Carmichael Library's Blog

Workshop: "How to Use Audacity"

2012-01-11T10:55:00.002-06:00

Workshop: "How to use Audacity"
Leader: Andrew Battista
When: Wed., January 25, 4:30-6:30 PM
Where: Carmichael Library EBSCO Computer Lab

Welcome back to a new semester at the University of Montevallo! This spring, several classes will engage in podcasting, "audio tweeting," and other forms of creativity that involve capturing and editing sound. To support students working on these assignments, the Carmichael Library will host a hands-on workshop that will introduce people to Audacity. The workshop is Wednesday, January 25 (4:30-6:30 PM) in the EBSCO classroom.

Audacity is one of several popular free, open-source software programs that anyone can use to record, edit, and produce sounds. If you're interested in podcasting or audio creativity of any kind, you will want to attend this workshop. We will learn how to import audio files, mix and produce tracks, incorporate content, and export work to .MP3 files. Anyone is welcome to attend.

It is not required that you have your own computer. However, you may want to download a copy of Audacity on your laptop and bring it to the workshop to try out some editing techniques. Please get in touch with Andrew Battista if you have any questions.

Curation Wars and Information Literacy

2011-12-12T13:50:00.005-06:00

Last month, Scoop.it's announcement of an initial public offering marked a watershed moment for curators. The act of curation has now been established, by anyone's measure, as a fundamental digital literacy. Scoop.it is a platform that allows people to publish fluid, visually-stunning "web magazines" by incorporating content already existing elsewhere on the Internet (Tweets, blog posts, Flickr images, YouTube videos, and more). The site suggests that Scoop.it users can "leverage curation to increase visibility" and "give persistence to their social media presence."

Scoop.it is just one among dozens of curation tools (see below) that have emerged to meet our growing digital age crisis of information. Last year, Robert Scoble wrote about the "curation wars," a militaristic metaphor for the uptick in platorms like Scoop.it that are seeking to capture market attention. Maybe the growth of these platforms is in fact an arms race to find "The Next Big Thing" that will someday rival the net worth of Facebook, Twitter, and Google. However, I believe that so many curation platforms have arisen because the exchange of information is still fundamentally about human creativity and the construction of narratives that we present to other people. The human component of information will remain essential, no matter how refined our algorithms might become.

What is Curation?

So what is curation? We tend to associate this word with the organization of museums, libraries, or archives. Yet curation has emerged alongside "cultivation" as the most apt metaphor of our digital age, a moment in time that requires constant work and perpetual revision. It is a term that has worked its way into the interface of Twitter, Facebook, and countless other social media platforms.

At its core, curation best describes the abilities and discretion often attributed to people who are information literate. Every day, we cycle through hundreds of bursts of information online, and we constantly make decisions about which sources we trust, which ones we don't, what we value, what we will return to, and how we organize what we've seen or listened to. By burst of information, I mean anything from an e mail to a link someone posts on Facebook to a "push notification" on our iPhones (others would call these "atoms"). Curation is, simply put, the composite of ordering, re-ordering, culling, bundling, embedding, and polling, each essential skills we need to find and evaluate information today.

As Bastian Lehmann, the founder of Curated.by, suggests in the video below, creating content and curating content are two different things. Just about anyone has the ability to upload a file to a host online, but not everyone has the ability to synthesize information in compelling ways.

Why Curation?

Increasingly, the task of seeking information has shifted from a task-based skill-set to an ongoing, fluid process of organizing information, re-labeling it, and presenting it to others. Because the nature of finding information changes so rapidly, I believe that the way we learn needs to change apace. There are a few compelling reasons why we should incorporate curation tools with our learning experiences, whether we are teaching classes, taking classes, or both.

First, curation is an extension of critical thinking. It is a perpetual process of sifting through information, deciding what is valuable, what matters, and what doesn't matter in a given discourse. It invites learners to draw boundaries around spheres of knowledge and present content to other people in meaningful ways to other people. Curation is a new dispensation of learning that already takes places in established models.

Second, thanks to the flexibility of real-time curation tools like Twitter, Storyful, Bag the Web, and others, curation is a public activity. I always like to cite research from the Stanford Study of Writing, a longitudinal project that tells us students who write or produce for public audiences tend to do work that is of better quality and more critical than work done for a college class and audience of one (the professor). Furthermore, work that reaches a public audience can be a service to a community that extends beyond the college classroom. It can help students establish a professional identity, and it allows them to participate in meaningful conversations, even as they are beginning to apprehend the basics of academic discourse. Of course, the things that students create on these platforms are readily available online, but they can also be circulated easily on other networks via embed codes and sharing tools.

Here are a few tools worth looking at that you may not have noticed before:

Storyful: This is one of the simplest tools for curation, citizen journalism, and synthesis of multi-media content that exists. It offers seamless integration with Twitter, Flickr, and YouTube, and it appears to have a broad audience.

Paper.li: Using content already generated elsewhere, users can create a magazine that updates daily and automatically. Great for collaboration between learners.

Google RSS Reader: As Google continues to evolve, its RSS reader platform also changes to account for what's happening on the web. You can use Google to organize, label, and share information with bundles (or "clips") that others can consume.

How Can I Get Into This?

If you are a student, feel free to meet up with me in the library. If you're in the Honors Program, you might even want to consider taking my 1-credit class on "Curation Culture," which is slated to be offered next Fall.

If you are an instructor, consider getting in touch with me or another librarian at Carmichael to see how we can bring some of these tools into your class.

Extended Hours for Fall 2011

2011-12-05T14:59:00.001-06:00

Photo Credit: Jim Roberts/Flickr

Starting today, Carmichael Library will be open late for your last minute study needs! We'll keep the doors open until 2:00 a.m. during the week before finals. The library will be open as late as 1:00 a.m. through next Wednesday, December 14^th.

Fall 2011 Extended Hours
Sun.	Mon.	Tue.	Wed.	Thu.	Fri.	Sat.
	Dec. 5 8 a.m. – 2 a.m.	6 8 a.m. – 2 a.m.	7 8 a.m. – 2 a.m.	8 8 a.m. – 2 a.m.	9 8 a.m. – 5 p.m.	10 10 a.m. – 2 p.m.
11 2 p.m. – 2 a.m.	12 8 a.m. – 2 a.m.	13 8 a.m. – 2 a.m.	14 8 a.m. – 1 a.m.	15 8 a.m. – 11 p.m.	16 8 a.m. – 5 p.m.

Good luck, students!

Reality is Broken, So Come Play Video Games at the Library

2011-11-10T11:49:00.008-06:00

Games in the Library: A Gaming Tournament

Thursday, November 17, 2011 7:00 PM
Carmichael Library
University of Montevallo

We live in a broken world. Corporations siphon billions of dollars from the public, taking money and jobs from people who are most needy. Every day, the United States and developing countries like China emit countless tons of CO2 into the atmosphere, escalating our climacteric and imperiling the future of life on this planet. Access to clean water is a crisis that transcends national boundaries; every twenty seconds, a child in the world dies because he or she does not have clean water to drink. Our most respected institutions turn a blind eye to corruption and abuse.

There are a lot of ways we could be spending our time to do something about these problems. Does anyone seriously think that playing video games should rank among these courses of action?

There are some scholars in a rapidly-growing field called Game Studies who suggest that game play can attune learners to the qualities of active engagement in a world of fragmentation and pain. Jane McGonigal, for instance, is among these scholars and says that the 300 billion hours we spend each week playing video games is anything but a waste of time. McGonigal argues that we actually aren't spending enough time playing video games (see her recent TED Talk below). Games, game play, and the study of gaming can unlock new patterns of learning and teach people how to solve real-world problems by cultivating essential skills like decision-making, time management, and collaboration.

Another ambassador for game play as a conduit for learning is Cathy N. Davidson, who argues in her recent book, Now You See It, that "Games are unquestionably the single most important cultural form of the digital age" (146). Davidson points to games as activities that radically improve the skill with which learners can divide attention and move from one task to another (an essential skill in the online world). Yet games don't just make us better learners for the sake of knowledge; rather, games are among the most effective ways that people find out about real social problems and become compelled to take action. According to a study conducted by the Pew Internet & American Life Project, 97 percent of U.S. teens play some form of video games. Of these, about half of them report that playing games make them think about (or indeed have introduced them to) moral or ethical issues. Just about everyone learns what effective, fervent action in the world looks like by playing video games.

With that reality in mind, the Carmichael Library, in association with the University of Montevallo Game Studies and Design Program, will host an evening of game play on Thursday, November 17, 2011. Inspired by the American Library Association's National Gaming Day @ Your Library, this event will feature circles of board game and video game tournaments. Come experience games that you haven't played before, like Settlers of Catan. There will be food and prizes. You can respond to the Facebook invitation, of you can just show up and play!

Day of the Dead at Your Campus Library

2011-10-31T16:31:00.001-05:00

Students build an altar to Amy Winehouse (photo by Joel Bullock.)

We've got a couple of events coming up this week related to Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead.) For those who have not joined us for this observance before, Día de los Muertos is a holiday celebrated mainly in Mexico and by people of Mexican heritage living in the United States and Canada. The holiday is dedicated to the remembrance of friends and relatives who have died. Tomorrow, Tuesday, November 1st, Kappa Pi (The Student Art Association) is having a Day of the Dead sale from 11 a.m. - 4 p.m. on the library's main floor. Items available for purchase will include t-shirts, tote bags, posters, ceramics, handmade notebooks and baked goods.

On Wednesday, November 2nd, students from Prof. Eric Vaccarella's Spanish 150 class will present their ceremonial altars (ofrendas,) which are located in the library's main floor lobby. This year's altars will be dedicated to actor and comedian Bernie Mack, singer Elvis Presley, playwright William Shakespeare, and singer Amy Winehouse. The public is invited when our students present their work at 10:00 a.m. The altars will remain on display from Friday, October 28th – Friday, November 11th.

University Presses and RSS Feeds

2011-10-18T15:44:00.006-05:00

An often-overlooked task for those of us who work in higher education, especially librarians and researching faculty, is keeping up with the latest monographs published by university presses. In the past, librarians and professors have learned about new publications by reading reviews in scholarly journals, scouring Choice cards, or sifting through glossy product catalogs, which inevitably seem to end up in our department mailboxes and then recycling bins after a glance.

Today, we have RSS technologies to keep track of information, and the most savvy university presses now present their content online in ways that benefit RSS users. It's now easier than ever before to know when important scholarship in a given field is published. MIT Press is a good example. If you visit their homepage, you can quickly navigate to a bank of RSS feeds organized by subject. You can subscribe to individual feeds for each subject area, add them to a reader, and learn when new titles in that area are published. MIT isn't the only press to do this. In a nearly-complete investigation, I've found several other presses that assign RSS feeds to specific subject areas:

If anyone has found other university or academic presses that organize new titles RSS feeds according to subject or discipline, let me know.

From a librarian's perspective there are several practical reasons why all university presses should provide this services on their websites. One is that the feeds allow us to customize content on our own Web 2.0-compatible sites. Many of the subject specific research guides that we create at the Carmichael Library contain feeds from recent publications (like, for instance, our recently published Sociology Research Guide). Students who reference these guides can encounter the latest scholarship in a given field, and librarians don't have to update web content.

Yet another way to keep track of what university presses are doing is to follow the blogs many of them maintain. All blogs can be tracked with RSS feeds. I've created a clip of some (not all) university press blogs, and anyone can subscribe to this list.

We'd love to hear how you keep track of university presses.

The Revelation of Research Guides

2011-10-03T09:22:00.008-05:00

Although I've been on faculty at the Carmichael Library for a few months now, this is my first post to the library blog. Many thanks to everyone in the Montevallo community who has welcomed me so warmly.

Today I wanted to share some of the new ways that our students and teaching faculty have been accessing information on the library webpages. Since July, I and the other librarians have been developing a series of subject-specific research guides. These guides are designed to index credible (scholarly and popular) information in a given discipline. So far, we have good research guides in Social Work, Literary Criticism, Education, Psychology, and several other fields.

The Social Work research guide is a good example of what these pages do. When you visit its homepage, you can see that resources are organized in a series of tabs at the top according to kind of resource. Students can rapidly make distinctions between popular and scholarly print sources, online publications, and electronic journals, and they can find materials specific to their discipline.

Faculty will also find these pages useful, especially the "Journals" tab, which often contains a constantly-updating list of recent journal publications. This is the "revelation" of research guides, and of the "Web 2.0" landscape in general: information comes to you automatically if you take time to cultivate a single online space or tool.

