by: Joseph Freeman, Associated Press
SALT LAKE CITY — Twelve-year-old Audrey Conner owed about $7 in fines to the Salt Lake City public library system, but the voracious reader was a little short.
It didn’t matter. Her nearby library branch had an alternative: Children who can’t pay the fine can do the time. So Audrey sat in a room reading a book of her choice, earning $1 for every 10 minutes. She paid her debt in a little over an hour.
“I actually timed myself with my cell phone, and they wrote down my starting time,” Conner said.
Libraries across the country are experimenting with similar programs that offer readers an amnesty on overdue fines or do away with them completely. In Salt Lake City, anyone 18 and younger can “read down” a debt.
“It’s a great idea, and it’s picking up more and more,” said Camila Alire, president of the American Library Association. “Especially now, during this economic recession, we don’t want to deter people from using the library.”
Lisa Curt, manager of the branch where Conner had the debt, said librarians “don’t really like to have fines, particularly with children and teens who owe. It’s like a necessary evil.”
In Arizona, the Scottsdale Public Library System has partnered with hospitals to issue library cards to newborn babies — and give those cards a year without fines. The idea is that new mothers shouldn’t have to worry about getting books back quickly; they have enough to do.
Some libraries think the fines system is so outdated that they are tossing it altogether.
On Valentine’s Day last year, the Anythink Libraries just north of Denver eliminated their fine system.
“Our philosophy is that we want people to come to the library, even if their heads are hanging low,” library spokeswoman Stacie Ledden said.
The library system gives patrons 25 days after the due date to return a book. It’s then marked lost, and the reader is charged to replace it.
“Overdue fines are definitely one of those traditional library conventions that are worth taking a look at,” Ledden said. “It’s intimidating to people. They feel embarrassed about it. They feel guilty about it, and we don’t want people to feel that way.”
Programs to forgive fines are easier to implement at smaller public library systems with fewer branches and where overdue penalties are not a huge part of the budget.
The Salt Lake City library has six branches and expects to collect $350,000 in fines for the fiscal year ending in June. That figure is not expected to be affected much by the “read down” program.
The library is also considering a program that would allow patrons to “bike down” their fines by pedaling around town instead of using their car. And it is looking at a program that wipes accounts clean once a reader turns 18, like a criminal record.
Audrey was glad to have the “read down” option.
“I wasn’t annoyed at all,” she said. “Besides, I like to read, so it was pretty good for me.”
from: Sign On San Diego
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Friday, July 30, 2010
Public Libraries Nourishing the Mind
by: Phil Shapiro, PC World
I've been thinking a lot about what ought to be architecturally designed into public library spaces in the future. As physical books play a lesser role, we can rethink the best use of library space.
Recall, the mission of public libraries is to nourish the mind. As it happens, the mind lives within the human body. When the human body gets hungry, it often leaves the library. In a knowledge economy, we can't let that happen. We need all brains on deck, so to speak. To nourish the mind, you've got to nourish the body. When you're hungry, your mind starts wandering. Soon after, your body starts wandering.
Libraries sometimes deal with this conundrum of food availability by setting up a snack machine in a hall outside the library. Snack machines are not food, though. Snacks, by definition, are nonnourishing. They defer hunger cravings by thirty minutes or an hour, but they do not nourish the body in any real way.
So public libraries ought to have some kind of cafeteria with a selection of healthy, affordable, nourishing foods: foods that cater to different people's dietary needs. Whether you're allergic to dairy or allergic to wheat should not be a deterrent to you spending time at the library. If you're on a low-sodium or low-potassium diet, we want you at the library just as much as we want anyone else.
A small cafeteria, adjacent to the library, is just the starting point, though. That cafeteria should have attached to it a public kitchen -- a place where cooking experimentation can take place. Remember the "culinary arts" from school? If art belongs in a library, then maybe culinary art belongs in a library, too. People need to learn how to eat healthier, and if libraries are to be a place where you go to learn things, then you ought to be able to learn to cook at a library.
Here in the northern hemisphere, that public kitchen ought be situated at the south side of the library building. Why? So that solar cookers can be used to cook rice and other food for the cafeteria. And at all times experimentation with recipes should be taking place in a public kitchen, for creativity is at the very heart of the public library. Want a delicious nondairy smoothie made with frozen bananas and rice beverage? Make it for yourself in the public kitchen using the bicycle-powered blender set up for that purpose. Then go back to the library and read some more or write some more or make some more or teach some more or compose some more or draw some more. You do not need to leave the library unless you can think of a better use of your time.
Adjacent to the public library is a community garden where vegetables grow. For libraries that are constrained for space, the community garden can be designed into the roof of the building. So you've been tasked with organizing the food for a library event? The radishes can be pulled right from the community garden, and the hummus can be made in the bicycle-powered food processor in the public kitchen. You get the picture. Vibrancy. All interconnected. Whole. Sensible. Self-sufficient. Thoughtful.
Whoever could imagine that libraries could be thoughtful? They can be if we want them to be.
From: San Francisco Chronicle
I've been thinking a lot about what ought to be architecturally designed into public library spaces in the future. As physical books play a lesser role, we can rethink the best use of library space.
Recall, the mission of public libraries is to nourish the mind. As it happens, the mind lives within the human body. When the human body gets hungry, it often leaves the library. In a knowledge economy, we can't let that happen. We need all brains on deck, so to speak. To nourish the mind, you've got to nourish the body. When you're hungry, your mind starts wandering. Soon after, your body starts wandering.
Libraries sometimes deal with this conundrum of food availability by setting up a snack machine in a hall outside the library. Snack machines are not food, though. Snacks, by definition, are nonnourishing. They defer hunger cravings by thirty minutes or an hour, but they do not nourish the body in any real way.
So public libraries ought to have some kind of cafeteria with a selection of healthy, affordable, nourishing foods: foods that cater to different people's dietary needs. Whether you're allergic to dairy or allergic to wheat should not be a deterrent to you spending time at the library. If you're on a low-sodium or low-potassium diet, we want you at the library just as much as we want anyone else.
A small cafeteria, adjacent to the library, is just the starting point, though. That cafeteria should have attached to it a public kitchen -- a place where cooking experimentation can take place. Remember the "culinary arts" from school? If art belongs in a library, then maybe culinary art belongs in a library, too. People need to learn how to eat healthier, and if libraries are to be a place where you go to learn things, then you ought to be able to learn to cook at a library.
Here in the northern hemisphere, that public kitchen ought be situated at the south side of the library building. Why? So that solar cookers can be used to cook rice and other food for the cafeteria. And at all times experimentation with recipes should be taking place in a public kitchen, for creativity is at the very heart of the public library. Want a delicious nondairy smoothie made with frozen bananas and rice beverage? Make it for yourself in the public kitchen using the bicycle-powered blender set up for that purpose. Then go back to the library and read some more or write some more or make some more or teach some more or compose some more or draw some more. You do not need to leave the library unless you can think of a better use of your time.
Adjacent to the public library is a community garden where vegetables grow. For libraries that are constrained for space, the community garden can be designed into the roof of the building. So you've been tasked with organizing the food for a library event? The radishes can be pulled right from the community garden, and the hummus can be made in the bicycle-powered food processor in the public kitchen. You get the picture. Vibrancy. All interconnected. Whole. Sensible. Self-sufficient. Thoughtful.
Whoever could imagine that libraries could be thoughtful? They can be if we want them to be.
From: San Francisco Chronicle
Thursday, July 29, 2010
Mauritania's hidden manuscripts
by: Isabelle Mandraud
The bone-dry wood creaks as the book opens at a page representing the course of the moon, framed by black balls and red crescents. The manuscript contains 132 pages of Arab astronomy bound in well-worn leather, a 15th-century treasure stored, with similar items, in a cardboard box in a traditional dwelling in Chinguetti. This historic town, on the Adrar plateau in Mauritania, holds some of the finest collections of old Arabo-Berber books, but now the desert libraries are disappearing.
With a sudden decline in tourism, Mauritania is spending all available resources on security and combating al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb. The government has no time for heritage. "It's not been a priority in recent years," the arts minister, Cissé Mint Cheikh Ould Boide, acknowledges. Handed down from generation to generation the manuscripts, some of which date from the 10th century, still belong to families and are dispersed around four main centres, Chinguetti, Ouadane, Oulatane and Tichitt. The towns have been on the Unesco World Heritage list since 1996. On the route of pilgrims travelling to Mecca and of caravans loaded with dates and salt serving a vast area from northern Mauritania to Sudan, the towns used to be a major tourist attraction. But visitors are scarce and the books are being forgotten.
"Until the colonial era they were the only form of reading matter, often consulted and sometimes copied. But with our modern ways they are increasingly regarded as mere relics," says Jiyid Ould Abdi, the head of Mauritania's Scientific Research Institute. To remedy this situation the government is planning a big event – Nouakchott, Capital of Islamic Art – for 2011. It hopes to form an international panel to select 35 projects and attract foreign capital. The scheme will focus largely on Moorish civilisation, disregarding black Mauritanian culture represented by the Pular, Wolof and Soninke ethnic groups.
The institute, located next to the National Museum in the capital, lacks the resources to protect the manuscripts. Only a handful have been restored, with the date and author cited on the final page recorded in a database. The modern laboratory, set up in adjoining premises with help from Italy, is just ticking over. A technician cautiously gives us a demonstration, placing the book in a glove-box and using a brush to clean each page, a little pump sucking up the desert sand. Then the manuscript is transferred to a plastic pouch containing no oxygen, and is set aside for three weeks, long enough to kill any bacteria. A simple carton binding is fitted and the original cover is scanned and returned to its owner.
Out of more than 33,000 ancient Arabic manuscripts identified at the end of the 1990s in Mauritania barely a tenth have reached the museum. Most of the books are still in the hands of private owners. "We have tried everything. We have offered to compensate the families or just look after them [the books] with a guarantee of property, but it makes no difference," Abdi says. "It is a legacy from their ancestors and an honour to keep them. Everyone does their best [storing the books] in trunks or boxes. It is storage, not conservation." Even a German-sponsored project to record the manuscripts on microfilm ran into opposition.
About 600km north-east of the capital, in Chinguetti, once a centre of Islamic learning, the Habott family owns one of the finest private libraries, with 1,400 books covering a dozen subjects such as the Qur'an and the Hadith (the words of the Prophet), astronomy, mathematics, geometry, law and grammar. The oldest tome, written on Chinese paper, dates from the 11th century.
Four generations have watched over the fine collection started by Sidi Ould Mohamed Habott in the 19th century. Their ancestor travelled by camel to Mecca to find these treasures – "six months there, six months back" – following in the footsteps of the scholars who handed down, exchanged and copied the books in the course of their caravan journeys. Indeed, this is how Islam took root in Mauritania. "With neither agriculture nor raw materials, the country coalesced around its culture," Abdi explains. "All the scholars had their own library," wrote the French ethnologist Odette du Puigaudeau in reference to the "leather-bound books brought back from North Africa, Egypt and Syria […] by pilgrims and messengers".
Every year the Habott family meets to appoint a custodian for the manuscripts. The library fittings are rudimentary, comprising metal cabinets, archive boxes and large jars of water in the four corners of the room to release some moisture into this sandy world. Sand is everywhere, a fearsome enemy, surrounding the town and advancing several metres a year. Across the square it has engulfed the old citadel, leaving only a few walls and a mosque.
In a nearby house Seif Islam, the manager of the local secondary school, watches over another library with about 700 dusty volumes. "The state has been trying to lay its hands on them for years," he says. "Would you part with your hand or your foot? It [the library] is a part of us." Until recently, the desert libraries attracted many visitors, contributing to the development of Chinguetti and its sister cities.
However, since the killing of four French tourists in December 2007 and the kidnapping of other Europeans for which al-Qaida claimed responsibility, visitors have become increasingly rare. The sandy streets are empty and the shops closed for lack of custom. On the only paved road from Nouakchott to Akar, an hour from Chinguetti, there is little traffic. Work is hard to find and young people are leaving for the capital, making the desert seem all the more lonely.
This article originally appeared in Le Monde
From: Guardian
The bone-dry wood creaks as the book opens at a page representing the course of the moon, framed by black balls and red crescents. The manuscript contains 132 pages of Arab astronomy bound in well-worn leather, a 15th-century treasure stored, with similar items, in a cardboard box in a traditional dwelling in Chinguetti. This historic town, on the Adrar plateau in Mauritania, holds some of the finest collections of old Arabo-Berber books, but now the desert libraries are disappearing.
With a sudden decline in tourism, Mauritania is spending all available resources on security and combating al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb. The government has no time for heritage. "It's not been a priority in recent years," the arts minister, Cissé Mint Cheikh Ould Boide, acknowledges. Handed down from generation to generation the manuscripts, some of which date from the 10th century, still belong to families and are dispersed around four main centres, Chinguetti, Ouadane, Oulatane and Tichitt. The towns have been on the Unesco World Heritage list since 1996. On the route of pilgrims travelling to Mecca and of caravans loaded with dates and salt serving a vast area from northern Mauritania to Sudan, the towns used to be a major tourist attraction. But visitors are scarce and the books are being forgotten.
