A Bi-Weekly Update
3/2/12
A Giant Yields
Big news on the journal publishing front. According to Inside Higher Ed, Reed Elsevier, a giant in the journal publishing business, yielded to academics who protested the publisher’s support of a bill that would have stood in the way of government-mandated open access to the results of scientific research. This is not to say that Elsevier supports government-mandates for open access. Far from it. But Elsevier has withdrawn its backing of the controversial Research Works Act that directly opposed open access initiatives.
To see a big publisher like Elsevier change direction even slightly in response to academic protesters– as Barbara McFadden Allen, executive director of the Committee on Institutional Cooperation, said, “At the end of the day, it’s extraordinary.”
Credo Reference Continues to Grow
Have you or your students tried out Credo Reference? It’s a library-subscribed collection of reference sources published by well-respected publishing houses like Oxford, Cambridge, and Routledge. Titles now number in the hundreds, encompassing all disciplines.
Here are a sampling of the newest titles, these added in the last month:
Aesthetics A-Z
Cambridge dictionary of Christian Theology
Dictionary of visual discourse: a dialectical lexicon of terms
Encyclopedia of African-American writing
Financial Times world desk reference
Key concepts and techniques in GIS
Key concepts and techniques in developmental psychology
Key concepts in ethnography
Key concepts in leisure studies
Key concepts in public relations
Key concepts in sports studies
Key concepts in teaching primary mathematicsKey concepts in urban geography
Infomaniac Tip
The Wikipedia Philosophy
Professor Timothy Messer-Kruse tried to update the Wikipedia page on the Haymarket riot of 1886 to correct a long-standing inaccurate claim. Even though he’s written two books and numerous articles on the subject, his changes were instantly rejected.
Professor Messer-Kruse found that Wikipedia discourages primary sources for documentation. He reports to the Chronicle of Higher Education,
I tried to edit the page again. Within 10 seconds I was informed that my citations to the primary documents were insufficient, as Wikipedia requires its contributors to rely on secondary sources, or, as my critic informed me, “published books.” Another editor cheerfully tutored me in what this means: “Wikipedia is not ‘truth,’ Wikipedia is ‘verifiability’ of reliable sources. Hence, if most secondary sources which are taken as reliable happen to repeat a flawed account or description of something, Wikipedia will echo that.
Verifiable but not the truth. Hmmmm…..
Calendar
3/15, 3/22 – Meditation Group. Open to all Muhlenberg faculty, staff, and students. (Fulford Room, 5:00-6:00 p.m.).
3/22 – Faculty Author Reception: Vivian Walsh (Fulford Room, 12:30-1:45 p.m.).
