Pauline Maier

Historian Pauline Maier, who wrote award-winning books on 18^th-century America, died last month at age 75. Maier had been on the MIT faculty since 1978. In one of her best-known books, American Scripture, she helped show that the Declaration of Independence was a “secular document” and a collaborative effort, not a sacred text that Thomas Jefferson wrote on his own: In her research Maier found dozens of local resolutions to declare independence from the British Crown. The New York Times named American Scripture one of the 11 best books of 1997.

“One of the key intellectual figures in her field, Pauline was also a leader at MIT—a great historian and scholar who understood the pulse of the Institute and helped guide and improve our community in profound ways,” said Deborah Fitzgerald, dean of the School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences at MIT.

“The impact of losing Pauline goes beyond family, friends, and colleagues. It extends to the young students who now will never encounter her enthusiasm, the cut of her mind, and how she made America’s past come alive,” wrote Maier’s MIT colleague John Dower in a post alongside other remembrances and tributes.

Maier was on the original faculty committee that put forward the MIT faculty Open Access Policy.

Explore Professor Maier’s research in the Open Access Articles collection in DSpace@MIT, where it is openly accessible to the world.

Since the MIT faculty established their Open Access Policy in March 2009 they have made thousands of research papers freely available to the world via DSpace@MIT. To highlight that research, we’re offering a series of blog posts that link news stories about scholars’ work to their open access papers in DSpace.

New Resources

• New search tool  Finding library resources just got easier with BartonPlus. It brings together many library collections in one search interface–searching most MIT-licensed e-resources like e-books and full-text articles, as well as collections in the classic Barton catalog like books, theses, music, DVDs, and more. 

• More options for borrowing  Borrow Direct, a partnership that allows library materials to be shared between member institutions, has expanded to include the University of Chicago. MIT users can search over 50 million volumes owned by Borrow Direct libraries through MIT’s WorldCat.

• New guide to APIs for scholarly resources  Many scholarly publishers, databases, and products offer APIs to allow users with programming skills to more powerfully extract data to serve a variety of research purposes. With an API, users might create programmatic searches of a citation database, extract statistical data, or dynamically query and post blog content. Learn more in the APIs for Scholarly Resources guide.

• Music Oral History Project  For over 100 years music has been a vibrant part of MIT’s culture. A new website features in-depth interviews with faculty, staff, and former students about their musical experiences at the Institute, as well as their professional careers in music or other fields.

• New e-resources  Find a number of new online resources including: the National Geographic Archive, Smithsonian Global Sound, several new titles in the Gale Virtual Reference Library, the Encyclopedia of Environmetrics, and Encyclopedia of Hydrological Sciences in the Wiley Online Library, and more.

Improved study spaces

• Upgrades to Hayden Library  The window bays in Hayden have gotten a facelift! The windows have been cleaned, frames painted, and new shades have replaced the curtains. Also check out the  new artwork by Dennis Oppenheim that adorns the first floor wall. Additionally, a number of tables and study carrels in Hayden were refinished this summer. Coming up – we hope to reupholster some of the comfy seating on the 1st floor.

• Finding locations, hours, and study spaces  New and improved webpages make it easier to locate current and future library hours with a date-picker option. Also find and reserve study spaces online and learn about what each location has to offer.
  

Upcoming events

• Music & Theater Arts Composer Forums  During the fall term the Lewis Music Library will host MTA Composer Forums. Stop by the library at 5pm on Oct. 9, Oct. 23, Nov. 6, Nov. 20 to hear from featured musicians.

•  Fall workshops Throughout the month of October the Libraries will offer a series of workshops on subject-specific resources. See the event calendar for details.
  

Be sure to follow us on Twitter and Facebook for all the latest news!

• Choose interviews by MIT affiliation (MIT faculty, staff, student, etc.) and by topic (composers, jazz, world music, etc.).
• Select interviews to watch video, or listen to audio.
• Search within transcripts by keyword, download PDF transcripts, and view biographical background information on each interviewee.

The resource is a culmination of over a decade’s worth of documentation by Forrest Larson, a staff member at MIT’s Lewis Music Library. The project was generously funded by MIT alumnus Lionel Kinney (’53). Learn more about the project.