"Until the colonial era they were the only form of reading matter, often consulted and sometimes copied. But with our modern ways they are increasingly regarded as mere relics," says Jiyid Ould Abdi, the head of Mauritania's Scientific Research Institute. To remedy this situation the government is planning a big event – Nouakchott, Capital of Islamic Art – for 2011. It hopes to form an international panel to select 35 projects and attract foreign capital. The scheme will focus largely on Moorish civilisation, disregarding black Mauritanian culture represented by the Pular, Wolof and Soninke ethnic groups.
The institute, located next to the National Museum in the capital, lacks the resources to protect the manuscripts. Only a handful have been restored, with the date and author cited on the final page recorded in a database. The modern laboratory, set up in adjoining premises with help from Italy, is just ticking over. A technician cautiously gives us a demonstration, placing the book in a glove-box and using a brush to clean each page, a little pump sucking up the desert sand. Then the manuscript is transferred to a plastic pouch containing no oxygen, and is set aside for three weeks, long enough to kill any bacteria. A simple carton binding is fitted and the original cover is scanned and returned to its owner.
Out of more than 33,000 ancient Arabic manuscripts identified at the end of the 1990s in Mauritania barely a tenth have reached the museum. Most of the books are still in the hands of private owners. "We have tried everything. We have offered to compensate the families or just look after them [the books] with a guarantee of property, but it makes no difference," Abdi says. "It is a legacy from their ancestors and an honour to keep them. Everyone does their best [storing the books] in trunks or boxes. It is storage, not conservation." Even a German-sponsored project to record the manuscripts on microfilm ran into opposition.
About 600km north-east of the capital, in Chinguetti, once a centre of Islamic learning, the Habott family owns one of the finest private libraries, with 1,400 books covering a dozen subjects such as the Qur'an and the Hadith (the words of the Prophet), astronomy, mathematics, geometry, law and grammar. The oldest tome, written on Chinese paper, dates from the 11th century.
Four generations have watched over the fine collection started by Sidi Ould Mohamed Habott in the 19th century. Their ancestor travelled by camel to Mecca to find these treasures – "six months there, six months back" – following in the footsteps of the scholars who handed down, exchanged and copied the books in the course of their caravan journeys. Indeed, this is how Islam took root in Mauritania. "With neither agriculture nor raw materials, the country coalesced around its culture," Abdi explains. "All the scholars had their own library," wrote the French ethnologist Odette du Puigaudeau in reference to the "leather-bound books brought back from North Africa, Egypt and Syria […] by pilgrims and messengers".
Every year the Habott family meets to appoint a custodian for the manuscripts. The library fittings are rudimentary, comprising metal cabinets, archive boxes and large jars of water in the four corners of the room to release some moisture into this sandy world. Sand is everywhere, a fearsome enemy, surrounding the town and advancing several metres a year. Across the square it has engulfed the old citadel, leaving only a few walls and a mosque.
In a nearby house Seif Islam, the manager of the local secondary school, watches over another library with about 700 dusty volumes. "The state has been trying to lay its hands on them for years," he says. "Would you part with your hand or your foot? It [the library] is a part of us." Until recently, the desert libraries attracted many visitors, contributing to the development of Chinguetti and its sister cities.
However, since the killing of four French tourists in December 2007 and the kidnapping of other Europeans for which al-Qaida claimed responsibility, visitors have become increasingly rare. The sandy streets are empty and the shops closed for lack of custom. On the only paved road from Nouakchott to Akar, an hour from Chinguetti, there is little traffic. Work is hard to find and young people are leaving for the capital, making the desert seem all the more lonely.
This article originally appeared in Le Monde
From: Guardian
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Study: Libraries Top The Competition In Lending Movies
by: Kim Velsey
Red boxes, red envelopes and the blue and yellow Blockbuster stores may dominate the movie rental landscape, but according to a recent survey, when Americans want to watch a DVD, they are most likely to turn to their local library.
The survey, released this year by OCLC, a nonprofit library co-operative and research organization, found that public libraries in the United States lend an average 2.1 million videos every day, slightly more than the 2 million that Netflix ships. The other top two competitors, Redbox and Blockbuster, come in at 1.4 million and 1.2 million respectively, according to daily averages provided by company representatives.
The findings were part of a report called "How Libraries Stack Up," which highlights the many roles that libraries play in communities, according to OCLC market analysis manager Peggy Gallagher. It also includes statistics on career assistance and Wi-Fi use — the extent of which might be surprising to the general public or even to businesses offering similar services.
"I think of libraries as places for books," said Steve Swasey, Netflix's vice president of corporate communications, adding that Netflix doesn't view public libraries as a competitor.
"It's free," said Swasey, "so it's a whole different model."
Libraries have been lending movies for decades, of course, but the size and scope of the offerings have changed vastly, from smatterings of PBS documentaries on VHS to smorgasbords of new releases, art house and hard-to-find foreign films, children's movies and TV shows on DVD and Blue-ray.
In the past 10 years, public libraries in the United States have doubled their movie collections — from 73.5 video materials per 1,000 people in 1999 to 166.7 in 2008, according to the most recent study by the Institute of Museum and Library Services. At the same time, print materials fell from 2,846 volumes per 1,000 people to 2,767 volumes.
In Connecticut, as in the rest of the country, books still make up the vast majority of library collections — 14.2 million books to 927,000 movies — but movies have a much higher circulation rate, according to Connecticut State Library statistician Tom Newman. They account for about 27 percent of library circulation.
"People think we're all about books," said Debbie Herman, president of the Connecticut Library Association. "But we have all these other resources to offer."
Netflix still dominates in Connecticut, with some 55,000 movies being shipped out of the Hartford distribution center daily, vs. 23,923 library checkouts (Redbox, a far runner-up, rents 13,000 movies per day from Connecticut kiosks). But librarians say that demand for movies is growing.
"Friday nights, the hour before we close, it's like a video store," said Simsbury Library Director Susan Bullock. "People are running to get their movies before the weekend."
Catering to patrons has contributed to the circulation surge at Simsbury and many other libraries. Bullock said that circulation boomed after the library figured out what kinds of movies people want to see: "24," "Inspector Poirot," "Star Trek," "Stargate," "I Love Lucy," "The Dick Cavett Show," BBC shows and foreign films.
Barbara Bailey, director of Glastonbury's Welles-Turner Memorial Library, said that the library also welcomes requests, buying multiple copies of new releases and each year's Oscar-nominated films.
"Traditionally, libraries have tried to concentrate on educational movies and award winners," Bailey said. "Right now … if it looks like something that will be watched by many people, we go ahead and buy it."
The policy results in both critically acclaimed and blockbuster titles: Due to popular demand, West Hartford just added 200 titles from the Criterion collection, an art house distributor, according to community services librarian Joseph Cadieux.
"Libraries want to serve our communities," said Herman of the Connecticut Library Association.
There is, of course, another enormous reason for library movies' popularity: They're free, a not insignificant quality, especially during the recession, when library use rose in Connecticut and across the country.
Felix Kossi, a student at Capital Community College, said that he checks movies out of Hartford Public Library twice a week. The visits, he said, were economically motivated, although not by the recession.
"I used to buy movies," Kossi said. "But I stopped because my friends would borrow them and not bring them back."
Jose Rosa, browsing the DVD selection in Manchester's Mary Cheney Library last week, said that cost is a factor for him as well — he's a big movie watcher and supplements a streaming Netflix subscription with the library's variety of older titles.
Largely, though, he likes the library because it's a library. He can look at movies while his 12-year-old son finds books to take home.
He noted that it also provides a personal touch: The librarians are really helpful. With neighborhood video stores nearly extinct, libraries are one of the few places where people can flip through movies and trade recommendations with one another.
"Netflix will give you the newest releases," said Library Director Douglas McDonough, "but there is a big social function to libraries."
Herman added that the debate over whether movies belong in libraries, has, she believes, been settled.
"Do movies help educate, promote literacy, contribute to the forum of ideas?" said Herman. "Then I think there is a place for them."
From: Hartford Courant
Red boxes, red envelopes and the blue and yellow Blockbuster stores may dominate the movie rental landscape, but according to a recent survey, when Americans want to watch a DVD, they are most likely to turn to their local library.
The survey, released this year by OCLC, a nonprofit library co-operative and research organization, found that public libraries in the United States lend an average 2.1 million videos every day, slightly more than the 2 million that Netflix ships. The other top two competitors, Redbox and Blockbuster, come in at 1.4 million and 1.2 million respectively, according to daily averages provided by company representatives.
The findings were part of a report called "How Libraries Stack Up," which highlights the many roles that libraries play in communities, according to OCLC market analysis manager Peggy Gallagher. It also includes statistics on career assistance and Wi-Fi use — the extent of which might be surprising to the general public or even to businesses offering similar services.
"I think of libraries as places for books," said Steve Swasey, Netflix's vice president of corporate communications, adding that Netflix doesn't view public libraries as a competitor.
"It's free," said Swasey, "so it's a whole different model."
Libraries have been lending movies for decades, of course, but the size and scope of the offerings have changed vastly, from smatterings of PBS documentaries on VHS to smorgasbords of new releases, art house and hard-to-find foreign films, children's movies and TV shows on DVD and Blue-ray.
In the past 10 years, public libraries in the United States have doubled their movie collections — from 73.5 video materials per 1,000 people in 1999 to 166.7 in 2008, according to the most recent study by the Institute of Museum and Library Services. At the same time, print materials fell from 2,846 volumes per 1,000 people to 2,767 volumes.
In Connecticut, as in the rest of the country, books still make up the vast majority of library collections — 14.2 million books to 927,000 movies — but movies have a much higher circulation rate, according to Connecticut State Library statistician Tom Newman. They account for about 27 percent of library circulation.
"People think we're all about books," said Debbie Herman, president of the Connecticut Library Association. "But we have all these other resources to offer."
Netflix still dominates in Connecticut, with some 55,000 movies being shipped out of the Hartford distribution center daily, vs. 23,923 library checkouts (Redbox, a far runner-up, rents 13,000 movies per day from Connecticut kiosks). But librarians say that demand for movies is growing.
"Friday nights, the hour before we close, it's like a video store," said Simsbury Library Director Susan Bullock. "People are running to get their movies before the weekend."
Catering to patrons has contributed to the circulation surge at Simsbury and many other libraries. Bullock said that circulation boomed after the library figured out what kinds of movies people want to see: "24," "Inspector Poirot," "Star Trek," "Stargate," "I Love Lucy," "The Dick Cavett Show," BBC shows and foreign films.
Barbara Bailey, director of Glastonbury's Welles-Turner Memorial Library, said that the library also welcomes requests, buying multiple copies of new releases and each year's Oscar-nominated films.
"Traditionally, libraries have tried to concentrate on educational movies and award winners," Bailey said. "Right now … if it looks like something that will be watched by many people, we go ahead and buy it."
The policy results in both critically acclaimed and blockbuster titles: Due to popular demand, West Hartford just added 200 titles from the Criterion collection, an art house distributor, according to community services librarian Joseph Cadieux.
"Libraries want to serve our communities," said Herman of the Connecticut Library Association.
There is, of course, another enormous reason for library movies' popularity: They're free, a not insignificant quality, especially during the recession, when library use rose in Connecticut and across the country.
Felix Kossi, a student at Capital Community College, said that he checks movies out of Hartford Public Library twice a week. The visits, he said, were economically motivated, although not by the recession.
"I used to buy movies," Kossi said. "But I stopped because my friends would borrow them and not bring them back."
Jose Rosa, browsing the DVD selection in Manchester's Mary Cheney Library last week, said that cost is a factor for him as well — he's a big movie watcher and supplements a streaming Netflix subscription with the library's variety of older titles.
Largely, though, he likes the library because it's a library. He can look at movies while his 12-year-old son finds books to take home.
He noted that it also provides a personal touch: The librarians are really helpful. With neighborhood video stores nearly extinct, libraries are one of the few places where people can flip through movies and trade recommendations with one another.
"Netflix will give you the newest releases," said Library Director Douglas McDonough, "but there is a big social function to libraries."
Herman added that the debate over whether movies belong in libraries, has, she believes, been settled.
"Do movies help educate, promote literacy, contribute to the forum of ideas?" said Herman. "Then I think there is a place for them."
From: Hartford Courant
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
NPR: 'Libraries Might Be the Next Big Thing!' But Then What?
by: Kathy Dempsey
OK, I feel the need to comment about this NPR article that's been making the rounds in US library circles. It's called "Why the Next Big Pop-Culture Wave After Cupcakes Might Be Libraries." I think just about every library-type person I know has posted it recently. Most are thrilled about it. And it is a good thing, but I have some reservations.
If you haven't read it yet, here's a piece of the opening:
From: The 'M' Word
OK, I feel the need to comment about this NPR article that's been making the rounds in US library circles. It's called "Why the Next Big Pop-Culture Wave After Cupcakes Might Be Libraries." I think just about every library-type person I know has posted it recently. Most are thrilled about it. And it is a good thing, but I have some reservations.
If you haven't read it yet, here's a piece of the opening:
And about the fact that a local news story skeptically questioning
whether libraries are "necessary" set off a response from Vanity
won her support from such diverse, non-library-specific outlets
as The A.V. Club and Metafilter, and from as far away as The
Guardian.
Call it a hunch, but it seems to me that the thing is in the air that
happens right before something — families with a million kids,
cupcakes, wedding coordinators — suddenly becomes the thing
everyone wants to do happy-fuzzy pop-culture stories about.