There's also a section of every guide dedicated to constructing Web 2.0 tools as sources of information. For instance, on the "Social Media" tab of the Social Work research guide, anyone who visits can find a list of organizations to "like" on Facebook, find a list of Twitter feeds to "follow," or view a clip of RSS feeds to add to a personal reader.

The Carmichael Library is using Twitter to organize information. Those people who follow the @umlibrary Twitter list on Social Work resources will be able to keep tabs on journals, prominent public intellectuals, professional organizations, and college/university initiatives, all with a few scrolls of the mouse.

There's also a space on our research guides that can be customized for a specific class. Carmichael Librarians can add information, create or build ideas related to a specific assignment, or assemble any other resources that may be helpful. If you are teaching a class at the University of Montevallo, consider taking us up on our offer to save a space for you on our research guides.

The project is still in progress. We have many more guides to build, but we are always open to suggestions as we move ahead.

Scenes from Family Day 2011

2011-10-02T21:12:00.001-05:00

For the second year running, Carmichael Library took part in the campus' Family Day event. Library staff and student workers told stories at three different campus sites giving talks at the top of the hour on Saturday afternoon. Below is a short clip of some of the scenes from this year's event:

We've also posted photos from this weekend's event on our Facebook and Flickr!

Day Two of Construction

2011-09-20T17:15:00.003-05:00

Day Two. No construction but we did move the tables and chairs away from the wall that will have the new entrance. Bad weather came in the form of rain and no outside work could be done today. I found a picture of the front of the library from 1969 in the 1969 Montage. Enjoy.

Video of Carmichael Library first day of construction

2011-09-20T13:30:00.007-05:00

Construction begins

2011-09-19T17:15:00.005-05:00

Monday afternoon: Construction on the new ground floor entrance started today. The old sidewalks are pulled up and some of the old dead shrubs are gone. The two water oaks will stay and we'll do our best to keep them healthy and safe during the construction. You'll see some orange construction fencing going up soon. A few parking spaces will have to be taken out of commission so the debris can be removed. Bad weather is coming soon so they are trying to get as much done as possible while we have good weather.

Sunday 4:00 p.m. Internet access restored

2011-09-18T16:00:00.003-05:00

Internet access is restored in the library as of 4:00 p.m. Sunday

Harbert Writing Center Hours for Fall Term 2011

2011-09-09T10:50:00.000-05:00

The Harbert Writing Center is open from 9:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m. Monday through Thursday and 9:00 a.m. - 3:00 p.m. on Fridays during the fall term.

The Harbert Writing Center's Consultants are skilled in assisting writers at all stages of the writing process--from selecting topics to revising final drafts.

The Center is located in Comer Hall, room 311, and can be reached by phone at (205) 665-6438. No appointments are necessary.

Free Samples at Ollie's Today, September 7th!

2011-09-07T09:07:00.001-05:00

Today from 9:00 a.m. until supplies last stop by Ollie's Simply To Go Café on the library's main floor for free samples. Ollie's is rolling out new food and beverage choices in the library café and we want to know what you think about these new offerings. Today's free items include Pepperidge Farm Goldfish crackers and V8 Frusion fruit and vegetable drinks. We hope to see you at Ollie's today!

Library Closed over Labor Day

2011-09-02T15:01:00.004-05:00

The library will close at 5:00 p.m. on Friday, September 2. We will reopen on Tuesday, September 6 at 8:00 a.m. Enjoy the holiday!

Carmichael Library Introduces ILLiad

2011-08-22T15:20:00.003-05:00

Carmichael Library Introduces ILLiad!

Interlibrary Loan is changing this semester! Carmichael Library now uses ILLiad, the Interlibrary Loan Internet Accessible Database.

With ILLiad, Interlibrary Loan is no longer a big deal. It’s easy to use and much faster than the old system. This is great news because when you need an article or book for a project—you need it, like, yesterday, right? Right!

With ILLiad, there are no more time-consuming, research-halting forms to fill out!! Clicking “Request this item” in many databases will do the work for you. There is also a “Free Text” option in ILLiad where you can cut and paste an entire citation into a request form. Dr. Kathy King, English professor, calls this “a BEE-U-TI-FUL thing!” And it really is!

But wait! There’s more!

With ILLiad’s electronic delivery service (called Odyssey) it’s entirely possible to get an article within an hour of requesting it—that’s crazy fast! It doesn’t happen with every request; normally you will receive articles within a few business days.

Typically, books are delivered in less than a week. To speed up the delivery process, we always borrow from Birmingham-area libraries first, and then we branch out to neighboring states—but even out-of-state books tend to arrive within seven days.

Other things ILLiad allows you to do:

Request books or individual articles either from databases or through Carmichael’s Interlibrary Loan homepage
Keep track of the requests as they are processed by Carmichael & whatever library decides to lend the items to you
Keep track of due dates and your loan history
Renew items online
Receive PDF articles electronically—they are delivered right to your UM email!
Receive notification the second a book is checked in at Carmichael—you’ll pick up your books at the circulation desk.

SO GET STARTED!

go here

http://montevallo.illiad.oclc.org/illiad/logon.html

to create your own ILLiad account!

For ILLiad Support: email jdeaver@montevallo.edu OR umill@montevallo.edu

And remember, if you have any trouble finding the right resources, the Carmichael Librarians and the Interlibrary Loan department are glad to help—seriously, we want you to ask for help! We ENJOY questions and the opportunity to help you find what you’re looking for—even if you’re not sure what it is.

Large Format Photo Printing and Book Binding Displays

2011-08-09T09:35:00.017-05:00

Carmichael Library invites you to come by and view two excellent displays of student works through September 3, 2011: Professor Collin William’s Large Format Photo Printing class and Professor Min Sun Lee’s Graphic Design: Book Binding class.Large Format Photo Printing class

1,2,3--Katherine Lincoln (beach, trees, underwater faces)
4--Rachel Crisson (library, thrift store)
5--Quentin Cornelison (kiln)
6--Chazz McLemore (main street Montevallo)
7--Aziza Shunnarah (floral patterns)
8, 9, 12--Justin Lee (crosses, church, night landscape with figures)
10--John Nicholson (meme)
11--Brian Carroll (tabletop turned into landscape)
13--David Wright (timber)
14--Kimberlee Bullock (Buck Park)
15--Brittany Ledbetter (dolls in woods)

Graphic Design: Book Binding class

Mark Basco
Melissa H. Frennea
Margaret E. Hague
Charles T. McLemore
Jessica E. Richard
Matthew P. Shirley
Aziza A. Shunnarah
Hannah M. Stein
Michelle L. Anderson
Kimberlee C. Bullock
Jasmine D. Densmore
Joyce F. Garrison
Ana-Sky J. Johnson
Emily A. Jones

Thanks to Collin Williams, Min Sun Lee, and their students for letting Carmichael Library display the works.

Ancient library information technology

2011-08-05T18:13:00.005-05:00

We found this Gaylord Library Fine Calculator in a file cabinet in the library. I couldn't find out much about this tool but from what I can tell you put a numbered tile in at the bottom of the device. The number would match up to that day's date and then you would use this thing like an old slide ruler to calculate the fine. Anybody know how old this thing is? I would guess from the 1950s or 60s. Thank you to Mike Price for the photo.

Carmichael Library completes first stage of digitization project

2011-07-19T16:45:00.004-05:00

The staff of Carmichael Library at the University of Montevallo has been working diligently for some time on a digitization project for some of the library’s holdings, and has recently shared the news that the first stage of the project is complete!

The goal of the project is to digitize all the University’s yearbooks and bulletins. Stage One included digitization of the earliest yearbooks and bulletins. These rare and one-of-a-kind items are now preserved and stored on a secure server and are available on the Internet Archives site. Alumni, students, faculty, staff and scholars can now view and download items of interest. These items can even be downloaded to a Kindle!

At a time when funding for such projects can be difficult to find, UM’s library staff was able to pursue this project by utilizing the LYRASIS Mass Digitization Collaborative. The program is supported by LYRASIS members and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. The Collaborative provides libraries the opportunity to digitize and share their collections. The project is being managed by Carey Heatherly, an assistant professor at Carmichael Library, with the help of UM student interns. Their work has taken the project to the start of the second stage.

To visit the Carmichael Library Internet Archives site: www.archive.org/details/universityofmontevallo

To view the 1907 edition of the Chiaroscuro, the school’s first yearbook: www.archive.org/details/chiaroscuro11907seni

Library Closed for July 4 Holidays; Catalog Outages Expected

2011-07-01T17:08:00.005-05:00

Photo credit: museinthecity. Creative Commons license

The library will be closed this weekend in observance of the July Fourth holiday. We will reopen Tuesday, July 5 at 8:00 a.m.

The library catalog and our database connections will be down periodically over the holiday weekend due to planned server maintenance.

Have a safe and relaxing Fourth of July!

2011 McNair Scholars Annual Research Presentations

2011-06-29T08:15:00.005-05:00

The 2011 class of McNair scholars will deliver the Eighth Annual Research Presentations today beginning at 9:00 a.m. in Wills Hall Master Classroom. Among the evaluators of this year's presentations is library faculty member Amanda Melcher, who also serves as a library mentor to Montevallo's McNair scholars.

This year's participants, in order of appearance, are: Crystal Nichols, Patrick Morris, Corey Duke, Mikia Carter, Andrea Echols, Rachel Davis, Melissa Hollon, Sydney Stover, Mercedes Jones, Kimberly Godsey, Whitney Mitchell, Jasmine Pearson, and Kelsey Dobyne.

For more information about the McNair Scholars Program, visit their web site.

Clark Hultquist and Carey Heatherly Get Caught Reading

2011-06-28T11:17:00.001-05:00

Photo and graphics by Joel Bullock

Our latest edition of UM Gets Caught Reading features professors Clark Hultquist and Carey Heatherly. The pair are the authors of Montevallo, which was published last month as part of the Images of America series by Arcadia Publishing. Dr. Hultquist is a Professor of History and chair of the Behavioral and Social Sciences Department at the university, while Mr. Heatherly is an Assistant Professor who handles the dual roles of Reference Librarian and University Archivist at Carmichael Library.

We usually ask our Get Caught Reading participants, "How do you use your campus library?" The following is a more detailed explanation of how Heatherly and Hultquist used the library and its collections during the preparation of their book for publication:

Clark Hultquist and Carey Heatherly use Carmichael Library for research purposes. This is best exemplified by the extensive research on both the campus and town history for the book Montevallo. The work is a pictorial history featuring 217 images accompanied by captions and chapter introductions. Almost all the images came from the University of Montevallo, mostly from Carmichael Library’s University Archives and Special Collections. Additionally, the duo spent six months researching each photograph; the people, the buildings, the stories behind each one. A sample of those rich resources include yearbooks from 1907 to the present, the student newspaper Alabamian from 1924 to the present, a collection of area newspaper scrapbooks from 1915 to 1995, and the University’s course catalogs and pamphlets from 1895 to the present.

The authors utilized Carmichael Library’s reference and circulation collections too. Much is owed to the available secondary sources on local history, particularly Eloise Meroney’s Montevallo: the First One-Hundred Years, Lucille Griffith’s Alabama College and White Columns and Red Bricks, and Mary Frances Tipton’s Years Rich and Fruitful. The research conducted at Carmichael has paid dividends beyond the publication of Montevallo as the authors are often asked to speak about local history. Most recently, the two led a tour of downtown and told stories about homes, businesses, churches, and the people who settled, lived, and worked in Montevallo, including notable events such as electricity coming to town in 1912 and the Main Street murder of Walter S. Cary.

Video: Stone Carving, May 2011

2011-06-27T20:38:00.006-05:00

In case you missed it on our Facebook page last week, here's another posting of our video of Professor Ted Metz's May 2011 Stone Carving class at work. This video was shot and edited by our student assistant for digital projects, Mike Price.

If you haven't seen our students' completed sculptures in the library be sure to stop in soon! We've got another summer art display (to be announced very soon) coming after this week.

Stone Carving Exhibit in the Library

2011-06-06T19:05:00.007-05:00

"Convolution," by Katie Avant. Photo by Mike Price

Please don't miss a remarkable display of student artwork from Professor Ted Metz’s May 2011 sculpture class, Stone Carving (Art 471/571.)

The twenty pieces on display are cut from Colorado alabaster, shaped, and polished into fascinating forms and textures. This work will be displayed in the library main floor foyer through June 30.