The “Trope Tank” is the name of his lab for creative computing at 14N-233, and there’s more about it at http://trope-tank.mit.edu.

Art and Architecture in Video
http://libraries.mit.edu/get/artv
This streaming video database offers more than 400 documentaries and interviews illustrating the history, theory, and practice of art, design, and architecture. This database includes real-time transcript highlighting, the ability to make clips, and offers links for embedding in course management systems.

OnArchitecture
http://libraries.mit.edu/get/onarch
This streaming video package contains more than 150 interviews with architects, project walk-throughs, and other original video about architectural design. Watch an interview with Ai Weiwei: http://www.onarchitecture.com/interviews/ai-weiwei-0. This resource offers closed captioning.

OntheBoards.tv
http://libraries.mit.edu/get/ontheboards
Sponsored by On the Boards in Seattle, the videos in this collection cover contemporary theatre, dance, and performance art. All are recordings of performances at either On the Boards or other arts organizations around the country.

Smithsonian Global Sound
http://libraries.mit.edu/get/globalsound
This streaming audio collection of world music provides access to over 42,000 tracks from the Smithsonian Archives and world music archives in Asia and Africa. Coverage includes over 169 countries worldwide, 1,000 genres, 1,400 cultural groups, and 450 different languages.

For more information or to learn more about how these resources may enhance research or teaching, please contact an MIT Libraries subject specialist.

Monday, April 8^th is this year’s Day of DH.

A Day in the Life of the Digital Humanities is a project that examines the state of the digital humanities through the lens of those within it. Follow the day’s activities @DayofDH on Twitter.

If you’re interested in the digital humanities or if you’re wondering what it is, explore our most recent research guide, Digital Humanities. Since it’s a work in progress, please let us know what you’d like to see added to it. 

Photo by Kurt Fendt

Kurt Fendt, Director of HyperStudio, recently announced the nomination of eight fellows to participate in the first year of HyperStudio’s new fellowship program, including two librarians, Sands Fish and Patsy Baudoin.

HyperStudio brings together humanities postdocs and visiting scholars, librarians, technologists, artists, curators, and other members of the MIT community to generate questions and energy around the Digital Humanities. The HSF program aims to cultivate community and collaboration at the edges of disciplines and fields, finding overlaps and investigating productive tensions of creative and critical engagement.

Read more information

Slingshot Hip Hop

Slingshot Hip Hop braids together the stories of young Palestinians living in Gaza, the West Bank and inside Israel as they discover Hip Hop and employ it as a tool to surmount divisions imposed by occupation and poverty. From internal checkpoints and Separation Walls to gender norms and generational differences, this is the story of young people crossing the borders that separate them.

“Documentary Competition” Sundance Film Festival 2008
Top 3 Finalist for the IDFA- “DOC U” Competition, Amsterdam
“Audience Award: Best Documentary“ Films de Femmes, France
“Audience Award: Best Film“ DOX BOX Film Festival, Syria
“Best Director” Beirut International Film festival, Lebanon
“Audience Award: Best Film“ Beirut International Film festival, Lebanon
“Jury Prize” Festival Cinéma et Politique de Tours, Paris, France
“Audience Award: Best Film“ Arabian Sights/Washington DC International Film Festival
“Silver Hanoman Prize” JAFF film festival, Indonesia
“Best Mediterranean Film” Granada Festival Cine del Sur, Spain
“Audience Award: Best Documentary” Cairo Refugee Film Festival, Egypt
“Audience Award: Best Film” Cairo Refugee Film Festival, Egypt
“Most Anticipated Film” Cairo Refugee Film Festival, Egypt
“Audience Award: Best Film“ Toronto Palestine Film Festival, Canada
“The Festival des Libertés Award” Festival des Libertés festival in Brussels, Belgium
“Aloha Accolade Winner” Honolulu Film Festival, Hawaii

Brown bag lunch event – dessert provided

Tuesday, 9 April 2013, 12:30 (film length 83 minutes)

7-134A (Rotch Library Conference Room)

Please join us!

