Coming Soon! Annual Juried Student Exhibition in Gallery 204

Starting next week on November 4, Gallery 204 on the upper level of the Hewes Library willl be featuring the Annual Juried Studen Exhibition.  This will run from November 4 - December 7, 2011.  Friday, November 4 will be the opening day with a Gallery Talk at 3:15pm followed by a reception from 3-5pm in the lobby area.

Title Highlight: Biographical Dictionary of Women in Science

The biographical dictionary of women in science: pioneering lives from ancient times to the mid-20th century

2 vol.: List of scientists by occupation (vol. 2), List of scientists by Time Period (vol. 2), List of scientists by Country (vol. 2)

This two volume dictionary is really more of an encyclopedia in that the entries range in length from a dictionary sized paragraph to 7 pages (Marie Curie). It covers women of all nationalities and time periods with entries on women engaged in scientific pursuits from pre-450 A.D. such as the physician Olympias of Thebes and mathematician Hypatia of Alexandria, to women of the Middle Ages like the physician Agnes of Jerusalem and the nurse Saint Catherine of Sienna to twentieth century scientists including Marie Curie and Margaret Meade. The indexes arranged by occupation, time period and country at the end of the second volume are useful in seeing the wide range of women represented.

Although most of the scientists mentioned are British or American, there are also biographies of women from many other countries, Egypt, Peru and Sri Lanka for example. There are suggestions for further reading given after each entry and each entry’s reading suggestions are divided into one of three categories: primary sources, secondary sources or standard sources.

New Items at Hewes Library

New items are added to the Hewes Library Collection on a continual basis. Recent titles have included:

• Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans by Peter Abelard
• Flamingo Rising by Larry Baker
• Thought of Work by John W. Budd
• Education Reform by Ian C. Friedman
• Buddhism: Introducing the Buddhist Experience by Donald W. Mitchell
• TTYL by Lauren Myracle
• Stage Lighting Design by Richard Pilbrow
• How the Cold War Ended by John Prados
• Deepest Wounds by Thomas D. Rogers
• American Film in the Digital Age by Robert C. Sickels

Just Released! New ScotsRead Titles

Newly released ScotsRead book titles have just arrived.  Check them out from the ScotsRead Collection on the main level of the library.

• Stealing Mona Lisa: A Mystery by Carson Morton
• Acceptable Loss: A William Monk novel by Anne Perry
• Cold Vengeance by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child
• The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer, adapted by Seymour Chwast
• Those Across the River by Christopher Buehlman
• The Night Circus: A Novel by Erin Morgenstern

Homecoming 2011: Dream Big

Good luck to the Monmouth College Fighting Scots!  And welcome to all of the Monmouth College friends, family, and alumni!

Dictionary of Paradox

Dictionary of Paradox:  This small dictionary illustrates many of the examples used to demonstrate the concept of paradox. Paradox is defined by the authors as a statement that is absurd because it flies in the face of what is correct, proper or logical. For instance the Abilene paradox illustrates a phenomenon often observed by managers. It tells of a family relaxing on a hot afternoon in Texas when one of them suggests driving to Abilene for dinner. None of the family wants to make the four hour round trip to Abilene, but none wants to be the first to say it, so the entire family gets in the car and drives to Abilene. The paradox is that no one wanted to go, yet everyone did. Why would people do this? This entry examines the reasons behind this strange, counterproductive behavior and suggests ways for managers to avoid it. This story and many more like it are found in this intriguing volume.

For those unfamiliar with the concept, paradox is explained under its own heading and the well-known paradoxes from many branches of knowledge (science, philosophy, literature, mathematics, etc.) are found under the title of the paradox such as the Acting paradox, the Bystander Paradox, Infinite Series Paradox, Zeno’s Paradox and others. Suggestions are given at the end of each entry for further reading and research into each example.

New Books Every Friday!

Just a reminder for students, staff, and faculty to check out the New Books Display area on the main level of the library.  While titles are added throughout the week, large updates of all new titles appear on the bookshelves on Friday mornings.

Abbreviations Dictionaries

Many people are familiar with the shorthand language of texting and know that the abbreviation  LOL means “laugh out loud”.  But did you know that it can also mean little old lady, lots of love, or lots of luck? According to the entry in the American Heritage Abbreviations Dictionary such is the case.   But shorthand ways of referring to things are not new.  There are many shorthand references used in articles and books, heard on the news or even in general conversation.  For instance, anyone listening to the news has heard the abbreviation NASDAQ referred to, but, how many of you know that it stands for National Association of Security Dealers Automated Quotation (system)? 

A few of the dictionaries available at Hewes Library.

To find that out and to decipher the many abbreviations found in books, articles and the news you should turn to an abbreviations dictionary.  Two good abbreviations dictionaries are found in the Hewes Library, the first is the 10^th edition of the Abbreviations Dictionary found in the reference collection, the second is the American Heritage Abbreviations Dictionary found in the Credo Reference collection, an online database subscribed to by Hewes.  The print dictionary, in addition to its abbreviations entries also contains such useful information as the abbreviations for airlines, birthstones, the Greek alphabet, the International Radio Alphabet and Code, musical nicknames and superlatives, national capitals, astronomical and zodiac symbols and many other interesting things.  The online dictionary contains more slang and technology terms like LOL, LDR (long distance relationship is only one meaning) and ROTFL (roll on the floor laughing)  Both dictionaries are good places to look to decipher unfamiliar terms and phrases. 

