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Learning a New Language? Now on trial — Mango Languages

Mango Languages is a web-based, self-directed application designed to help you learn a new language. Falvey Memorial Library is featuring a Mango Languages trial, which offers an overview of many languages including Spanish, French, German, Italian and Japanese. This product also offers languages with international flavors, such as Arabic (Levantine), Chinese (Mandarin), Farsi, Turkish and Hebrew.

Features include—

—complete control of each lesson by a click-of-the-mouse ability to repeat words and review phrases.

—a combination of audio format and written text that focuses primarily on conversational skills.

—lessons tailored for each language, though all cover standard tourist and language learner topics. Native speakers (male and female) give pronunciation, then pause for the learner to repeat. Review modules for vocabulary, phrases also included.

—grammatical and cultural notes that provide insight into the language and customs, as well as quizzes and conversations that focus on practical experiences.


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Stat-USA to Cease Operation

STAT-USA has been a trusted one stop shop for getting data releases from a variety of economic and trade government agencies  including but not limited to; The Treasury Department, Census Bureau,  Bureau of  Labor Statistics, Federal Reserve, U.S. Trade Representative, U.S. Commercial Service, U.S. Foreign Agricultural Service, Department of State, and Energy Information Administration.  STAT-USA will cease operation on September 30, 2010.  For a statement about this development see a message from the Director of STAT-USA.

Fortunately,  much of the data on Stat-USA can be found directly from the publishing agencies or via a handful of web sites devoted to aggregating economic and trade data in more dynamic ways.  The following are just few examples:

U.S. Exports

Date.gov

American Factfinder

If there are data series that you routinely accessed via Stat-USA and would like advice on alternative sources, please don’t hesitate to contact me!


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ARTstor — a Visual Treasure Trove at Your Fingertips

by Alice Bampton

ARTstor, a digital image database, over five years old and still growing, now contains over one million images of “arts, architecture, humanities, and social sciences.” Initially, ARTstor held 300,000 images but none of modern or contemporary art. There are now over 350,000 images of twentieth and twenty-first century works.

Not just for art historians, the collections support multidisciplinary uses. Need a photograph of Nelson Mandela or East African folk art? Representations of Ophelia across the centuries or examples of Gothic architecture?  Contemporary writers’ photos include the young Jack Kerouac. You may also peruse the Thomas Eakins collection, which includes the well-known “Gross Clinic” and his boating paintings. (more…)


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Bartley Business Bestsellers Summering @ Falvey

Bartley Business Bestsellers are summering at Falvey Memorial Library.  During fall and spring semesters the collection resides in the Business Librarians Office in 1005, Bartley Hall.  But this summer they’re on the Library’s main floor, shelved above our popular-reading books.

The Bartley Business Bestsellers is a small browsing collection of books of interest to the business community. Titles chosen for the collection don’t  necessarily fit the profile we use for buying  scholarly business books.  Popular books that fit this mold include: The Fred Factor, an inspirational book about extraordinary service, and Delivering Happiness, a biography of the founder of Zappos,  the widely successful online shoe store.

We  select books for the collection based on rankings in the Bloomberg Business Week and the New York Times.  Of course, purchases are also made at the recommendation of students and faculty.  Engaging articles in the popular press such as a recent interview of the authors of This Time is Different:  Eight Centuries of Financial Folly also trigger purchases.

Look for some of these new titles to appear on our shelves:  Googled, the Facebook Effect,  and The Big Short.


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New HRD e-books

These e-books were acquired by the library this Spring in support of the distance Graduate HRD program.  To recommend additional titles contact Linda Hauck

Best Practices in Talent Management

Changing Organizational Culture

Group & Team Coaching

Handbook of Employee Benefits and Administration

Mastering Organizational Knowledge Flow

Pension Policy

Perfect Phrases for Writing Employee Surveys

Politics of Parental Leave Policies

Practicing Organizational Development

Sage Handbook of Human Resource Management

Wisdom and Management in the Knowledge Economy

Zero Turnover Sales Force


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Lexis-Nexis Academics’ New Look is Worth a Look

Accented with a cool blue color scheme, “Lexis-Nexis Academic” now offers five easy templates for finding its most sought after content:  news, legal cases and research on companies, countries and people.  For in-depth research, the left-hand navigation bars expand to provide detailed search categories.