This special presentation is made possible by the Aga Khan Program Documentation Center @ MIT Libraries

Questions? Contact: scsmith@mit.edu, 617.354.5022

• The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, by Junot Diaz
• Life of Pi, by Yann Martel
• Ragnarok, by A.S. Byatt

to history of science and technology

• How the Hippies Saved Physics, by David Kaiser
• The Pleasure of Finding Things Out, by Richard P. Feynman
• Theory of Everything, by Stephen Hawking

to popular culture

• Barrel Fever and Other Stories, by David Sedaris
• Bossypants, by Tina Fey
• The King’s Speech, by Mark Logue and Peter Conradi

and more. We focus on getting works that are Audie Award winners and nominees, as well as winners of Earphones Awards. These works have excellent readers, a critical aspect of a good audiobook. Take a listen!

Please suggest any titles you would like to see something in the collection!

• Researching soil chemistry properties in the scholarly literature? What database does the Chemistry guide suggest?

• Not sure what the first settlers in Massachusetts grew in their gardens? Try the Historical Newspapers guide.

• Want to do market research on produce? Have you seen the Do-It-Yourself Market Research guide?

We even have guides about organizing your references, managing your data, getting published, and so much more! Seriously, think of a topic – any topic. Yep, we probably have that, too.

And you’re always welcome to ask us for help!

Statista provides statistics on a wide range of topics, including industries, markets, demography, countries & economies.  It harvests data from market researchers, trade associations, scientific publications, and government sources, and compiles it in a central place for you to search.  Download data in tabular or graphical form and link to original data sources and related reports.  Find statistics such as:

• Global market share held by the leading smartphone operating systems in sales to end users from 1st quarter 2009 to 4th quarter 2012
• Percentage of U.S. population who has (or ever had) cancer, 1999-2011, by age
• U.S. organic food sales growth forecast from 2010 to 2014
• Monthly unemployment rate in the U.S. from January 2012 to January 2013 (seasonally-adjusted)
• and more…

Access Statista at: http://libraries.mit.edu/get/statista.

Researching local areas in the United States?  Govistics provides spending, revenue, employment and crime data for state and local governments and school districts across the U.S., pulling together data from different sources.  Find data such as the following for the City of Cambridge:

• Government spending and number of employees in all areas, including social services, education, and public safety
• Number of violent and property crimes
• Investment portfolio of the city’s retirement system, with data on membership and contributions
• and more…

Access Govistics at: http://libraries.mit.edu/get/govistics.

Need data on your research topic but have no idea who collects it?  Try the Statistical Abstract of the United States!  This online reference source provides summary statistical tables of everything under the sun, and detailed citations to the original source for you to find more detailed data.  Search not only by subject but also filter your results to those available at certain demographic (e.g., age, sex, race, education, marital status), geographic (e.g., state, smsa), and economic (e.g., industry, occupation) breakdowns.  Find data such as:

• Nonfatal occupational injury and illness cases in private industry by type of injury or illness and days away from work: 2010
• Coastline counties most frequently hit by hurricanes: 1960 To 2008
• Municipal solid waste generation, materials recovery, combustion with energy recovery, and discards: 1980 to 2010
• Research and development expenditures in science and engineering at universities and colleges: 2000 to 2010

Access the Statistical Abstract at: http://libraries.mit.edu/get/stat-abstract.

Want further information on statistics and data resources?  Try Social Science Data Services or other data resources listed on our subject-oriented research guides.

photo by L.Barry Hetherington

Are you interested in music, video, literature, art or architecture? Join Libraries staff for a session highlighting some of the vast arts, culture, and multimedia resources available to you through the MIT Libraries. Learn how to access over a million tracks of streaming audio (everything from classical to jazz to popular music), over 150,000 online music scores, streaming video of foreign films, dance, theater, documentaries and more, and over one million high-res images of art, architecture, science and the humanities.

Please register for this class.

Questions? Contact Mark Szarko.

If you use Google Scholar, you already know it’s a great tool for finding citations to literature in your research area. It’s a massive index of articles, books and other publications of a scholarly nature. (It doesn’t cover ALL the scholarly literature in any discipline, however, so be sure to include the Libraries’ databases in Vera in your literature search.)

Many of the articles in Google Scholar are licensed by the MIT Libraries through our subscriptions, so – in many cases – the full text is available to you. If you are on campus, you’ll see this link in your results list:

Are you working off campus?   To take advantage of this feature, click on Settings and then Library Links.