So take a look and discover the meanings of many of the shorthand terms and phrases you see all around you, YKWIM?

Just Arrived! More ScotsRead Titles

The following ScotsRead titles have just arrived and are available:

• Death in the City of Light: The Serial Killer of Nazi-Occupied Paris by David King
• Pirate King: A novel of suspense featuring Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes by Laurie R. King
• Sleeping with the Enemy: Coco Chanel's Secret War by Hal Vaughan
• Kill Me If You Can: A Novel by James Patterson and Marshall Karp
• The Leftovers by Tom Perrotta
• The Good Theif's Guide to Venice by Chris Ewan

New BookScan Station Now Available

Hewes Library has acquired a new BookScan Station, which includes a flatbed scanner, document scanner, and touch screen instruction monitor. 

The BookScan Station will allow users to scan booksor documents quickly and convert them into .PDF documents, Word Files, text files, and more.  Files can be sent directly to your email address, USB flash drive, or uploaded to your Google Docs account.

The BookScan Station is located near the Public Workstations computers and printer on the Main Floor of the library.  If you have questions, stop by the Reference or Circulation Desks.

Einstein Bros Bagels Resumes Normal Hours

As of this morning, Einstein Bros Bagels has resumed normal hours. 

Library Resumes Regular Hours

Welcome back to campus after Fall Break!  As of today, Tuesday, October 11, Hewes Library has resumed regular hours. 

New ScotsRead Titles

The following titles have recently arrived and are now available in the ScotsRead Collection on the Main Level of Hewes Library.

• The 3rd Alternative: Solving Life's Most Difficult Problems by Stephen Covey
• The Dovekeepers: A Novel by Alice Hoffman
• The Best of Me by Nicholas Sparks
• The Deception at Lyme: Or, the peril of Persuasion by Carrie Bebris
• Sweetness: The Enigmatic Life of Walter Payton by Jeff Pearlman
• Shatner Rules: Your Guide to Understanding the Shatnerverse and the World at Large by William Shatner

Check out these titles and more from ScotsRead: the leisure reading collection.  If you are interested in a particular author or book titles, please email the information to referenceATmonmouthcollegeDOTedu.

Why use a dictionary?

Most people think of dictionaries as places to look up how to spell a word or to find the correct meaning(s) of a word.  Among the best known are the many varieties of Merriam-Webster’s and the most famous of all the Oxford English Dictionary.   Another common use for dictionaries is to look up an equivalent word in a foreign language in a French-English, Spanish-English, Greek-English Dictionary, etc.  All of this is true, but dictionaries can be a lot more. 

There are many other sorts of information that can be found in a dictionary.  For instance when reading a book or article about art or theatre, you may come across a reference to an unfamiliar concept, such as “conceptual art “.  A quick look at the “Dictionary of the Avant-Gardes” will tell you that conceptual art is the “..radical idea that a statement which need not be in words can be an aesthetic experience” and that it is found in visual art, music and performance art.  Or if you are reading a financial article and see the word “bubble”, you may not know what is referred to by the term.  However, if you look it up in the “Wall Street Dictionary” you would know that in business terms a bubble is ““..a speculative venture that has little chance of making a profit”. 

And dictionaries may not just illustrate words, but also concrete objects such as a Brewster chair and the aurora borealis as shown in “The Dictionary of Interior Design” and the Academic Press Dictionary of Science and Technology respectively.  There are many uses of dictionaries for short bits of information on, or even pictures of, a term or concept that is unfamiliar. 

Look for more on with this series of articles that will explore some of the many dictionaries found in or accessible through Hewes Library.

Einstein Brothers Bagels Fall Break Hours

Over Fall Break, Einstein Brothers Bagels will have reduced hours.  They will be open:

• Friday, October 7: 7:30am – 2:00pm
• Saturday -Tuesday, October 8-11: Closed

Normal hours will resume on Wednesday, October 12 at 7:30am.

Library Fall Break Hours

Hewes Library will have shortened hours over Fall Break. 

• Friday, October 7: 7:30 a.m. - 4:30 p.m.
• Saturday - Sunday, October 8 - 9: Closed
• Monday, October 10: 8:00 a.m. - 4:30 p.m.
• Tuesday, October 11: 8:00 a.m. - Midnight

The library will return to normal hours on Tuesday, October 11.

Research Tip! Printing from JSTOR

Printing from the database JSTOR can be tricky.  If you just select print from your internet browser's window, it will only print the first page of the article that you are interested in.  To print the full article, you need to download the .PDF.  You can access the article .PDF file from either the search results list or the top right if you are viewing the first page of the article.  Once you select download, you will have to agree to the copyright restrictions before you can view the full article to print.

Banned Book Week Wrap Up

Banned Book Week 2011 officially comes to a close today, but the library displays will remain up until the beginning of next week.

Take a few moments to browse the books that have been challenged or banned throughout the country.  Browse through the list of most frequently challenged titles to see how many you have read.....you may be surprised!

Books are available for checkout.  Please take them to the Circulation Desk on the main floor of the library with your MC ID card to take them with you.