Peruse the gallery and discover what is new and unique about Special Collections at the Hay Library. Explore recent acquisitions from the 14th century to the present through the lens of renowned Brown faculty, and gain insight into the place where the past, present and individual connect.
Opening reception: Friday, November 22nd, 4-6 PM
Dates: November 22, 2019 – February 14, 2020
Time: John Hay Library Hours
Location: Exhibition Gallery, John Hay Library, 20 Prospect Street, Providence
The Library doesn’t want you to study on an empty stomach. Visit us at the Rock or SciLi (or both) for some free pizza from Domino’s.
Pizza nights are brought to you by the Library and Campus Life.
Pizza isn’t the only thing we bring to the table. Let us know if we can help your research. Best of luck during finals!
Created by famous political cartoonist Thomas Nast, these eight vignettes depict a “state of the Union” featuring President Abraham Lincoln during his reelection year. Each rendering touches on a significant factor during the Civil War, which was in its fourth year and with no clear victor at the time. The double-page image, published in Harper’s Weekly in December 1864, reflects the artist’s more illustrative work. Nast is also credited with crafting the modern American representation of Santa Claus during the course of his time at the magazine.
Exhibit Dates: November 1 – 30, 2019
Exhibit Time: John Hay Library Hours
Exhibit Location: Second Floor Landing, John Hay Library, 20 Prospect Street, Providence
On Friday, November 8, 2019 at 3 p.m. in the Digital Scholarship Lab at the Rockefeller Library, Elaine Sullivan, Associate Professor of History at UC Santa Cruz, will give a talk entitled, “Constructing the Sacred: Visibility and Ritual Landscape at the Egyptian Necropolis of Saqqara.”
This event is free and open to the public.
This talk will discuss Sullivan’s forthcoming born digital publication which utilizes a 3D reconstruction model to examine the importance of visibility and landscape change at the ancient Egyptian necropolis of Saqqara. The project will be published as an online only monograph by Stanford University Press in winter 2020 and includes a dynamic 3D GIS model as part of the publication.
Dr. Sullivan is an Egyptologist and a Digital Humanist. Her work focuses on applying new technologies to ancient cultural materials. She acts as the project coordinator of the Digital Karnak Project, a multi-phased 3D virtual reality model of the famous ancient Egyptian temple complex of Karnak. She is project director of 3D Saqqara, which harnesses Geographic Information Systems (GIS) technologies and 3D modeling to explore the ritual and natural landscape of the famous cemetery of Saqqara through both space and time.
Her field experience in Egypt includes five seasons of excavation with Johns Hopkins University at the temple of the goddess Mut (Luxor), as well as four seasons in the field with a UCLA project in the Egyptian Fayum, at the Greco-Roman town of Karanis.
Because of a broad interest in the history and material culture of the larger ancient Near Eastern and Mediterranean worlds, she has also excavated at sites in Syria, Italy and Israel. Dr. Sullivan received her M.A. and Ph.D. in Egyptian Art and Archaeology from Johns Hopkins University. Her B.A. (Magna Cum Laude) in History is from Duke University.
Date: Friday, November 8, 2019
Time: 3 p.m.
Location: Patrick Ma Digital Scholarship Lab, Rockefeller Library, 10 Prospect Street, Providence
The Library is pleased to announce that Joseph Campbell will be joining us as Director of Library Facilities.
Joe brings over two decades of professional experience to the position, including five years in Brown’s Facilities Management Department as the HVAC Controls Supervisor. During this time Joe has provided leadership and direction to the Controls Division, including work on several energy management and building automation projects as well as collaborations with various departments within Facilities and across campus, such as Environmental Health and Safety, the Office of Sustainability, and Planning, Design & Construction.
As the Director of Library Facilities, Joe will be part of the Library’s executive team and report directly to the University Librarian. In this role, Joe will bring an understanding of the special characteristics and requirements of collections, study, and research facilities as he assesses Library needs and opportunities relating to facilities quality and building safety. Coordination with campus partners will be an essential part of the job, especially with Facilities Management, Public Safety, Environmental Health and Safety, and Computing and Information Services. Library construction, renovation, and repair efforts are under the director’s purview, as is compliance with University, state, and federal laws and regulations.
