Current Awareness

Category: Current Awareness

Meet the Staff, Student Worker Edition: John O’Neill

With Welcome Week just around the corner, it’s time to celebrate the fabulous John O’Neill, who began working in the Mudd during Welcome Week two years ago, when he was a freshman. Little did we know how valuable and well-loved this horn performance and government major from Reno, Nevada would become.

Not only does John work tremendously hard balancing all of his roles during the academic year, he has also spent his summers working with us in the Mudd, doing all sorts of necessary and useful projects, from helping to manage our music scores and collections, to charmingly modeling for social media posts. Summer would not be the same without John, who is always ready to lend a hand. Read on to learn more about this wonderful and talented student worker!

What is your job title at the Mudd and what work does that entail?

I am a student shelving assistant in the score section, which means that I keep the area organized and shelve everything that circulates. I have also worked at the circulation desk over breaks and have done some cataloging work with Antoinette Powell, the music librarian.

What’s your favorite part of your job?

I really love fixing up and erasing some of our “extra loved” scores because it tells me how much students use the score collection.

Share something you’ve done at work that has made you especially proud.

Very recently someone asked how many feet of CDs we would have if they were laid end-to-end. It was really fun and satisfying to figure out the answer.

As a student, where is your favorite (study/relaxation/hang-out) spot in the Mudd?

I usually head straight for the middle of the stacks on the third and fourth floors, although the “fishbowl” on the 2nd floor is also a great place to work.

What are your hobbies?

Collecting vinyls, reading, putting together puzzles, and baking when I can.

What’s the last book you read that you couldn’t put down?

Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man

What are your favorite bands or performers?

The Beatles, Chicago

How about your favorite blogs and/or magazines?

The Atlantic Weekly, New York Times, the Horn Call, and the Mudd’s blog (of course!)

What groups and/or organizations are you active in (on or off campus)?

I am active with Lawrence’s Young Democrats, Lawrence’s Quizbowl Team, and several chamber groups in the conservatory.

When will you graduate? What are your post-graduation plans?

Since I will be a fifth year and I’m only a junior, I won’t graduate until 2018!

 

 

Honors Convocation: Is it Warm in Here?

The 2015 Honors Convocation will be this Thursday, May 14th at 11:10am in the Memorial Chapel.

Is it Warm in Here? The Intractable Challenges of Climate Change will be presented by David Gerard, Associate Professor of Economics and recipient of Lawrence’s annual Faculty Convocation Award.

What does it mean to say that a problem is “intractable”?  What makes this particular problem so difficult to solve?  Where can we go from here? Here is a link to a recommended reading as a brief introduction to the subject. And for a longer, more detailed consideration of the issues, take a look at this article. Gerard’s primary research interests lie in quantitative policy analysis, particularly focusing on energy, environmental and safety issues such as risk regulation and public policy.

To learn more about Professor Gerard and his work, visit his faculty and research webpage here.

Professor Gerard will participate in a Q&A session on Thursday afternoon from 1:00-2:00pm in the WCC Cinema.

Remembering Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

001 (Medium)As the Lawrence community prepares to celebrate and commemorate the life and work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. with speakers, discussions, and acts of community service, the Mudd library offers heartfelt reverence, as well as a collection of materials that those wishing to honor the man and his mission will appreciate.

We have several DVDs featuring this incredible and inspiring civil rights activist. King: A Filmed Record-Montgomery to Memphis highlights his life and work, from the beginnings of the Civil Rights movement in Montgomery, Alabama, and culminating with his assassination in Memphis in 1968. Featuring archival footage, this film is an indispensable primary resource of a pivotal moment in American and world history. It originally screened in theaters for one night only in 1970.

Roads to Memphis documents the story of assassin, James Earl Ray, his target, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and the seething, turbulent forces in American society that led these two men to their violent and tragic collision in Memphis in April of 1968. This film explores the wildly disparate, yet fatefully entwined stories of Ray and King to create a complex, engaging, and thought-provoking portrait of America in that crisis-laden year.