So someone at an influential media company thinks libraries might be the next big pop-culture hit. That's great! Really. And it would be cool if they were. But here's my thing: Then what??
Pop cultures comes & goes. Fads are hot, then not. So if you're serious about promoting your library and you want it to thrive, and to be loved & funded, then you're excited about this new wave of publicity. Now, ask yourself: What are you going to do during your 15 minutes of fame to build new visitors into regular users? (either in person or online) What's your plan for converting the fad-followers into lifelong supporters?
Don't get me wrong. I love NPR and am thrilled that this idea is floating around. And I want to thank blog post author Linda Holmes for her publicity & her vote of confidence. The awesomeness that is a library deserves to be known by all. But even if it happens, it won't solve our long-term challenges of branding and funding. I don't mean to be a downer, I just want you to be thinking ahead, preparing, planning. So, seriously -- whenever new people discover your library (any type of library), how do you encourage them to come back? Do you have strategies in place for this?
Hints:
1. Giving new visitors a library card is NOT enough.
2. Getting their email addresses is practically essential.
3. You need to personally invite them back; don't assume they'll return on their own.
4. You should be doing all of this not only in person, but also online.
Just as with retail stores, a first-time visitor is not automatically a customer for life. All libraries should have tactics for addressing this. You need to be welcoming, be extraordinary, be interesting, be useful, and be available. What makes you worth returning to, and how can you get that message across? If you're just starting out, think about what appeals to you and what makes you want to go back to a place you've just discovered.
Again, don't get me wrong. I'm not against publicity or getting noticed or being the Next Big Thing. I just want to use this opportunity to build longterm customers and advocates. Why accept being just a flash in the pan when we are really so much more?
From: The 'M' Word
Monday, July 26, 2010
Why The Next Big Pop-Culture Wave After Cupcakes Might Be Libraries
by: Linda Holmes
I realize we're picking the bones from the Old Spice campaign at this point, but when I saw that the Brigham Young University parody of the Old Spice ads had gotten more than 1.2 million views (Old Spicy himself — that's what I'm calling him — did a video for libraries), it got me thinking.
Specifically, it got me thinking about the very enjoyable Librarians Do Gaga video that everyone sent my way after the debut of the NPR Does Gaga video.
And about the fact that a local news story skeptically questioning whether libraries are "necessary" set off a response from Vanity Fair, and a later counterpunch by Chicago's Public Library Commissioner won her support from such diverse, non-library-specific outlets as The A.V. Club and Metafilter, and from as far away as The Guardian.
Call it a hunch, but it seems to me that the thing is in the air that happens right before something — families with a million kids, cupcakes, wedding coordinators — suddenly becomes the thing everyone wants to do happy-fuzzy pop-culture stories about. Why?
Libraries get in fights. Everybody likes a scrapper, and between the funding battles they're often found fighting and the body-checking involved in their periodic struggles over sharing information, there's a certain ... pleasantly plucky quality to the current perception of libraries and librarians. Yes, it plays a little ironically against the hyper-stereotypical buttoned-up notion of what a librarian is, but the sense that they're okay with getting mad in public — like Chicago's Public Library Commissioner did — gives library people a spark they might not otherwise have.
Librarians know stuff. You know how the words "geek" and "nerd" have gone from actual insults to words used to lovingly describe enthusiasts? Well, if we haven't gotten past venerating people who don't know anything, we've certainly reduced, I'd argue, the degree to which we stigmatize people for knowing a lot. This alone might not make libraries cool, but it takes away from the sense that they're actively not cool. More specifically, they live in the world of information, and are employed in part to organize and make accessible large quantities of data. If your computer had feet and a spiffy personality, you see.
Libraries are green and local. This is where there's a lot of potential appeal for the same people who like organic produce and reusable grocery bags. You can pretty easily position a library as environmentally friendly (your accumulation of books and magazines you are not reading is fewer trees for the rest of us, you know), not to mention economical (obvious) and part of your local culture. This is the part of the potential appeal that's anti-chain-store, anti-sprawl, anti-anonymity, and so forth.
Libraries will give you things for free. Hi, have you noticed how much hardcover books cost? Not a Netflix person? They will hand you things for free. That's not an especially hard concept to sell.
"Open to the public" means "some days, you really have to wonder about people." This is where you get the spark of an idea for TLC or somebody to do some goofball show called The Stacks, which follows a small local library through funding problems, trying to get book clubs started, whatever. When your building is open to the public, that means open ... to ... the ... public. And you know what's a little unpredictable? The public. This is where you might get your drama. (When I was in college, the information desk used to post the best questions it received, one of which was "How long do you cook spaghetti?" I suspect many libraries have similar stories.)
There seems to be a preposterous level of goodwill. Quite honestly, I feel like you can go on YouTube and act like a complete goof (in the best way), and if it's for libraries, people have that same rush of warmth that they used to get about people who had sextuplets, before ... well, you know. Before.
I don't know whether it's going to come in the form of a more successful movie franchise about librarians than that TV thing Noah Wyle does, or a basic-cable drama about a crime-fighting librarian (kinda like the one in the comic Rex Libris), or that reality show I was speculating about, but mark my words, once you've got Old Spicy on your side and you can sell a couple of YouTube parodies in a couple of months, you're standing on the edge of your pop-culture moment. Librarians: prepare.
From: NPR
I realize we're picking the bones from the Old Spice campaign at this point, but when I saw that the Brigham Young University parody of the Old Spice ads had gotten more than 1.2 million views (Old Spicy himself — that's what I'm calling him — did a video for libraries), it got me thinking.
Specifically, it got me thinking about the very enjoyable Librarians Do Gaga video that everyone sent my way after the debut of the NPR Does Gaga video.
And about the fact that a local news story skeptically questioning whether libraries are "necessary" set off a response from Vanity Fair, and a later counterpunch by Chicago's Public Library Commissioner won her support from such diverse, non-library-specific outlets as The A.V. Club and Metafilter, and from as far away as The Guardian.
Call it a hunch, but it seems to me that the thing is in the air that happens right before something — families with a million kids, cupcakes, wedding coordinators — suddenly becomes the thing everyone wants to do happy-fuzzy pop-culture stories about. Why?
Libraries get in fights. Everybody likes a scrapper, and between the funding battles they're often found fighting and the body-checking involved in their periodic struggles over sharing information, there's a certain ... pleasantly plucky quality to the current perception of libraries and librarians. Yes, it plays a little ironically against the hyper-stereotypical buttoned-up notion of what a librarian is, but the sense that they're okay with getting mad in public — like Chicago's Public Library Commissioner did — gives library people a spark they might not otherwise have.
Librarians know stuff. You know how the words "geek" and "nerd" have gone from actual insults to words used to lovingly describe enthusiasts? Well, if we haven't gotten past venerating people who don't know anything, we've certainly reduced, I'd argue, the degree to which we stigmatize people for knowing a lot. This alone might not make libraries cool, but it takes away from the sense that they're actively not cool. More specifically, they live in the world of information, and are employed in part to organize and make accessible large quantities of data. If your computer had feet and a spiffy personality, you see.
Libraries are green and local. This is where there's a lot of potential appeal for the same people who like organic produce and reusable grocery bags. You can pretty easily position a library as environmentally friendly (your accumulation of books and magazines you are not reading is fewer trees for the rest of us, you know), not to mention economical (obvious) and part of your local culture. This is the part of the potential appeal that's anti-chain-store, anti-sprawl, anti-anonymity, and so forth.
Libraries will give you things for free. Hi, have you noticed how much hardcover books cost? Not a Netflix person? They will hand you things for free. That's not an especially hard concept to sell.
"Open to the public" means "some days, you really have to wonder about people." This is where you get the spark of an idea for TLC or somebody to do some goofball show called The Stacks, which follows a small local library through funding problems, trying to get book clubs started, whatever. When your building is open to the public, that means open ... to ... the ... public. And you know what's a little unpredictable? The public. This is where you might get your drama. (When I was in college, the information desk used to post the best questions it received, one of which was "How long do you cook spaghetti?" I suspect many libraries have similar stories.)
There seems to be a preposterous level of goodwill. Quite honestly, I feel like you can go on YouTube and act like a complete goof (in the best way), and if it's for libraries, people have that same rush of warmth that they used to get about people who had sextuplets, before ... well, you know. Before.
I don't know whether it's going to come in the form of a more successful movie franchise about librarians than that TV thing Noah Wyle does, or a basic-cable drama about a crime-fighting librarian (kinda like the one in the comic Rex Libris), or that reality show I was speculating about, but mark my words, once you've got Old Spicy on your side and you can sell a couple of YouTube parodies in a couple of months, you're standing on the edge of your pop-culture moment. Librarians: prepare.
From: NPR
Saturday, July 24, 2010
The fine art of recommending books
Pairing the right reader with the right book is too delicate a task to leave to e-commerce robots.
by: Laura Miller
So many books, so little time, as coffee mugs are always telling us, so how do you decide what to read next? Most people rely on word of mouth from trusted friends. The seldom-acknowledged advantage to this method is that you can chew your friend out if she steers you wrong, whereas your recourse with regard to the New York Times Book Review is a lot less direct.
Since the other regular feature I write for Salon is all about recommending books, people often ask me for tips. It's a ticklish question. In a review, I can expound at length, giving readers a pretty good sense of what I like so they can judge if my preferences align with their own. One-on-one, however, what really matters to me is what you like to read.
Amazon and other online merchants have harnessed mighty algorithms to run their "If you enjoyed that, you might like this..." suggestion engines, but these are still crude instruments. Practically any novel you plug into Amazon's search engines at the moment returns the robotic announcement that people who bought it also bought one of Stieg Larsson's "Girl" thrillers — because seemingly everybody in America is buying those books. It's not like you need the world's most sophisticate e-commerce servers to tell you that.
Recognizing that book recommendation may as yet defy science, a couple of literary types are currently offering artisanal advice. Lorin Stein, the new editor of the Paris Review, has launched a column called "Ask the Paris Review," in which he suggests books and films to meet very particular needs. From the practical (a New York-themed hostess gift) to the eccentric (exquisitely boring volumes selected to cure the letter writer's case of girl-craziness) Stein's prescriptions venture far from the beaten path. (Full disclosure: Stein, when stumped, as with a recent inquiry about what to give to a nonbookish 13-year-old boy, has been known to call upon such "experts" as myself.)
"You can't recommend books to strangers without asking personal questions," Stein told me. As he pointed out, what we want to read is often pegged to transitory moods. The same book may not thrill the same person at every point in his or her life. "I don't think people read 'for' pleasure, exactly," he went on. "Of course there is pleasure in reading. But mainly we do it out of need. Because we're lonely, or confused, or need to laugh, or want some kind of protection or quiet — or disturbance, or truth, or whatever." The recommender must take this into account.
The doyen of all professional book recommenders (aside from Oprah, that is) is Nancy Pearl, a Seattle librarian who's a regular on NPR and has published several books of tips under the "Book Lust" rubric — coming out this fall is "Book Lust to Go: Recommended Reading for Travelers, Vagabonds, and Dreamers." Pearl is so iconic that when the Archie McPhee novelty company decided to create a librarian action figure, they modeled it after her.
Unsurprisingly, Pearl has a system. After determining that the petitioner is "serious" in requesting her advice, she provides a list of 16 statements. Then she asks the reader to think about a favorite book and select four statements that describe his or her experience reading it. "I also look and listen for key phrases and certain key words."
As Pearl sees it, four "doorways" allow readers to enter into any work of fiction or narrative nonfiction: story, characters, setting and language. "The difference between books is often a difference in the size of those doorways," she explained. Someone who agrees with statements like "I stayed up late to finish the book," is drawn to story, while someone who picks "I am in awe of the way the author could put words together," cares more about the beauty of the prose.
The ideal book, of course, excels in all four aspects, but such works are rare. (Pearl lists "To Kill a Mockingbird," Larry McMurtry's "Lonesome Dove," and "Angle of Repose" by Wallace Stegner as her fail-safes — that is, recommendations likely to please readers of any taste.) "For a recommendation to mean something, the book has to have a door that matches the person you're recommending it to," Pearl observes. "You can like a book that doesn't have your doorway, but you're going to have a harder time getting into it."
On the opposite end of the spectrum is the Biblioracle over at the Morning News. This savant (an alias of college instructor John Warner), asks readers to list the last five books they've read, then suggests a sixth. He doesn't even inquire if they enjoyed those five books — but then, maybe only a professional book reviewer, whose work life is dominated by assigned rather than chosen reading, would find that stipulation necessary.
The Biblioracle seems to operate on gut feeling alone. "I try to suss out a little bit about what will taste good (readingwise) according to their recent diet," Warner told me. While this may sound like a parlor trick, the results strike me as intuitively spot-on. A reader whose last five books read were "Mortals" by Norman Rush, "Solar" by Ian McEwan, "The Human Stain" by Philip Roth, "Next" by James Hynes, and "The Possessed" by Elif Batuman was nudged toward Margaret Atwood's "The Blind Assassin" — although it turned out she'd already read and loved it. The first official appearance of the Biblioracle generated an astonishing 1,045 comments, most of them requests for recommendations.
What about accountability, the great quality-control monitor for word-of-mouth recommendations? "I do get feedback on my recommendations," Warner replied, "and thus far, it's running quite positive, something like an 85 percent success rate, including my favorite, where I went on a limb and recommended 'Gravity's Rainbow' and the person said it 'changed my life.'" As for those who remain unsatisfied, the Morning News offers this consolation: "If your chosen book fails to please you, the Biblioracle will refund you the cost of your free recommendation."