Joe has assumed HVAC, power plant, and property management leadership roles in organizations including the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, Mount Auburn Hospital in Cambridge, MA, and Rhode Island Hospital in Providence.
Joe will serve a critical function for the Brown Library, working to ensure continuous improvement in the quality and functionality of Library spaces for students, faculty, researchers, staff, and visitors, making the Library a safe, inclusive, and welcoming space for academic pursuits. Among the philosophies Joe values is the concept of a collaborative work environment that encourages ongoing growth and skill development for individuals as well as a strong appreciation of the benefits of continuous process improvements.
Joe’s first day at the Library is November 4, 2019.
Join the Brown University Library for an unforgettable night of poetry, fiction, and discussion of how library and archival research is essential to creative and literary endeavors. Lauren Russell and Megan Milks will both read from their works, followed by a discussion led by librarians and archivists about how they are using primary sources. A Q&A period will conclude the presentation.
The first event in the Authors in the Archives series, this talk will take place on Monday, October 28, 2019 at 6:30 p.m. in the Willis Reading Room of the John Hay Library.
Free and open to the public. A light reception will follow the talk.
Lauren Russell is the author of What’s Hanging on the Hush (Ahsahta Press, 2017) and Descent, a winner of the 2019 Tarpaulin Sky Book Awards and a finalist for the National Poetry Series, forthcoming from Tarpaulin Sky Press in 2020. A 2017 NEA Creative Writing Fellow in Poetry, she has also received fellowships and residencies from Cave Canem, The Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing, VIDA/The Home School, the Rose O’Neill Literary House, the Millay Colony, and City of Asylum/Passa Porta. Her work has appeared in The New York Times Magazine, boundary 2, the Academy of American Poets’ Poem-a-Day, and Bettering American Poetry 2015, among others. She is assistant director of the Center for African American Poetry and Poetics at the University of Pittsburgh.
Megan Milks is the recipient of the 2019 Lotos Foundation Prize in Fiction Writing. Their first book, Kill Marguerite and Other Stories, won the 2015 Devil’s Kitchen Reading Award in Fiction and was named a Lambda Literary Award finalist. They have also published four chapbooks, most recently Kicking the Baby and The Feels, an exploration of fan fiction and affect. Their critical writing, for which they won a 2014 Critical Hit Award from Electric Lit, has been published in 4Columns, Los Angeles Book Review, and The New Inquiry, among other venues. Their work as editor includes The &NOW Awards 3: The Best Innovative Writing, 2011-2013 (Northwestern UP, 2015) and Asexualities: Feminist and Queer Perspectives (Routledge, 2014); currently, they edit the Fiction section of The Account.
The Authors in the Archives series features notable writers whose work is brought to fruition through their creative and sagacious use of primary source materials.
To request special services, accommodations, or assistance for this event, please contact Jennifer Braga at Jennifer_Braga@brown.edu or (401) 863-6913 as far in advance of the event as possible. Thank you.
Date: Monday, October 28, 2019
Time: 6:30 p.m.
Location: Willis Reading Room, John Hay Library, 20 Prospect Street, Providence
October 21 – 27, 2019 is Open Access Week, and the Brown University Library is marking the occasion with two events:
Brown Bag on Open Access and Publishing
Wednesday, October 23
1:30 – 2:30 p.m.
121 South Main Street, Providence
Free
More information
Celebrate International Open Access Week by joining Doctoral Candidate Jason Gantenberg, Public Health Librarian Erin Anthony, and Data Management Librarian Andrew Creamer for a Brown Bag discussion on Open Access and Publishing. Get an overview of Open and the many paths to making a publication open. Questions welcomed!
Transform the Narrative: A Wikipedia Edit-A-Thon for Increasing Marginalized Voices in Environmental Justice
Wednesday, October 23
3 – 6 p.m.
Digital Scholarship Lab, Rockefeller Library
Free
Registration required
Join the Brown University Libraries in collaboration with SACNAS for a Wikipedia edit-a-thon focusing on increasing awareness of marginalized voices in environmental justice. This hands-on workshop will teach you how to edit Wikipedia entries to increase visibility of marginalized voices in environmental activism. There will be autumnal snacks!
The open movement seeks to work towards solutions of many of the world’s most pressing problems in a spirit of transparency, collaboration, re-use and free access.
