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For the visual learners out there, here’s a video explaining why the library won’t necessarily have a copy of your textbook, as well as providing options that might save you money on some of your books and assigned readings. Enjoy!
One of the first things students do as the new semester begins is figuring our their textbook strategy. Which ones can they borrow from friends that took the course before. Can it be rented in e-format from B&N, Amazon, Google or Chegg? Does the bookstore have a used copy? For which courses could a textbook purchase be delayed or even ignored? With the high cost of textbooks, figuring out how to get them at the cheapest possible price is high on the students’ beginning of the semester to-do-list.
That’s why one of the most frequently asked questions at the Temple Libraries during the first week or two of the semester is about textbooks. Students want to find out if the Libraries hold a copy of their textbook. Some assume we buy them, but they find out that’s not the case. Sometimes their book is placed on course reserve by the instructor. Sometimes a fairly out-of-date edition, a past reserve item, can be found in the book stacks. Some students will choose to take that outdated edition over the current edition.
Student interest is growing in having faculty point them to open education resources instead of assigning traditional textbooks. In a research paper titled “Online and Campus College Students Like Using an Open Educational Resource Instead of a Traditional Book“, Brian Lindshield and Koushik Adhikari of Kansas State University, report that data gathered over several semesters using an alternate textbook they called the “flexbook”, that utilized an open-source textbook platform to allow faculty to collaboratively offer freely available learning materials, was preferred by students over the traditional textbook. They conclude “that students are willing to move beyond traditional print textbooks.” An article in Inside Higher Ed titled “Expense Experiments” identifies how different institutions are experimenting with both e-textbooks and technology for reading them.
Additionally in the Chronicle of Higher Education’s Almanac of Higher Education 2013, there is a chart that summarizes student responses to a question asking them what technologies they would like to most see their professors using – and what they’d like to see used less often. Nearly half of the students surveyed indicated that they would like to see more use of freely available course content beyond the student’s own campus. A slightly lesser number of students wanted more use of e-books and e-textbooks.
The Temple University Libraries offers a resource page for faculty seeking more sources for open educational resources – such as the University of Minnesota open textbook catalog that can subject search the holdings of numerous open textbook repositories. The Libraries also owns thousands of e-books that may be used as an alternate to a textbook. Using the SUMMON search (on the Libraries homepage) it is possible to modify a search to locate book chapters in electronic sources:
With the growing number of open educational resources available to faculty, and the increasing student acceptance of e-resources, the possibility of replacing traditional textbooks with open learning materials is greater than ever.
When the Temple University community returns from summer break, students will be attending classes from off-campus, and from locations well outside the Philadelphia metropolitan area. Luckily, even at this distance, all Temple students still have access to the incredible wealth of databases, eBooks, and streaming media available through the library. Now, more than ever, students can engage directly with the library staff who are positioned to guide them towards academic success.
Temple librarians already provide specialized assistance to remote students with through our “Ask a Librarian” service. We also offer in-class information literacy instruction to students enrolled in some online-only courses.
In order to extend library instruction to remote learners and faculty teaching online courses, Temple University Libraries is pleased to offer our first ever Virtual Learning Lunch Week on September 3rd-6th. Each session will consist of 20 minute long presentations, designed to jumpstart your use of various library services and resources, with additional time to ask the librarian your questions on the topic.
Sessions are open to the whole Temple community, no matter whether you are many miles away or right next-door. To attend, login to https://webex.temple.edu with your AccessNetID and password. Click on “Live Sessions” under “Attend a Session” and look for the day’s “Library Virtual Learning Lunch”. (Please note: first-time WebEx users should arrive a few minutes early to install the WebEx Add-On on their computer or the Cisco WebEx Meeting app on their mobile device.)
The event starts off with a Tuesday session designed to help faculty use the new Ares course reserve system, followed by one explaining the legal ins-and-outs of using video in both face-to-face and online classes. On Wednesday and Thursday, we continue with sessions fostering basic research skills and highlighting some of the useful databases and unique resources available at the library. Then, Friday sessions introduce both students and faculty to the streaming media available through the library, resources equally useful for research and leisure.