Referenced in this article:
Ask the Paris Review advice column by Lorin Stein
The Biblioracle by John Warner of the Morning News
Book Lust, Nancy Pearl's website
Librarian action figure from Archie McPhee
Laura Miller is a senior writer for Salon. She is the author of "The Magician's Book: A Skeptic's Adventures in Narnia" and has a Web site, magiciansbook.com. More Laura Miller
From: Salon
by: Laura Miller
So many books, so little time, as coffee mugs are always telling us, so how do you decide what to read next? Most people rely on word of mouth from trusted friends. The seldom-acknowledged advantage to this method is that you can chew your friend out if she steers you wrong, whereas your recourse with regard to the New York Times Book Review is a lot less direct.
Since the other regular feature I write for Salon is all about recommending books, people often ask me for tips. It's a ticklish question. In a review, I can expound at length, giving readers a pretty good sense of what I like so they can judge if my preferences align with their own. One-on-one, however, what really matters to me is what you like to read.
Amazon and other online merchants have harnessed mighty algorithms to run their "If you enjoyed that, you might like this..." suggestion engines, but these are still crude instruments. Practically any novel you plug into Amazon's search engines at the moment returns the robotic announcement that people who bought it also bought one of Stieg Larsson's "Girl" thrillers — because seemingly everybody in America is buying those books. It's not like you need the world's most sophisticate e-commerce servers to tell you that.
Recognizing that book recommendation may as yet defy science, a couple of literary types are currently offering artisanal advice. Lorin Stein, the new editor of the Paris Review, has launched a column called "Ask the Paris Review," in which he suggests books and films to meet very particular needs. From the practical (a New York-themed hostess gift) to the eccentric (exquisitely boring volumes selected to cure the letter writer's case of girl-craziness) Stein's prescriptions venture far from the beaten path. (Full disclosure: Stein, when stumped, as with a recent inquiry about what to give to a nonbookish 13-year-old boy, has been known to call upon such "experts" as myself.)
"You can't recommend books to strangers without asking personal questions," Stein told me. As he pointed out, what we want to read is often pegged to transitory moods. The same book may not thrill the same person at every point in his or her life. "I don't think people read 'for' pleasure, exactly," he went on. "Of course there is pleasure in reading. But mainly we do it out of need. Because we're lonely, or confused, or need to laugh, or want some kind of protection or quiet — or disturbance, or truth, or whatever." The recommender must take this into account.
The doyen of all professional book recommenders (aside from Oprah, that is) is Nancy Pearl, a Seattle librarian who's a regular on NPR and has published several books of tips under the "Book Lust" rubric — coming out this fall is "Book Lust to Go: Recommended Reading for Travelers, Vagabonds, and Dreamers." Pearl is so iconic that when the Archie McPhee novelty company decided to create a librarian action figure, they modeled it after her.
Unsurprisingly, Pearl has a system. After determining that the petitioner is "serious" in requesting her advice, she provides a list of 16 statements. Then she asks the reader to think about a favorite book and select four statements that describe his or her experience reading it. "I also look and listen for key phrases and certain key words."
As Pearl sees it, four "doorways" allow readers to enter into any work of fiction or narrative nonfiction: story, characters, setting and language. "The difference between books is often a difference in the size of those doorways," she explained. Someone who agrees with statements like "I stayed up late to finish the book," is drawn to story, while someone who picks "I am in awe of the way the author could put words together," cares more about the beauty of the prose.
The ideal book, of course, excels in all four aspects, but such works are rare. (Pearl lists "To Kill a Mockingbird," Larry McMurtry's "Lonesome Dove," and "Angle of Repose" by Wallace Stegner as her fail-safes — that is, recommendations likely to please readers of any taste.) "For a recommendation to mean something, the book has to have a door that matches the person you're recommending it to," Pearl observes. "You can like a book that doesn't have your doorway, but you're going to have a harder time getting into it."
On the opposite end of the spectrum is the Biblioracle over at the Morning News. This savant (an alias of college instructor John Warner), asks readers to list the last five books they've read, then suggests a sixth. He doesn't even inquire if they enjoyed those five books — but then, maybe only a professional book reviewer, whose work life is dominated by assigned rather than chosen reading, would find that stipulation necessary.
The Biblioracle seems to operate on gut feeling alone. "I try to suss out a little bit about what will taste good (readingwise) according to their recent diet," Warner told me. While this may sound like a parlor trick, the results strike me as intuitively spot-on. A reader whose last five books read were "Mortals" by Norman Rush, "Solar" by Ian McEwan, "The Human Stain" by Philip Roth, "Next" by James Hynes, and "The Possessed" by Elif Batuman was nudged toward Margaret Atwood's "The Blind Assassin" — although it turned out she'd already read and loved it. The first official appearance of the Biblioracle generated an astonishing 1,045 comments, most of them requests for recommendations.
What about accountability, the great quality-control monitor for word-of-mouth recommendations? "I do get feedback on my recommendations," Warner replied, "and thus far, it's running quite positive, something like an 85 percent success rate, including my favorite, where I went on a limb and recommended 'Gravity's Rainbow' and the person said it 'changed my life.'" As for those who remain unsatisfied, the Morning News offers this consolation: "If your chosen book fails to please you, the Biblioracle will refund you the cost of your free recommendation."
Referenced in this article:
Ask the Paris Review advice column by Lorin Stein
The Biblioracle by John Warner of the Morning News
Book Lust, Nancy Pearl's website
Librarian action figure from Archie McPhee
Laura Miller is a senior writer for Salon. She is the author of "The Magician's Book: A Skeptic's Adventures in Narnia" and has a Web site, magiciansbook.com. More Laura Miller
From: Salon
Friday, July 23, 2010
63 books turns into 10 tons bound for Ghana
by: Peter Fischetti
Most of the children in the West Africa republic of Ghana will never know Nathan Sapong of Menifee in Riverside County.
But Nathan knows them.
In 2007, when he was 8 years old, his parents, Christian and Belinda, took him and his younger brothers to Accra, Ghana's largest city with a population of about 4 million, to introduce them to the country where their parents met and were married.
Nathan passed through small villages where children had no shoes and life was not so good. Ghana had instituted a program of free education a few years earlier, but books were not included, so many of the children went to work at an early age rather than going to school.
"It was kind of sad to see them that way," Nathan said.
Back at home, Nathan noticed all the books on his shelf. He approached his mother with the idea of boxing them -- 63 books in all -- and shipping them to Ghana.
"I thought it was a good idea," she said, "and I called some friends and the Menifee Valley Council PTA," which would take Nathan's donation to a much more ambitious level.
The response was phenomenal. With collection boxes placed in the schools and through contributions from local libraries, Nathan's donation of 63 books ultimately grew to more than 40,000.
Working with Nathan's mother, who is programs director for the PTA, and Dr. Jonathan Greenberg, Perris Union High School District superintendent, Danielle Rini, the current council president looked for ways to raise the $4,500 needed to pack and ship the 10 tons of books to Ghana.
"We set up coin drives with our schools," she said. "The very same children who donated the books to help the children of Ghana then stepped up to the plate and donated their allowances for our coin drives."
The drives were successful, but $3,200 was still needed.
PJHM Architects, which does work with the school district, wrote the check. The books were ready to make their final journey to Ghana from Menifee, where they had spent a year in donated space at Statewide Storage.
Once the books arrive in Ghana, they will be cleared and distributed by Child's Rights International, a non-governmental organization in Accra.
"To say I'm proud of Nathan is an understatement," his mother said. "It was his idea, and he has been selfless. But I'm also proud of the children of Menifee for donating their own books. Some who will never meet the children there wrote notes in their books. A little girl who parted with a Disney book wrote in it, 'I hope you take care of the princesses because I love them very much.'"
From: The Press-Enterprise
Most of the children in the West Africa republic of Ghana will never know Nathan Sapong of Menifee in Riverside County.
But Nathan knows them.
In 2007, when he was 8 years old, his parents, Christian and Belinda, took him and his younger brothers to Accra, Ghana's largest city with a population of about 4 million, to introduce them to the country where their parents met and were married.
Nathan passed through small villages where children had no shoes and life was not so good. Ghana had instituted a program of free education a few years earlier, but books were not included, so many of the children went to work at an early age rather than going to school.
"It was kind of sad to see them that way," Nathan said.
Back at home, Nathan noticed all the books on his shelf. He approached his mother with the idea of boxing them -- 63 books in all -- and shipping them to Ghana.
"I thought it was a good idea," she said, "and I called some friends and the Menifee Valley Council PTA," which would take Nathan's donation to a much more ambitious level.
The response was phenomenal. With collection boxes placed in the schools and through contributions from local libraries, Nathan's donation of 63 books ultimately grew to more than 40,000.
Working with Nathan's mother, who is programs director for the PTA, and Dr. Jonathan Greenberg, Perris Union High School District superintendent, Danielle Rini, the current council president looked for ways to raise the $4,500 needed to pack and ship the 10 tons of books to Ghana.
"We set up coin drives with our schools," she said. "The very same children who donated the books to help the children of Ghana then stepped up to the plate and donated their allowances for our coin drives."
The drives were successful, but $3,200 was still needed.
PJHM Architects, which does work with the school district, wrote the check. The books were ready to make their final journey to Ghana from Menifee, where they had spent a year in donated space at Statewide Storage.
Once the books arrive in Ghana, they will be cleared and distributed by Child's Rights International, a non-governmental organization in Accra.
"To say I'm proud of Nathan is an understatement," his mother said. "It was his idea, and he has been selfless. But I'm also proud of the children of Menifee for donating their own books. Some who will never meet the children there wrote notes in their books. A little girl who parted with a Disney book wrote in it, 'I hope you take care of the princesses because I love them very much.'"
From: The Press-Enterprise
Thursday, July 22, 2010
Novel approach: reading courses as an alternative to prison
In Texas, offenders are being sent on reading courses instead of prison. Could it work in the UK?
by: Anna Barker
With one of the highest incarceration rates in the world, and the death penalty, the US state of Texas seems the last place to embrace a liberal-minded alternative to prison. But when Mitchell Rouse was convicted of two drug offences in Houston, the former x-ray technician who faced a 60-year prison sentence – reduced to 30 years if he pleaded guilty – was instead put on probation and sentenced to read.
"I was doing it because it was a condition of my probation and it would reduce my community hours," Rouse recalls.
The 42-year-old had turned to drugs as a way of coping with the stress of his job at a hospital where he frequently worked an 80-hour week. But cooking up to a gram of crystal meth a day to feed his habit gradually took its toll on his life at home, which he shared with his wife and three young children. Finally, fearing for his life, Mitchell's wife turned him into the authorities. "If she hadn't, I would be dead or destitute by now," he says.
Five years on, he is free from drugs, holding down a job as a building contractor, and reunited with his family. He describes being sentenced to a reading group as "a miracle" and says the six-week reading course "changed the way I look at life".
"It made me believe in my own potential. In the group you're not wrong, you're not necessarily right either, but your opinion is just as valid as anyone else's," he says.
Rouse is one of thousands of offenders across the US who, as an alternative to prison, are placed on a rehabilitation programme called Changing Lives Through Literature (CLTL). Repeat offenders of serious crimes such as armed robbery, assault or drug dealing are made to attend a reading group where they discuss literary classics such as To Kill a Mockingbird, The Bell Jar and Of Mice and Men.
Rouse's group was run by part-time lecturer in liberal studies at Rice University in Houston, Larry Jablecki, who uses the texts of Plato, Mill and Socrates to explore themes of fate, love, anger, liberty, tolerance and empathy. "I particularly liked some of the ideas in John Stuart Mill's On Liberty," says Mitchell, who now wants to do a PhD in philosophy.
Groups are single sex and the books chosen resonate with some of the issues the offenders may be facing. A male group, for example, may read books with a theme of male identity. A judge, a probation officer and an academic join a session of 30 offenders to talk about issues as equals.
Of the 597 who have completed the course in Brazoria County, Texas, between 1997 and 2008, only 36 (6%) had their probations revoked and were sent to jail.
A year-long study of the first cohort that went through the programme, which was founded in Massachusetts in 1991, found that only 19% had reoffended compared with 42% in a control group. And those from the programme who did reoffend committed less serious crimes.
CLTL is the brainchild of Robert Waxler, a professor of English at University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. As an experiment, he convinced his friend, Judge Kane, to take eight criminals who repeatedly came before him and place them on a reading programme that Waxler had devised instead of sending them to prison. It now runs in eight states including Texas, Arizona and New York.
In the UK, nearly half of prisoners reoffend within a year of being released from jail. Could programmes like CLTL work on this side of the Atlantic where Ken Clarke, in his first major speech as justice secretary, indicated that more offenders could be given community sentences by putting a greater emphasis on what he terms "intelligent sentencing"?
Lady Stern, senior research fellow at the international centre for prison studies at King's College London, is not convinced. "Research does show that the public are largely pro-rehabilitation, but when you take an idea that involves offenders attending a university campus to be part of a reading group, instead of being sentenced to prison, it asks a lot of even the most thoughtful and socially conscious public," she says.