Type MIT in the search window; select it; click Save.  You should now see the full text link in your results list for articles in any of MIT’s paid subscriptions.

New World Cinema includes full-length feature films as well as award-winning short films. Many are award-winning (collectively the films have won more than 1,000 awards). Films are indeed from all over the world and many different genres.  Happy Together by Wong Kar Wai, Tran Anh Hung’s The Scent of Green Papaya, and Michael Haneke’s The Piano Teacher are among the internationally known.

The philosophers reflected on whether their discipline has motivated their support of open access to research and scholarship. Professor Holton indicated that his role as a moral philosopher has highlighted the rare position academics enjoy with respect to their writing:

“we’re not like journalists, we’re not like novelists, or composers, who have to sell their stuff…we are in this incredibly privileged position, where we can give [our articles] away, and that only adds to the benefit to us.“

Peter Suber, Director of the Harvard Open Access Project, and a Faculty Fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society, said his “primary motivation” in supporting open access is not linked specifically to philosophy, but rather to his desire to seize the opportunity the web holds for scholarly publishing.

Holton explored the possibilities open access offers for this kind of change in the scholarly publishing system, identifying the “strong monopoly position” of some publishers as a key motivator for the MIT Faculty Open Access Policy. The Policy, Holton said, addresses the “mess” the scholarly publishing market is in by offering a “freely available database” of MIT-authored articles that is “indexed through Google Scholar and other search engines.” After making an article available in this database under the Policy, the author can still “go on and publish…with a scholarly journal,” which provides the “very important task as a kind of quality control.” He notes that MIT has made “about a third” of articles openly available since the faculty Policy was put in place.

Both speakers addressed the role of publishers moving forward. In Suber’s view, we need to “persuade publishers [that] adapting to the world of open access publishing is better than resisting,” a task that is becoming easier given the increasing momentum of open access. Holton emphasized that working antagonistically is not necessary, that

“there is a way forward for both us and the publishers.”

Suber and Holton agreed that the recent approach to open access recommended in the UK could be counterproductive. “I love the ambition” of making all of the UK’s research open access, Suber said, but the UK should “tweak the policy” so that it emphasizes depositing manuscripts in repositories, in addition to the current focus on publication in open access journals. Holton had reservations as well. The UK plan is “not a good way to go,” he says, and will lead to “double dipping” by some publishers and to “entrench[ing] the monopolies of these journals.”

Both philosophers continue to devote their time and energy to supporting open access to research, working towards lasting cultural change that will make open access — and thus wider and more equitable access — the norm. They look to the day when, as Suber said, it will be “unheard of to write an article and not deposit it in a repository.”

More information:

Scholarly publishing website
Podcasts & videos on scholarly publishing and copyright

The games featured in the exhibit invite players to become Nick Carraway, the narrator of The Great Gatsby, dodging drunken partygoers in the way to meeting Gatsby; explore the world of Shakespeare’s plays; carry out an introspective exercise based on Sophocles’ Oedipus at Colonus; or revisit the events of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Games by the Book, curated by Clara Fernández-Vara and Nick Montfort, will be open to the public through October 8th on the 2nd floor of the Hayden Library. More details at http://trope-tank.mit.edu/games_by_the_book/.

The exhibit is sponsored by the De Florez Fund for Humor, the MIT Council of the Arts, the MIT Game Lab, and the Electronic Literature Organization and Comparative Media Studies.

Where: 14N-132

Want to find out how to obtain over one million tracks of streaming audio ranging from classical to jazz, popular, and contemporary world music? How about over 150,000 online music scores? Streaming video of poets reading from their work? Images so sharp you can see the shadow beneath the Mona Lisa’s smile? Or panoramic views of architectural sites from around the world?

Come to this session to learn how to bring these and other cultural treasures right to your desktop through the MIT Libraries.

Please register for this session. For more information, please contact Mark Szarko.

Where: Lobby 10

Celebrate National Bookmobile Day with the MIT Libraries! Check out new fiction and non-fiction, DVDs, and music (Bring your MIT ID if you want to borrow something).

For more information, please contact Theresa Tobin.