The following is a list of participating artists:

Katie Avant
"Convolution"*
"Untitled"*

Danielle Banner
"I Wish my Boyfriend were Here"
"Lost at Sea"

Kirsten A. Bowman
"Connection"
"Movement"

Melissa Brobston
"Untitled"
"Untitled"

Sommer Fortner
"Jellyfish"
"Untitled"

Joyce Garrison
"In the memory of my Parents"
"Together Forever Amen"

Parker Hunt
"Untitled"

Joshua James
"Elementium"
"Once a Mountain, Now the Sea"

Jason Jeffcoat
"Untitled"

Hannah Ronan-Daniell
"Camelot"
"Constant Shallowness Leads to Evil"

Alexander Schmidt
"Untitled"
"Untitled"

* These works are no longer on display.

Thanks to our library student assistants Hannah Ronan-Daniell and Mike Price. Hannah helped with the coordination of our exhibit and created the labels for these fine works. Mike took photos of the exhibit, which you may view on our Flickr.

Thanks to our Circulation Manager, Gloria Beasley, who headed coordination and publicity efforts for this exhibit.

Deal of the Century: EBSCO and H.W. Wilson merge

2011-06-05T17:42:00.006-05:00

In what is being billed as the "Deal of the Century" in the library world, EBSCO has acquired the H.W. Wilson company. Here's a link to a chart detailing the new world of Super Databases.

Summer 2011 Hours

2011-06-01T07:24:00.004-05:00

Summer I and II hours for Carmichael Library:

Sunday: 2:00 p.m. - 10:00 p.m.
Monday-Thursday: 8:00 a.m. - 10:00 p.m.
Friday: 8:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.
Saturday: Closed

The Library of Congress Adds a Jukebox

2011-05-11T08:41:00.002-05:00

The Library of Congress has added a National Jukebox The jukebox is browsable and searchable by artist (with a short bio for each) and genre. According to the website,

"The National Jukebox debuts featuring more than 10,000 78rpm disc sides issued by the Victor Talking Machine Company between 1900 and 1925.

Imagine your computer as a new Gramophone purchased for family and friends to enjoy in your home parlor. Audition popular recorded selections of the beginning of the 20th century years—band music, novelty tunes, humorous monologues, hits from the season's new musical theater productions, the latest dance rhythms, and opera arias."

This little ditty about made me laugh!

Harbert Writing Center Hours for May 2011

2011-05-10T13:39:00.003-05:00

This information from Dr. Glenda Conway, Professor of English and Coordinator of the Harbert Writing Center:

The Harbert Writing Center is open during May Term from 10:00 a.m. - 2:00 p.m.

The Peer Consultants who work in HWC provide free consultation services to writers from all disciplines and at all stages of the writing process.

HWC is located in Comer Hall, Room 311. Sessions are conducted on a walk-in basis.

Photo Credit: Susan Sharpless Smith. Creative Commons license

How You Can Help Storm Relief Efforts

2011-05-02T18:13:00.003-05:00

This information from UM Service Learning coordinator Dr. Hollie Cost:

Dear Montevallo Community,

Thank you all for the outpouring of support for victims of the recent storms. We are expecting a long road to recovery so our efforts will be needed for many months. Below is an updated list of items we are gathering locally. Donations can be delivered directly to Montevallo First Baptist or can be placed in any of the donation boxes located on campus.

Volunteering:
The city and university are working collaboratively to identify areas closest to us that are in the greatest need of volunteers. That information will be provided to campus on Thursday. Individuals interested in volunteering immediately can dial 2-1-1 or 1-888-421-1266. For more information visit the Alabama Poverty Project website.

Please keep in mind, if you are not volunteering or do not live in any of these areas, do not visit these areas! Onlookers are delaying relief efforts.

Donations:
Can be delivered to Montevallo First Baptist or placed in donation boxes around campus. For pick-up contact David Belk with the City of Montevallo (205) 965-4336.
plastic gas containers
manual can openers
hard shell coolers
new, packaged undergarments
first aid supplies
flash lights
large trash bags
Clorox spray
batteries of all sizes
paper towels
baby wipes
baby and adult diapers
drinking water
work gloves
easy snack food (non perishable and packaged)
personal hygiene items
instant formula
toilet paper
emergency candles
hand sanitizer
large Tupperware bins for belongings as they are found
Sharpies
over-the-counter medicines

Additionally, you may wish to participate in the 3,000 in 3 Water Drive taking place on campus. Montevallo students, staff, and faculty are working to collect 3,000 cases of water over the next three days to help area storm victims. Get more information on the drive on the 3,000 in 3 Facebook event page.

The UM Archives and Special Collections

2011-04-29T17:19:00.006-05:00

Just a quick note to let everyone know the archives move is underway. Student worker Jamie Rawls and interns Michael Messina, Amber Whiting, and Andrea Self have been hard at work moving and cleaning items. Ben Hayes, UM Physical Plant, came by Wednesday morning and moved portions of our shelving to the new area. I plan to document this experience by posting photos and updates along the way. Please check out more photos on our Carmichael Library Flickr account.

Extended Finals Hours for Spring 2011

2011-04-20T14:36:00.015-05:00

Original artwork by Joel Bullock

Starting this Sunday, April 24, Carmichael Library will be open late for your last minute study needs! We'll keep the doors open until 2:00 a.m. during the week before finals. The library's end-of-semester extended hours will continue through Tuesday, May 3.

Spring 2011 Extended Hours
Sun.	Mon.	Tue.	Wed.	Thu.	Fri.	Sat.
April 24 6 p.m. – 2 a.m.	25 8 a.m. – 2 a.m.	26 8 a.m. – 2 a.m.	27 8 a.m. – 2 a.m.	28 8 a.m. – 2 a.m.	29 8 a.m. – 5 p.m.	30 10 a.m. – 5 p.m.
May 1 2 p.m. – 2 a.m.	2 8 a.m. – 2 a.m.	3 8 a.m. – 2 a.m.	4 8 a.m. – 11 p.m.	5 8 a.m. – 11 p.m.	6 8 a.m. – 5 p.m.	7 Closed
8 Closed

Good luck, students!

History Day in the Library, April 18

2011-04-18T17:12:00.006-05:00

Photo from 2010 Fall History Day by Dr. Ruth Truss

Tomorrow, Carmichael Library will be the site of the History Department's semi-annual History Day. Seniors taking History 491 with Dr. Robert Barone will present their final research projects. At 1:00 p.m. we will have a Skype video session from England with 2005 UM alumna, Kelly Kilpatrick. Ms. Kilpatrick is soon to finish her DPhil in European History, The Historical Interpretation of Early Medieval Insular Place-Names, at Wadham College at Oxford.

The 2011 Spring History Day student presenters include:

Nathan Brown, "Southern Transformation: Chestnut Creek, the Rise and Fall of a Nineteenth Century Community"

Tiffany Cummings, "Environmentalism: A Movement of Humanity"

Marshall Davidson, "Spring Offensives of 1918: Germany’s Need for Manpower"

Vanya Gaines, "Chasing the Setting Sun: Churchill’s Early Years"

David Hughes, "The Development of the Coosa River: The Logan Martin Dam Project"

Christina Joiner, "The Making of Women in the 1920s: A Change in the Workplace, Relationships, and Culture"

Patrick Lakey, "Triumph Over the Will: Jazz Resistance Under the Third Reich"

Nick Miller, "Birmingham: The Civil Rights Movement and the African-American Church"

Christopher Robinson, "The Untold story: African-American Soldiers Who Defended the Southern Way Life During the Civil War"

Sarah Stephens, "Geronimo: The Last Campaign"

Richard Thompson, "Bloodshed in Alabama: The Major Players and Key Events of the Creek War"

Michael Trott, "Helicopter Pilots of the Vietnam War"

Amber Whiting, "The Aleutian Islands Campaign"

Please join us at any time between noon and 2:00 p.m. tomorrow!

University and Library Closing at 1pm today, April 15, 2011

2011-04-15T13:20:00.004-05:00

This news from the University of Montevallo Public Relations Office:

Due to the possibility of inclement weather, the University of Montevallo will close at 1 p.m. today (Friday, April 15, 2011). This also includes all evening classes and special events. The University will reopen Monday at 8 a.m., as per regular schedule.

The National Weather service has indicated a severe weather event in Central Alabama this afternoon and extending into the evening.

For those attending the Montevallo Literary Festival, afternoon events have been moved to Eclipse Coffee and Books.

Please stay safe! Carmichael Library will open for our regular Saturday hours of operation, 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.

University and Library Closing at 2pm today, April 4,2011

2011-04-04T13:57:00.000-05:00

Because of the threat of a severe weather outbreak, the University of Montevallo and Carmichael Librarywill close today (Monday, April 4, 2011) at 2 p.m.

Faculty, staff and students are encouraged to be safe and to stay tuned to a good source for weather information.

The University will re-open at 8 a.m., Tuesday, April 5.

Graphic novels in the Library!

2011-03-30T14:07:00.005-05:00

Stop by the Library to "check out" our display of graphic novels/comic books!! They were generously donated by the Environmental, Philosophy, and Astronomy Clubs.

A few of the titles include:
Concrete: complete short stories by Paul Chadwick
Akira: book1 and book 2 by Katsuhiro
Hell and back : a sin city love story by Frank Miller
High society by Dave Sim
A small killing by Alan Moore and Oscar Zarate

Editors Wanted for the Tower, the Montage, and the Alabamian

2011-03-23T18:37:00.000-05:00

Are you interested in leading one of UM's student publications? Applications are now being accepted for editors of the Tower (literary/arts magazine), Montage (yearbook), and Alabamian (newspaper).

Leadership positions in student publications look great on resumes. Students of all majors are encouraged to apply.

Pick up an application in the student life office or on the second floor of Will Lyman House. Electronic applications may be requested by contacting Tiffany Bunt, bunttr@montevallo.edu.

The deadline to submit applications is Wednesday, April 6, by 5 p.m. Applications should be returned to Tiffany Bunt, UM Public Relations, Will Lyman House.

2011 Faculty Research Symposium

2011-03-06T16:19:00.003-06:00

Monday, March 7 is the date of the 2011 Faculty Research Symposium on the Montevallo campus. Tomorrow's presentations will center around five themes and feature the creative work of 21 UM faculty members representing all four colleges and the library, a stellar group of scholars and creative artists.

Faculty, staff and students are encouraged to drop in anytime between 10:00 a.m. - 6:30 p.m. as interest prompts and time permits. The presentations will take place in Wills Hall Master Classroom, room 200. Here's a list of this year's presenters:

10:00 a.m. – 10:05 a.m.
Welcoming Remarks by President John W. Stewart

10:05 a.m. – 11:30 a.m.
Learning Curves
Tom Sanders (Business)
Nancy Bell (Business)
Mickey Bunn (Business)
Joe Walsh (Education)

11:30 a.m. – 1:00 p.m.
Interventions
Laurel Hitchcock (Social Work)
Jason Newell (Social Work)
Linda Murdock (Communication Science and Disorders)
Dan Valentine (Communication Science and Disorders)

2:00 p.m. – 3:30 p.m.
Soundings & Discoveries
Betsy Inglesby (English)
Joseph Landers (Music)
Glenda Conway (English)
Deborah Karpman (Art)

3:30 p.m. – 5:00 p.m.
Recoveries
Eric Vaccarella (Spanish)
Leonor Vazquez (Spanish)
Ruth Truss (History)
Clark Hultquist (History) & Carey Heatherly (Library)

5:00 p.m. – 6:30 p.m.
Creative Processes
Kelly Wacker (Art History)
Bryn Chancellor (English)
Collin Williams (Art)
Karen Graffeo (Art)

More information on the symposium can be found here.

College Night Student Leaders Get Caught Reading

2011-02-10T14:40:00.000-06:00

For the second time in three years, Carmichael Library is highlighting Montevallo's greatest tradition with our occasional blog feature, Get Caught Reading. Meet your Gold and Purple Side student leaders and learn what they're reading!

Photos by Joel Bullock

Purple Side co-leader Logan Reid chose The Berenstain Bears in The Bears' Nature Guide, by Stan Berenstain. Elizabeth Minyard chose The Legend of Drizzt Collectors Edition, by R. A. Salvatore. Logan majors in acting and directing, and Elizabeth is working on a fine arts degree in painting.

Gold Side co-leader Jennifer Bellamy chose Wolf Boy, by Evan Kuhlman, while Philip Green chose Stuff White People Like: The Definitive Guide to the Unique Taste of Millions, by Christian Lander. Both Jenna and Philip are Communication Studies majors, and Philip is also pursuing a double major in sociology.

Now that we know what our College Night student leaders are reading there's only one question to ask: "What's it gonna' be?!"

