A traveler’s tales

My family visited England and France with our son, who’d been in England on a Gap Year. Our 11 day whirlwind tour included London, Milton Keynes/Bletchley Park, Paris, Bath, Hayward’s Heath (West Sussex), and Brighton. Two days after we returned, my daughter and I headed to Washington, D.C. for a homeschool version of the 8th grade pilgrimmage to our nation’s capital, plus a visit with her young cousins, aunt, and uncle.

Along the way, I tried to note what people are reading and how. American and British readers have embraced Ipads and Kindles, although many are playing games rather than reading. I saw roughly 50% e-readers versus books.

In Paris, people were reading actual books. The parks were of French and international readers. An afternoon event at Shakespeare and Company drew a small crowd. I didn’t see a single e-reader all day.

In both the London Underground and the Paris Metro, poster-size ads for books were as prevalent as those for shows or films. Many of the London ads were for literary fiction. Fiction was the top choice of readers on trains and planes; people on e-readers are harder to spy on. I saw lots of adults reading The Hunger Games.

Train station and airport shops are heavily promoting the Fifty Shades of Grey books. In England, Diamond Jubilee titles celebrating Queen Elizabeth and books about the Olympics are also prominent. In Holland Park, where we stayed, Daunt Books had an enticing window filled with books I recognized and some I didn’t, and inside, one of the best selections of travel titles I’ve ever seen.

I visited a Waterstones, England’s biggest chain (which just agreed to carry Kindles). The staff there was knowledgeable and the display included some local authors and staff picks. Everything was clearly designed to feel like an independent store.

I also enjoyed popping into some of the ubiquitous charity shops selling used books (Oxfam, for example) and a half-price remainders bookshop in Bath. I wish I’d had time to check out libraries as well. In fact, I could plan an entire trip around libraries and bookstores . . . .

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Library instruction, or teaching college students to fish

You’ve probably heard the proverb, “Give a man a fish, and you feed him today; teach him to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” Two of my favorite nonprofits are modeled on this idea: Heifer International founder Dan West was delivering milk to Spanish Civil War victims and realized “These children don’t need a cup, they need a cow.” Habitat for Humanity‘s mission is to eradicate poverty housing with “a hand up, not a handout,” so they partner with families to build a simple decent home purchased with a no-interest loan.

Reference is another form of service; we’re teaching library patrons how to fish for information.  Students who ask me for assistance often want to fish for themselves; they just need a little guidance. But some have always had someone else fish for them and would prefer I catch, clean, prepare, and serve up the information they need, as quickly as possible.

How to handle this kind of interaction? Gently, but firmly. The patron may be somewhat impatient in the short term if I encourage him or her to search a database (with suggestions and pointers), learn to locate a book on the shelf (sadly, some college students claim they’ve never done this, particularly in a library with LC classification), or to find citation information.

But when the library is closed or the student has graduated and needs to assess the reliability of a website, find a key piece of information for a work assignment, or even just look for a good book, I know I’ll have laid the groundwork for independent information literacy.

Class of 2012, may your fishing feed you well for the rest of your lives.

Please note, the semester is wrapping up at the Nocturnal Librarian blog. I will post less frequently during the summer months.

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World Book Night

April 23 is the anniversary of the death of both Cervantes and Shakespeare in 1616, marked as World Book Day by UNESCO. In 2011, World Book Night was born in the UK and Ireland, with volunteer “givers” handing out books for adults, (kids in those countries get “book tokens” on April 23). Organizers hoped to reach people who might not otherwise pick up a book.

This year World Book Night comes to the U.S. with “tens of thousands” of givers signed up to fan out across their communities handing out twenty copies of a book they love (selected from a list of thirty titles). Authors of these books agreed to give up royalties for the special WBN editions, and a long list of paper and printing companies, book-related professional organizations and publishers collaborated to make the books available free.

In the UK, Ireland, and Germany World Book Night is partnering with BookCrossing so participants can see where the books end up. BookCrossing allows people to label and register a book, “read and release” it for another reader to discover. Typing in the book’s code later will reveal where it went and possibly, who read it.

I’ll be at the reference desk during the festivities, but my husband is handing out one of his favorite books, Stephen King’s The Stand. I look forward to hearing about his experience sharing his love of reading and in particular, this amazing story. I think World Book Night is brilliant, and I hope to be a giver myself in the future.

And World Book Night organizers, if you’re reading this, how about some poetry next year?

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Drawn to Draw Something

I’ve never played an online game. Usually, I’m only vaguely aware of what’s popular. But as of Friday, I’m thoroughly hooked on Draw Something, which my teens and spouse invited me to play.