The initiative was initially met with an inevitable flurry of criticism in the US. Waxler and his supporters were described as "bleeding-heart liberals".
"They were shocked at the idea of offenders going on to university campuses to read books for free while the students were paying their way through education," says Waxler. "Some even thought the offenders would steal from them. It only takes one person to prove them right, but it's never happened."
In Texas, the public have been largely won over by the success rates and how cheap the programme is to run. Instead of spending a lifetime in prison at a cost of more than $30,000 (£19,520) a year, Rouse's "rehabilitation" cost the taxpayer just $500 (£325).
But it is the experiences of offenders, some of whom have never read a book before, that Waxler points to.
"In one group we read The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway," he recalls. "The story focuses on Santiago, an old fisherman in Cuba, and opens with some heartache: Santiago is not able to catch fish. We talk about him and the endurance he seems to represent, the very fact that he gets up every morning despite the battering he takes.
"The following time the group meet, one of the offenders wants to share something. He'd been walking down Main Street and he said he could hear, metaphorically speaking, the voices of his neighbourhood. He'd been thinking about returning to his old life, to drugs, but as he listened to those voices, he also heard the voice of Santiago. If Santiago could continue to get up each day and make the right choice then he could do too."
Santiago, a character in a novel, had become the offender's role model. For many offenders, some of whom have spent half their lives in jail, it is the first time they've had a worthy model, says Waxler.
Literacy is a problem. Offenders are unlikely to be sentenced to the programme if they cannot read. However, those with poor reading are not excluded. The groups may read short stories, or excerpts from a novel may be read aloud so that low-level readers can participate.
In the UK, a version of the programme called Stories Connect is running in a handful of prisons with some success, and in Exeter it has recently moved out into the community for people with drug and alcohol problems. But it does not yet have the support of the criminal justice system, so cannot be an alternative sentencing option for the courts.
Retired probation officer Louise Ross voluntarily runs the small group in Exeter. Participants are referred from the Exeter and North Devon Addiction Service, and were, until three-year funding from the Paul Hamlyn Foundation ran out in April, made to attend as part of a community service order. Now all attendance is voluntary, but stories of how the programme changes lives are no less impressive.
After years of opiate abuse, Steve Rowe, 50, who joined the first Exeter group three years ago, says: "Stories Connect didn't just change my life, it saved it." He explains: "We looked at a section of Oliver Twist, the relationship between Bill Sikes and Nancy. One of us pretended we were Bill while everyone else asked questions. The idea was you responded as much as you could from that character's point of view. It makes you think about what others think and feel, and really helps you to reflect on yourself."
Mary Stephenson, a writer, who runs Stories Connect, says more funding is needed. To date, in Exeter, 96 people have been through the programme, but of these only 29 completed the course. This, she says, is largely due to the chaotic lives of the participants, many of whom are battling with drug problems, and the fact that the groups are not an alternative to prison, which removes the main incentive.
There are plans, again subject to funding, for the University of Exeter to run a research project into the effectiveness of the programme in the UK, both inside prisons and out. But until then, there are no quantitative results that prove the programme reduces reoffending.
Next week, Stephenson is attending a roundtable meeting with prisons and probation minister Crispin Blunt, at which she will make the point that the programme could be achieving so much more.
"In terms of tackling reoffending, we need both more funding and the political support to explore it," says Stephenson. "There's no doubt among the people I've worked with that the success in America could be repeated here."
Waxler agrees: "I think that one of the great testaments of this programme is that it demonstrates clearly that literature can make a difference to people's lives," he says. "I already believed that, but I knew it could also be used to rehabilitate offenders."
Rouse says it is hard to judge how much the reading group should take credit for turning his life around as he'd already made the decision to change.
"I didn't want to lose my family," he says. "But the group did give me the guidance and direction I needed in my life, and without it I'd have spent the rest of my life in jail. It gave me a second chance."
from: Guardian
by: Anna Barker
With one of the highest incarceration rates in the world, and the death penalty, the US state of Texas seems the last place to embrace a liberal-minded alternative to prison. But when Mitchell Rouse was convicted of two drug offences in Houston, the former x-ray technician who faced a 60-year prison sentence – reduced to 30 years if he pleaded guilty – was instead put on probation and sentenced to read.
"I was doing it because it was a condition of my probation and it would reduce my community hours," Rouse recalls.
The 42-year-old had turned to drugs as a way of coping with the stress of his job at a hospital where he frequently worked an 80-hour week. But cooking up to a gram of crystal meth a day to feed his habit gradually took its toll on his life at home, which he shared with his wife and three young children. Finally, fearing for his life, Mitchell's wife turned him into the authorities. "If she hadn't, I would be dead or destitute by now," he says.
Five years on, he is free from drugs, holding down a job as a building contractor, and reunited with his family. He describes being sentenced to a reading group as "a miracle" and says the six-week reading course "changed the way I look at life".
"It made me believe in my own potential. In the group you're not wrong, you're not necessarily right either, but your opinion is just as valid as anyone else's," he says.
Rouse is one of thousands of offenders across the US who, as an alternative to prison, are placed on a rehabilitation programme called Changing Lives Through Literature (CLTL). Repeat offenders of serious crimes such as armed robbery, assault or drug dealing are made to attend a reading group where they discuss literary classics such as To Kill a Mockingbird, The Bell Jar and Of Mice and Men.
Rouse's group was run by part-time lecturer in liberal studies at Rice University in Houston, Larry Jablecki, who uses the texts of Plato, Mill and Socrates to explore themes of fate, love, anger, liberty, tolerance and empathy. "I particularly liked some of the ideas in John Stuart Mill's On Liberty," says Mitchell, who now wants to do a PhD in philosophy.
Groups are single sex and the books chosen resonate with some of the issues the offenders may be facing. A male group, for example, may read books with a theme of male identity. A judge, a probation officer and an academic join a session of 30 offenders to talk about issues as equals.
Of the 597 who have completed the course in Brazoria County, Texas, between 1997 and 2008, only 36 (6%) had their probations revoked and were sent to jail.
A year-long study of the first cohort that went through the programme, which was founded in Massachusetts in 1991, found that only 19% had reoffended compared with 42% in a control group. And those from the programme who did reoffend committed less serious crimes.
CLTL is the brainchild of Robert Waxler, a professor of English at University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. As an experiment, he convinced his friend, Judge Kane, to take eight criminals who repeatedly came before him and place them on a reading programme that Waxler had devised instead of sending them to prison. It now runs in eight states including Texas, Arizona and New York.
In the UK, nearly half of prisoners reoffend within a year of being released from jail. Could programmes like CLTL work on this side of the Atlantic where Ken Clarke, in his first major speech as justice secretary, indicated that more offenders could be given community sentences by putting a greater emphasis on what he terms "intelligent sentencing"?
Lady Stern, senior research fellow at the international centre for prison studies at King's College London, is not convinced. "Research does show that the public are largely pro-rehabilitation, but when you take an idea that involves offenders attending a university campus to be part of a reading group, instead of being sentenced to prison, it asks a lot of even the most thoughtful and socially conscious public," she says.
The initiative was initially met with an inevitable flurry of criticism in the US. Waxler and his supporters were described as "bleeding-heart liberals".
"They were shocked at the idea of offenders going on to university campuses to read books for free while the students were paying their way through education," says Waxler. "Some even thought the offenders would steal from them. It only takes one person to prove them right, but it's never happened."
In Texas, the public have been largely won over by the success rates and how cheap the programme is to run. Instead of spending a lifetime in prison at a cost of more than $30,000 (£19,520) a year, Rouse's "rehabilitation" cost the taxpayer just $500 (£325).
But it is the experiences of offenders, some of whom have never read a book before, that Waxler points to.
"In one group we read The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway," he recalls. "The story focuses on Santiago, an old fisherman in Cuba, and opens with some heartache: Santiago is not able to catch fish. We talk about him and the endurance he seems to represent, the very fact that he gets up every morning despite the battering he takes.
"The following time the group meet, one of the offenders wants to share something. He'd been walking down Main Street and he said he could hear, metaphorically speaking, the voices of his neighbourhood. He'd been thinking about returning to his old life, to drugs, but as he listened to those voices, he also heard the voice of Santiago. If Santiago could continue to get up each day and make the right choice then he could do too."
Santiago, a character in a novel, had become the offender's role model. For many offenders, some of whom have spent half their lives in jail, it is the first time they've had a worthy model, says Waxler.
Literacy is a problem. Offenders are unlikely to be sentenced to the programme if they cannot read. However, those with poor reading are not excluded. The groups may read short stories, or excerpts from a novel may be read aloud so that low-level readers can participate.
In the UK, a version of the programme called Stories Connect is running in a handful of prisons with some success, and in Exeter it has recently moved out into the community for people with drug and alcohol problems. But it does not yet have the support of the criminal justice system, so cannot be an alternative sentencing option for the courts.
Retired probation officer Louise Ross voluntarily runs the small group in Exeter. Participants are referred from the Exeter and North Devon Addiction Service, and were, until three-year funding from the Paul Hamlyn Foundation ran out in April, made to attend as part of a community service order. Now all attendance is voluntary, but stories of how the programme changes lives are no less impressive.
After years of opiate abuse, Steve Rowe, 50, who joined the first Exeter group three years ago, says: "Stories Connect didn't just change my life, it saved it." He explains: "We looked at a section of Oliver Twist, the relationship between Bill Sikes and Nancy. One of us pretended we were Bill while everyone else asked questions. The idea was you responded as much as you could from that character's point of view. It makes you think about what others think and feel, and really helps you to reflect on yourself."
Mary Stephenson, a writer, who runs Stories Connect, says more funding is needed. To date, in Exeter, 96 people have been through the programme, but of these only 29 completed the course. This, she says, is largely due to the chaotic lives of the participants, many of whom are battling with drug problems, and the fact that the groups are not an alternative to prison, which removes the main incentive.
There are plans, again subject to funding, for the University of Exeter to run a research project into the effectiveness of the programme in the UK, both inside prisons and out. But until then, there are no quantitative results that prove the programme reduces reoffending.
Next week, Stephenson is attending a roundtable meeting with prisons and probation minister Crispin Blunt, at which she will make the point that the programme could be achieving so much more.
"In terms of tackling reoffending, we need both more funding and the political support to explore it," says Stephenson. "There's no doubt among the people I've worked with that the success in America could be repeated here."
Waxler agrees: "I think that one of the great testaments of this programme is that it demonstrates clearly that literature can make a difference to people's lives," he says. "I already believed that, but I knew it could also be used to rehabilitate offenders."
Rouse says it is hard to judge how much the reading group should take credit for turning his life around as he'd already made the decision to change.
"I didn't want to lose my family," he says. "But the group did give me the guidance and direction I needed in my life, and without it I'd have spent the rest of my life in jail. It gave me a second chance."
from: Guardian
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Old Spice to New Spice
From Old Spice to New Spice? Check out this parody of the Old Spice guy's promo of libraries from Brigham Young University's Harold B. Lee Library.
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
France pioneers 'crowdfunded' publishing
Editions du Public seeks 'co-editors' who 'invest in what they want to read'
by: Alison Flood
From science fiction writers to poets and playwrights, would-be French authors are lining up to take part in France's first venture into crowdfunded literature.
Launched this spring by publisher Éditions du Public, the initiative – slogan: "I invest in what I want to read" – has already received 80 manuscripts. Sixteen have been merited good enough to make it onto the publisher's website, from Nathalie Tavignot's Croissant de lune (Crescent Moon), in which a series of murders occur in a village whose inhabitants have just woken from a long sleep and remember nothing, to Ghislain Hammer's poetry collection Les colosses nus (The Naked Colossi).
The publishers are now looking for co-editors to help fund publication of the books. Each co-editor must invest €11 in their chosen title, and will then be able to discuss the book with its author on Éditions du Public's forum, following each stage as it is written. Each title has six months to sign up 2,000 co-editors and some are already proving more popular than others: Tavignot's thriller has 45 subscribers, while Hammer has just two.
Once the 2,000 threshold has been reached, an editor at Éditions du Public will go over the text and layout with the author. The book will then be sold online and through bookshops, with each co-editor able to recoup "up to eight times the amount of their initial subscription" depending on sales, as well as receiving a free copy of the book they have edited.
"We want, thanks to crowdfunding, to give the chance to every author to be published," said Laurence Broussal at Éditions du Public. "Thanks to our website, authors have a real communication platform to make themselves known to internet users and to meet their public. But we want this to be without risk: the internet co-editor is refunded with 100% of their output, and the author gets back their manuscript, if the book is not published."
Broussal said that Éditions du Public was the first publisher to utilise crowdfunding in France, although the concept has already been experimented with in music and film. The publisher has already received around 1,000 subscriptions across all its titles after starting to recruit co-editors at the beginning of July, and hopes to publish its first book by the end of the year.
from: Guardian
by: Alison Flood
From science fiction writers to poets and playwrights, would-be French authors are lining up to take part in France's first venture into crowdfunded literature.
Launched this spring by publisher Éditions du Public, the initiative – slogan: "I invest in what I want to read" – has already received 80 manuscripts. Sixteen have been merited good enough to make it onto the publisher's website, from Nathalie Tavignot's Croissant de lune (Crescent Moon), in which a series of murders occur in a village whose inhabitants have just woken from a long sleep and remember nothing, to Ghislain Hammer's poetry collection Les colosses nus (The Naked Colossi).