Related on Carmichael blog:

College Night 2009 Student Leaders Get Caught Reading

From the Director of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina "To our Friends Around the World: The Events in Egypt"

2011-02-03T09:54:00.005-06:00

To our friends around the world: The Events in Egypt
30 Jan 2011

The world has witnessed an unprecedented popular action in the streets of Egypt. Led by Egypt’s youth, with their justified demands for more freedom, more democracy, lower prices for necessities and more employment opportunities. These youths demanded immediate and far-reaching changes. This was met by violent conflicts with the police, who were routed. The army was called in and was welcomed by the demonstrators, but initially their presence was more symbolic than active. Events deteriorated as lawless bands of thugs, and maybe agents provocateurs, appeared and looting began. The young people organized themselves into groups that directed traffic, protected neighborhoods and guarded public buildings of value such as the Egyptian Museum and the Library of Alexandria. They are collaborating with the army. This makeshift arrangement is in place until full public order returns.

The library is safe thanks to Egypt’s youth, whether they be the staff of the Library or the representatives of the demonstrators, who are joining us in guarding the building from potential vandals and looters. I am there daily within the bounds of the curfew hours. However, the Library will be closed to the public for the next few days until the curfew is lifted and events unfold towards an end to the lawlessness and a move towards the resolution of the political issues that triggered the demonstrations.

Ismail Serageldin
Librarian of Alexandria
Director of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina

SafeHouse Book Drive

2011-01-26T18:21:00.005-06:00

Are you looking for an easy way to make an impact in our community? University of Montevallo Falcon Scholar Brandy McGough is hosting a book drive to benefit SafeHouse, a shelter for battered women and children.

Donation boxes will be at various locations throughout the University of Montevallo campus including:

Carmichael Library
Jeter Hall
Ramsay Hall
Farmer Hall
The Office of Student Support Services, Main Hall

Books are needed for readers of all ages, from elementary level to adult. The shelter is particularly interested in receiving books for children and teens. Monetary donations will be accepted in Ramsay Hall and will be used to purchase more books. You may specify the age group for which you want purchased.

Please help this cause! Books will be accepted through March 7^th.

For further information about Safehouse, visit safehouse.org.

For more information on the book drive you may contact Ms. McGough at bmcgough@forum.montevallo.edu.

Photo by Amanda Melcher

Student Book Art Exhibition and Reception, Jan. 20

2011-01-14T16:26:00.005-06:00

Carmichael Library Presents

Journeys and Sequences: Photography books by Montevallo Art Students

Photo by Joel Bullock

Carmichael Library, in cooperation with the Department of Art, presents a display of photographic books made by University of Montevallo Art Students. The books were made by the students of Karen Graffeo who took part in Art Department Travel Abroad courses to Italy, Turkey and Greece. In addition, some of these works were produced by students enrolled in Photo I and Documentary Photography courses. The assigned projects required the student to take a journey, or to explore a cultural topic, as well as being required to do a visual sequence of photographs in response to the Carson McCullers story "A Tree, A Rock, A Cloud". The books were produced using the iPhoto software program.

The following students have books in this display: Heather Anderson, Maggie Blevins, Melissa Brobston, Leslie Carver, Rachel Crisson, Carolyn Fain, Lauren Franks, Rachel Grimes, Elizabeth Gross, Sky Johnson, Katherine Lincoln, Jameilia Little, Faza Malik, Elizabeth Minyard, Janessa Mobley, Stephanie Moceri, Oriana Padron, Michael Price, Hannah Ronan-Daniell, Alexander Schmidt, and Allison Vancleave

Please enjoy a reception on Thursday, January 20 at 1:00 p.m. in the library. Hot cider, treats, and books will warm your body and soul! Persons attending the reception will have a chance to look at these works and learn more about the processes used in their creation. The books will be on display in the library's Main Floor lobby through Friday, January 28.

Thanks to Karen Graffeo and her students for sharing their work with us! Also thanks to Gloria Beasley, Joel Bullock, and our library student assistants who helped with the set up of this exhibition.

Martin Luther King, Jr. Holiday Hours

2011-01-11T17:12:00.004-06:00

The library will have shortened hours for the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday weekend.

Saturday, January 15	Closed
Sunday, January 16	2:00 p.m. – 6:00 p.m.
Monday, Monday 17	Closed – Martin Luther King, Jr. Holiday

Photo credit: U.S. Embassy New Delhi

UM to Close Monday, Jan. 10

2011-01-09T10:24:00.002-06:00

This news from the UM Office of Public Relations: The University of Montevallo will be closed Monday, January 10, 2011, due to predicted ice and snow conditions that will affect the central part of the state. Today’s weather forecasts indicate ice and snow conditions throughout central Alabama beginning Sunday night and continuing into the evening on Monday which could make travel dangerous. All classes and special events for Monday and Monday evening have been canceled.

A decision regarding Tuesday’s operations, including classes and special events, will be made by noon on Monday, provided there is sufficient information to make the decision at that time.

Photo by Joie Molden

Myrlie Evers-Williams to speak at UM Jan. 11

2011-01-07T15:34:00.004-06:00

Carmichael Library commemorates the Montevallo visit of Myrlie Evers-Williams with a display of related materials. First, this announcement and biography of Mrs. Evers-Williams from the UM Office of Public Relations:

Nationally known civil rights activist Myrlie Evers-Williams will be the featured speaker for the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. program at UM Jan. 11, 2011, at 7 p.m. The location of the presentation will be announced at a later date. The topic of her talk will be "Forging the Dream: Leadership by Action and Not by Design."

Widow of slain civil rights leader Medgar Evers, she has never been content to rest on her late husband’s laurels. She garnered the national spotlight as the first woman elected board of directors chair of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). She was elected chairperson to lead the nation’s oldest civil rights organization in 1995 at a time when it had been surrounded by scandal and controversy. Her positive reputation among civil rights activists, and blacks in general, made her election a cause for renewed optimism among NAACP supporters.

In early 1998, Evers-Williams decided not to run for another term as NAACP chairperson and instead chose to pursue other projects. In particular, she started the Medgar Evers Institute to promote education, training and economic development. Civil rights leader, Julian Bond, succeeded Evers-Williams as NAACP chairperson.

Evers-Williams was born in Vicksburg, Miss., and was raised by her grandmother and an aunt. In 1950 she enrolled at the then all-black Alcorn Agricultural and Mechanical College (now Alcorn State University) in Lorman, Miss. Starting in 1954, Evers-Williams worked full-time as field secretary for the NAACP in Mississippi. She served as her husband’s secretary in the Jackson office of the NAACP, and in that capacity played a significant role in advancing the civil rights cause. In June 1963, Medgar Evers was shot and killed as he entered his Jackson home. His murder brought national attention to the evils of racism in the South, particularly in Mississippi. Byron De La Beckwith was tried several times, but was not convicted of the murder until 1994. Although devastated personally by her loss, Evers-Williams became a symbol of courage as well as tragedy in the civil rights movement. She and co-author William Peters wrote a biography of her late husband, For Us, The Living.

Evers-Williams moved to California in 1964, where she received her B.A. from Pomona College in 1968, lectured for the NAACP and began a career in business. She remained active in civil rights work and politics, running unsuccessfully for Congress of the United States in 1970 and serving as commissioner of public works for Los Angeles in 1987. She also worked for two years for an advertising agency, and for 10 years she was the director of community affairs for a Los Angeles corporation.

Her life has been the inspiration for two movies, For Us the Living: The Medgar Evers Story and Ghosts of Mississippi. Oscar winner Whoopi Goldberg portrayed her in Ghosts of Mississippi.

Carmichael Library commemorates the Montevallo visit of Myrlie Evers-Williams with a special display of books and DVDs related to the history and development of the NAACP. Please feel free to check out any of the materials now on display on the library's Main Floor.

On the Web:

Mississippi Writers Page biography of Myrlie Evers-Williams
NAACP Interactive Time Line
Oral history from the National Visionary Project: "Myrlie Evers-Williams: National Visionary"

Memorial Service for Mary Seagle

2011-01-03T16:17:00.006-06:00

A memorial service for Mary Seagle, who served as a library assistant at Carmichael Library for about 10 years, will be held Wednesday, January 5^th, at 4:00 p.m. at Carmichael Library. Mary passed away New Year's Day. Friends and colleagues will be invited to share their memories about Mary at the service. Her daughter said Mary's work at the library "was precious to her. Working with the students, library staff, faculty, UM staff and others was her life."

Memorial gifts may be made to Carmichael Library or to the American Cancer Society.

The library will open Wednesday at 8:00 a.m. and will close to the general public at 3:00 p.m. prior to the memorial service.

Extended Hours for Fall 2010

2010-12-06T09:23:00.010-06:00

The library's end-of-semester extended hours began this week and will continue through Thursday. The library will be open until midnight all week. We'll also be open until 2:00 a.m. during final exams.

December Extended Hours
Sun.	Mon.	Tue.	Wed.	Thu.	Fri.	Sat.
	6 8 a.m. – 12 a.m.	7 8 a.m. – 12 a.m.	8 8 a.m. – 12 a.m.	9 8 a.m. – 12 a.m.	10 8 a.m. – 5 p.m.	11 10 a.m. – 5 p.m.
12 2 p.m. – 2 a.m.	13 8 a.m. – 2 a.m.	14 8 a.m. – 2 a.m.	15 8 a.m. – 2 a.m.	16 8 a.m. – 12 a.m.	17 8 a.m. – 5 p.m.	18 Closed
19 Closed	20 8 a.m. – 5 p.m.

Photo credit: Creative Commons license

Welcome to the New Oxford English Dictionary online

2010-11-30T16:41:00.005-06:00

The OED website got a face-lift on December 1, 2010. There's a new design and new functionality. In addition to easier navigation, John Simpson, editor of the OED says " Perhaps the most important new feature involves the Historical Thesaurus to the OED, published in book form in 2009. The entire text is now integrated with the OED Online"

History Day 2010 in the Library

2010-11-30T12:15:00.002-06:00

In a few moments the History Program will begin its annual History Day program. All faculty and students are welcome to attend as History Senior Seminar students will present their research, via poster presentations, from 12:30-2:00 on the library's main floor.

Please join our student scholars for the presentations today!

Day of the Dead Presentations

2010-11-01T12:28:00.007-05:00

Photos by Joel Bullock

Tomorrow brings our ninth annual presentation of the Day of the Dead altars. The students of Eric Vaccarella's Spanish 301 (Conversation) class will present their work in Spanish on the library's Main Floor. It all starts tomorrow, November 2, at 11:00 a.m. Dr. Vaccarella will be on hand to answer questions about the altars (ofrendas) and the Día de los Muertos tradition in English.

Last Thursday was our Day of the Dead set up day. This has long been one our favorite days in the library. For about an hour or so, Dr. Vaccarella and his students engage in a flurry of activity. When the time is up, the library foyer is transformed into a festive scene of candy skulls, colored tissue paper (papel picado,) and cempasuchil flowers (known as the flower of the dead, or "flor del muerto" in their native Mexico.)

The entire community is invited to see the altars when our students present their work tomorrow. Also, don't miss Joel Bullock's photos on our Facebook and Flickr.

Early Images of Humans

2010-10-28T11:09:00.002-05:00

This story was featured on Yahoo!News yesterday. It discusses the recent discovery of humans in a Cincinnati waterfront daguerreotype taken in 1848. In the photograph, there are two men standing on the dock located on the left side. The story goes on to compare this discovery with that of the earliest known image of a human in Louis Daguerre's 1838 photo of Paris. In Daguerre's picture, there is a man getting his shoes shined in the lower left hand corner.

Ghost Stories and Condie Cunningham's Door at the Library

2010-10-26T09:33:00.006-05:00

This week the library shares one of Montevallo's most enduring haunted tales. The door to Condie Cunningham's Main Hall dorm room is now on display at our Ask Here Desk. This week you may come by and see the door, read the official accounts of Condie's unfortunate demise, and share your own Montevallo ghost stories.

The door will be on display through tomorrow, Wednesday, the 27th and again from Friday, the 29th through Saturday the 30th.

The haunting continues on Saturday afternoon when library faculty and staff will recite Montevallo's famous ghost stories from various locations on campus. The stories will be told from 2:00 - 5:00 p.m. Saturday.

Celebrate Montevallo history and our haunted past this week at your campus library!

Darkness into Life: Remembering the Holocaust

2010-10-25T10:01:00.005-05:00

A poignant exhibit opens today in the gallery of Parnell Memorial Library in Montevallo.

