins/Bostock, Aug. 6-10

Pardon our dust-busting!

All library furniture in Perkins and Bostock libraries is scheduled to be cleaned during the week of August 6-10, 2012. 

Expect some vacuum noise and other minor disturbances while the work is being completed.

We apologize for the inconvenience, but we’re looking forward to offering everyone a clean, comfy place to sit when classes resume on August 27. (Only three more weeks of summer break? Say it ain’t so!)

Alerts & Outages: ILLiad Service Interuption July 21

Please bear with us with we upgrade ILLiad!
(Photo by channah via stock.xchng)

On Saturday morning, July 21, approximately between 8:00 and 11:00 a.m., the Duke University Libraries will be performing an upgrade to the server which hosts ILLiad, our interlibrary loan program.  The operation is planned to take two hours, and during this time users will not be able to access their interlibrary loan accounts.

We apologize for any inconvenience and thank you for your patience while we upgrade our system.