September 3rd
12:00pm – Ares course reserves system (Justin Hill)
12:30pm – Video copyright basics for faculty (Brian Boling)
September 4th
12:00pm – Refworks for citation management (Fred Rowland)
12:30pm – Basic research in education (Jackie Sipes)
September 5th
12:00pm – Learn about primary sources (David Murray)
12:30pm – Special Collections Research Center orientation (Josue Hurtado)
September 6th
12:00pm – Streaming Music Databases (Anne Harlow)
12:30pm – Streaming Video Databases (Brian Boling)
Planning on hitting the TUFest tables on Liacouras Walk? We’ll be there, too, handing out bags, bubbles, buttons, and information about the libraries. Feel free to drop by and ask us any questions you may have about our services, and don’t forget to grab some candy before you leave!
We’re here to answer your questions!
Paley Library will also be hosting CeLIBration, a party for students that will include fair-themed food (think: cotton candy, popcorn, and hotdogs), arcade games, & a DJ spinning jams. Stop by and bring your friends!
Thursday May 2, 2013 was the date that the library celebrated students and undergraduate research. The 9th annual Library Prize for Undergraduate Research and the 3rd annual Library Prize on Sustainability & the Environment were awarded on that afternoon with a welcome by the Interim Dean of University Libraries, Carol Lang; and Peter Jones, the Senior Vice Provost of Undergraduate Studies at Temple University. A Temple alumnus, John H. Livingstone, Jr. a 1949 graduate of the SBM, has supported this undergraduate prize since its founding. Gale, a part of the Cengage Learning family of research products, has provided funding for the prize for sustainability and the environment.
The scholarship introduced to us that day continues the heritage of our earlier prizes, each award reminding us about what research is: the language of new knowledge. Please take the time to visit the Research Guide for the Library Prize for Undergraduate Research. If you are interested in the sustainability prize visit the Research Guide for Undergraduate Research on Sustainability & the Environment. At both these sites you will find information about the prize itself, and also the winners and their entries. Amongst these, there might be an entry to inspire you to apply next year, or perhaps discover a new area of interest for you to pursue! The Libraries, the resources we provide and our staff are here to help you in either case!
Whether or not you were able to join us on May 2, you can watch the Library Prizes Awards Ceremony right here. We were so impressed with this year’s winning research. We know you will be, too.
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William Noel at the Center for Humanities at Temple
“My mission is to bring art and people together, for learning, discovery, and enjoyment.” –William Noel
On Thursday, April 25th, the Center for Humanities at Temple hosted William Noel, internationally renowned expert in the application of digital technologies to manuscript studies. Dr. Noel is currently director of the Special Collections Center, and Founding Director of the Schoenberg Institute for Manuscript Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. His presentation, “Free and Easy: The Appearance of Truly Useful Cultural Heritage Data”, covered the restoration and digitization of the Archimedes Palimpsest, a project that he led while at the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore. Dr. Noel concluded with a discussion of the reasons why a “free and easy” approach is best for digitization of cultural materials. (Eureka!)
What is the Archimedes Palimpsest?
Upon initial examination, what is now known as the Archimedes Palimpsest, appears to be a medieval prayer book, dating from 1229, written by the scribe Johannes Myronas in Jerusalem. Back then, parchment was expensive, and therefore was sometimes “recycled.” To make this prayer book, the scribe scraped off old mathematical text from some parchment and wrote new text on top, making the book a palimpsest. From then until 1906, this prayer book was used in liturgical services, and suffered numerous abuses, most notably dripping candle wax, mold, missing pages, and images painted over text as late as the 1930s. In 1906 the Danish philologist Johan Heiberg discovered the manuscript in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Istanbul, and identified the hidden text as Archimedes. He photographed every page, and with the help of only a magnifying glass, transcribed and published the underlying text that he could perceive.
The twentieth century was no kinder to manuscripts than the middle ages, and from about 1930 to 1991, the Archimedes Palimpsest was either lost or gone from public view until 1998, when an anonymous collector bought the manuscript at an auction at Christie’s in New York. This collector brought it to William Noel at the Walters Museum in Baltimore for preservation and digitization, for the world to study and enjoy.