For Birmingham residents Max Herzel, Ruth Siegler, Martin Aaron, and Riva Mirsch, their memories of the Holocaust are a complicated patchwork of loss, suffering, grief, bravery, and hope. These men and women, along with five others, survived the horrors of the Holocaust and came to settle in Birmingham. Their stories are told in Darkness into Life, an exhibit of original paintings and photographs on display at Parnell Memorial Library Gallery October 25 through December 4. The exhibit, produced and sponsored by the Birmingham Holocaust Education Committee, is co-sponsored by Parnell Memorial Library and the Montevallo Arts Council.

Darkness into Life was created by artist Mitzi J. Levin and photographer Becky Seitel, who spent hours with each of the survivors to better comprehend what they experienced as children and young people during the Holocaust. Levin's paintings focus on the survivors' lives before and during the Holocaust; Seitel's photographs depict the survivors' present-day lives in Birmingham. Montevallo resident Deborah Layman is the the education and publicity coordinator for the Montevallo exhibit.

Former MHS English teacher Jane Clayton has arranged for every class from Montevallo High School and Montevallo Middle School to have docent-guided tours when the students visit the exhibit. Teachers will be given follow-up classroom activities and resources to further explore issues raised by the exhibit.

A special program and reception at Parnell Memorial Library on Sunday, November 7, at 2:00 P. M. will feature traditional Jewish music played by a Klezmer band organized by Dr. Alan Goldspiel, Chair of the Music Department at the University of Montevallo.

The exhibit is free and open to the public during library hours. Guided tours for groups are available by appointment. For information, contact deborah.layman(at)gmail.com.

Upcoming Events at Carmichael Library

2010-10-19T15:02:00.004-05:00

Your campus library is busy with programs, displays, and other events in the weeks ahead. Here are some highlights:

Program: Issues in Literature for Children and Young Adults: Censorship and the Young Person's Right to Read.
Wednesday, October 20, 4:00-6:00 p.m.

The Montevallo Branch of AAUW and Carmichael Library will host a program on "Issues in Literature for Children and Young Adults: Censorship and the Child's Right to Read" on Wednesday, October 20, at 4:00 p.m. in Carmichael Library. At this session Pat Scales, UM graduate, prominent member of the Association of Library Services for Children, and Chair of the prestigious Caldecott Committee in 2003, will discuss Censorship Issues and the Child’s Right to Read. Mary Beth Rodgers, Barbara Belisle, and Loretta Cobb will comment on books such as The Boy with the Striped Pajamas by John Boyne, The Red Hills of Alabama by Barbara Belisle, and Tales from the Heart of Haiti by Patti Marxsen. Jane Clayton will moderate the discussion. The public is cordially invited to attend.

Family Day in the Library
Saturday, October 29

The library will be the site of faculty meet and greets with parents. In the afternoon, library staff and faculty will tell some of Montevallo's famous ghost stories from sites across campus. More information about UM Family Weekend can be found at the Division of Student Affairs web site.

Exhibit and Presentation: Day of the Dead
Exhibit runs from October 28-November 9. Presentations on Tuesday, November 2, 11:00 a.m.

Carmichael Library will commemorate Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) in the library lobby for the ninth consecutive year. The library will host a showing of ceremonial altars (ofrendas) built by students of Dr. Eric Vaccarella's Spanish Conversation class. This year's ofrendas will also serve as a commemoration of the Mexican Bicentennial of Independence (1810) and the centennial of the Mexican Revolution of 1910. All the honorees are Mexican. They include Mario Moreno Cantinflas (film actor), María Felix (film actress), Sor Juan Ines de la Cruz (17th-century poet and advocate for the rights of women), Pedro Infante (signer and actor), and Frida Kahlo (painter).

The public is invited when our students present their work at 11:00 a.m. on Tuesday, November 2nd. The presentations will be made in Spanish. The altars will be on display from October 28th - November 9th.

We hope to see you here!

Sigma Delta Pi Photography Competition

2010-10-16T11:03:00.004-05:00

Photo by Wolfgang Staudt. Creative Commons license.

Sigma Delta Pi, Chapter Epsilon Eta

VI Photo Contest Moments Around the World

The Spanish Honor Society, Sigma Delta Pi, is now accepting entries for its sixth photography competition.

Photo Contest Details

The contest is open to any University of Montevallo student, faculty or staff.
The theme of this contest is "Moments Around the World." Pictures accepted may be from travels within the USA or abroad taken between October 2009 to August 2010.
Participants must print out, sign, and return the Contest Rules and Entry Agreement Form when submitting their entry. Failure to submit this form will invalidate the contest entry.
You may pick up the Contest Rules and Entry Agreement Form in the Foreign Language Office (Comer 101).
Sigma Delta Pi will not accept any electronic submissions.
Entries are limited to 3 pictures per person. Please place all entries in one package.
Photos may be in one or two of the categories described below, and will be judged on the beauty and quality of the photo.

Categories

Entries will be divided into three categories 1) People, 2) Places or Landscapes, and 3) Weird Wonders (funny, unique, or uncommon pictures.)

Submissions

There will be a special box in the Department of Foreign Languages in which students may place their entries. Also, students may send submissions to:

Sigma Delta Pi
Department of Foreign Languages
Station 6410
University of Montevallo
Montevallo, AL 35115

Deadline

Sigma Delta Pi accepts entries from Monday September 23 to Monday October 25, 2010.

Questions

Please email Dr. Leonor Vázquez-González at vazquezl@montevallo.edu with any questions.

Our Presidential Heritage

2010-10-13T20:35:00.003-05:00

Over the next few days, I hope everyone will stop by Carmichael Library and view our display about Montevallo's presidents. The presentation features photos, a few artifacts, and brief highlights from each administration. The display coincides with Founders' Day 2010 and the inauguration of Dr. John Stewart as the University of Montevallo's 15th President. October 14th will mark the institution's 114th year of operation.

Click here to see a few more photos

Click here for this years Founders' Day schedule

Special thanks to Jamie Rawls, Archives student worker.

Founders' Day 2010 Schedule

2010-10-10T14:51:00.005-05:00

Photo by Matt Orton

This week's Founders' Day events include the inauguration of Montevallo's 15^th president, Dr. John Wesley Stewart III. Be sure to check UM's Inauguration 2010 page for details on the many events happening this week.

The library will be closed on the morning of Founders' Day, Thursday, October 14^th. We'll open at 12:30 p.m. Our new coffee shop, Ollie's Simply To Go, will open at 3:00 p.m.

Happy 114^th birthday, UM!

Conference Hightlights

2010-10-09T11:21:00.005-05:00

Over the past few days, I've had the opportunity to sit in on a number of excellent and exciting research presentations. One session that really grabbed my attention was titled, Of Bits, Bytes, and Books: Use and Meaning in Digital Humanities and the Emerging Library. While we have all heard about the how great digitization is, this group of presenters spoke about serious research problems that have risen in the past couple of years.

The Historic Columbia Foundation's Kyra Herzinger began by comparing digital information dissemination to a buffet style restaurant, meaning that objects were sometimes loosely arranged into arbitrary categories from which the consumer can pick and choose without sifting through the totality of the collection. She went on to say that digitization can cause objects to loose their intrinsic value. For example, a person can view the scanned version of a diploma, but viewing the physical artifact allows the researcher to see if and how the diploma was framed, displayed, etc. She also warned that archivist have a tendency to scan aesthetically pleasing collections and while overlooking documents that many may consider important.

Melanie Griffin, University of South Florida Special and Digital Collections Librarian, expressed concern about the research value of Victorian sensation novels in the digital format. Paraphrasing her description of Victorian sensation novels, Griffins states these are works "appearing between 1860 and 1880 England that are marked by adultery, illegitimate children, poisoning, bigamy by women, paranormal activity, and drug use." Many of these novels were first published in serial format then as as multi-volume sets, then as condensed single-volume books. Additionally, many authors wrote a "base text" and publishers sometimes add details and drama might appeal to their audience. Obviously, this poses problems when presented in the digital format. Often times only one edition is presented and usually it is the most attractive copy or the shortest version. Researchers could be led to believe they are looking at the only copy or the finished text, while in reality the physical archive may contain multiple runs of the novel presented in book and serial format.

Finally, Patricia Sasser, University of South Carolina, discussed musicology and the lack of coherent digital resources available. She states that the study of music history lacks clear and centralized tools and researchers depend on sources ranging from information in scholarly databases in other subjects to YouTube. Sasser laments that even the Doctoral Dissertations in Musicology tool, meant to actively collect citations in a bibliographic format, is not comprehensive and lacks standardization in its information gathering techniques.

All three presenters highlighted problems that are applicable to almost any field in this new technological age and are worth exploring by scholars and practitioners alike. While digitization adds a significant geographic convenience for researchers, many collections are still worth a visit.

Greetings from Maryland

2010-10-07T13:17:00.003-05:00

The morning began with David Gracy's keynote address. Before joining the faculty of the University of Texas at Austin, he served as the 14th Texas State Archivist. While in this position, he began a project that has evolved into a book titled, The State Library and Archives of Texas: A History, 1835-1962.

During his address, Gracy spoke about how the idea of funding libraries has always been popular with politicians until the actual budget request is made. He cites specific instances of this throughout Texas history beginning with the group that gathered at Washington-on-the-Brazos to found the Republic of Texas in 1836. The men loved the thought of ordering books on law and government to aid them in writing a constitution and actually created a committee to explore the idea further. The committee regarded this purchase as essential for the survival of Texas, but in the end declined to actually buy the materials because it just wasn't the right time.

Gracy closed his speech by pointing to the lack of research being performed on library history, especially on state libraries and archives. He argued that this is fertile ground for exploration and research on the institutions themselves is as valuable as what they contain.

Off to another round of sessions and then a trip to Annapolis.

Delta Gamma Gets Caught Reading

2010-10-06T17:02:00.004-05:00

Photo and graphics by Joel Bullock

The ladies of Delta Gamma were in the library earlier this week with some of their favorite books in hand. The Zeta Nu chapter of the sorority was founded in 1991 and now includes over 50 sisters.

We caught the ladies in the main floor browsing area of Carmichael Library just in front of our new coffee shop, Ollie's Simply To Go Café. The library café offers fresh coffee and tea, as well as snacks, salads, and sandwiches.

We asked a few of the Delta Gammas to talk to us about what they were reading.

Kate Lewallen, Chapter President, History and French major

Carmichael Library: What are you reading?
Kate: Un Americano a Fusine Laghi, by Robert McCall

Carmichael Library: Why did you choose this book?
Kate: My grandfather wrote this book about the time he spent in northern Italy immediately following World War II. He was a soldier in the 88th infantry that helped secure the border with Yugoslavia.

My grandfather is one of my biggest role models, and I love having this piece of his history, especially since I got to see these places with him and the rest of my family a few years ago.

Carmichael Library: How do you use your campus library?
Kate: I use the upstairs area as a quiet place to study. I also use the Interlibrary Loan service a lot.

Olivia Tennant, Chapter Public Relations Officer, Undeclared major

Carmichael Library: What are you reading?
Olivia: Big Fish, by Daniel Wallace.

Carmichael Library: Why did you choose this book?
Olivia: I saw the movie and I thought that it would be a fun book to read.

Carmichael Library: How do you use your campus library?
Olivia: I use the ground floor area for study all of the time. I make "A"s on tests that I study for here!

Mattie Owens, Political Science major

Carmichael Library: What are you reading?
Mattie: Paper Towns, by John Green.

Carmichael Library: Why did you choose this book?
Mattie: Because I love the author dearly.

Carmichael Library: How do you use your campus library?
Mattie: I use the library to meet with groups: it's a good place to meet with friends. I've also been stopping in at Ollie's a lot this past week!

Olivia Timpson, Art major

Carmichael Library: What are you reading?
Olivia: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, by J.K. Rowling

Carmichael Library: Why did you choose this book?
Olivia: I'm a huge fan of the series. I read all of the books when I was younger and I'm now re-reading them to remember what happens in them and to renew my love of the series.

Carmichael Library: How do you use your campus library?
Olivia: I use the computers for research and spend a lot of time in the second floor quiet study area.

Thanks to the ladies of the Delta Gamma Zeta Nu chapter for appearing in this edition of Get Caught Reading. Be sure to stay tuned to our updates here and on Facebook. You never know who we'll catch curled up with their favorite book!

Library Research Seminar-V

2010-10-05T16:58:00.005-05:00

Library Research Seminar-V will begin in a little more than 24 hours with a large number of librarians descending on College Park, Maryland. The official start will happen first thing Thursday morning as Diane Barlow and Trudi Hahn welcome conference attendees and introduce our keynote speaker, David B. Gracy and his presentation, Is There Counsel in those Curtains? Research Agendas for the Times. Both Barlow and Hahn represent the University of Maryland's iSchool where they serve as Associate Dean and Professor of the Practice, respectively. Dr. Gracy is the Governor Bill Daniel Professor in Archival Enterprise at the School of Information, University of Texas at Austin.

