November 5th Program, “Does Liberty Have a Future? Autonomy and Biotechnology”

Dr. Peter Lawler, political scientist and former member of President George W. Bush’s Council on Bioethics, will present “Does Liberty Have a Future? Autonomy and Biotechnology.” This program, sponsored by the University of West Georgia’s Department of Political Science and Planning, will be on Thursday, November 5th, at 12:30 p.m. at Ingram Library.

In his presentation, Dr. Lawler will explore the impact of the modern biotechnological revolution on humanity and express his concern that it presents one of the greatest threats to liberty.  The victories won on behalf of the modern individual, he says, “will probably be at the expense of  . . . love, family, friends, country, virtue, art, [and] spiritual life.”

Peter Lawler is Dana Professor of Political Science in the Department of Government and International Studies at Berry College and is executive editor of the acclaimed quarterly journal Perspectives on Political Science.  Dr. Lawler also serves on the editorial board of the new bilingual critical edition of Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy in America.

Dr. Lawler has written or edited ten books.  His latest, published in July 2007, is Homeless and at Home in America: Evidence for the Dignity of the Human Soul in Our Time and Place. His American Political Rhetoric (edited with UWG professor Robert Schaefer) is used in introductory American government courses at many colleges and universities.

For further information, contact Dr. Schaefer at rschaefe@westga.edu.

Professor Susan Smith, Associate Director of University Libraries, retires October 1

When Susan Smith (then Susan Austin) began working for West Georgia’s library in 1965, she was a seventeen-year-old freshman and the library was located in Sanford Hall on Front Campus Drive.  In her role as a student worker, she helped at the circulation desk where Lady Chatterley’s Lover was kept only on reserve, copied items for patrons in the years before self-service duplication, and typed purchase orders even though she really didn’t know how to type.  One summer she was hired to work forty hours a week as the periodical room clerk.  In 1968, Susan moved with the library to its present location.  

 In 1976, Susan returned to the West Georgia library with a Master’s in Library Studies.  She was initially hired as the interlibrary/map librarian and through the years moved to reference, the archives, serials, government documents, and acquisitions.  In March 2007, Susan was named Associate Director of the Library. 

From entry as a freshman in 1965 to her retirement at the end of this month, Susan has travelled with the University of West Georgia through forty-four years of its history.

Poet Yusef Komunyakaa to Read at the UWG

Pulitzer Prize-Winning Poet to Read at the University of West Georgia

Yusef Komunyakaa, a Pulitzer Prize-winner for poetry, will read from his work on Wednesday, September 30, 7:30 p.m., in the Campus Center Ballroom at the University of West Georgia.

Born Joseph Brown in 1947 in Bogalusa, Louisiana, Komunyakaa assumed the name of his grandfather, a Trinidad émigré to the United States. He served in the army from 1969 to 1970 as a correspondent and managing editor of the Southern Cross during the Vietnam war, and earned a Bronze Star. He is the author of numerous books of poems, including Copacetic, Dien Cau Dau, Neon Vernacular, Talking Dirty to the Gods, and Pleasure Dome. His most recent collection, Warhorses, was released by Farrar, Straus, and Giroux in September, 2008.

Komunyakaa is widely celebrated for his poems on the Vietnam war, as well as for his writings devoted to, and inspired by, jazz. With Sascha Feinstein, he co-edited The Jazz Poetry Anthology and has collaborated with composers and jazz musicians in many recordings and performances. Aside from winning the Pulitzer Prize for Neon Vernacular, Komunyakaa has also been awarded the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award, the William Faulkner Prize from the Université de Rennes, the Thomas Forcade Award, the Hanes Poetry Prize, fellowships from the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, the Louisiana Arts Council, and the National Endowment for the Arts, as well as being named a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. Komunyakaa has taught at the University of New Orleans, Indiana University, and Princeton University, and is currently Distinguished Senior Poet in New York University’s graduate creative writing program. In 1999, he was elected chancellor of the Academy of American Poets and was inducted in 2009 into the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

This reading is free to students, faculty, staff, and the wider community, and is co-sponsored by the Department of English and Philosophy, the Honor Society of Phi Kappa Phi, the Office of Institutional Diversity, Ingram Library’s Penelope Melson Society, and the Creative Writing Program.

Copies of the authors numerous books will be available for purchase at the reading, and a book signing will follow.

For more information, contact:
Jonette Larrew
Senior Secretary
Department of English and Philosophy
678.839.6512

Construction Done: 2nd and 3rd Floors of Library Open

The library’s 3rd floor is again open for access. Anyone can now access all areas and items on the library’s 2nd and 3rd floors.

The construction project to replace ceiling, lights and ductwork on the library’s 2nd and 3rd floors is now complete. This project was funded by an energy conservation grant secured by UWG Campus Planning and Development. The work provides much better lighting and will result in significant energy savings for the campus.