The open movement implicitly supports several facets of Brown’s Strategic Plan, Building on Distinction. The values and goals set forth in commitments toward Integrative Scholarship and Academic Excellence rely upon open communication and sharing of knowledge that could occur organically through an open paradigm of research and teaching.
The open movement:
On Wednesday, October 23, 2019 at 12 p.m. in the Digital Scholarship Lab at the Rockefeller Library, Dr. Li Wang, Curator of the East Asian Collection, will give a talk, “Exploring the Digital China 2019.” This event is free and open to the public. Coffee and cookies will be served.
This new visual report will focus on Dr. Wang’s professional trip this summer in China, where he attended several conferences, Beijing International Book Fair, and other events. During this period, he delivered two presentations at the International Conference on Digital Publishing and Digital Libraries and the Sino-American Academic Library Forum on Collaboration and Development. The first presentation, entitled “Digital Scholarship at Brown (Continuance): Knowledge Innovation and Research Engagement in North American University Libraries,” is a follow-up chapter of his award-winning paper on “Digital Scholarship at Brown” from 2014. The second is on American Sinologist Charles S. Gardner and the Chinese collection at Brown University, which won the first prize for papers at the Sino-American Library Forum.
In his talk, Dr. Wang will scan recent trends in digital publishing, knowledge innovation and library services developed in China and other places in the world. He will also share pictures, stories and thoughts on this fruitful journey, including cultural tours of the Russian style Gogol Bookstore, the wonderful Heaven Lake on the China-North Korea border, and the Inner Mongolian prairie in north China, and much more.
Date: Wednesday, October 23, 2019
Time: 12 – 1 p.m.
Location: Patrick Ma Digital Scholarship Lab, John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Library, 10 Prospect Street, Providence
At a Standstill, Moving: Gesture, Temporality and the Interval in Performance by Rebecca Schneider, Professor of Theatre Arts and Performance Studies, situates the importance of gesture within a wide range of performances. From the vibrancy of opera to the seeming standstill of stone, Schneider’s project offers a non-linear reading experience while focusing on the significance of the interval in order to explore multiple and intersecting temporalities.
The Past and Future of Chika Sagawa, Japanese Modernist Poet by Sawako Nakayasu, Assistant Professor of Literary Arts, draws attention to an influential but largely overlooked female poet from early-twentieth-century Japan. Nakayasu’s project proposes an innovative use of interwoven media to illuminate the complex poetry of Chika Sagawa as well as to broaden the scope of literary translation.
With continued support from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, Brown’s Digital Publications Initiative seeks to advance humanities scholarship by providing a university-based approach to the development, evaluation, and publication of born-digital scholarly monographs. With oversight from Brown’s Digital Scholarship Editor, projects that are selected by the Initiative’s Digital Publications Advisory Board are developed as digital works that draw upon the capabilities of the Library’s Center for Digital Scholarship. These scholarly works are then submitted to leading university presses that have corresponding academic interests and the infrastructure for peer review and digital publication.
In addition to Nakayasu and Schneider’s projects, digital works currently under development include: Furnace and Fugue: A Digital Edition of Michael Maier’s Atalanta fugiens (1618) with Scholarly Commentary, co-edited by Tara Nummedal, Professor of History, and Independent Scholar Donna Bilak (forthcoming with University of Virginia Press); Italian Shadows: A Curious History of Virtual Reality by Massimo Riva, Professor and Chair of Italian Studies; The Sensory Monastery: Saint-Jean-des-Vignes, co-authored by Sheila Bonde, Professor of History of Art and Architecture and Professor of Archaeology, and Clark Maines, Professor Emeritus of Art History at Wesleyan University; Islamic Pasts and Futures: Gazing at Horizons of Time by Shahzad Bashir, Director of Middle East Studies, Aga Khan Professor of Islamic Humanities, and Professor of Religious Studies; and Nicholas Brown and The Roman Revolution of 1848–1849 by David Kertzer, Paul R. Dupee, Jr. University Professor of Social Science, Professor of Anthropology, and Professor of Italian Studies.
To learn more about Brown’s digital scholarly publication program, contact Digital Scholarship Editor Allison Levy (allison_levy@brown.edu).