Noam Chomsky, photo credit: MIT News

MIT’s Libraries were recently chosen to be the stewards of the personal archives of noted linguist, political activist, and Institute Professor emeritus Noam Chomsky. The significant collection spans a long and distinguished career, beginning when Chomsky joined MIT in 1955 in the Research Laboratory of Electronics, through his years as a professor in the Department of Modern Languages and Linguistics, then as Institute Professor.

Often referred to as “the father of modern linguistics,” Chomsky revolutionized the field of linguistics and paved the way for transformational grammar and universal grammar. His book Syntactic Structures (1957) was considered groundbreaking. He also made significant contributions to the fields of psychology, cognitive science, philosophy of language and philosophy of mind.

“It’s fitting that Professor Chomsky’s papers will remain at MIT as a resource for future generations of scholars. He revolutionized the way we think about the linguistic sciences and the cognitive mechanisms of language acquisition, and his ideas in many realms have had profound influence on scholarship and public discourse here at MIT and worldwide,” MIT President Susan Hockfield said.

Over the years, Chomsky has been awarded numerous prizes, including the Kyoto Prize in 1988 and the MIT Killian Award for the academic year 1991-1992. Most recently, he won the Sydney Peace Prize in 2011. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

“Over the last fifty years, Noam Chomsky has not only created the building blocks of linguistic theory and understanding, but has built a remarkable and unique department of Linguistics that has nurtured several generations of linguists who have taken their MIT experience into and across the globe. It is wonderful that Noam’s papers, which span this long period of growth and development, will be available to scholars for many years to come,” MIT Dean of Humanities Deborah Fitzgerald said.

The collection also reflects Chomsky’s political activism and outspoken support for freedom of speech and social justice. He was once quoted as saying, “If we don’t believe in freedom of expression for people we despise, we don’t believe in it at all” (Guardian (UK), Nov.23, 1992).

He has authored numerous works on the topic, including American Power and the New Mandarins (1969), Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media (1988), Failed States: The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy (2006), and Hopes and Prospects (2010).

The addition of Chomsky’s personal archives, and a large portion of his personal library, augments a small existing collection of Chomsky’s papers already in the care of the MIT Libraries’ Institute Archives.

“With this addition, the collection will be a complete archival resource that will provide researchers with unique insight into Professor Chomsky’s thinking, and the development of the field of linguistics, as well as his views on significant issues in social activism from post-WWII through current day,” MIT Institute Archivist Tom Rosko said.

Staff from the MIT Libraries and Institute Archives and Special Collections are in the beginning stages of transferring material to the Archives. Initial work in organizing the Chomsky collection will occur this year, with additional work on improving access to the collection, including online access to portions of it, continuing over the next several years. When the work is done, scholars will have unprecedented access to an enormous depth and breadth of material from one of the world’s most renowned linguists and top intellectual minds.

Want to brush up on your language skills or learn a new language? Use all that time you spend waiting for the T, and learn a new language with Byki Mobile!

Learn over 70 languages, including English, using the Byki language-learning system. Learn at your own pace with virtual flashcards and quizzes.  Byki will remember where you left off, so you can track your progress and easily learn on-the-go. The mobile app works for iPhone and Android, but if you don’t have a mobile device, you can still use Byki from any computer.

To get started: 

1. Visit Byki through the MIT Libraries from a computer or mobile device, and log in through your MIT Touchstone account.
2. Click the “Sign Up Now” button and create an account. (Or just log in, if you already have a Byki account.)
3. After you’ve logged in, click the “Byki Mobile” button, and follow the steps to download and activate the Byki Community Edition app for Android or iPhone.

To access the full version of Byki, use the same link from a computer: http://libraries.mit.edu/get/byki.

Questions? Ask Us!

Date: Friday, February 10, 2-4pm
Location: Maihaugen Gallery (14N-130)

A new exhibition in the Libraries’ Maihaugen Gallery explores glassmaking as revealed in glassware from MIT laboratories, blown glass from the MIT Glass Lab, and stunning stained glass windows from the Libraries’ Charles J. Connick Stained Glass Foundation Collection. Tools, early photographs, and selections from rare books demonstrate the combination of artistry and engineering that goes into the creation of glass.

This event is free and open to the community.