Probably the biggest challenge “Lexis-Nexis Academic”  users face is choosing the right file or silo to search for the information they need.  This is largely due to the complexity and wide range of sources offered by Lexis-Nexis.  With this latest interface design, the Easy Search, Power Search and Source Browse and Find features should make searching Lexis-Nexis Academic easier than ever for the Google generation.

The valuable content available via Lexis-Nexis hasn’t changed, though.  Lexis-Nexis’ “US Legal” section is the best place to look for analysis of the law in “Am Jur 2nd” (a premier legal encyclopedia), scholarly legal articles (called law reviews), and THE law found in state and federal court decisions, statutes and administrative regulations.  Lexis-Nexis’ “News” section is almost entirely text, lacking the media and images we’ve become accustomed to on the free Web and in other library databases.   News is conveniently bundled:  files for foreign language news, transcripts of radio and television programs, articles about business and industry, traditional regional print publications and web blogs.  Lexis-Nexis’ “Companies”  section brings together business directories for public private and international firms crated by reliable providers such as Hoovers, ICC, Extel, Disclosure and S&P.  Accounting, taxation and environmental regulation are subject areas of strength for Lexis-Nexis.

Lexis-Nexis Academic may be accessed from our Databases A-Z page.


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Phylis Wright Promoted

pw-headshotPhylis Wright was recently promoted to Manager of Access Desk Services. Commenting on her promotion, University Librarian Joe Lucia said, “Phylis has a long history of dedicated service to the library and has been recognized for that by the faculty through the Facultas Award (spring 2006). She has an unwavering commitment to making the library a welcoming and responsive environment for our users. She also does an amazing job hiring and coordinating the schedules of the students who work on the Access team.”

Phylis began her library career working part-time in Reserves, and then became a full-time employee. Other library assignments have included a stint in interlibrary loan. In addition to her work in Reserves, she began hiring, training and scheduling students who work at the circulation desk, a number that ultimately grew to sixty student employees.

Luisa Cywinski, team leader of Access Services and Phylis’s supervisor, said “Our large group of student employees, who work in multiple areas of the department, reflect Phylis’s commitment to the goal of making cross-training a reality.” Luisa also said that Phylis will be the “front end manager” at Access Services, where her dedication to service will benefit library patrons most.

Phylis commented that her “job is always changing,” and she is excited about her promotion because she is “very people-oriented.”

In her free time Phylis indulges in her interest in crafts such as beading, ceramics and wreath-making.

By Alice Bampton


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More summer reading suggestions

By Jackie Mirabile

Did you know that Falvey has a collection called Popular Reading located near the Circulation Desk? Works by well-known authors such as Mary Higgins Clark, Michael Connelly or James Patterson are here. Have you read the latest Harry Potter? Take a chance on a first novel such as the delightful Major Pettigrew’s last stand.

We have graphic novels and even a graphic biography of Trotsky. How about biographies of people in sports, politics or history such as Team of rivals: the political genius of Abraham Lincoln by the renowned historian, Doris Kearns Goodwin.

Or maybe this is the time to try out a new recipe such as you might find in Japanese cooking by Emi Kazuko.

Our Popular Reading collection can provide you not only with familiar authors but also open up new reading adventures.

(Illustration, top left, by Michael Kirkham from Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand.)


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EconLit with full text — available on trial

by Linda Hauck

Now available:  a trial for EconLit with Full Text!  EBSCO, one of the leading academic database platform and journal subscription agents, offers an enhanced version of the American Economic Association’s indexing and abstracting service, EconLit.  (To try it and for more information, see the Business Reference blog.)


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Last Modified: July 1, 2010

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