Why is the Archimedes Palimpsest important?
Archimedes (c.287BC-212BC), brilliant scientist, inventor, mathematician, and engineer of ancient Greece, worked extensively in geometry, calculating the value of pi, the circle, the sphere, and cylinder. He developed a theory of buoyancy called the Archimedes Principle. Of the nine known treatises by Archimedes in Greek, hidden within the Archimedes Palimpsest are seven. Of these seven, The Stomachion and The Method are the only known copies in the world. Archimedes’ treatise On Floating Bodies contained here is the unique source in the original Greek. These Archimedes texts predate any other surviving Archimedes manuscripts by 400 years.
“Best of all is to win. But if you cannot win, then fight for a noble cause…” – Hyperides
Extensive sections of previously lost speeches by the 4th century Greek orator Hyperides, the largest discovery of new Hyperides text in over a century, also reside hidden in the Archimedes Palimpsest. Hyperides spoke at public meetings on topics of Athenian court cases as well as politics and democracy. Previous texts of Hyperides are gleaned only from fragments of papyri.
Other texts hidden beneath the prayerbook are a Commentary on Aristotles Catergories, two Byzantine liturgical manuscripts, and two unidentified manuscripts.
Restoration
Conservation and restoration of the Archimedes Palimpsest is an enormous and ongoing task. Progress is slow and the work is meticulous and painstaking. To prepare the manuscript for imaging, the codex had to be taken apart because the hidden text continued under the folds of the parchment in the spine of the book. Because some of the glue was from the late 20th century, it was particularly difficult to remove. It took 4 years just to take off the glue! Next, the parchment was analyzed chemically to determine the condition of the collagen, the main component of parchment. Here you see an image of an enlargement of a cross-section sample of the parchment, the size of a pinhead, from the Archimedes Palimpsest. The Archimedes text is the dark stain at the top of the parchment. In this sample, the collagen is sound. But where the manuscript has mold, the collagen is breaking down and disintegrating.
Imaging and Digitization
Modern technology allows us to view the underlying text of the Archimedes Palimpsest through various techniques. One technique is multi-spectral imaging. In ultraviolet light, both the overlying and underlying texts are visible. Ink blocks ultraviolet light, but the parchment flouresces, causing another light source. There is then, two light sources, one going into the page, and one coming from the page going out, which allows us to see the underlying text. When the images are merged together, the underlying text becomes red, and enlarging the image allows the underlying text to be legible. The only way to access the text underneath the gold-leaf illustrations added to the codex in the twentieth century, was to use the particle accelerator at Stanford University. Ink used for the Archimedes manuscript contained a high amount of iron, which could be recognized and captured only by the strongest xrays such as those generated by the particle accelerator. In the following image, an abstraction of an object or a boat in the sea, one can see that Archimedes considered the world to be round.
Principles of Digitizating Cultural Artifacts
William Noel explained the basic principles that formed the foundation for the many decisions made during the Archimedes Palimpsest project. His principles are based on ethical considerations, digital use and sustainability, and economic value for the institution undertaking the project. Taking the example of the Mona Lisa, Noel explained that thousands of people visit the Louvre every year to see the Mona Lisa, even though they already know what the painting looks like. In fact, the reason that the Mona Lisa has so many visitors is precisely because so many know the painting already and want to see the original. Therefore, making digital images as broadly available and usable as possible to the largest audience benefits the institution in name recognition, visitors, and financially. The Walters Museum in Baltimore has already benefited this way because many of their medieval manuscripts are so freely available, and that they appear at the head of results in Google image searches. Thus, the Walters Museum gains name recognition, prestige, and popularity.
The sustainability of the data benefits from Noel’s philosophy of wide availability and use. As he explains, data from digitized cultural documents must be:
1. well documented
2. free
3. just take it
4. just use it
The data from the Archimedes Palimpsest is licensed in the Creative Commons, and images also appear on Flickr. As a result, the data from the Archimedes Project is preserved, not only at the Walters Museum, but at Stanford, and at other universities as well.