Tonight I learned I’m not alone. USA Today’s Mark Salzman calls it the “hottest game since Angry Birds.” How hot? Fifty million downloads in fifty days plus a $180 million sale to Zynga, the company that also owns Words With Friends, Farmville and other games so famous even I recognize their names.

If you haven’t played Draw Something, it’s simple: you draw something to help the other player guess one of three words. There are two clues for guessing besides the drawing: a pool of possible letters and boxes indicating word length.

You watch each other play. The drawing (every stroke, even erasures and aborted drawings) or the guessing are replayed for the other person, which creates an uncanny affinity between players. I love that!

Other reasons Draw Something appeals to me:

–It’s asynchronous and there are no timers, so no pressure.

–It’s cooperative. You aren’t trying to “beat” or fool the other player, because you both benefit from a successful drawing/guessing combo. It’s a positive experience for both players.

–It’s quick, although CNN interviewed a man who spends two hours a day on Draw Something. That said, his drawings are a bit more detailed than mine.

–It’s challenging but simple, fun for any skill level. (Note to the person who posted that last example: in 99% of the world, that is indeed a perfect rendering of football).

–It combines nostalgia (it reminds me of Pictionary and hangman) with intuitive technology. Even for someone who finds most technology unintuitive.

So here’s something this nocturnal librarian never imagined saying: I recommend the hottest game around, Draw Something.

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Library love

It’s National Library Week so I’m going to share the library love.

First, from Zak Stone at GOOD, a great article about a small Massachusettes library, MN Spear, raising money for a new building. Their homegrown You Tube video, “Where would you be without your library?” has gone viral, attracting donations from around the world. They’ve also started a Tumblr feed where people share the many reasons they love their libraries.

You can find lots to love about libraries online. Over on Pinterest, you can visit beautiful libraries, check out library art project ideas, or enter the Age of Librarius. Galley Cat reports on the ALA’s “10 most frequently challenged library books” of 2011. Flavorwire shares all kinds of DIY and alternative library spaces on its “Tiny Libraries, DIY Reading Rooms, and Other Micro Book Depots” post. Huffington Post’s “Libraries in Crisis” section is really about why libraries are as important as ever, why people are fighting library budget cuts across the country, and how libraries are getting creative, doing more with less.

Of course, the best way to love your library is to support it. Go there regularly, check out what they have to offer. If you haven’t been lately, you’ll find much more than books — libraries lend e-readers, downloadable ebooks and audio books, museum passes, magazines, even telescopes. They host classes & programs for all ages, from concerts, readings, discussion groups, and films to edible book contests.  And as I mentioned last week, they incubate the arts.

What do you love about your library?

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Libraries and the arts

Like many states, New Hampshire recently faced draconian arts funding cuts. Happily, as Connie Rosemont explained in the Concord Monitor, “The Arts Prevailed.” Last year when arts and literature programs lost funding in Wisconsin, a trio of library school students launched a website: the Library as Incubator Project. I read about this innovative idea in Poets & Writers, where you can view a slideshow of  ”art, writing, performances and workshops that have taken place in or been inspired by libraries.”

The Library as Incubator Project connects libraries with the arts community. Finding inspiration and ideas and collaborating at the incubator benefits artists and libraries as well as the public they are both trying to reach. The site also links to resources helpful to artists and writers and offers professional development for librarians who want to “incubate the arts.”

When I mentioned the  Library As Incubator Project on an email list recently, a colleague replied with a link to Art-o-Mat, which re-purposes old cigarette vending machines into art dispensers. The machines are found in a variety of locations, including libraries.

Libraries often schedule performances, films, and readings as well. This week Regina Library here at Rivier College is hosting “An Evening of Favorite Poems.”  My nocturnal colleague Peter and I had fun creating a display of poetry books. I actually found too many books for our allotted display space and had to put the overflow on a table by the entrance.

So if you think libraries are just housing books, take another look. Chances are you’ll find the arts.

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So many citation styles

One of the most common reference questions I hear is “How do I cite this?”  Like most academic libraries, mine provides citation help on our website. Even with online tools and, in the most recent edition of Word, a click of the “References” ribbon at their fingertips, students are often unsure.

As I go over what information is included in a citation, where to find it, which style to use, and how to format it, students often ask why it’s so complicated. Which made me wonder, why are there so many styles? The humanities use MLA and Chicago, and the sciences have APA and  several more. Within styles, why are there different citation formats (mainly parenthetical and documentary, according to Plagiarism.org)?

Kerry Creelman, a librarian at University of Houston, explains that different academic disciplines place higher value on particular information about sources, which is reflected in the style formats.  Yale College Writing Center concurs but points out that even within the same field,  journals may require different citation styles.