Celebrating National Tutoring Week

2010-10-04T09:23:00.003-05:00

In celebration of National Tutoring Week, The Learning Enrichment Center will host a series of events. The Center will host an Open House, Wednesday, October 6^th from 2:00-4:00 p.m. in the lower level of library. Come and enjoy refreshments, meet the tutors and see what the LEC has to offer!

LRS-V?

2010-09-28T20:18:00.003-05:00

LRS-V is the Library Research Seminar-5: Integrating Practice and Research. The conference is organized and hosted by the iSchool at Maryland and major sponsors include the American Library Association's Library Research Roundtable, the Institution of Museum and Library Services, the University of Maryland's College of Information Studies, and OCLC.

The main purpose of this event is to "bring together a diverse community of scholars from academia and practitioners from libraries and archives who are interested in research that informs policy-making, decision-making, and best practices." The seminar's schedule is full of exciting offerings, ranging from archives and librarianship in the age of Web2.0 to information dissemination through graphic novels. One featured speaker, Anne S. MacLeod, will offer a presentation on modern art influences found in picture books for children.

How does this conference relate to Carmichael Library? Recently, I was fortunate enough to receive a fellowship to attend. From October 6th-9th, I plan to sit in on many of these presentations and hope to be inspired to broaden my own research activities and forge stronger connections with Montevallo's research community. Over the next two weeks, I'll use this blog to share my LRS-V thoughts and experiences.

I also encourage you to take a few moments and check out these related blog posts.

The New England Journal of Medicine

2010-09-23T13:50:00.003-05:00

The New England Journal of Medicine has provided free electronic access to their content, back to the first article in the year 1812. According to their website:

"The more recent part of the archive from 1945 through 1989 is presented in an HTML format similar to that used for current issues, with full text, tables and figures, PDFs, and tables of contents. The older archive from 1812 through 1944 contains tables of contents plus PDFs of individual articles. The entire archive is fully searchable. This is possible because every page of the Journal was first scanned, using high-resolution technology to produce PDF files, which were then read, using optical character recognition, to produce the HTML. Tagging and indexing according to specialty were done by computer algorithm and Medline tags as far back as they were available. These processes are not perfect, and readers may find some errors that have been missed, especially in the older content. The entire archive consists of 8498 issues with 486,434 pages and 145,969 articles with 75,649 images.

Click here to have a look at the index.

Coffee Shop Opening!

2010-09-23T13:10:00.004-05:00

Carmichael Library's Coffee Shop, Ollie's Simply To Go Café, will open on Friday, September 24, at 9 a.m.!

Hispanic Heritage Month 2010

2010-09-14T11:04:00.006-05:00

September 15^th marks the start of Hispanic Heritage Month. This national observance began in September 1968, when Congress authorized President Lyndon B. Johnson to proclaim National Hispanic Heritage Week. In 1988, President Ronald Reagan expanded the observance into a monthlong celebration taking place between September 15^th and October 15^th.

I have long wondered why this observance begins in the middle of a month and runs through the middle of the next month. September 15^th was chosen as the starting point for the celebration because it is the anniversary of independence of five Latin American countries: Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. Additionally, two more countries celebrate their independence around the same time. Mexico celebrates its independence on September 16^th and September 18^th marks the date of Chilean independence.

We've selected a few websites and reference materials from the Carmichael collection to recognize this national observance.

Reference Works

Lehman, Jeffrey. Gale Encyclopedia of Multicultural America. Detroit: Gale, 2000. Ref. E184.A1 G14 2000
Meier, Matt S. and Margo Gutiérrez. The Mexican American Experience: An Encyclopedia. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2003. Ref. E184 .M5 M4535 2003
Meyer, Nicholas E. Biographical Dictionary of Hispanic Americans. New York: Checkmark Books, 2001. Ref. E184.S75 M49 2001
Navarro, Sharon Ann and Armando Xavier Mejia, eds. Latino Americans and Political Participation: A Reference Handbook. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2004. Ref. E184.S75 L3557 2004
Oboler, Suzanne and Deena J. González, eds. The Oxford Encyclopedia of Latinos and Latinas in the United States. New York: Oxford UP, 2005. Ref. E184.S75 O97 2005
Stavans, Ilan, and Harold Augenbraum, eds. Encyclopedia Latina: History, Culture, and Society in the United States. Danbury, CT: Grolier Academic Reference, 2005. Ref. E184.S75 E587 2005

Web Sites

Hispanic Heritage Cultural Tour - From the Smithsonian Institution, an exploration of historic pieces in the museum collection plus quizzes and activities
Hispanic Heritage in the Americas - An Encyclopedia Brittanica collection of biographies, speeches, images, and other documents
Hispanic Heritage Month on Biography.com - Featured biographies, photos, a trivia game, and more
National Hispanic Heritage Month - Hosted by the Library of Congress, this site links to audio, video, and historic documents

Photo credit: "Mexican Independence Day celebration, La Habra, (Sept. 16) 1920s."
Photo courtesy of Orange County Archives. Creative Commons license.

Announcing the 2011 Book Review Competition

2010-09-13T08:29:00.003-05:00

Enter the annual Book Review Competition!

Deadline: February 15, 2011
Winners will be announced on Honors Day, April 13, 2011

September 7, 2010 marked the start of the 2011 Carmichael Library Book Review Competition. The Competition was established in 1982 to foster student interest in critically reading and evaluating a recent work of fiction or non-fiction. Winners of the competition receive an award certificate with a monetary prize, and they are recognized at the Honors Day ceremony in the spring.

For full details on competition rules, check out our Book Review Competition web page. Happy reading and good luck!

An Evening of Montevallo History

2010-09-08T11:23:00.007-05:00

Eclipse Coffee & Books will host Montevallo Memories on Thursday, September 9th from 6:00 to 7:30 p.m. To celebrate the re-release of Eloise Meroney’s Montevallo: The First One Hundred Years, Dr. Mike Mahan will serve as the moderator of a panel of long-time Montevallo denizens who will share their memories of their home town. Audience members are invited to share their memories as well or ask questions of the panelists. Speakers will include Carmichael Library's own Barbara Belisle, as well as J. A. Brown, John Kirby and Bill Plott. Copies of the Meroney book will be available with proceeds to benefit the Montevallo Historical Society.

Also, if local history is your thing you won't want to miss the current gallery exhibit at Parnell Memorial Library, Montevallo Downtown "Over the Years." The exhibit is curated by Becky Bolton Crisswell and will remain on display through October 20^th.

Heatherly, Jones Profiled in UM Research Publication

2010-08-31T13:57:00.001-05:00

Photo by Matt Orton

Congratulations to our own Carey Heatherly, who was profiled in the latest edition of Pathways to Discovery. Produced annually by the Division of Academic Affairs and the Public Relations Office, Pathways highlights the scholarly achievements of the faculty and students at the University of Montevallo.

In this third edition of UM's campus research publication, Carey's profile highlights his work in the University Archives. He discusses his interest in campus history, specifically the life and career of Captain Henry Clay Reynolds, the first president of the Alabama Girls' Industrial School (now the University of Montevallo.) He also talks about his current project with Dr. Clark Hultquist on a photographic history book of Montevallo.

Also appearing in this edition of Pathways is Carmichael Circulation Desk Assistant Mercedes Jones. Readers of this blog will know that the Guntersville native traveled to Brazil this past year. Mercedes presented her research into Brazilian art and history at the National Conference of Undergraduate Research in April.

Congratulations to all of Montevallo's student and faculty scholars!

Welcome Back!

2010-08-30T08:10:00.003-05:00

The new academic year is underway, and it's bringing a number of exciting changes to Carmichael Library. The Computer Lab has moved out of the room it had been in on the ground floor, and it's now much more accessible to students. Instead of showing a student ID card, students will now log in to use these computers. The Lab Assistants will be happy to help you if you have any problems using the computers.

The Learning Enrichment Center is also on the ground floor, immediately to your right as you come off the elevator. Check in here is you are looking for tutoring or other help with your classes.

The University Archives will be moving from the small space it had occupied into the former computer lab space. This will give us much more space to house this important collection, and it gives us a space where we can better control the temperature and humidity to help preserve the materials. We hope to have that move completed by the end of the Fall Semester.

Finally, coffee is coming to the library! We hope to be opening a coffee shop, in cooperation with Sodexo, on the main floor of the building to your left as you enter the building. More details on this project are coming soon.

STAT-USA database is closing its doors.

2010-08-02T13:31:00.006-05:00

After more than 25 years of operation, STAT-USA is closing its doors. Service will cease September 30, 2010. Access to government information from STAT-USA is a key source of current economic and trade information from many government agencies. Whenever possible, the Library will provide new links to source agency websites for all data series in STAT-USA. If you have any questions please contact Kathleen Lowe, Reference and Instruction Librarian, 665-6109.

Librarian of Congress announces six classes of works exempt from digital copyright

2010-07-27T09:45:00.007-05:00

The Librarian of Congress has announced the classes of works subject to the exemption from the prohibition against circumvention of technological measures that control access to copyrighted works. Persons making noninfringing uses of the following six classes of works will not be subject to the prohibition against circumventing access controls (17 U.S.C. § 1201(a)(1)) until the conclusion of the next rulemaking. According to Nate Anderson of ars technica, "This time, the Library went (comparatively) nuts, allowing widespread bypassing of the CSS encryption on DVDs, declaring iPhone jailbreaking to be "fair use," and letting consumers crack their legally purchased e-books in order to have them read aloud by computers."

The Nation's Largest Libraries by number of volumes

2010-07-09T14:18:00.006-05:00

The American Library Association recently released an updated fact sheet listing the 100 largest libraries in the United States by volumes held.

The Top Five include: The Library of Congress, Harvard University, Boston Public, Yale University, and University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Auburn University at number 95 is the only Alabama library to make the top 100.

July 4th Holiday

2010-07-01T10:33:00.007-05:00

Carmichael Library will be closed Friday, July 2nd through Monday, July 5th for
Independence Day. We will reopen Tuesday at 8:00am.

Creative Commons image, taken by NightRPStar:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ninjanoodles/69744905/

New Audio Books for June 2010

2010-06-08T15:19:00.005-05:00

Every now and then we like to list some of the recent additions to our downloadable audio book collection. Here are a few items we've added to the Carmichael catalog this week.

7 Lessons for Leading in Crisis, by Bill George.

With straight talk and clear directions, George shows listeners specifically what they must do to become strong leaders and survive any crisis. His seven lessons include Face Reality, Starting with Yourself; Never Waste a Good Crisis; and Be Aggressive: This Is Your Best Chance to Win in the Market.

Angel's Peak, by Robyn Carr.

Four years ago Sean and Franci broke up when he refused to commit. Now vacationing in Virgin River, Sean is shocked to run across Franci again. He's grown up and wants to give things another shot, but she can't afford to have him break her heart again.

Every Man Dies Alone, by Hans Fallada, translated by Michael Hofmann.

Based on a true story, Fallada tells of a German couple who try to start an uprising by distributing anti-fascist postcards during WWII. But their dream ultimately proves perilous under the tyranny that dominates every corner of Hitler's Germany.

Murder in the Marais, by Cara Black.

Sleuth and computer expert Aimée Leduc, a Franco-American, hunts for neo-Nazis in Paris following the murder of a Jewish woman. As part of her investigation she becomes involved with an Aryan supremacist. First in a projected series.

The Second Husband, by Louise Candlish.

Kate divorces Alistair after 10 years of marriage, swearing off relationships altogether. But that was before she rented the extra space in her flat to the charming Davis Calder, who soon endears himself to Kate and her teenage daughter Roxy. Now married again and fresh off her honeymoon, Kate discovers a shocking secret about Davis and her daughter.

The Secret of Shelter Island: Money and What Matters, by Alexander Green.

Green shows listeners how to face down tough economic times. During this time of uncertainty, Green says it is imperative to reassess our goals and priorities. This is, however, merely the first step in Green's comprehensive four-step program for achieving wealth in any economic climate.

Zen and the Art of Vampires, by Katie MacAlister.

While on a singles tour of Europe, Seattle's own Pia Thomason is looking for a man and trying not to think about her 40th birthday. Too bad her choice of suitors is less than appealing. But when she meets two mysterious strangers in Iceland, Pia becomes immersed in an undead love affair.

The Carmichael collection of downloadable audio now includes over 2,650 titles available to all UM students, staff, and faculty. Instructions on how to access the audio books are available on our website. Happy listening!