Noel also explained the importance of presenting such data as data, pure and simple, allowing others to create interfaces for study and exhibition. Why? Because interfaces have a shelf-life of only about three years, but the pure data can be used and re-used. Noel said that too often institutions are busy creating “boutiquey” interfaces for their digitized data, that these institutions are presenting “apple pie” to the researchers, when simply presenting the raw data in many cases would be more helpful. In addition, Noel gave an amusing way to think about data. Dr. Noel says that data should be:
Sustainable
Usable
Complete
Known
The criteria for data to be sustainable is that it should be cheap to maintain, in an interface that should last, and be simple, not relational. By complete, Dr. Noel explained that images must be presented at full resolution (with derivatives as an option), with all descriptive metadata and all technical metadata. And to make the data known, a discovery layer for human readers should be developed. Raw xml can be presented that is machine readable, with a style sheet that combines images with the xml, to give a traditional type of presentation.
Dr. Noel ended the presentation discussing new ways for social media to further scholarship and knowledge. For example, jokes are often hidden within medieval manuscripts. If a scholar finds a joke in a manuscript, they tweet it! The Penn Provenance Project uses social media to help identify the provenance, or historic background of the ownership of precious books and manuscripts by crowdsourcing. Scholars writing blogs about the images are important, too. Another project, t-pen.org, will, in the next few years, make manuscripts texts searchable.
Using these techniques, we can all share in William Noel’s mission, “to bring art and people together for learning, discovery, and enjoyment.”
William Noel answering questions at the Center for Humanities at Temple.
For more information see:
The Archimedes Palimpsest; 2004; 2 May 2013 <http://archimedespalimpsest.org/about/>
Archimedes Palimpsest. 2 May 2013 <http://www.digitalpalimpsest.org/>
Archimedes. Works. New York; Dover, 195-?.
Noel, William. Revealing the Lost Codex of Archimedes; TED: Ideas Worth Spreading; Apr 2012; 2 May 2013 <http://www.ted.com/talks/william_noel_revealing_the_lost_codex_of_archimedes.html>
“Archimedes.” Encyclopaedia Britannica. Encyclopaedia Britannica Online Academic Edition. Encyclopaedia Britannica Inc., 2013. Web. 02 May 2013. <http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/32808/Archimedes>.
Krock, Lexi. Inside the Archimedes Palimpsest; NOVA; 09.30.03; 2 May 2013 <http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/physics/inside-archimedes-palimpsest.html>
Netz, Reviel and William Noel. The Archimedes Codex: How a Medieval Prayer Book is Revealing the True Genius of Antiquity’s Greatest Scientist. Philadelphia; Da Capo, 2007.
-Anne Harlow, May 2 2013.
As students traverse the main floor of Paley Library, rushing to and from classes this spring semester, a few stop every now and then to experience the poetry. Spread among the display cases on the first floor of Paley are books and documents from the Temple University Libraries Special Collections Research Center (SCRC) that invite us to explore 20th century alternative and small-press American poetry. As the crush of exams and final projects arrives, exploring this poetry display can be a great way to clear one’s mind and do a bit of de-stressing.
According to Margery Sly, Director of the SCRC,all the material in the exhibit comes from SCRC manuscript and rare book holdings. She adds that the display was designed as a journey into our poetry collections that begins with Philadelphia-region forefathers Walt Whitman and Edgar Allen Poe, who were considered radical in their day and moves forward into the work of 20th century poets. The display was also intended to coordinate with a lecture about Whitman, and to also promote the use of the poetry collection for research by Temple students.
Moving among the cases provides insight into poets who be less familiar to us but whose work is significant in the world of poetry. The work of accomplished poets such as John Burnett Payne, Lyn Lifshin, Dorothea Grossman and Tony Quagliano are featured in this display. Browsing the poems, letters and related documents one senses the importance the small press has played in expanding the dissemination of poetry in 20th century America. A small (literally) book of verse, such as Grossman’s “The First Time I Ate Sushi” communicates “the fun of speaking English” (a line from her poem Future Past).
If you want to explore those other iconoclasts and innovators of American poetry, scattered among the display cases are rare artifacts for Poe and Whitman found in our Special Collections Research Center. Then proceed up the stairway to the mezzanine level where you will find several cases dedicated to Poe and Whitman. There you will find some unique items documenting the lives and works of these great writers. This exhibit will remain in Paley Library through August. Be sure to take some time to explore before it returns to the SCRC.