The publishers are now looking for co-editors to help fund publication of the books. Each co-editor must invest €11 in their chosen title, and will then be able to discuss the book with its author on Éditions du Public's forum, following each stage as it is written. Each title has six months to sign up 2,000 co-editors and some are already proving more popular than others: Tavignot's thriller has 45 subscribers, while Hammer has just two.
Once the 2,000 threshold has been reached, an editor at Éditions du Public will go over the text and layout with the author. The book will then be sold online and through bookshops, with each co-editor able to recoup "up to eight times the amount of their initial subscription" depending on sales, as well as receiving a free copy of the book they have edited.
"We want, thanks to crowdfunding, to give the chance to every author to be published," said Laurence Broussal at Éditions du Public. "Thanks to our website, authors have a real communication platform to make themselves known to internet users and to meet their public. But we want this to be without risk: the internet co-editor is refunded with 100% of their output, and the author gets back their manuscript, if the book is not published."
Broussal said that Éditions du Public was the first publisher to utilise crowdfunding in France, although the concept has already been experimented with in music and film. The publisher has already received around 1,000 subscriptions across all its titles after starting to recruit co-editors at the beginning of July, and hopes to publish its first book by the end of the year.
from: Guardian
Monday, July 19, 2010
'I Write Like' Website Goes Viral, Authors Bewildered
by: Jake Coyle
NEW YORK — For anyone who has ever thought Charles Dickens was lurking inside his or her prose, a new website claims it can find your inner author.
The recently launched I Write Like has one simple gimmick: You paste a few paragraphs that exemplify your writing, then click "analyze" and – poof! – you get a badge telling you that you write like Stephen King or Ernest Hemingway or Chuck Palahniuk.
The site's traffic has soared in recent days and its arrival has lit up the blogosphere. Gawker tried a transcript from one of the leaked Mel Gibson phone calls. The suggested author: Margaret Atwood.
The New Yorker found that an invitation to a birthday party was James Joycean. Many others were aghast to discover they wrote similarly to "The Da Vinci Code" scribe Dan Brown.
The New York Times tried putting in actual novels, such as "Moby-Dick." Herman Melville, it turns out, writes less like himself than King, according to I Write Like.
Atwood, herself, tried the site only to discover she also apparently writes like King. "Who knew?" she tweeted.
Obviously, I Write Like isn't an exact science. But simply the idea of an algorithm that can reveal traces of influence in writing has proven wildly popular.
Though the site might seem the idle dalliance of an English professor on summer break, it was created by Dmitry Chestnykh, a 27-year-old Russian software programmer currently living in Montenegro. Though he speaks English reasonably well, it's his second language.
"I wanted it to be an educational thing and also to help people write better," he said.
Chestnykh modeled the site on software for e-mail spam filters. This means that the site's text analysis is largely keyword based. Even if you write in short, declarative, Hemingwayesque sentences, its your word choice that may determine your comparison.
Most writers will tell you, though, that the most telling signs of influence come from punctuation, rhythm and structure. I Write Like does account for some elements of style by things such as number of words per sentence.
Chestnykh has uploaded works by about 50 authors – three books for each, he said. That, too, explains some of its shortcomings. Melville, for example, isn't in the system.
But Chestnykh never expected the sudden success of the site and he plans to improve its accuracy by including more books and adding a probability percentage for each result. He hopes it can eventually be profitable.
"I think that people really like to know how they write, even if it's not accurate results," said Chestnykh. "Still it's fun for them."
It's easy to find a laugh. Obama's Oval Office speech in June? David Foster Wallace. Lady Gaga's lyrics to "Alejandro"? William Shakespeare.
Whatever the deficiencies of I Write Like, it does exude a love of writing and its many techniques. The site's blog updates with inspiring quotations from writers, and Chestnykh – whose company, Coding Robots, is also working on blog editing and diary writing software – shows a love of literature. He counts Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Agatha Christie among his favorites.
"I had a typewriter when I was 6 years old," he said. "But I'm not a published writer and I don't think I write very good."
___
Online:
http://iwl.me/
From: Huffington Post
NEW YORK — For anyone who has ever thought Charles Dickens was lurking inside his or her prose, a new website claims it can find your inner author.
The recently launched I Write Like has one simple gimmick: You paste a few paragraphs that exemplify your writing, then click "analyze" and – poof! – you get a badge telling you that you write like Stephen King or Ernest Hemingway or Chuck Palahniuk.
The site's traffic has soared in recent days and its arrival has lit up the blogosphere. Gawker tried a transcript from one of the leaked Mel Gibson phone calls. The suggested author: Margaret Atwood.
The New Yorker found that an invitation to a birthday party was James Joycean. Many others were aghast to discover they wrote similarly to "The Da Vinci Code" scribe Dan Brown.
The New York Times tried putting in actual novels, such as "Moby-Dick." Herman Melville, it turns out, writes less like himself than King, according to I Write Like.
Atwood, herself, tried the site only to discover she also apparently writes like King. "Who knew?" she tweeted.
Obviously, I Write Like isn't an exact science. But simply the idea of an algorithm that can reveal traces of influence in writing has proven wildly popular.
Though the site might seem the idle dalliance of an English professor on summer break, it was created by Dmitry Chestnykh, a 27-year-old Russian software programmer currently living in Montenegro. Though he speaks English reasonably well, it's his second language.
"I wanted it to be an educational thing and also to help people write better," he said.
Chestnykh modeled the site on software for e-mail spam filters. This means that the site's text analysis is largely keyword based. Even if you write in short, declarative, Hemingwayesque sentences, its your word choice that may determine your comparison.
Most writers will tell you, though, that the most telling signs of influence come from punctuation, rhythm and structure. I Write Like does account for some elements of style by things such as number of words per sentence.
Chestnykh has uploaded works by about 50 authors – three books for each, he said. That, too, explains some of its shortcomings. Melville, for example, isn't in the system.
But Chestnykh never expected the sudden success of the site and he plans to improve its accuracy by including more books and adding a probability percentage for each result. He hopes it can eventually be profitable.
"I think that people really like to know how they write, even if it's not accurate results," said Chestnykh. "Still it's fun for them."
It's easy to find a laugh. Obama's Oval Office speech in June? David Foster Wallace. Lady Gaga's lyrics to "Alejandro"? William Shakespeare.
Whatever the deficiencies of I Write Like, it does exude a love of writing and its many techniques. The site's blog updates with inspiring quotations from writers, and Chestnykh – whose company, Coding Robots, is also working on blog editing and diary writing software – shows a love of literature. He counts Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Agatha Christie among his favorites.
"I had a typewriter when I was 6 years old," he said. "But I'm not a published writer and I don't think I write very good."
___
Online:
http://iwl.me/
From: Huffington Post
Saturday, July 17, 2010
The bookcase you'll want to live in
It's called The Ark and, yes, it's for storing your books. But it's also so much more...
Christian Sinbaldi for the Guardian
by: Lucy Mangan
Oh, my beloved Billy bookcases, I fear I will never look at you the same way again. I am in a free-standing, multi-storey wooden tower comprising a spiral staircase and walls composed of open shelves lined with 6,000 books. Designed and constructed by Rintala Eggertsson Architects it's called The Ark and is part of the V&A museum's 1:1 Architects Build Small Spaces exhibition. Dagur Eggertsson himself, on the video playing, likens it to "a gigantic Ikea bookcase" – but, my dears, it is so much more.
From the outside, it looks cold – the unstained wood is pale and the paper edges of the books white – but inside the books' spines turn it into a warm riot of colour.
I ascend the stairs cocooned by books. Books, books, books. Every few floors there is a little alcove seat to rest and read in. I feel like an intellectual Rapunzel ("Could you piss off, valiant Prince, until I've finished Wolf Hall?"). I am so happy. I could stay here for ever.
"I really like it – it is very cosy," agrees 20-year-old Clare McCrann, an architecture student from Manchester University. "I'd love to be able to make something like this. Especially as all my books are stacked up on my floor."
Natasha Mitchell and her partner James Broad, both 24, are equally beguiled. "It's your ideal structure, really, isn't it?" James says. "Wood and books." "I'd love one," confirms Natasha. "But it wouldn't fit."
There's the rub. It may show how much can be done in a small space. It may be an impressive feat of engineering – even if it does tend to sway a bit. And it may even, as the museum blurb says, "investigate how small spaces can focus our energies and thoughts in moments of study, meditation and self-reflection", though I can't be sure because the sentence keeps making my eyes bleed.
But to a book lover it inspires an unfulfillable yearning. Because rare is the person – especially the person who keeps converting all disposable income into hardbacks – who has the wherewithal to install a five-storey, walled spiral staircase in her house. What it needs, I realise, as I fold myself into the top floor reading nook with an Elizabeth Taylor, is to become a house itself. Quadruple the footprint, pad the seats, replace The Time Traveller's sodding Wife with a microwave, and it becomes the bibliophile's paradisaical starter home. Until then, the Billys and I will just have to make do with each other.
From: Guardian
Friday, July 16, 2010
Follow 'The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo' on Stieg Larsson tour of Stockholm
by: Malin Rising
STOCKHOLM (AP) — Fans of the late crime novelist Stieg Larsson are getting lost in the Swedish countryside, searching for the quaint town of Hedestad featured in "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo."
The problem is, it doesn't exist.
But international readers of Larsson's best-selling Millennium crime trilogy could be excused for thinking otherwise, because most locations in the books are authentic.
Some of them include the Kaffebar cafe in Stockholm — a favorite haunt of Larsson's fictional journalist Mikael Blomqvist — and the Kvarnen bar, where Larsson has tattooed computer hacker Lisbeth Salander spending evenings with her friends from the rock band Evil Fingers.
Both places are located on the trendy island of Sodermalm, a former working-class area with narrow streets where old wooden cottages are squeezed between 20th century stone houses.
The hilly Stockholm district — with popular bars, fashion stores and art galleries — is one of many islands that form the city center and the home of Larsson's characters.
Blomqvist and Salander, the trilogy's main characters, both have apartments there. Salander's friendly first legal guardian Holger Palmgren also lived there before he was hospitalized.
Eager Millennium fans can take the Stockholm City Museum's Larsson tour, an increasingly popular pastime for aficionados who visit the Swedish capital. Or they can venture out on their own, visiting the scenes of Blomqvist's and Salander's exploits with maps provided by the tourist office.
Starting with Blomqvist's small apartment in the brown 19th century building at 1 Bellmansgatan, Millennium fans can relive the books' plots in the real settings, while listening to the guide's detailed descriptions.
"It is great to identify the addresses and see what the buildings look like," said Roland Ojeda, a retired banker from San Francisco, who took the tour in June with his wife, Linda. "I think it brings it to life."
Larsson's books about a darker side of Sweden, where Blomqvist and Salander become involved in murder mysteries, sex trafficking scandals and a secret government department, have sold more than 30 million copies worldwide.
The tour has attracted visitors from as faraway as Japan, Canada and Australia, said Eva Palmqvist, who leads the museum's tour.
"I think a lot of people want to savor the experience, the story and the characters," Palmqvist said. "I think they want to see this and feel the atmosphere."
During the two-hour walk, Palmqvist guides the group past the scenic Monteliusvagen, a promenade overlooking other islands that are home to some of the more dubious characters in the book. The guide makes the point that Larsson's good characters live in one area, while the evil ones live elsewhere.
"When Stieg Larsson started to write the story in 2001, he decided that Sodermalm, where he also lived, was to become the land of the good people," Palmqvist says, smiling.
"Those that are not presented so nicely, they live in other parts of Stockholm, like Ostermalm, for example," she adds, pointing to the east.
Palmqvist also points out the courthouse where Blomqvist is put on trial in the first book and the home of Salander's second guardian, the evil Nils Bjurman, located in the northern part of Stockholm by Odenplan.
The group continues past a small Lebanese eatery on 22 Tavastgatan, which is believed to be the inspiration for Samir's, the restaurant where Blomqvist dines several times.
From there, it's just a short walk to Kaffebar on the wide, bustling street of Hornsgatan.
The cafe, renamed Mellqvists Kaffebar in 2008, is frequently visited by coffee-quaffing Blomqvist and was also one of Larsson's favorite spots, before he died of a heart attack in 2004 at age 50.
"This is where Lisbeth Salander will ask Mikael for a loan so that she can go to Zurich," Palmqvist chuckled.
The picturesque, hilly streets of Sodermalm have also inspired other writers.
Leading Swedish 20th century authors, such as Ivar Lo Johansson and Per Anders Fogelstrom, both lived here and described the neighborhood's working-class history in classics, including Fogelstrom's "City of My Dreams."
Playwright August Strindberg's famous novel, "The Red Room," also describes Stockholm as seen from a spot in Sodermalm near Salander's 21-room luxury apartment on Fiskargatan 9, where the tour ends.
The tour doesn't quite stretch to Salander's other, gloomy, apartment on Lundagatan at the western end of Sodermalm, or to the Kvarnen bar on Tjarhovsgatan, which Salander regularly visits and where she once kisses another character, Miriam Wu, in front of Blomqvist.
But the places are marked on the map and are worth a visit.
Kvarnen, with its tall ceilings and arched windows, has been in the same spot for more than 100 years. A popular working-class bar and home drinking hole for fans of Hammarby football club, it serves traditional Swedish fare like pickled herring, deer stew and meatballs.