State of Alabama Gulf Oil Spill Information

2010-06-04T07:01:00.006-05:00

Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill Information from the Office of Governor Riley
BP issued phone numbers for the following response inquiries:
To report oiled wildlife, please call 1-866-557-1401 and leave a message. Messages will be checked hourly.

To discuss spill related damage, please call 1-800-440-0858.

To report oiled shoreline or request volunteer information, please call 1-866-448-5816.

Press Releases include information about SBA assistance, instructions for applying for oil clean-up jobs, and DIR satellite office locations opened along the Alabama Gulf Coast to assist displaced workers.

Official Deepwater Horizon Unified Command

2010-06-03T13:09:00.005-05:00

A Unified Command has been established to manage response operations to the April 20, 2010 “Deepwater Horizon” incident. A Unified Command links the organizations responding to an incident and provides a forum for those organizations to make consensus decisions. This site is maintained by the Unified Command’s Joint Information Center (JIC), which provides the public with reliable, timely information about the response.

Deepwater Horizon Oil spill information for Alabamians

2010-06-03T10:24:00.011-05:00

The Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium and its partners will host three community forums to help provide answers to the public’s questions about the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

A forum will take place from 9 a.m. to noon on Wednesday, June 2, at the Mississippi Coast Coliseum and Convention Center, 2350 Beach Blvd., in Biloxi. Forums will take place also at the Mobile Civic Center in Mobile, Ala., from 6-9 p.m. on June 2 and from 9 a.m. until noon on June 3.

Representatives from state resource agencies, the Small Business Administration (SBA), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and others have been invited to answer questions and share information about the situation in the Gulf. Topics will include seafood safety, oil impacts on habitats, dispersants and human health, business and personal finance, coping with a technological disaster and legal perspectives.

2010 Primary Election Info at AlabamaVotes.gov

2010-06-01T08:22:00.007-05:00

Today marks the date of Alabama's statewide primary election. Complete information on today's elections can be found at AlabamaVotes.gov. This website has a number of tools to assist voters. Among the things one can do at AlabamaVotes:

Find your polling place
Check your registration status - - make sure you're already registered to vote!
Study a sample ballot for your county
Download a mail-in voter registration form
Obtain information on military and overseas voting

In May, we posted some of the important dates for Alabama's 2010 elections. If you're unable to vote today you may still participate in November's general election. Remember that state law requires voters to register ten days before a voting day.

Polls opened at 7:00 a.m. today and will be open until 7:00 p.m. across the state. Be sure to get out to the polls and exercise your right to vote!

Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan

2010-05-12T08:19:00.002-05:00

If you are interested in the Supreme Court of the United States and current nominee, Elena Kagan, check out this resource from the Law Library of Congress.

Harbert Writing Center May 2010 Hours

2010-05-10T14:06:00.002-05:00

The Harbert Writing Center is open from 10:00 a. m. - 2:00 p. m. during May Term.

HWC Writing Consultants have been trained to help students with writing projects at all stages of the writing process, from brainstorming through editing.

The Center is located in Comer Hall, room 311. Consulting sessions are available on a walk-in basis.

Information on 2010 Primary Elections

2010-05-05T09:50:00.006-05:00

The Shelby County Reporter has produced an 2010 Election Guide that is included with this week's newspaper. The so-called "mid-term" elections are important: all seven of Alabama's U.S. House seats are on the ballot, as well as a U.S. Senate seat. Alabama will choose its next governor in 2010 and citizens will evaluate dozens of candidates vying for statewide office. In addition to a list of all of the candidates on the June ballot the Guide contains other helpful information for voters, including this list of important dates:

Friday, May 21 - Last day to register to vote in primary
Tuesday, June 1 - Primary election
Tuesday, July 13 - Primary runoff election
Friday, October 22 - Last day to register to vote for general election
Tuesday, November 2 - General election

In addition to the above dates, you'll want to be aware of deadlines for applying for and postmarking absentee ballots. To get a copy of the voter registration form or to get the answers to questions about elections you may visit AlabamaVotes.gov, the state of Alabama's official online election center.

Classical Music Library Streaming Audio Now in Catalog

2010-04-30T14:32:00.000-05:00

We're excited to announce a new service today. The Carmichael catalog is now loaded with records that link to individual streaming audio recordings in Classical Music Library. We now have over 2,700 of these in the catalog and this number will only grow as we get more records from the publisher of this database.

The simplest way to find all of these records is to launch a series search for Classical Music Library, but a better way to find these tracks is to use the "musical sound recordings" limiter with a search. The results include streaming audio from Classical Music Library and items from the Music CD collection housed here in Carmichael.

Another feature that I like is the persistent linking to individual albums within the Classical Music Library database. These links, along with the ability to create playlists, give you the ability to return to the same pieces without having to repeat your searches.

We hope you enjoy this new cataloging service! You may direct any questions or comments to me at cooperjd(at)montevallo.edu or (205) 665-6114. We look forward to getting your feedback.

Student Art Exhibition Through May 7

2010-04-29T18:45:00.014-05:00

Don't miss our display of student art on the main floor of Carmichael Hall. Now in the library lobby you'll find paintings by the students of Prof. Misty Bennett's ART 429: Narrative Painting class. These pieces were produced in conjunction with our SLEDGEHAMMER: Recollections of E. B. Sledge program that took place last week.

As a part of the celebration of the life and career of Dr. Sledge, Bennett’s Narrative Painting class was given the assignment of creating paintings that tell a story about war for exhibition in Carmichael Library. Though Dr. Sledge famously fought in World War II, the assignment was open to any kind of war throughout history and any kind of personal experience the students may have with war that they wanted to explore in their work.

Participating students include Maggie Blevins, Leslie Carver, Allison Cleveland, Lindsay Dyess, Courtney Harper, Ian Heil, Anna Humphreys, Ryan Moody, Sarah Morriss, Oriana Padron, Jaimi Poole, Danielle Robinson, Austin Self, and Megan Scofield.

Congratulations to Megan Scofield for her winning diptych (located on the South Wall of the Main Floor.) Megan took Best of Show for her work, which deals with some of the iconic imagery of war propaganda. We in the library especially enjoyed her ominous portrayal of Uncle Sam in the above painting.

We also have the pieces produced by our student artists and poets for our recent Prints and Poems event. This year marks the fourth time we've hosted Prints and Poems, and we're thrilled to make it a part of our annual recognition of National Poetry Month. Prints and Poems is an on-going collaborative project between the Departments of English and Art at the University of Montevallo. In the 2009-2010 edition, students from Prof. Scott Stephens’s advanced printmaking class produced original prints that students from Prof. Jim Murphy’s creative writing class responded to. Here is a list of our poets and artists:

Print: untitled, a photo-etching/collage by West Finlayson - Poem: When Pigs Play Chess, by Danielle Robinson

Print: Untitled, an etching by Rachel Fowler - Poem: Playtime, by Teresa A. Whiting

Print: Artes in Allegretto, etching and chine collé by Tenisha Hicks - Poem: Glib, by Sarah Etheridge

Print: Iaido, relief printed etching by Sarah Morriss - Poem: Iaido, by Michael-Paul Smith

Print: “Eek!” Etching by Alana Palermo - Poem: The Lighthouse After Eek, by Matt Goethe

Print: untitled, an inkless embossing by Kyle Reed - Poem: Tangibility in Invisibility, by Charles Trey Stallworth

Print: Self-Portrait, an etching by Kelsey Roberts - Poem: Totems, an ekphrastic poem by Rosie Maguire

Print: untitled, an etching by Marie Smyly - Poem: Of What Remains, by Faiza Malik

Print: untitled, a photo-etching by Scott Stephens - Poem: Vessels, by Jim Murphy

You can see all of these works in the library through Friday, May 7^th. Also, check our Facebook and Flickr for more photos of these pieces.

Photos by Joel Bullock and Jason Cooper

Extended Hours for Spring 2010

2010-04-26T08:59:00.005-05:00

It's that time of the year again! Finals Week is nearly upon us and your campus library is keeping the doors open late. We'll be open until midnight for the next four nights. We'll also be here late next week during final exams.

Monday, April 26 8:00 a.m. - 12:00 a.m.
Tuesday, April 27 8:00 a.m. – 12:00 a.m.
Wednesday, April 28 8:00 a.m. – 12:00 a.m.
Thursday, April 29 8:00 a.m. – 12:00 a.m.
Friday, April 30 8:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.
Saturday, May 1 10:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.
Sunday, May 2 2:00 p.m. – 2:00 a.m.
Monday, May 3 8:00 a.m. – 2:00 a.m.
Tuesday, May 4 8:00 a.m. – 2:00 a.m.
Wednesday, May 5 8:00 a.m. – 2:00 a.m.
Thursday, May 6 8:00 a.m. – 12:00 a.m.
Friday, May 7 8:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.
Saturday, May 8 Closed
Sunday, May 9 Closed

Good luck to all students as we near the end of the semester!

Photo credit: Creative Commons license

Announcing the 2010 Book Review Competition Winners

2010-04-21T13:53:00.004-05:00

On this Honors Day the library wishes to recognize the following students for their winning book reviews:

Division I (Freshmen) Winners

Brittany Cash
Darla Allen
Janet Bermudez
Devon Edwards

Division I Honorable Mentions

Dani Swift
Emily Yundt

Division II (All Students) Winner for Best Review of a Non-fiction Work

Charlie Foster

Division II Winner for Best Review of a Work of Fiction

Heather Belles

Congratulations, students!

Sledgehammer: Recollections of E.B. Sledge

2010-04-19T11:28:00.006-05:00

The University of Montevallo and Carmichael Library wants to welcome everyone to a special event tonight at Parnell Memorial Library, 7:00 p.m.

E.B. Sledge was a University of Montevallo biology professor whose remarkable World War II memoir With the Old Breed has been acclaimed by such luminaries as Stephen Ambrose, Ken Burns, John Keegan, and Paul Fussell as the best war memoir ever written by an enlisted man. His book, an account of the battles in Peleliu and Okinawa, along with Robert Leckie’s Helmet for My Pillow, form the basis for the current HBO series The Pacific.

Please join us for a discussion on personal experience and its portrayal in life histories, formal histories, and community memory as evidenced in E. B. Sledge’s With the Old Breed and the book's use as a source today through the History Channel, Ken Burn’s The War and most recently HBO’s The Pacific.

The evening will include a performance by the University of Montevallo Chamber Singers and discussion moderated by Clark Hultquist (history professor) Ruth Truss (history professor), Jim Day (history professor) and Kouri Allen (UM graduate student) with special guest Henry Sledge (son of Dr. Sledge).

Misty Bennett's Narrative Painting class has a war-themed installation on the main floor of Carmichael Library. Please drop in before the end of the semester to see these beautiful student paintings!

Prints and Poems 2010

2010-04-13T16:02:00.004-05:00

This month will see the return of Prints and Poems to Carmichael Library. This collaboration between UM's student writers and artists has always been a popular event and we hope to see you here.

Prints and Poems will feature the creative work of Scott Stephens' Art 330: Advanced Printmaking, Etching class from Fall 2009 and Jim Murphy's English 461: Advanced Creative Writing — Poetry class from Spring 2010

Prints and Poems will take place on the second (top) floor of the library on Thursday, April 15th at 4:00 p.m.

Related on Carmichael Blog:

Prints and Poems 2007 Announcement, Photos

April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month

2010-04-12T12:42:00.002-05:00

The following information is from the UM Counseling and Career Center:

April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month...

The Counseling and Career Center will be engaged in initiatives on campus to raise awareness about sexual violence and promote prevention.

April 19-22 the Counseling and Career Center will be partnering with Housing and Residence Life to provide nightly programming to promote awareness. The programs are open to the UM community and will take place at the following dates, times, and locations:

April 19th - 7:00 p.m. in the Main Hall TV Room
April 20th - 7:00 p.m. in the Hanson Hall Parlor
April 21st - 7:00 p.m. in the New Hall Classroom
April 22nd - 6:00 p.m. in the Brooke Hall Parlor

April 19th and 20th from 11-1, the Counseling and Career Center and SafeHouse of Shelby County are partnering to host an information table in the cafeteria. Teal ribbons will be provided to promote Sexual Assault Awareness. We will also be promoting a white ribbon campaign where men can pledge to work to end violence against women.

For more information about sexual violence and sexual violence prevention please see the following links:
Rape Abuse & Incest National Network
The Crisis Center
SafeHouse of Shelby County
Alabama Coalition Against Rape
National Sexual Violence Resource Center

Thanks to the Counseling and Career Center for putting together a display, which you may view on the library's second floor. This exhibit includes books and other resources to raise awareness about this important issue.