To help you get through those study days and finals, Paley Library will be open 24 hours starting tomorrow, May 2 at 8am, through Wednesday, May 15 at 8pm. Good luck with the end of the semester!
What is research? And how exactly is that concept made manifest? As members of an academic community, we may think of research as a culling—one gathers information from a static collection of preexisting “facts”, and uses said facts as supporting evidence in the construction of an original thesis. That thesis is then articulated, filled out, augmented with the appropriate research materials, and, often, rendered formally in print.
However, after attending Temple’s Undergraduate Research Forum/Workshop Symposium (aka TURF-CreWs), held in the Howard Gittis Student Center on April 18th, it’s clear that research can be a far more fluid enterprise than its face value definition suggests. Composed of the research projects of 130 undergraduate participants from all of Temple’s colleges, the forum offers these students a setting in which to display and present their ongoing projects. From papers to posters to panels to performances, a wide range of subjects were on exhibit for the Temple community to not only observe, but to engage with as well.
At the event, I was able to speak with three students from three different Temple colleges, whose respective research interests engendered three different approaches to the research process—some traditional, some more creatively employed, but all immanently remarkable.
Andrea Gudiel, Biology: “Deforestation and the Spread of Invasive Species”
While assisting with a graduate student research project during a field work trip to Madagascar , Andrea found herself focusing on the effects of local human use in her immediate environment. Built infrastructure, such as roads and trails, along with various invasive flora and fauna species, were causing tangible changes within the Madagascan ecosystem. Though internet connectivity was precarious in her location, she was able to discern a lack in written research in this specific area after conducting preliminary searches. This lack, then, Andrea decided to take up and address herself. Since her trip, Andrea has utilized various library databases—including Web of Knowledge and Gale—to flesh out her field work. Though still in progress, Andrea told me she hopes to submit the finished project to an international bio-diversity journal for publication.
Daharis Pesantez, Communication Studies, “Networks in New Urbanism”
I was drawn to Daharis’ poster because its primary subject matter, The High Line Park in New York City (check out the website HERE if you’re unfamiliar with the park), is, in and of itself, very interesting. Daharis’ engagement with the park, though, added several dimensions to its appeal: her poster posed the questions, Do these types of spaces promote diversity within the community? Within their respective communities, are they perceived as inviting spaces, or as marginalizing? Thinking of the High Line as one of the first “repurposed urban spaces” in what is becoming an emerging trend (including in our own Philadelphia!), Daharis sees these spaces as sites, “networks”, in which social, economic, and cultural intersections are enacted, redefining ideas surrounding urban areas and community engagement. As of now, Daharis’ footwork has been interdisciplinary and research-based, looking at work in fields such as urban studies, sociology, and her major, communication. This summer, Daharis will be in New York conducting on-site research (she hopes to interview parkgoers) and incorporating an experiential aspect into the solid research-based foundation she’s established.
Daharis and her High Line poster
Kenneth Brown, Music Composition, “Two Concertos for Bassoon and String Orchestra”
After being commissioned to write two neo-baroque concerti for bassoon by a fellow composition student, Kenneth began the task of composing. Aided by a Diamond Scholars Research grant, he started at Paley, where he studied a variety of concerti from the baroque period for bassoon and other instruments. With these materials in hand, Kenneth analyzed the key, tempo, meter, and length of the pieces he found in the library, identifying patterns in the scores. Vivaldi’s 10 Bassoon Concerti in particular was an important resource. In the process, he found he had to move out of his familiarity with writing specifically for bassoon, learning how to write in baroque concerto form.
During his panel presentation, Kenneth showed us his early drafts, each subsequent draft moving toward becoming “less imitative and more inventive”. Of his process of composing, Kenneth said, “…I began twisting my baroque-influenced ideas into a more modern shape by playing with meter and introducing unexpected dissonances.” He describes his work as moving toward “Vivaldi through a prism—exploded and refracted.” The concerti now completed, Kenneth was kind enough to share a video of their performance. Take a look below!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EO7PMh1bq6U