Dedicated Larsson fans may also want to visit Sandhamn in the outer Stockholm archipelago, where Blomqvist has a small cottage that acts as a refuge from his hectic city life.
Boats to the popular resort island, with its red fishing huts, bare cliffs and small sand beaches, depart daily from Strandvagen in downtown Stockholm and take roughly two hours.
Then there is always Hedestad — often vividly imagined by Larsson's readers but nowhere to be found along the coast north of Stockholm, as described in the books.
Still, there is one way to get to know Hedestad — the sleepy town of Gnesta, 45 miles (70 kilometers) south of Stockholm.
This is the place used to illustrate Hedestad in the Swedish movie of Larsson's books, with signs about the town showing filming locations.
"Last year, some Italian guys came here just because of the books," says Jonathan Olsson at Gnesta's tourist office. "We have printed a brochure about the sites."
___
If You Go...
MILLENNIUM TOUR: http://www.stadsmuseum.stockholm.se. Two-hour tour of sites associated with the Stieg Larsson Millennium crime trilogy, including "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo." Offered Wednesdays at 6 p.m. or Saturdays at 11 a.m., departing from 1 Bellmansgatan. Tickets are $16 or 120 Swedish kronor and can be purchased at Stockholm City Museum, the Stockholm Tourist Centre, or online at http://www.ticnet.se.
WALKING ON YOUR OWN: Buy the Millennium map for $5 or 40 Swedish kronor at the Stockholm City Museum, or the Stockholm Tourist Centre.
From: Chicago Tribune
STOCKHOLM (AP) — Fans of the late crime novelist Stieg Larsson are getting lost in the Swedish countryside, searching for the quaint town of Hedestad featured in "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo."
The problem is, it doesn't exist.
But international readers of Larsson's best-selling Millennium crime trilogy could be excused for thinking otherwise, because most locations in the books are authentic.
Some of them include the Kaffebar cafe in Stockholm — a favorite haunt of Larsson's fictional journalist Mikael Blomqvist — and the Kvarnen bar, where Larsson has tattooed computer hacker Lisbeth Salander spending evenings with her friends from the rock band Evil Fingers.
Both places are located on the trendy island of Sodermalm, a former working-class area with narrow streets where old wooden cottages are squeezed between 20th century stone houses.
The hilly Stockholm district — with popular bars, fashion stores and art galleries — is one of many islands that form the city center and the home of Larsson's characters.
Blomqvist and Salander, the trilogy's main characters, both have apartments there. Salander's friendly first legal guardian Holger Palmgren also lived there before he was hospitalized.
Eager Millennium fans can take the Stockholm City Museum's Larsson tour, an increasingly popular pastime for aficionados who visit the Swedish capital. Or they can venture out on their own, visiting the scenes of Blomqvist's and Salander's exploits with maps provided by the tourist office.
Starting with Blomqvist's small apartment in the brown 19th century building at 1 Bellmansgatan, Millennium fans can relive the books' plots in the real settings, while listening to the guide's detailed descriptions.
"It is great to identify the addresses and see what the buildings look like," said Roland Ojeda, a retired banker from San Francisco, who took the tour in June with his wife, Linda. "I think it brings it to life."
Larsson's books about a darker side of Sweden, where Blomqvist and Salander become involved in murder mysteries, sex trafficking scandals and a secret government department, have sold more than 30 million copies worldwide.
The tour has attracted visitors from as faraway as Japan, Canada and Australia, said Eva Palmqvist, who leads the museum's tour.
"I think a lot of people want to savor the experience, the story and the characters," Palmqvist said. "I think they want to see this and feel the atmosphere."
During the two-hour walk, Palmqvist guides the group past the scenic Monteliusvagen, a promenade overlooking other islands that are home to some of the more dubious characters in the book. The guide makes the point that Larsson's good characters live in one area, while the evil ones live elsewhere.
"When Stieg Larsson started to write the story in 2001, he decided that Sodermalm, where he also lived, was to become the land of the good people," Palmqvist says, smiling.
"Those that are not presented so nicely, they live in other parts of Stockholm, like Ostermalm, for example," she adds, pointing to the east.
Palmqvist also points out the courthouse where Blomqvist is put on trial in the first book and the home of Salander's second guardian, the evil Nils Bjurman, located in the northern part of Stockholm by Odenplan.
The group continues past a small Lebanese eatery on 22 Tavastgatan, which is believed to be the inspiration for Samir's, the restaurant where Blomqvist dines several times.
From there, it's just a short walk to Kaffebar on the wide, bustling street of Hornsgatan.
The cafe, renamed Mellqvists Kaffebar in 2008, is frequently visited by coffee-quaffing Blomqvist and was also one of Larsson's favorite spots, before he died of a heart attack in 2004 at age 50.
"This is where Lisbeth Salander will ask Mikael for a loan so that she can go to Zurich," Palmqvist chuckled.
The picturesque, hilly streets of Sodermalm have also inspired other writers.
Leading Swedish 20th century authors, such as Ivar Lo Johansson and Per Anders Fogelstrom, both lived here and described the neighborhood's working-class history in classics, including Fogelstrom's "City of My Dreams."
Playwright August Strindberg's famous novel, "The Red Room," also describes Stockholm as seen from a spot in Sodermalm near Salander's 21-room luxury apartment on Fiskargatan 9, where the tour ends.
The tour doesn't quite stretch to Salander's other, gloomy, apartment on Lundagatan at the western end of Sodermalm, or to the Kvarnen bar on Tjarhovsgatan, which Salander regularly visits and where she once kisses another character, Miriam Wu, in front of Blomqvist.
But the places are marked on the map and are worth a visit.
Kvarnen, with its tall ceilings and arched windows, has been in the same spot for more than 100 years. A popular working-class bar and home drinking hole for fans of Hammarby football club, it serves traditional Swedish fare like pickled herring, deer stew and meatballs.
Dedicated Larsson fans may also want to visit Sandhamn in the outer Stockholm archipelago, where Blomqvist has a small cottage that acts as a refuge from his hectic city life.
Boats to the popular resort island, with its red fishing huts, bare cliffs and small sand beaches, depart daily from Strandvagen in downtown Stockholm and take roughly two hours.
Then there is always Hedestad — often vividly imagined by Larsson's readers but nowhere to be found along the coast north of Stockholm, as described in the books.
Still, there is one way to get to know Hedestad — the sleepy town of Gnesta, 45 miles (70 kilometers) south of Stockholm.
This is the place used to illustrate Hedestad in the Swedish movie of Larsson's books, with signs about the town showing filming locations.
"Last year, some Italian guys came here just because of the books," says Jonathan Olsson at Gnesta's tourist office. "We have printed a brochure about the sites."
___
If You Go...
MILLENNIUM TOUR: http://www.stadsmuseum.stockholm.se. Two-hour tour of sites associated with the Stieg Larsson Millennium crime trilogy, including "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo." Offered Wednesdays at 6 p.m. or Saturdays at 11 a.m., departing from 1 Bellmansgatan. Tickets are $16 or 120 Swedish kronor and can be purchased at Stockholm City Museum, the Stockholm Tourist Centre, or online at http://www.ticnet.se.
WALKING ON YOUR OWN: Buy the Millennium map for $5 or 40 Swedish kronor at the Stockholm City Museum, or the Stockholm Tourist Centre.
From: Chicago Tribune
Thursday, July 15, 2010
The Old Spice Guy Speaks Up for Libraries
In case this hasn't come to your attention through another medium, check out the video below. You're welcome.
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Twitter's #dearpublisher hashtag tags off
Readers and publishers engage in new medium for debate.
Twitter is not to everyone's taste – it's no secret that many readersof this blog suspect that the Guardian gives the microblogging servicefar more attention than it deserves and might agree with OylMiller's stream of consciousness piece in McSweeney's this week thatbegins: "I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by brevity,over-connectedness, emotionally starving for attention."
But … yes, of course there's a but, the current Twitter conversationbetween publishers and readers, writers and booksellers is worth a look.
Gathered under the hashtag "dearpublisher" (hashtags are how Twitterusers group topics to make it easy to find all the tweets on onesubject – just put dearpublisher in the search box and all tweets thatinclude the phrase #dearpublisher will show up on one page) arequestions and comments that are starting up a direct debate betweenpublishers and readers.
The publishers say they are listening:
SceptreBooks: If anyone's got a specific question ask away – and will join in the conversation when I can add something to it.
HodderBooks: Just so you all know, we're listening if you've got something to say!
WalkerBooksUK: Just came back after meetings to discover #dearpublisher. Keep them coming – we love all feedback!
PanMacmillanAus: Reading the #dearpublisher chat – keep them coming,
people, we're listening!
And readers are making their views known. OK, so there's only so muchyou can say in 140 characters – it's not the place to go into thecomplexities of e-book pricing and DRM – but readers are makingsuccinct and forceful points and the initiative is encouraging debateabout all areas of publishing.
Vampire-fatigue is coming across strongly:
Maria_Disidoro: Telling me something is "the next Twilight" guaranteesI will never pick it up.
BloomsburyBell: Please, no more vampires
Well, mostly:
tehawesomersace: People of color don't all live in the ghetto or have abusive parents or wish they were white. Why can't we be vampires?
Other comments range from content to marketing:
StuartEvers: #dearpublishers remember: the book that became a success wasn't always an obvious bestseller in the first place ...
MarilynFactor: being black can be fun not in a we make the best out of the worst kind of way and does not have to involve an identity crisis
SekritEmuSister: That book you feel is a risk in the market that's too edgy and provocative? I'll read it. So will all my friends.
RyanMCFC: don't allow poor scans of your picture books to be used on Google Books. As an illustrator that would drive me nuts.
Empireofbooks: It's okay to have quotes on the back and inside, but please not on the cover. It spoils amazing artwork.
The publishers have started responding as well as listening and thedebate is hotting up:
Vintagebooks: Just to add to the #dearpublisher debate - often we do publish amazing/translated/odd/bizarre books (like you want!) and no one buys them!
Whatever you think of Twitter, I'm not sure that this kind of openforum dialogue would have been possible on any other platform and,personally, I think more direct interaction between readers andpublishers is an overdue and welcome development. Do you think it'sprogress or a superficial gesture? And, if you're not a twitterer,what would your short message to a publisher be?
From: Guardian
Twitter is not to everyone's taste – it's no secret that many readersof this blog suspect that the Guardian gives the microblogging servicefar more attention than it deserves and might agree with OylMiller's stream of consciousness piece in McSweeney's this week thatbegins: "I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by brevity,over-connectedness, emotionally starving for attention."
But … yes, of course there's a but, the current Twitter conversationbetween publishers and readers, writers and booksellers is worth a look.
Gathered under the hashtag "dearpublisher" (hashtags are how Twitterusers group topics to make it easy to find all the tweets on onesubject – just put dearpublisher in the search box and all tweets thatinclude the phrase #dearpublisher will show up on one page) arequestions and comments that are starting up a direct debate betweenpublishers and readers.
The publishers say they are listening:
SceptreBooks: If anyone's got a specific question ask away – and will join in the conversation when I can add something to it.
HodderBooks: Just so you all know, we're listening if you've got something to say!
WalkerBooksUK: Just came back after meetings to discover #dearpublisher. Keep them coming – we love all feedback!
PanMacmillanAus: Reading the #dearpublisher chat – keep them coming,
people, we're listening!
And readers are making their views known. OK, so there's only so muchyou can say in 140 characters – it's not the place to go into thecomplexities of e-book pricing and DRM – but readers are makingsuccinct and forceful points and the initiative is encouraging debateabout all areas of publishing.
Vampire-fatigue is coming across strongly:
Maria_Disidoro: Telling me something is "the next Twilight" guaranteesI will never pick it up.
BloomsburyBell: Please, no more vampires
Well, mostly:
tehawesomersace: People of color don't all live in the ghetto or have abusive parents or wish they were white. Why can't we be vampires?
Other comments range from content to marketing:
StuartEvers: #dearpublishers remember: the book that became a success wasn't always an obvious bestseller in the first place ...
MarilynFactor: being black can be fun not in a we make the best out of the worst kind of way and does not have to involve an identity crisis
SekritEmuSister: That book you feel is a risk in the market that's too edgy and provocative? I'll read it. So will all my friends.
RyanMCFC: don't allow poor scans of your picture books to be used on Google Books. As an illustrator that would drive me nuts.
Empireofbooks: It's okay to have quotes on the back and inside, but please not on the cover. It spoils amazing artwork.
The publishers have started responding as well as listening and thedebate is hotting up:
Vintagebooks: Just to add to the #dearpublisher debate - often we do publish amazing/translated/odd/bizarre books (like you want!) and no one buys them!
Whatever you think of Twitter, I'm not sure that this kind of openforum dialogue would have been possible on any other platform and,personally, I think more direct interaction between readers andpublishers is an overdue and welcome development. Do you think it'sprogress or a superficial gesture? And, if you're not a twitterer,what would your short message to a publisher be?
From: Guardian
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
The First American Bookmobile
The first bookmobile in the United States was introduced in Washington County, Maryland in 1905. Mary Titcomb, the first librarian of
Washington County Free Library, Maryland, considered seriously the
need for the library to become a County Library. Her task was to get
books in homes throughout the county, not just in Hagerstown, the
county seat.
