Library News

If you have ever read a classic book in an electronic format, especially if you didn’t have to pay for it, there’s a good chance you were enjoying the fruits of Project Gutenberg. Since the early 1970s, Project Gutenberg has been converting out-of-copyright texts into electronic formats and making them freely available. Since March of 2012, the Digital Library team has been contributing some of their digitized titles to Project Gutenberg. One of the latest of our books to be made available as a Project Gutenberg e-book is Bolax: Imp or Angel–Which? by Mrs. Josephine Culpeper. (We think the title alone would stir your curiosity.)

Previous titles we have featured and proofread are Atchoo!, How to Fence, The Brighton Boys in the Trenches and the list goes on.

Visit the Blue Electrode Blog to find out more about the Distributed Proofreaders Project and to follow Falvey’s participation in this project.

By Demian Katz, Laura Bang, and Luisa Cywinski

Falvey’s Digital Library has welcomed a new intern, Joseph Malcomson. To learn about Malcomson and his work with the Digital Library collections and projects, please go to http://blog.library.villanova.edu/digitallibrary/2013/01/30/meet-joseph-malcomson-spring-2013-digital-library-intern/.

By Jutta Seibert

The library website is not just a pretty face; it is an essential research tool for Villanova University faculty and students. It is the main access point to online journals and databases, the library catalog, patron accounts, subject librarians, library events and much more. The library website had over 400,000 visitors in 2011. Available usage statistics already tell us a lot about how the site is used: the number of unique users, their geographic location, the devices and browsers they use to access the site and the time of the day or night when site traffic peaks.

They also tell us which library functions are most heavily used: the online library catalog is at the top of the list with over 120,000 hits followed by the Databases A-Z list with over 100,000 hits. What usage statistics cannot tell us is whether students ultimately find the information they seek. For this reason the library’s Web team planned and executed a series of usability tests.

What is usability testing?

Usability testing is a technique used to test the functionality of website design through the close observation of novice users who are asked to perform a number of pre-defined tasks. Jakob Nielsen’s Usability 101: Introduction to Usability is a good source for detailed information about usability. Usability testing does not require much investment of time and resources although specialized usability labs use heat maps as well as eye and navigation tracking and recording software. Some labs have one-way mirrors installed to ensure unobtrusive observation of research subjects.

Falvey’s Web team determined that a test administrator, a test recorder and software that tracked the test subject’s navigation paths while recording the thoughts of the subjects would suffice. How do you record the thoughts of a test subject? We asked all test subjects to think out loud while they performed the assigned tasks on the library website.

Why do usability testing?

Web designers generally conduct usability testing to identify design flaws. Why does the Web team need students, rather than library employees, to detect potential design flaws? The majority of library employees use the library website on a daily basis, which makes them expert users. Expert users navigate a website efficiently because they have been trained by their daily interaction with a website’s functionality and organization. As a consequence they are no longer able to see the site through the eyes of a novice user.

Library employees also know from personal observation that students often cannot find library resources as readily as they should. Students may be confused by library lingo or by a content hierarchy that only makes sense to a librarian. For this reason the library’s Web team administers usability tests before and/or after it updates the website’s user interfaces. The ultimate goal of these tests is to design a website that is functional, intuitive and accessible to novice users and experts alike.

What did we learn?

Some of the results of the latest rounds of usability testing were expected based on informal observations; others were a surprise. Student feedback was unanimous in regard to text-heavy Web pages. They told us that certain library Web pages are too text heavy and make their “eyes glaze over,” which interfered with their ability to find what they were looking for. (more…)

By Alice Bampton

Abbey Theatre program cover. Abbey Theatre, Dublin, Ireland, 1904-1910.

“Curtain Call: Theatrical Materials in Special Collections and the University Archives,” currently on display on the library first floor, showcases the breadth of theatrical materials housed in Special Collections and the University Archives. Laura Bang, Digital and Special Collections curatorial assistant, designed “Curtain Call.” On a placard introducing the exhibit, Bang states, “These materials cover a wide array of theatre history in the Western world with a particular emphasis on Irish theatre and our own Villanova theatre.”

Bang worked with the Rev. Dennis Gallagher, OSA, PhD, University archivist, to select materials from University Archives. Michael Foight, Special Collections and Digital Library coordinator, helped Bang mount the exhibit. And Joanne Quinn, design specialist, created graphics for the exhibit and the banner on Falvey’s homepage.

“Curtain Call …” is divided into six sections: “Curtain Call,” “Setting the Stage,” “Casting Call,” “The Play’s the Thing,” “Criticism and Reviews,” and “The Bard.”