Satyagraha is a visionary opera telling the story of how Mahatma Gandhi developed the philosophy of satyagraha, nonviolent active resistance, as a political revolutionary tool to fight oppression, connection his lifework to three historical figures who advanced his philosophy, including Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

The Mudd library also features many books about MLK, Jr., most of which can be found on the fourth floor. These include biographies such as I May Not Get There With You: the True Martin Luther King, Jr., Let the Trumpet Sound: the Life of Martin Luther King, Jr., and Coretta Scott King’s My Life with Martin Luther King, Jr. Titles like Parting the Waters and Pillar of Fire, as well as To the Mountaintop: Martin Luther King Jr.’s Sacred Mission to Save America and Judgement Days: Lyndon Baines Johnson, Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Laws That Changed America explore the social and political context of the country during this pivotal period of history.

Books that focus specifically on King’s work, his philosophy, and his speeches include, among many, The Preacher King: Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Word that Moved America, King Among The Theologians, and Martin Luther King, Jr.: Apostle of Militant Nonviolence. The book A Call to Conscience: The Landmark Speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr. is available both in print and on CD.

We also have music CDs available that pay tribute to Dr. King’s legacy. These works include Alice Parker’s Sermon From the Mountain, which features a cantata celebrating the life of the civil rights leader and Sinfonia by Berio Luciano, which includes a tribute to King’s memory and is also available on LP.

We are happy to provide so many resources, both informative and inspirational, pertaining to the work and life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and we invite you to visit the Mudd on Monday, January 19, as we pause to reflect on his life and legacy. If you are planning to honor his memory with an act of service in the community, we’d love to hear about it.

Sian Beilock Convo!

Before or after you’ve attended the Sian Beilock convo, you’ll want to read more.Sian Beilock

Search LUCIA, the Library catalog for Sian Beilock or check Academic Search Premier for articles by her.

There are, of course, plenty of pertinent web links:

Enjoy!

A Stone of Hope in the Fox Cities

The Mudd Library welcomes A Stone of Hope: Black Experiences in the Fox Cities, a “pop-up” museum exhibit that examines black history in the area from the 1700s to the present. The exhibit, that began in June on Appleton’s Juneteenth celebration, will be traveling for two years, displaying at numerous sites around the Fox Cities and Appleton area.  The exhibit will be on display on the Mudd Library’s 2nd floor from September 29th-October 31st, 2014.

Twelve educational floor banners make up the exhibit, sharing stories and photographs of individuals, businesses, and events that have contributed to the historical narrative.  Lawrence University Archivist Erin Dix ’08, Research Intern Sarah Golden ’15, and Music Librarian Antoinette Powell have all contributed research to the exhibit.

More information on the Stone of Hope exhibit and other locations it will be showing at can be found here on the History Museum at the Castle’s website.  Check out our Flickr page for more photos of the display.

Scholarly work of Lawrence Alumni: Joe Siegel ‘01

A bit about me, Joe Siegel (LU class of 2001)Joe Siegel

How do people learn to listen? It’s something that most people don’t even stop to think about. The ability to listen in our first language develops with little effort or explicit attention, but listening competency in a second language can be an arduous task, something that takes significant time and effort.  I’ve been interested in how listening ‘works’ for a long time, particularly in a second language, and I’m amazed by what an incredible ability it is. Biological, psychological, and auditory aspects combine to help us understand the aural messages we receive, and the communicative importance of listening, whether in a first or second language, makes it a fundamental tool.

I’m currently working as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Foreign Languages at J. F. Oberlin University in Tokyo, Japan. In the classroom, I teach courses on general English as a foreign language (EFL) with a specific focus on the development of aural abilities in a second language. Such skills include recognizing the beginnings and endings of words, parsing the speech stream into meaningful chunks of language, and confirming or rejecting predictions we make about what we hear. As a researcher in the field of applied linguistics, I’m interested to learn more about teaching methods and learning styles for second language listening. This work has included MA and PhD dissertations and grant-funded research supported by the Ministry of Education in Japan.