Thanks to Tim McWhorter and Lynn Agan for successfully coordinating the differing needs of the campus community, library staff and construction contractor. Thanks to the employees of Latimer and Hughes Contracting for doing good work and working well with us. Thanks to Andy Freer, his staff, Margaret Hughes and Travis Hylbak for effecting furniture, computer and office moves, often with too short notice. Thanks to Mary Frances McClure for preparing the floors for our use. Thanks to Chris Carroll, Margot Davis, Katie Mitchell and all the library staff for their patience and professionalism at continuing to provide library services throughout the construction period and for developing good work-arounds.

And thanks to the campus community for your patience as we continue to provide improvements to the library’s aging building.

Photo: Dean Sullivan

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Previous Information about this project

Contractors began early Monday morning, July 13, to replace the ceiling tile and lighting on the 2nd and 3rd floors of the library. This is an extensive project that will be phased by sections on each floor, one section being done at a time. When a section is being done, it will be draped-off with plastic sheeting and signage.

Patrons will not be allowed access to the section until it is finished. The stacks in these sections will be covered with plastic sheeting to protect the materials. Designated library staff will access these sections to retrieve or return materials. Signage will be placed throughout the library to alert patrons not to enter the area and to go to the Circulation Desk if they need access to materials in the closed-off section. Please share any recommendations or ideas you have as we work through this project and we will change these procedures as needed.

The work will involve removal of the existing tile, lighting and supporting metalwork some of which will be dropped down a chute from the second floor window which is just above the secondary loading dock to the left as you face the library’s back staff entrance/main loading dock.

Some of the existing tile, lighting and metalwork will be recycled via buckets and drums taken out by UWG staff via the staff elevator.

At this time, library staff can continue to use the back staff entrance, receive deliveries and use the library’s normal loading dock.

This project will be very disruptive in many ways. We will have to relocate all furniture and computers on the 2nd and 3rd floors as we work through each section — this includes offices, work-areas and patron tables and seating. The workers will use nail guns that fire a charge to anchor the new framing system — this will cause a repeating sound like shooting-off a .22 caliber gun in the building. Dust will be disrupted when the old ceiling is removed. The air system has some filtration that may remove this dust before it gets redistributed throughout the building. There will possibly be bad odors released, also. And when the ceiling tile is removed, the building’s air system will probably not work correctly which will cause variations in temperature throughout the building. Workers will be coming and going, using the staff elevator and back entrance.

The good news is that after this project is completed, the library will have a better-looking and more easily-accessible ceiling and better, more energy-efficient lighting. The expense and inconvenience will be well worth it.

Here are contacts for this project:

Chris Huff, Ingram Library
(678)839-6366 chuff@westga.edu
For general information, concerns, recommendations, questions…

Tim McWhorter, UWG Campus Planning and Development
(678)839-6373 timmc@westga.edu
If you cannot contact Chris and think you should not wait.

UWG Risk Management/EHS
(678)839-6277 safety@westga.edu
If you notice anything you think is unsafe but not an emergency.

Public Safety
(678)839-6000
To report any emergency.

World War I Album

This photo, is the first of a set originally uploaded by Ingram Library – University of West Georgia.

Rescued from a landfill in the late 1990’s, these photos were carefully preserved in an album whose owner is unknown, but who served in the American Expeditionary Forces in France during World War I.

Pictorial History of Carrollton to Be Published in 2010

UWG archivist Suzanne Durham and UWG art student Emma Elaine Dobbs have written a pictorial history of Carrollton using vintage photographs from the Ingram Library Special Collections and modern photographs taken by Ms. Dobbs. “Then and Now Carrollton” will be published in early 2010 by Arcadia Publishers.

Charles E. Beard Lecture and BIG Conference

The 2009 Atlanta Area BIG (Bibliographic Instruction Group) Conference  will be held at the University of West Georgia, Friday May 29th. 

 This year’s theme is “The Learning Commons: New Frontiers in Instruction.” Ingram Library’s annual Charles E. Beard Lecture will be the keynote address for the conference with the program beginning at 10:00 a.m. in the University’s Campus Center Ballroom.

Atlanta Area BIG, an organization of instruction librarians, works to ensure that libraries play a role in advancing the educational, cultural, and economic life of Georgia through the expansion of information literacy. BIG originated in the 1980s as an informal way for instruction librarians from academic and school libraries in the greater Atlanta area to share ideas and discuss common issues. Thirty years later, it is still striving to improve the library services necessary to enhance information literacy. Mary Jane Rootes, Assistant Professor and Instructional Services Librarian at the University of West Georgia, is the president of BIG.