The “Curtain Call” section, in the tall glass cabinet, features four programs from Belle Masque Dramatic Society productions (1948-1961) and seven posters from various Villanova University plays. In “Setting the Stage” Bang has gathered programs from some notable theatre companies, including the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, Ireland, and the University’s past theatre groups. “Histoire Générale Illustrée Du Theatre” by Lucien Dubech, et al, is opened to an illustration of a Greek theatre.

“Casting Call,” according to Bang, “contains information on some notable performers as well as some behind-the-scenes glimpses of the production side of a play.” Particularly interesting is a large sketch of Brian G. Morgan, MA ‘70, BA ‘67. Other images show Villanova actors reviewing scripts, a selection of theatre-arts prints and a copy of “Le Theatre” (December 1898) opened to a story about Loïe Fuller (1862-1928), an American actor and dancer.

The Golden Apple: A Play for Kiltartan Children. Lady Gregory. London: John Murray, 1916.

“The Play’s the Thing” displays play scripts including three written by the cofounders of the Abbey Theatre: “The Golden Apple: A Play for Kiltartan Children,” written by an Irish woman, Lady Gregory; and “Vision: A Tale of the Time of Christ” by the Rev. John F. Burns, OSA, of Villanova. This case also highlights a program from the “[f]irst entertainment given by the Villanova College Dramatic Society” on Thanksgiving evening, 1873.

“Criticism and Review” includes three works: an anonymous critical review of “The Playboy of the Western World” in The Lepracaum [sic], a 1907 Irish publication; a 1905 critical review by Bernard Shaw and John Corbin, “The Author’s Apology From [sic] Mrs. Warren’s Profession”; and a review in a periodical, “Samhain,” edited by W. B. Yates.

The final section of the exhibit, “The Bard,” highlights the work of William Shakespeare, whose “characters and plays … are [probably the] most widely known in the Western world” (Bang). Three books and a collection of plates from “Theatre Arts Prints” provide a sampling of Shakespeare’s works.

This exhibit will remain on view for the spring semester except for a brief hiatus for an Easter exhibit.

By Linda Hauck and Merrill Stein

E-Book Survey at Falvey, Spring 2012

Anyone with even a passing interest in reading books, book publishing, libraries or gadgets has noticed that e-books have finally reached that long predicted tipping point to become mainstream. They’re not just for geeky gadget lovers anymore. To glean a clearer picture of how they’d like to see the library collection evolve, we took a closer look at how students and faculty are using our e-books.

History of e-Books at Falvey

E-books (not just digital encyclopedias) have been a part of Falvey Memorial Library’s collection mix since well before the tipping point. In the 1990s Falvey joined a library consortium to purchase a collection of individual titles via NetLibrary, an academic e-book pioneer that has since been acquired by EBSCO Publishing.

Our very first e-books weren’t online at all. In the mid 1990’s the Library purchased CDs with the text of Past Masters and the Library of Latin Texts , both of which were not online. We subscribed to our first online e-book collection, Patrologia Latina, in 1997.

In 2008, the reference librarians undertook a major initiative to shift our reference book collection from print to online. In that year we significantly expanded access to digital encyclopedias, directories, compendia and handbooks. Since we started tracking e-book purchases as a distinct “book” material type, spending on e-books vs. print books has grown from 9.9% in 2007/8 to a plateau of 12.6% in 2008/9 and 12.4% in 2009/10 with a jump to 22.6% in 2010/11.

Falvey’s absolute spending on e-books is much closer to the average spent on e-books in 2011 by graduate and professional libraries than undergraduate libraries, according to a 2011 Library Journal article. However, at 2.9% it is well below the median for graduate/professional libraries (4.5%), undergraduate libraries (3.4%) and also $1million-acquisitions-budget libraries (4.4%).

Our Survey

Until now our understanding of e-book usage patterns by Falvey Memorial Library patrons has been viewed through the prism of usage statistics and unstructured conversations with students and faculty. To view e-book usage from another angle, an online survey was made available, via a link on our website banner, to self-selected respondents during four weeks in the spring of 2012. Six questions looked at the use of Falvey e-books, purpose for use, device used for access, perceived usability and discovery modes. To encourage participation, respondents were entered into a random drawing for one of three $20.00 gift cards.