The liberal arts education I received at Lawrence was a great preparation for my career, since my particular area of research focuses on the intersection of biology, psychology, education, and foreign language teaching and learning. A number of classes I took at LU have had a great impact on how I go about research and academic writing. Freshman Studies was a wonderful interdisciplinary experience, and I benefitted from the challenges of relating different works, genres, and themes to each other. I remember one Freshman Studies teacher who gave us the autonomy to choose any two works we had covered during the semester and write a paper on any aspect that linked the two. What a fantastic assignment for freshman students! What freedom!

Creativity, analytic thinking, and the need for clarity of expression: all of these have been indispensable in the work that I do now.

I majored in English at Lawrence, and the comparative and close analyses of important works of literature have definitely prepared me to do background reading of academic works and to construct clearly-written yet sophisticated literature reviews for academic publications. The two independent studies classes that I completed at LU gave me the opportunity to set up, plan, resource, and execute small-scale projects on my own. These courses, which I completed in my junior and senior years, were practical bridges that allowed me to transition from work done purely for grades and research done in the ‘real world’ for the benefit of students, colleagues, and the language teaching field in general. Further, at Lawrence, I had chances to interact closely and collaboratively with professors, which gave me much-needed confidence and thick skin that I’d need when dealing with peer reviewers and editors working for journals and publishing companies, who can sometimes be a picky bunch.

Listed below are some of my main and more recent publications, mostly on topics related to second language listening pedagogy:

Siegel, J. (2013). Methodological ingenuity for second language listening. In J.  Schwieter (Ed.), Studies and global perspectives of second language teaching and learning (pp. 113-139). Charlotte: Information Age Publishing.

Siegel, J. (2013). Exploring L2 listening instruction: Examinations of practice.  ELT Journal, 68(1).

Siegel, J. & Siegel, A. (2013). Empirical and attitudinal effects of bottom-up listening activities in the L2 classroom. ELT World Online, 5, 1-25, http://blog.nus.edu.sg/eltwo/.

Siegel, J. (2012). Second language learners’ perceptions of listening strategy instruction. Innovations in language learning and teaching, 7(1), 1-18.

Siegel, J. (2011). Thoughts on L2 listening pedagogy. ELT Journal, 65(3), 318-321.

Siegel, J. (2011). Learner development through listening strategy training. In K. Irie & A. Stewart (Eds.), Realizing autonomy: Practice and reflection in language education contexts (pp. 78-93). Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan.

In the future, I plan to continue investigating current methodologies in language teaching and to develop and trial other alternative ways of teaching second language listening. I’ve also recently become more interested in pragmatic development, especially concerning university students who complete study abroad experiences.

Standing Desks in the Library

Desks are available in front of the Circulation Desk
Desks are available in front of the Circulation Desk

As part of a student health initiative, there are now two standing desks available for use in the library.  Donated by stand2learn, these wheeled desks allow students to go anywhere in the library and work standing up. Standing aids in focusing, increasing energy level, and is overall good for a student’s health (plus they’re a nice break from sitting constantly all day).

The initiative has been led by three students- Christopher Bohl, Nathan Eckstein, and Brynley Nadziejka- and it appears to be quite popular with the student body, as the desks are almost always in use!

Lux Reaches 100,000 Downloads

The Lux institutional repository is the home for the scholarly and creative output of Lawrence University. What does that mean, exactly? Lux is an electronic database that contains scholarly articles, art projects, honors projects, meeting documentation, and more- all created by Lawrence University students, faculty, and staff.

Here are a few examples of what can be found in Lux:

Recently, Lux reached the exciting milestone of 100,000 downloads of full-text content.