His publishing policy for book chapters is the same as for journals, but he “will consider reviewing books or book chapters that are not OA-friendly, because books are a different business from research journals,” though he “wish[es] that there was more movement towards OA books.”

As for books, Professor von Fintel will limit his publishing to books that “have a significant open access component, such as making at least the final manuscript freely available…”

Professor von Fintel has been taking action for more open access to research and scholarship for many years. In 2007, he launched an open access journal in his field, Semantics & Pragmatics, with a colleague, David Beaver. In 2009, he participated in the faculty committee that crafted the MIT Faculty Open Access Policy. He decided to post his personal open access policy publicly now because, as he tells it, “I had noticed that some of my publication and reviewing decisions were made in a rather unprincipled way that I later regretted. Having a clear personal policy will guide me towards making deliberate decisions in these matters.”

The passage of the MIT Faculty Open Access Policy makes it possible for faculty research to be shared openly on the web, von Fintel says, but a personal manifesto is still important because “faculty still have to make principled decisions such as choosing a journal that does not impose an embargo or exerts pressure to opt out of the OA Policy.”

Date:  Monday, Nov. 7th
Time:  2-3pm
Place: 6-120

Bio: G. Sayeed Choudhury is the Associate Dean for Library Digital Programs and Hodson Director of the Digital Research and Curation Center at the Sheridan Libraries of Johns Hopkins University. He is also the Director of Operations for the Institute of Data Intensive Engineering and Science (IDIES) based at Johns Hopkins. He is the Principal Investigator for the Data Conservancy, one of the awards through NSF’s DataNet program. He has oversight for the digital library activities and services provided by the Sheridan Libraries at Johns Hopkins University.

Tuesday, Nov 8, 7-9 pm in the Lewis Music Library (14E-109)

It’s Alive!
A series of staged play readings by students
in collaboration with professional actors
curated by Anna Kohler, Senior Lecturer, MIT Music and Theater Arts
presents

Illness or Modern Women
by Elfriede Jelinek
Nobel Prize for Literature, 2004

Join us for a staged reading of Elfriede Jelinek’s play, read by Jay Scheib, Associate Professor of Music and Theater Arts, Tanya Selvaratnam, and MIT students.

Free and open to the public. For more information, contact the Lewis Music Library: 617-253-5636.

NYC Parcels

Detailed tax lot data for New York City from 2002 – 2011 is available through the MIT Geodata Repository.  Attributes include ownership information, building characteristics (number of floors, total units, year built, etc.), valuations for tax purposes, and more. Easily find available datasets by using borough names, like Manhattan, to search.

It’s Alive!
A series of staged play readings by students
in collaboration with professional actors
curated by Anna Kohler, Senior Lecturer, MIT Music and Theater Arts
presents
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf by Edward Albee

Join us for a staged reading of Edward Albee’s classic play, read by Anna Kohler and Michael Ouellettee of Theater Arts, and MIT students.

Next reading date in the “It’s Alive” series: Thursday, November 17

Free and open to the public. For more information, contact the Lewis Music Library: 617-253-5636.

Don’t know what RSS is?  You can still visit the page to see the list of new Hayden DVDs.  Or if you want to learn more about RSS, see our guide on RSS, Email, and Table of Contents alerts.

New resources

• Have a smart phone? Now you can go to the MIT Mobile Web to search for and request books and more.
• Find out how to use and cite images (and other content) with a new guide on copyright & fair use.
• Need help managing your data? Get assistance, attend workshops, or schedule an individual consultation on the guide for finding and managing data.
• Download new ESRI ArcGIS 10 software and improved MIT Geodata Search Tool for ArcGIS. Find GIS lab hours, workshops and more.

Library hours & study space

• The Hayden Library group study room (14E-311) is now equipped with a touch-screen reservation system and new video conferencing equipment.
• Study under the Dome: new group study rooms on the 8th Floor of  Barker Library open soon.
• Longer hours have returned!  See hours for all library locations.
• Get answers to all your questions about borrowing with helpful new FAQs: Circulation FAQ and Course Reserves FAQ.
• Questions? Ideas or Comments?

Upcoming Events

• We’re offering a wide variety of events throughout the fall.  Find out about scheduled readings, talks, workshops, exhibits and more.

View the What we did on your summer vacation flyer (pdf).