In total, 88 participants responded, including nearly even numbers undergraduate (45.6%) and graduate students (43.3%). Of the remaining respondents, seven (7.8%) were faculty members and six (6.6%) were staff members or other. The low response rate by faculty makes any conclusions about e-book behavior and preferences for these community members tenuous. (more…)

By Corey Arnold

Joe Lucia

This Tuesday, Jan. 29, author Conor Grennan will visit Villanova University’s campus as part of the One Book Villanova celebration. Grennan will be available for a number of events throughout the day, the first of which will be a book signing in the Speakers’ Corner on the library’s first floor at 1:30 p.m.

In preparation for this exciting event, we’ve asked Joe Lucia, director of Falvey Memorial Library and co-founder of the One Book Villanova series, to talk about Grennan’s book Little Princes. He’s also shared with us a few moments from the One Book Villanova past. Read the interview below and, if you haven’t already, be sure to pick up a copy of this lovely and inspirational book before Grennan’s lecture and book signing on Tuesday.

CA: Tell me about this year’s book selection, Conor Grennan’s Little Princes. Is there a common theme that connects Grennan’s book to past One Book selections?

JL: Conor Grennan’s Little Princes tells a remarkable story of self-discovery and self-transformation, starting with a young man’s personal adventures in Nepal and ending with his quest to reconnect young children sold into servitude during civil war with their lost families. The narrative takes us into remote and often dangerous regions in the high reaches of the Himalayas at the same time that it charts an inward journey toward the recognition of compassion and love as motives to action on behalf of the victims of human trafficking. Grennan’s narrative is full of action and intrigue but derives its power from the moments of kindness and affection that drive a twenty-something American on a mission to serve others. We are excited to hear Conor Grennan speak in person about his experiences in Nepal and his ongoing commitment to the betterment of children’s lives there through the work of his foundation, Next Generation Nepal.

A characteristic of most of our One Book Villanova selections has been personal narrative about major transformative events in individual lives—whether those events transpire in fictional or non-fictional works. In many ways, the greatest commonality among the books we’ve chosen thus far has been what you could call a “coming of age” thematic, or perhaps more precisely stories about psychological and moral growth grounded in experiences of personal loss, social disruption, and historical calamity. That puts it in rather dry and schematic terms, given that all of the books we’ve chosen thus far have been distinguished by a rich, particular personalism that conveys the taste and texture of very specific event and circumstances. We’ve also tried hard to keep a multi-cultural focus at the heart of our selections, to open thereby a view to the larger world beyond the comfortable confines of Villanova, especially for our students.

CA:  Do you have a favorite memory from past One Book years—perhaps an encounter with another reader, or a moment during one of the lecture events?

JL: There really are too many wonderful moments from our seven prior years of One Book events to pick just one. A highlight every year is the Community Dinner, at which Dining Services pulls out all the stops and creates a meal that reflects the culture and cuisine in that year’s book. The year we read Mahbod Seraji’s Rooftops of Tehran, the chefs preparing the dinner managed to track down someone in the Philadelphia area who was familiar with the rose-petal flavored ice cream that plays a role in the story. That ice cream was a featured dessert that evening to the astonishment and delight of our author, who even wrote about it after the event on his blog, I believe.  Of course, every year I glory in the hundreds of students streaming in to hear the author talk and to get books signed. Over and over each year I have listened as students have told visiting authors how deeply the books have touched them, how much of a connection they’ve felt with specific characters and situations. In particular, the year we had Immaculee Ilibagiza as our author, a survivor of the Rwandan genocide, we had many people weeping in her presence as she inscribed their books. To witness that abiding emotional power of storytelling and of the written word in time so saturated with trivial digital distractions is a joy indeed.

But there is one moment that stands out as a particular pinnacle. It came in the second year of the program, when we had Timothy Tyson as our author. His book Blood Done Sign My Name, tells the story of a particularly brutal race murder in North Carolina in the 1970s and then connects those events to the unfolding drama of the civil rights era in the preceding and subsequent decades. Professor Tyson brought with him an African American gospel singer—Mary B. Washington—with whom he often presents.  Before his lecture began, the Connelly Center’s Villanova room was darkened and Ms. Washing entered from the room and walked through the audience as the lights came halfway up, singing a series of spirituals from the African American tradition. It was stunning, dramatic, and it evoked tears from many people in that room. When she was done singing, Prof. Tyson opened his talk by addressing the power of that music. It remains one of the high points in my lifelong experience of attending cultural and intellectual programs. I still shake my head in awe thinking back on it. (more…)

By Darren G. Poley

What is usually meant by church documents?