Dr. Russell Bailey, Director of Phillips Memorial Library at Providence College, Rhode Island, will present the 2009 Charles E. Beard Lecture. Bailey’s presentation on “The Evolving Commons—Information, Teaching, Learning, Research” will focus on the new learning commons model for today’s libraries. Bailey is the co-author of Transforming Library Service Through Information Commons: Case Studies for the Digital Age and Information Commons Handbook. There is no fee for the lecture and the public is invited to attend.

The Charles E. Beard Lecture honors the late Charles Beard, who served as Director of University Libraries at the University of West Georgia from 1978 to 2004. The lecture series was created in 2007 to honor Beard’s dedication to the library profession for almost forty years. For the twenty-six years that he was at West Georgia, Beard led Ingram Library through a period of rapid technological change which altered the course of library services and programs. His influence extended far beyond West Georgia, as he was instrumental in the development of GALILEO, one of the first web-based initiatives of its kind, which made a wide realm of information resources available to all Georgians. Susan Smith, associate director of Ingram Library, described Beard as a “champion for libraries. He was forward thinking,” she said, “He was always asking for funding, acting as an advocate, talking about freedom of speech and freedom of access to information.”

BIG’s focus on learning commons is a timely topic for the University of West Georgia’s Ingram Library and very much in keeping with Charles Beard’s vision for library services. Ingram Library recently received funding from the University’s Student Technology Fee Committee to begin building a learning commons environment within the library, to better accommodate the needs of library users in the digital age.

Members of the University of West Georgia campus and the larger community are invited to attend the entire conference as well as the Charles E. Beard Lecture.  A campus parking pass will be required for the day. To obtain a parking pass, please send an email to mrootes@westga.edu and the pass will be sent to your email address after May 15.

To register for the BIG Conference, go to AA BIG Homepage and follow the link to “Registration for 2009 Conference.” There is no registration fee for the conference but registration closes on May 22.

For further details, please contact Mary Jane Rootes at (678) 839-6363 or mrootes@westga.edu or Catherine Hendricks at (678) 839-5337 or chendric@westga.edu.

Need to print or copy? Add money to your card online!

You can use a credit card to add money  online to your student ID for printing and copying in the library by using the Online Wolves Card Center at: http://www.bf.westga.edu/WolvesCard/validate.asp

For more information about Wolf Bucks and you Wolves Card, see: http://www.westga.edu/wolvesCard/index_2609.php

GALILEO Update

In response to user feedback, GALILEO  now displays “Articles & Databases” as the initial tab within the subject areas for all University libraries.

Program – Food at the Center of Everything: Traditional Food Culture in Georgia

On April 14, 2009, Dr. Ann McCleary, Director of the University of West Georgia ‘s Center for Public History, and history graduate students Kristina Hartmann and Katherine Hicks will present, Food at the Center of Everything: Traditional Food Culture in Georgia at Ingram Library. This program, part of the Library’s Lunch and Learn series, will begin at noon. Campus and community members are invited to bring their lunch; sweets and beverages will be provided.

In this presentation, McCleary, Hartmann, and Hicks will share their recent research on Georgia food culture. In 2007, McCleary was selected by the Georgia Humanities Council to be the state scholar for the Georgia tour of the Smithsonian Institution’s travelling exhibit, Key Ingredients: America by Food. This honor launched McCleary and her two graduate students on an extensive research project of Georgia foodways in which they interviewed residents from throughout the state. The end product was the state catalog, “Food, Family, and Community: A Collection of Georgia Memories,” which is accompanying the Smithsonian exhibit as it currently tours Georgia. The catalog explores the connections between Georgians and the food they have traditionally produced, prepared, preserved, and presented at meals.

Dr. McCleary, who is also a professor in the University of West Georgia’s Department of History, researches American social and cultural history with a particular focus on twentieth-century rural life. In her role as Director of the Center for Public History, she oversees projects which research, document, preserve, and promote public discussion of the history and resources of western Georgia and the surrounding region. In May 2005, Georgia Governor Sonny Perdue awarded McCleary the Governor’s Award for the Humanities.

Catalog co-authors Kristina Hartmann and Katherine Hicks are University of West Georgia graduate students in Public History. Hartmann came to UWG from Asheville, North Carolina, and Hicks from Danville, Illinois.

McCleary, Hartmann, and Hicks hope that the Georgia catalog for Key Ingredients: America by Food will not only document Georgia’s food culture but also encourage Georgians to preserve the heritage of their family food traditions and consider the role that food has played in their families, communities, and state. Their catalog will accompany Key Ingredients: America by Food as it tours twelve Georgia communities between June 2008 and February 2010, with the final site being the Haralson County Historical Society in Buchanan. Further details are available at www.gafoodtour.org.

For further information on the Ingram Library program, Food at the Center of Everything: Traditional Food Culture in Georgia, call (678) 839-5337 or contact chendric@westga.edu.