Happy National Library Week!

2010-04-12T09:23:00.003-05:00

Public, school, academic and special libraries make a difference to millions of Americans, today more than ever. National Library Week is April 11-17.

First sponsored in 1958, National Library Week is a national observance sponsored by the American Library Association (ALA) and libraries across the country each April.

Celebrate National Library Week today by visiting your campus library - in person or online and discover how communities thrive @ your library.

On the Web:

National Library Week - A Philatelic Tribute - A great history page about NLW from The Library History Buff

WWII and Montevallo

2010-03-31T15:43:00.013-05:00

World War II has descended on Montevallo this spring. At the beginning of March, Jason Cooper posted a blog titled Women's History: The Original Flygirls. Jason's entry highlights a piece that aired on NPR's Morning Edition about WASP, Women Airforce Service Pilots.

On April 19th, we will pay tribute to UM Professor of Biology and author, E. B. Sledge. The event will be held at Parnell Memorial Library in Montevallo. Dr. Sledge's book With the Old Breed is considered by many to be one of the finest war memoirs ever published. The book is used heavily by researchers and serves as a major foundation piece for HBO's miniseries The Pacific.

UM's History Department offers many classes that focus on World War II subject matter and this semester is no exception. Two of these courses are Dr. Ruth Truss' History 481/581 "The United States 1900-1945" and Dr. Clark Hultquist's History 411/511
"Europe 1914-1945.

Finally, UM's University Archives and Special Collections contains a small, but interesting group of WWII materials. Located primarily in the Helen Parrish Collection and the Presidential Papers of Dr. Arthur Fort Harman, the items offer a real sense of what the home front was like during the war years. Harman's Papers contain documents and letters about salvaging items and donating them to the war effort. Scrap paper and tin were highly sought after material. Items in the Helen Parrish Collection include personal correspondence with soldiers stationed in Europe, a piece of Vmail, and war ration booklets (with some stamps still intact). Helen was a student and employee at Alabama College, in the 1940s, and her keepsakes were part of a recent donation to our Archives.

Special thanks to Jamie Rawls for processing the Helen Parrish Collection and to Dallas Hanbury and Kathy Ratcliffe for their research on this project. Also thanks to Hunter Tinsley and Joel Bullock for their digital image work.

April 1st is Census Day

2010-03-31T08:56:00.005-05:00

Tomorrow, April 1^st, marks Census Day. This is the day that the Census Bureau hopes to have all surveys completed and in the mail.

According to the Montevallo Chamber of Commerce, each person counted is equivalent to more than $1700 in funding for Montevallo's local government, schools, libraries, and more. And here's another reason to send in your form: due to the cost of training census takers* the Census Bureau estimates that it would save $1.5 billion if 100 percent of households mailed them in.

As of today, 50 percent of Census forms have been returned nationally. Alabama lags slightly behind that rate of return at 48 percent. You can track your own town's participation rate from the Census Bureau's Take 10 Map page.

If you haven't already done so, take ten minutes today to complete your survey and send it in. As the Census Bureau says, "we can't move forward until you mail it back."

* Also known as enumerators! I love that word.

2010 Women's History Makers Breakfast

2010-03-29T12:19:00.008-05:00

The 2010 Women’s History Makers Breakfast will take place tomorrow, March 30^th from 8:30 to 9:30 a.m. in the Montevallo Room of the Anna Irving Dining Hall. Tickets are required but free and can be picked up from the Office of Multicultural Affairs (6023). Deadline for ticket pickup is March 29th by 5:00 p.m.

Three women will be honored tomorrow morning including Carmichael Library's own Barbara Belisle. The 2010 Women’s History Makers Breakfast honorees are:

Dr. Judy Merritt
Jefferson State Community College
On December 1, 1979, Judy was appointed President of Jefferson State Community College. This appointment marked the first time a woman had been appointed as president of a two-year college in Alabama.

Barbara Belisle
University of Montevallo
On the first day of classes in 1967, Barbara Belisle walked into Montevallo High School; the first African American to teach there.

Alyce Manley Spruell
Spruell and Powell, LLC
Alyce Manley Spruell is the 2009-2010 President Elect of the Alabama State Bar and will be the first woman to head the state bar

For more information contact Robert L. Robinson, Coordinator of Multicultural Affairs by phone at 6023, or by e-mail at robinsonrl@montevallo.edu.

University of Montevallo MBA Program is official

2010-03-12T10:30:00.002-06:00

The Alabama Commission on Higher Education (ACHE) Friday morning, March 12 approved UM's proposal for a master of business administration degree. The MBA will be offered by the Stephens College of Business beginning this fall.

More information

Library Catalog is Now Available

2010-03-11T16:47:00.003-06:00

Maintenance on the library catalog is complete. The catalog will be available tonight, tomorrow, and into the Spring Break.

2-1-1 Connects Alabama

2010-03-11T10:00:00.003-06:00

What is 2-1-1 Connects Alabama?

Are you facing difficult times and don’t know where to turn? Are you looking for help with everyday needs? Are you wanting to volunteer? Dialing 2-1-1 is your first step. 2-1-1 is a free, easy to remember number to dial for information about health and human service organizations in your community. By dialing 2-1-1, information is much easier to find.

At 2-1-1 Connects Alabama , you will speak with a real person every time. Call Specialists will assess your needs, help to problem solve and refer you to community-based organizations, government programs, support groups, and other local resources that can help. 2-1-1 Connects Alabama is:

A local call from anywhere in Alabama.
Confidential telephone assistance.
Available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week
Access for persons who have special needs.
Accurate information about community resources in Alabama.

Women's History: The Original Fly Girls

2010-03-09T10:43:00.009-06:00

"Female WWII Pilots: The Original Fly Girls."

Susan Stamberg of National Public Radio's Morning Edition read an excellent piece on the brave women who flew planes for the United States during World War II. The group of female pilots was called the Women Airforce Service Pilots, or WASP. While women were not allowed to serve in combat roles, 38 of these pilots lost their lives in the service of their country.

NPR highlights the tragic death of 26-year-old Mabel Rawlinson, who lost her life in a training accident. Because she was not technically a member of the military, the government was not required to pay for her burial costs. Also, the American flag was not supposed to be draped across her coffin. (Mabel's fellow WASPs pitched in to provide an honorable burial service and her family draped their lost one with the flag anyway.) These stories were common during this period.

At the start of the WASP program in 1942 the commanding general of the U.S. Army Air Forces, Henry "Hap" Arnold, stated that he was unsure "whether a slip of a girl could fight the controls of a B-17 in heavy weather." Such was the competence and bravery of this group of women that Arnold declared two years later that "it is on the record that women can fly as well as men."

The pilots weren't granted military status until the 1970s. Tomorrow, 65 years after their service, the WASP will receive the highest civilian honor given by the United States Congress. Last July, President Obama signed a bill awarding the WASP the Congressional Gold Medal. The ceremony will take place on Capitol Hill.

Related on Carmichael Blog:

Women's History Month 2008 post - Includes a bibliography and several external Web links.

Photo credit: Helen Abell, a student of the Springfield Aviation Company and later a member of the WASP. Photo uploaded by the Lincoln Library, Springfield, Illinois as part of the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) Digital Collections and Content (DCC).

Carmichael Switches to E-mail Notices

2010-03-08T10:40:00.004-06:00

You've been asking for it, and we've been working on it. Starting last week, the library has been sending e-mail notifications to most members of the UM community. This includes overdue notices, recall notifications, and more. The change is part of the library's commitment to more sustainable operations. As you can see above, the traditional method of generating notices used a lot of paper!

UM students, staff, and faculty will see library notifications appear in their ForUM email account. Notices generated after the spring term ends, in early May, will be mailed to students' permanent physical addresses.

Photo by Joel Bullock.

Catalog to Be Unavailable March 11-12

2010-03-07T17:52:00.002-06:00

Our catalog will be unavailable this coming Thursday, March 11th for planned system work. This outage is expected to continue through Friday, March 12th. For these two days, we will still have access to some holdings information on WorldCat. Feel free to contact us should you need assistance searching for items on those days. We'll post here once the system is again available.

UM Board names Montevallo's 15th president

2010-03-04T11:47:00.004-06:00

The University of Montevallo Board of Trustees selected Dr. John W. Stewart III as the University’s 15th president at a special meeting of the trustees this afternoon. Dr. Stewart is vice president for institutional advancement at Flagler College in St. Augustine, Fla. He will take over as president of the University of Montevallo Aug. 1.

George Walker, chairman of the Montevallo Board of Trustees, said: “We are extremely pleased to announce the selection of Dr. Stewart to lead the University in these challenging times. He has expressed and has demonstrated his commitment to the important mission of the University, which is to provide students from throughout the state an affordable, geographically accessible, ‘small college’ public higher educational experience of high quality with a strong emphasis on undergraduate liberal studies and with professional programs supported by a broad base of arts and sciences.”

Walker expressed his hope that the students, faculty, staff, alumni, and friends of the University will join the trustees in welcoming Dr. Stewart to Montevallo and in supporting him as he leads the University and carries on its tradition as Alabama’s public liberal arts university.

Dr. Stewart was selected as vice president for institutional advancement at Flagler in 2005. He previously served as vice president for development at William Carey University in Hattiesburg, Miss.

He brings a unique mix of experience to Montevallo, including marketing, fundraising and even teaching. He received a doctorate in English with a focus on African/Caribbean and Harlem Renaissance literature from the University of Southern Mississippi. He also has an M.A. in English from Washington College in Chestertown, Md., and a B.A. in history from Wake Forest University.

His credentials also include service as director of capital giving at Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania and as director of major gifts and director of development operations at USM.

Earlier in his career, he held a number of administrative and academic positions at William Carey, beginning there in 1997.

Dr. Stewart was marketing representative and project manager for J.W. Stewart Inc. Industrial Contractors in Delaware from 1983-1997. He was vice president of operations and business development for the company from 1990-1997.

A frequent speaker at conferences, Dr. Stewart has published scholarly articles and book reviews. Recipient of a number of awards and honors during his career, he was selected as the Mississippi Humanities Council/William Carey University Co-Professor of the Year. He has held leadership roles in a number of community and arts organizations, including the Small Business Development Committee in Hattiesburg, United Way and the Florida Ballet.

Toni Morrison and Mark Twain: The Black and White Of It

2010-02-24T15:35:00.005-06:00

Alabama Humanities Foundation Scholar, Dr. Elaine Hughes, will speak Thursday, Feb. 25, at 7 p.m., at the Parnell Memorial Library in Montevallo. Hughes’s presentation will explore important parallels in the works of two important American authors and social critics: Mark Twain and Toni Morrison. According to Hughes, “Though writing a century apart, Mark Twain and Toni Morrison have dared to explore in their fiction the great truths underlying their cultures’ espoused attitudes and beliefs. From Twain’s indictment of the hypocrisy of the 19th Century to Morrison’s examination of contemporary society’s duality, their voices have provided readers penetrating portrayals of their fellow countrymen. An examination of the historical, political and biographical contexts of major works by these authors reveals the parallels in their social criticism—of the post-Civil-War era and the post-Civil-Rights period in America. ‘Morrison and Twain: The Black and White of It’ is a presentation that attempts to put before an audience those questions about ourselves that we have difficulty confronting: our beliefs, our prejudices, our fears. Through examination of works by two major American writers—writing during tumultuous times in our country—we can understand those elements in our society that shape us and perhaps seek a better understanding of ourselves. Racism was at the root of the problems resulting from slavery; racism remains today at the root of many of our social problems. Literature can provide the vehicle by which each of us, and thus our society, can make that painful journey to self understanding.”

For the past 35 years, Hughes has been a professor of American literature at the University of Montevallo, with a specialty in contemporary literature. She has taught both undergraduate and graduate courses in Southern literature and in Alabama literature. She has delivered more than 200 lectures to varied audiences—from high-school honors students to retirees in UAB’s New Horizons—in many locations. In 1998-1999, she received the Carnegie Foundation CASE Professor of the Year Award for Alabama and was the 2007 Recipient of the Eugene Current-Garcia Distinguished Scholar Award. Hughes has been involved with the Alabama Humanities Foundation since 1978 and chaired the board of directors from 2004-2006. She holds the honor of professor emerita from the University of Montevallo.

Barbara Belisle, Mary Jo Buff, Lelia Mitchell, Robin Norsworthy, Mary Lou Williams, and Thomasyne Hill Smith will read from American authors Toni Morrison and Mark Twain. Event sponsors are the Montevallo Branch of AAUW, Alabama Humanities Foundation, and Parnell Memorial Library. All are welcome.