Church documents are published statements, primarily on matters of faith and morals, which are publicly promulgated by some part of the official hierarchy of the Catholic Church. The hierarchy is the body of church leaders, called bishops, who are in communion with the Bishop of Rome. The hierarchy is headed by the visible head of the Catholic Church: the bishop of Rome, who is the supreme pontiff or simply the pope. A good starting point for research is ATLA Catholic Periodical and Literature Index. You can enter a keyword in the advanced search and under Publication Type, select either “Church Document” or “Papal Document.”

What are papal documents?

In addition to being the spiritual leader for over a billion Catholics worldwide, the pope is also the head of state for the Vatican City and chief officer of the Holy See, another name for the Catholic Church’s government commonly called The Vatican. The Vatican functions as the administration for the Catholic Church, a diplomatic entity as well as a religious organization. The documents signed by a pope are called papal documents. The official Vatican Web Site is an excellent place to look for papal documents from popes of the twentieth-century.

The most famous kind of papal document produced today is the encyclical, a public “letter” to his fellow bishops that is meant to be circulated and read by all. Encyclicals are theological in nature but are by no means the only source of Catholic doctrine. Search in Falvey’s catalog using “Catholic Church Doctrines Papal documents” as a subject. See also compilations of church doctrine such as the multi-volume Précis of official Catholic teaching or the one volume Catechism of the Catholic Church in English online and in print. (more…)

By Alice Bampton

Little Princes by Conor Grennan is the 2012-13 One Book Villanova selection. Joanne Quinn, Falvey’s design specialist, created an exhibit highlighting Little Princes: One Man’s Promise to Bring Home the Lost Children of Nepal. The display also reflects the history of the One Book Villanova program, which began in the 2005-2006 academic year after a conversation between Joe Lucia, University librarian, and Terry Nance, PhD, professor of communication and assistant vice president for Multicultural Affairs.

Grennan will be signing books in the Speakers’ Corner, first floor, Falvey, on Tuesday, Jan. 29 at 1:30 p.m.

Bright blue informative posters, in the center, feature “The Story,” “The Author” and “Schedule of Events.” Photographs of Grennan, Grennan with Nepalese children and a map of Nepal complete the centerpiece. Framing the “Little Princes” materials and One Book Villanova posters are images documenting each of the eight previous One Book Villanova selections. Colorful Tibetan prayer flags form a backdrop.

By Gerald Dierkes

The Library offers numerous award-winning titles of contemporary and classic fiction.  Why not check out one of these staff favorites for your winter break?

The Tiger’s Wife by Téa Obreht.

Call Number: PS3615.B73 T54 2011

See a preview of this book in Google Preview.

Cold Comfort Farm by  Stella Gibbons, her classic tale, first published in 1932

Call Number: PR6013.I24 C6 2006

See a preview of this book in Google Preview.

The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet by David Mitchell, author of Cloud Atlas

Call Number: PR6063.I785 T47 2010

Take a peek in this book in Google Preview.

A Christmas Carol and Other Christmas Books by Charles Dickens (a new edition with an introduction by Margaret Atwood, illustrations by Arthur Rackham)

Call Number: PR4557 .A1 2009

Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel

PR6063.A438 W65 2009

Take a peek in Google Preview.

Bring up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel

PR6063.A438 B75 2012

Take a peek in this book in Google Preview.

In the Garden Of Beasts by Erik Larson

E748.D6 L37 2011

Take a peek inside using Google Preview.

This short video demonstrates one search strategy to help you find additional titles. If books have been checked out, you may be able to obtain those titles through interlibrary loan.

Also, please let us know in the “Comments” below what you recommend. Are there new fiction titles you would like us to order? Happy reading!

By Laura Bang

On Nov. 15, Falvey Memorial Library debuted its new digital-humanities program, the Aurelius Digital Humanities Initiative. The digital humanities (DH) is a growing academic movement exploring the intersections of humanities scholarship and technologies, and it will have an important impact on future humanities scholarship. As such, the Library is pleased to offer support for DH projects as well as foster a digital-humanities community at Villanova University. Although we have yet to publish DH research, we are currently working with faculty on three digital-humanities projects and have already spoken with other faculty about possible future projects.

We are planning a more formal launch of the Aurelius Digital Humanities Initiative in the spring semester, in which we anticipate having some finished projects to share. In addition, we will hold monthly get-togethers for those interested in DH to meet and hang out, as well as occasional workshops.

I am very excited about bringing digital humanities to Villanova University, and I hope you will be, too. If you have any questions, comments or ideas, please feel free to get in touch with me at laura.bang@villanova.edu – I would love to hear from you!

Follow along on Twitter and/or on the new DH blog!