Providence, R.I. [Brown University] Brown University has received a $775,000 grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to support a second phase of its Digital Publications Initiative, launched in 2015 with an initial grant of $1.3 million. The Initiative, a collaboration between the University Library and the Dean of the Faculty, has established a novel, university-based approach to the development, evaluation, and publication of born-digital scholarly monographs.
Following
a successful initial phase, a second grant allows the University to consolidate
its Initiative while continuing to advance the role of digital scholarship in
the academy. From
employing interactive simulations to nonlinear reading opportunities, these publications
demonstrate how the digital environment is necessary for articulating and
advancing scholarly argument beyond the capabilities of print. With oversight from Allison Levy, Brown’s Digital
Scholarship Editor, projects that are selected by the Initiative’s faculty
advisory board are developed as digital works that draw upon the capabilities
of the Library’s Center for Digital Scholarship. These digital scholarly works are
then submitted to leading university presses that have corresponding academic
interests and the infrastructure for peer review and digital publication.
“When
Dean of the Faculty Kevin McLaughlin, former University Librarian Harriette
Hemmasi, and I were developing the initial proposal for Mellon, we were sailing
into uncharted waters,” said Joukowsky Family University Librarian Joseph S.
Meisel, co-principal investigator for the Initiative. “But the Initiative has
succeeded even beyond what we hoped for at the time. Mellon’s commitment to
continued funding to help us consolidate these early successes and make the
Initiative sustainable is a significant recognition of what we have managed to
achieve. Our guiding principles have been to focus on scholarly excellence and to
put the faculty’s vision for their work first.”
To date, five faculty publication projects in a range of humanities fields have been selected and are under development for the Initiative’s first phase, with a sixth project yet to be chosen from the most recent round of proposals. The first two projects are nearing publication. Over the next six years, with support from the new Mellon grant, the Initiative plans to add 4-5 new projects.
The first of the Initiative’s two pilot projects, Furnace and Fugue: A Digital Edition of Michael Maier’s Atalanta fugiens (1618) with Scholarly Commentary, will be published by the University of Virginia Press. Co-authored by Tara Nummedal, Professor of History, and independent scholar Donna Bilak, Furnace and Fugue revolves around a seventeenth-century German alchemical book. The second pilot project, Italian Shadows: A Journey into the New World and Other Tales of Imaginary and Forgotten Media by Massimo Riva, Professor and Chair of Italian Studies, takes as its focus the genealogy of virtual reality in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Italy.
A part of the Initiative from the earliest stages, Riva expresses the significance of working on Italian Shadows in the digital realm: “My project involves a rich and diverse set of visual and multimedia sources, as well as interactive models and simulations of historical artifacts, and could only have been conceived and implemented in a digital environment. Working with this exceptionally talented team of designers, editors, and librarians has opened new horizons to my scholarship and inspired me to explore new ways to share it with my peers, my students, and the public at large.”
The third project, The Sensory Monastery: Saint-Jean-des-Vignes by Sheila Bonde, Professor of History of Art and Architecture, and Clark Maines, Professor of Art History Emeritus at Wesleyan, explores the sensory experience of monasticism in medieval and early modern France. The fourth, Islamic Pasts and Futures: Gazing at Horizons of Time by Shahzad Bashir, Aga Khan Professor of Islamic Humanities and Director of Brown’s Middle East Studies program, rethinks the conjunction between Islam and temporality, spanning the centuries and regions where Islam has been a significant presence. The fifth, Nicholas Brown and the Roman Revolution of 1848–1849, by David Kertzer, Paul R. Dupee, Jr. University Professor of Social Science, Professor of Anthropology, and Professor of Italian Studies, re-examines the politics of nineteenth-century Italy via a trove of recently rediscovered correspondence.
Having arrived at a model of developing long-form digital scholarship, seeing growing interest in this effort on campus, and finding that leading academic publishers are receptive to the Initiative’s projects and approach, Brown is on a path to facilitating the creation and validation of new scholarly forms and helping to broker their dissemination through the most suitable venues for digital publication.
“With this renewed support from The Mellon Foundation, Brown will be able to continue to produce innovative digital publications that open new possibilities for the presentation and dissemination of scholarship by our faculty that is of the highest quality,” said Dean of the Faculty Kevin McLaughlin, co-principal investigator for the Initiative. “Each one of these digital publications creates new conditions for the production and circulation of humanist scholarship.”