Maybe there isn’t a compelling argument against a universal citation style.  In-text citations in the three main styles all include the author. APA also requires the publication year and page number, MLA only the page number, and Chicago only the year. Couldn’t a universal style make the source clear? Bibliographies (also known as works cited or reference lists), require similar but not identical information across styles and could easily be standardized.

Besides streamlining the research and writing process, universal citation would make it easier to cite materials across disciplines. And it would save students and researchers time and frustration. I suppose it would reduce my reference desk stats,  but I could live with that. What am I missing? Is there a good reason to have so many citation styles?

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Book art

Book art used to refer to artfully made books featuring fine letterpress printing, hand-sewn bindings, beautiful papers and covers.  Today it’s as likely to mean art made from recycled books. In the past year or so I’ve noticed decoraters, Etsy crafters, and DIY types cited in news articles, blog posts, and social media for their re-purposed book projects. Many libraries I follow posted photos of their book trees for the holidays.

As a writer, reader and librarian I’ve feel a little Janus-like about this surge of book art. On the one hand, people, these are books you are mutilating. And yet, how pretty, how nice to give books another life. There’s a table in Regina Library that looks as if it is made from giant old volumes and I found myself touching them to see if they were real, torn between wanting them to be and feeling that if they were someone should rescue them.

At GOOD‘s “Intermission” page, Kristy Pyke points visitors to the  strangest and yet also most beautiful installation of book art I’ve come across in my internet wanderings.  Biografias, a work made of three sculptures in Spain by Alicia Martin, incorporates thousands of books, which look as if they are streaming out of buildings like water. The pages even blow in the wind. I’ve posted one photo below. Take this link to see the rest. What do you think?

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A bookish break and more musings on e-reading

The Nocturnal Librarian has been on spring break. I visited family in Austin, TX and had a very good time. Besides good company, excellent restaurants, funky local shopping, UT’s museums, warm sunny weather, and live music, I relished the bookish delights of the Austin area. We shopped at the Austin Public Library Bookstore, Recycled Reads, and the indie bookstore BookPeople, visited the Ransom Center‘s King James Bible exhibit, and saw some of Dr. Suess’s original Lorax drawings at the LBJ Library and Museum and an exhibit of his work at Art on 5th.

On planes and in airports, I saw more e-books than print. On one flight, I noticed my seat-mate reading The Hunger Games on an iPad, (which explained why he was in no hurry to de-plane). As Michael and Ann observed on the Books On the Nightstand podcast (#170), it is increasingly hard to pick up reading ideas while traveling because e-readers make books nearly anonymous. I made a dent in my “to-read” piles and am hopeful some fellow traveler snooped on the titles, because they are both terrific: Homer & Langley by E. L. Doctorow and In the Stacks: Short Stories About Libraries and Librarians edited by Michael Cart.

When I got home I reminded my son, who is home this week, that we now subscribe to the New York Times electronically. He made a very sharp observation which I had overlooked, since my husband and I read the paper in shifts (he departs for work while nocturnal people are still sleeping). You can’t enjoy communal newspaper reading — swapping sections around the breakfast table — with an e-reader.

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Part time vegetarian

For years food writers including Michael Pollan, Mark Bittman, Ben Hewitt, and Barbara Kingsolver have extolled the pleasures of responsible omnivorism, urging people to know where their meat comes from, but not necessarily to stop eating it. They all recommend seasonal, local eating, that may include meat, but is probably more plant-based than not.

This morning venerable vegetarian activist Frances Moore Lappe spoke with the always awesome Brady Carlson on NHPR’s The Exchange. She told listeners they can improve their health and that of the planet if they eat a “plant-centered,” rather than strictly vegetarian, diet.  I was surprised, since she has written very convincingly in favor of giving up meat altogether.

Diet for a Small Planet was the first vegetarian guide I read (about fifteen years ago), and it really changed the way I looked at nutrition and the ethics of eating. I’m married to a carnivore who doesn’t care for the texture of most veggies and fruits, so I wasn’t trying to set a trend when I switched my family’s diet to semi-vegetarian, it was just what I thought was workable for my family. We’ve tried to eat at least one meatless dinner a week ever since.

In Lent that meant meatless Fridays like those of my childhood. Lately I’ve heard about Meatless Mondays, which even some schools are embracing. Over the weekend I read that iconic designer Stella McCartney co-wrote the Meat Free Monday Cookbook with her sister and father. I’m wondering if vegetarians are simply realizing that with all the food choices available to first world shoppers, working towards part-time vegetarianism is better than nothing? Like many trends, I think this idea has been around for some time, but seems to be gaining momentum.

Are you a part-time vegetarian? Is it for health or budget reasons, ethics, or some combination?

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