STEP AWAY FROM THE SCREEN

In time for the start of the semester comes a reminder that “Digitial Devices Deprive Brain of Needed Downtime.” In case you need justification for taking an occasional break from your screen, this article suggests one reason why many of us feel overstimulated and overhwelmed by the amount of data we encounter every day.

"When people keep their brains busy with digital input," the article states, "they are forfeiting downtime that could allow them to better learn and remember information, or come up with new ideas." One scientist puts it more bluntly: When the brain is constantly stimulated, he says, “you prevent this learning process.”

Read the entire article here.

NEW RESOURCE: ENCYCLOPEDIA OF RELIGION IN AMERICA

The Department of Religious Studies' Abrams Fund has made possible the acquisition of The Encyclopedia of Religion in America, an online version of this authoritative, multidisciplinary four-part reference resource.

The Encyclopedia of Religion in America provides broad subject coverage of "...the origins, development, influence, and interrelations of the many faiths practiced in North America, including major world religions and emerging sects, cults, and movements." The range of topics extend to many areas of the humanities, making this a valuable resource for a variety of departments, courses, and subjects:

Religion and politics
African American religion
Arts and architecture
Church-state issues
Environment and ecology
Ethnicity
Gay and lesbian issues
Historical overviews
Immigration
Media
Megachurches
New religious movements
Popular religion and culture
Terrorism and war

To learn more about this resource, click here.

For Samford access, click here.

RefWorks Trial

Thanks to Lori Northrup for providing this information.

On September 2, the library will host a WebEx demonstration of RefWorks software. While we have no current funding for purchasing this product, we thought that in the interest of keeping you abreast of developments in bibliographic management software and planning for the future, we would go ahead with a demo and trial this fall.

We know that some of you are already using Zotero, bibliographic management software from Mozilla, which is freely available on the web. We are particularly interested in hearing your opinions about RefWorks’ features in light of your Zotero experiences.

This is the kind of product that could benefit the entire campus, and while we would very much like to be able to acquire it, we know that there may other types of resources that are also of interest to you. Plagiarism detection software comes to mind. We invite you to share your opinions in the interest of helping to establish funding priorities in the future.

RefWorks Demonstration:
10:00am
Thursday, September 2, 2010
University Library Classroom, lower level

We look forward to seeing you there (or hearing about your experiences with these products by email if you can’t make it).

FREE AND LEGAL DOWNLOADABLE AUDIO

The Internet Archive is a non-profit organization founded in 1996 to build an Internet library. Its purposes include offering permanent access for researchers, historians, scholars, people with disabilities, and the general public to historical collections that exist in digital format. It is located in San Francisco.

The Internet Archive's audio offerings include an MP3 library containing over two hundred thousand free digital recordings ranging from alternative news programming, to Grateful Dead concerts, old time radio shows, and book and poetry readings.

Egg Recall

PITTS THEOLOGY LIBRARY DIGITAL IMAGE ARCHIVE

The Pitts Theology Library of Emory University's Candler School of Theology is home to a digital image archive presenting 28,000+ images of biblical illustrations, portraits of religious leaders, printers' devices, engravings of church buildings, and other theologically-relevant images.

Many of the images in the archive are taken from the library's Kessler Reformation Collection.

These images are available for teaching, research, and other non-commercial purposes. Click here to learn more about this beautiful collection.

LIBRARY CLOSED FRIDAY AUGUST 20

This is a reminder that the University Library will be closed this Friday, August 20, for library staff and faculty in-service programming.

The library will reopen on Monday August 23. For a full schedule of library hours, please click here.

SPECIAL COLLECTION DATABASE NOW ONLINE

The database for the Special Collection manuscript collection is online and available for viewing.

Please visit http://library.samford.edu/about/special.html and scroll down to the last item, "Special Collection Subject Card File Database."

Thanks to Jennifer Taylor for this news item.

BUTTERFLIES OF ALABAMA

Alabama's ecology is exceptionally rich and diverse. A book by co-authors W. Mike Howell (a Samford biology professor) and Vitaly Charny provides detailed descriptions and photographs of Alabama butterflies, collected over a nine-year period. The book contains valuable introductory material on butterfly anatomy, life cycle, and taxonomy.

This book is a wonderfully readable and visually compelling account of a particularly beautiful aspect of Alabama's natural environment.

See http://www.amazon.com/Butterflies-Alabama-W-Mike-Howell/dp/0558556310

or

find this book in the Samford library.

Many of Vitaly Charny's gorgeous photos are available for viewing here:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=18192&id=603704124&l=1c14f6946d

Display of the Month: Bullying

Flooding in Pakistan

A BLENDED LIBRARIAN TALKS INFORMATION LITERACY

The term "blended librarian" may sound like a menu item at a martini bar.

In reality, however, blended librarianship is a model for academic library work that invovles combining traditional reference work and instructional design, with the goal of better integrating librarians into the teaching and learning process. Read about it here: http://chronicle.com/blogPost/A-Blended-Librarian-Talks/25938/

LIBRARY CLOSED FRIDAY AUGUST 20

This is a reminder that the library will be closed Friday August 20 for library faculty and staff in-service.