Gettysburg Address Turns 150

Lincoln at Gettysburg
Abraham Lincoln at Gettysburg, November 19, 1863. Enlargement from glass plate negative. Brady-Handy Collection, Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress Digital ID # cwpb-07639.

Today is the 150th anniversary of the delivery of President Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. President Lincoln had been invited to deliver “a few appropriate remarks” at dedication ceremony of the soldiers’ cemetery at the site of the Battle of Gettysburg.  Edward Everett, a leading orator of the time, had spoken for two hours prior to the President’s address. The audience was taken by surprise when President Lincoln’s address had drawn to a close after approximately three minutes. Upon completion, the address was met with “long continued applause,” as well as three cheers from the audience. Some favorable reviews from newspapers around the country were published in the November 20th issue of The New York Times,

Chicago Tribune: “The dedicatory remarks by President Lincoln will live among the annals of man.”

Springfield (Mass.) Republican: “Surprisingly fine as Mr. Everett’s oration was in the Gettysburg consecration, the rhetorical honors of the occasion were won by President Lincoln. His little speech is a perfect gem; deep in feeling, compact in thought and expression, and tasteful and elegant in every word and comma. Then it has the merit of unexpectedness in its verbal perfection and beauty… Turn back and read it over, it will repay study as a model speech. Strong feelings and a large brain are its parents.”

As well as unfavorable reviews.

Chicago Times: “The cheeks of every American must tingle with shame as he reads the silly, flat, and dishwatery utterances.”

Care to read it for yourself? The text of the speech that has been inscribed on the wall of the Lincoln Memorial can be found on this Library of Congress page. If you’d like to see the original drafts, The Library of Congress owns what is known as the “Hay Draft” and the “Nicolay Copy” and has made them available as part of their online Gettysburg Address exhibition.

The Mudd Library’s Lincoln Reading Room contains an interesting collection of Abraham Lincoln-related documents, pictures, and works of art- including bronze casts of President Lincoln’s hands and face.

Sources:

“Contemporary Reactions.”  The Gettysburg Address. Cornell University Library, 2008. Web 18 November 2013.

“Gettysburg Address.” Encyclopedia of American Studies. : Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010. Credo Reference. Web. 18 November 2013.

“Gettysburg Address.” The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Houghton Mifflin. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2002. Credo Reference. Web. 18 November 2013.

“The Heroes of July.” The New York Times. 20 November 1863. The Learning Network: Teaching and Learning With The New York Times. Web. 18 November 2013.

National Library Week and More!

Beginning Sunday, April 14th and lasting through Saturday April 20th, the Mudd Library will be celebrating National Library Week! We have planned a variety of exciting events. Stop in to celebrate with us!

  • Library Student Worker Appreciation Day: Say ‘thanks’ to our library’s excellent student workers. Tuesday, April 16th
  • Make Your Voice Heard! Take part in a quick usability survey about the library’s new website. Pizza and beverages for all participants. Wednesday, April 17th, 6-8 pm.
  • Get a cookie for asking a question at the reference desk Thursday night from 6-10. Yes, may I have a cookie will suffice.

Take part in the following fun events all week long:

  • Enter in our annual Haiku contest for a chance to win an Amazon gift card.
  • Tell us why you love the Mudd Library.
  • Check out our display of staff favorites. We’ll be adding new favorites all week- so check back frequently.

As if Library Week wasn’t enough fun, members of the Mudd Library staff have also been helping to plan the following events around campus and in the community.

  • The Fox Cities Book Festival lasts from April 17th through April 24.  A variety of festival events are scheduled to take place on the Lawrence campus. Take a look at the festival website for more information.
  • Women and Identity in Gaming Symposium, hosted by the Lawrence University Gaming Club, will be held on April 20th on the Lawrence Campus. This day-long event will feature discussions, activities, and presentations from two fantastic guest speakers. See the Women and Identity in Gaming website or Facebook page for more information.