Titcomb believed that libraries should reach out to the surrounding communities. She set up 22 deposit stations for the Washington County Free Library in store fronts where libraries could drop off requested books and patrons could pick up such books. Within five years, the number of stations grew from 22 to 66.
The deposit stations were popular, but Titcomb wanted to reach out to the larger potential patron base that was not aware of such services or perhaps did not care. The bookmobile was founded in 1905.
Miss Titcomb later wrote in The Story of the Washington County Free Library;
Would not a Library Wagon, the outward and visible signs of the service
for which the Library stood, do much more in cementing friendship?
[could not agree more -ed.]...
The first wagon, when finished with shelves on the outside and a place for
storage of cases in the center resembled somewhat a cross between a
grocer's delivery wagon and the tin peddlers cart of by gone New England
days [Miss Titcomb was born in NH in 1857, apprenticed in MA and was a
librarian for 12 years in Rutland VT]. Filled with an attractive collection of
books and drawn by two horses, with Mr. Thomas the janitor both holding
the reins and dispensing the books, it started on its travels in April 1905.
No better method has ever been devised for reaching the dweller in the
country. The book goes to the man, not waiting for the man to come to the
book.
from: 10engines
Monday, July 12, 2010
52 Ways to Make a Difference - Library Advocacy Throughout the Year
Over at ala.org, there's a document written by Dr. Camila Alire, the President of ALA, which contains 52 ways to advocate for libraries. If you want to check it out, just go here.
Sunday, July 11, 2010
Reading on Paper is Faster than iBooks on the iPad
by: Ian Paul
It will take you longer to read a book on an iPad or Kindle compared to the printed page, according to a recent study. Dr. Jakob Nielsen of the Nielsen Norman Group--a product development consultancy that is not associated with Nielsen, the metrics company--compared the reading times of 24 users on the Kindle 2, an iPad using the iBooks application, a PC monitor and good old fashioned paper. The study found that reading on an electronic tablet was up to 10.7 percent slower than reading a printed book. Despite the slower reading times, Nielsen found that users preferred reading books on a tablet device compared to the paper book. The PC monitor, meanwhile, was universally hated as a reading platform among all test subjects.
The Study
Nielsen's findings were based on the performance of 24 users who "like reading and frequently read books." The subjects each read different short stories by Ernest Hemingway on all four platforms, and were measured for their reading speeds and story comprehension. Overall, it took each user an average of 17 minutes and 20 seconds to read a story regardless of the platform and comprehension levels were virtually identical on all four reading formats.
However, Nielsen says the printed book was the clear winner in terms of speed. Users were reading 6.2 percent slower on an iPad compared to paper, and 10.7 percent slower on the Kindle 2. Nielsen did not provide any statistics on the reading time for the PC monitor.
Interestingly, Nielsen's results appear to show that reading on the iPad is significantly faster compared to the Kindle 2. But Nielsen was quick to dismiss this conclusion arguing that the reading speeds between the two devices were "not statistically significant." "The difference [between reading times on the iPad and Kindle 2] would be so small that it wouldn't be a reason to buy one over the other," Nielsen wrote.
The study also asked each user to rate how they liked each format on a scale of 1 to 7. The iPad, Kindle 2, and printed book were nearly tied at 5.8, 5.7, and 5.6 respectively, while the PC monitor ranked last at 3.6 points. The test subjects said that reading on the PC felt too much like being at work, while they found it more relaxing to read a printed book than on an electronic device.
Tablets Still Can't Beat the Book
So it appears technology hasn't quite figured out yet how to replicate the experience of the printed page. That said this study leaves a lot to be desired owing to its small test group size, but it would be interesting to see a similar study on a much larger scale. I'd be curious to find out, for example, if there's any big difference in reading speeds based on age groups.
Would people in their 20s read faster on a screen than a book since they've spent a majority of their lives consuming digital content? How would the younger group compare to people in their late 30s and early 40s who also grew up with electronic devices such as the Commodore Vic-20, the original Mac, and IBM clones?
This study also left out reading on a laptop, which is a far more mobile reading experience than a desktop PC and could therefore be more enjoyable. I'd also like to know if the iPad would remain a faster reading experience than the Kindle in a larger study. On the one hand, the iPad can render a new page faster than the Kindle, which could account for the uptick in speed. But you would think the Kindle's ability to closely mimic the printed page, thanks to its e-ink display, would bring its reading speeds closer to the traditional book.
Regardless of how fast people can read on an electronic device, the e-reader is becoming more popular every year. E-books raked in $313 million in 2009 growing by 176.6 percent compared to 2008, overtaking audio book sales. In 2010, e-book sales are currently growing at a rate of 217.3 percent versus 2009, according to estimates by the Association of American Publishers.
If you want to check out Nielsen's findings for yourself, you can find it here. It's a fairly short read, but if you're pressed for time you might want to print it out.
from: PC World
It will take you longer to read a book on an iPad or Kindle compared to the printed page, according to a recent study. Dr. Jakob Nielsen of the Nielsen Norman Group--a product development consultancy that is not associated with Nielsen, the metrics company--compared the reading times of 24 users on the Kindle 2, an iPad using the iBooks application, a PC monitor and good old fashioned paper. The study found that reading on an electronic tablet was up to 10.7 percent slower than reading a printed book. Despite the slower reading times, Nielsen found that users preferred reading books on a tablet device compared to the paper book. The PC monitor, meanwhile, was universally hated as a reading platform among all test subjects.
The Study
Nielsen's findings were based on the performance of 24 users who "like reading and frequently read books." The subjects each read different short stories by Ernest Hemingway on all four platforms, and were measured for their reading speeds and story comprehension. Overall, it took each user an average of 17 minutes and 20 seconds to read a story regardless of the platform and comprehension levels were virtually identical on all four reading formats.
However, Nielsen says the printed book was the clear winner in terms of speed. Users were reading 6.2 percent slower on an iPad compared to paper, and 10.7 percent slower on the Kindle 2. Nielsen did not provide any statistics on the reading time for the PC monitor.
Interestingly, Nielsen's results appear to show that reading on the iPad is significantly faster compared to the Kindle 2. But Nielsen was quick to dismiss this conclusion arguing that the reading speeds between the two devices were "not statistically significant." "The difference [between reading times on the iPad and Kindle 2] would be so small that it wouldn't be a reason to buy one over the other," Nielsen wrote.
The study also asked each user to rate how they liked each format on a scale of 1 to 7. The iPad, Kindle 2, and printed book were nearly tied at 5.8, 5.7, and 5.6 respectively, while the PC monitor ranked last at 3.6 points. The test subjects said that reading on the PC felt too much like being at work, while they found it more relaxing to read a printed book than on an electronic device.
Tablets Still Can't Beat the Book
So it appears technology hasn't quite figured out yet how to replicate the experience of the printed page. That said this study leaves a lot to be desired owing to its small test group size, but it would be interesting to see a similar study on a much larger scale. I'd be curious to find out, for example, if there's any big difference in reading speeds based on age groups.
Would people in their 20s read faster on a screen than a book since they've spent a majority of their lives consuming digital content? How would the younger group compare to people in their late 30s and early 40s who also grew up with electronic devices such as the Commodore Vic-20, the original Mac, and IBM clones?
This study also left out reading on a laptop, which is a far more mobile reading experience than a desktop PC and could therefore be more enjoyable. I'd also like to know if the iPad would remain a faster reading experience than the Kindle in a larger study. On the one hand, the iPad can render a new page faster than the Kindle, which could account for the uptick in speed. But you would think the Kindle's ability to closely mimic the printed page, thanks to its e-ink display, would bring its reading speeds closer to the traditional book.
Regardless of how fast people can read on an electronic device, the e-reader is becoming more popular every year. E-books raked in $313 million in 2009 growing by 176.6 percent compared to 2008, overtaking audio book sales. In 2010, e-book sales are currently growing at a rate of 217.3 percent versus 2009, according to estimates by the Association of American Publishers.
If you want to check out Nielsen's findings for yourself, you can find it here. It's a fairly short read, but if you're pressed for time you might want to print it out.
from: PC World
Saturday, July 10, 2010
Libraries focus on convenience with mall locations
by: Jamie Stengle
DALLAS (AP) -- People streamed into a storefront on a recent summer day at an upscale Dallas mall, but they weren't drawn to a heavy discount on designer clothes. It was story sing-a-long time for babies at one of the city library's newest outposts.
The library for kids 12 and under has been wildly successful in offering unconventional access to families who might not make a trip to a traditional public library, and it's one of a growing number of strategies used by librarians nationwide to reintroduce communities to their local library.
"I think what's happening now is really that focus on convenience," said Sari Feldman, president of the Public Library Association, a division of the American Library Association. "How do we make the public library as convenient as Amazon, Netflix? Part of that is putting library branches in the path of customer."
"We are very aware of the fact that our biggest advantage is that we're free, but if time is actually a commodity for people, will people be willing to spend money rather than go to a library?"
She said putting libraries in malls is one of many efforts by public libraries to become more convenient. Even at more traditional branches, libraries have built cafes, provided downloadable books or installed drive-through windows.
With about 5,000 items, including books and DVDs, the Bookmarks branch in Dallas' NorthPark Center checks out as many items as branches eight times its size, said Jo Giudice, youth services manager. She said in the two years since it opened, it's had to increase story times to 12 a week compared to the two or three at most branches.
"It's been extremely successful. Numbers have risen every month in respect to programming and book checkout," said Giudice. "We've reintroduced the library to some young families."
The American Library Association doesn't have a comprehensive list of how many libraries are in malls or shopping centers but has an informal tally of around two dozen such branches. One of those opened as far back as the 1960s, but the idea seemingly has grown in popularity in the last decade.
Some locations are arranged like traditional libraries, while others resemble a bookstore. There's also a handful of libraries with arts centers, museums and even apartment buildings.
In Wichita, Kan. there's a library in a grocery story, and a small annex opened by the Chicago Public Library to offer best-sellers to patrons in a visitor center in the city's historic Water Works Pumping Station along Michigan Avenue.
Meanwhile, traditional libraries are trying to become more convenient. Leslie Burger, executive director of New Jersey's Princeton Public Library, said her library in downtown Princeton has a cafe, a bookstore selling donated books, return boxes around town and will mail books to borrowers. This summer, it started hosting a farmer's market.
"It's really that public libraries are really in the midst of some amazing transformation," Burger said. "I think the point of all this is we have multiple generations that we're serving right now and what we're trying to do is surprise and delight our customers."
More people are visiting public libraries, with the Institute of Museum and Library Services showing an almost 20 percent increase from 1999 to 2008, even though the number of librarians remains the same and more libraries have decreased hours and flat or decreased funding.
While there was a bump in library use as the economy faltered, libraries have been seeing consistent growth over the last decade, said Larra Clark, project manager in the Library Association's office for Research and Statistics.
In the face of budget concerns, Feldman, who is also executive director of Ohio's Cuyahoga County Public Library in suburban Cleveland, said a shopping center location can be a good for people and the library system.
Opening a new location in a strip mall nine months ago, one of her branches found affordable rent because of the large number of vacant shops. And since the library is arranged like a bookstore with a self-service focus, they only need the equivalent of 2 1/2 staffers compared to the 11 needed for a full stand-alone branch, she said.
For Bookmarks in Dallas, the owners of NorthPark paid for the mall space to be converted into a library and charge only $1 a year for rent. The library's programs are sponsored by a local energy company.
Curled up reading a book to her 4-year-old son at Bookmarks, 31-year-old Priscilla Gluckman said they came for a yoga class and stayed to read. On such visits they also usually have lunch or shop at NorthPark, which offers higher-priced storefronts like Neiman Marcus and Carolina Herrera.
Bookmarks, she said, is a nice contrast to the consumerism.
"It was just perfect. It was just a nice clean place that wasn't trying to market you something - just a book," she said. "NorthPark is so high-end. It was so refreshing to see this little pocket of childhood."
---
Online:
American Library Association, http://www.ala.org/
Bookmarks, http://dallaslibrary2.org/branch/bookmarks.php
from: AP
DALLAS (AP) -- People streamed into a storefront on a recent summer day at an upscale Dallas mall, but they weren't drawn to a heavy discount on designer clothes. It was story sing-a-long time for babies at one of the city library's newest outposts.
The library for kids 12 and under has been wildly successful in offering unconventional access to families who might not make a trip to a traditional public library, and it's one of a growing number of strategies used by librarians nationwide to reintroduce communities to their local library.
"I think what's happening now is really that focus on convenience," said Sari Feldman, president of the Public Library Association, a division of the American Library Association. "How do we make the public library as convenient as Amazon, Netflix? Part of that is putting library branches in the path of customer."
"We are very aware of the fact that our biggest advantage is that we're free, but if time is actually a commodity for people, will people be willing to spend money rather than go to a library?"
She said putting libraries in malls is one of many efforts by public libraries to become more convenient. Even at more traditional branches, libraries have built cafes, provided downloadable books or installed drive-through windows.
With about 5,000 items, including books and DVDs, the Bookmarks branch in Dallas' NorthPark Center checks out as many items as branches eight times its size, said Jo Giudice, youth services manager. She said in the two years since it opened, it's had to increase story times to 12 a week compared to the two or three at most branches.
"It's been extremely successful. Numbers have risen every month in respect to programming and book checkout," said Giudice. "We've reintroduced the library to some young families."
The American Library Association doesn't have a comprehensive list of how many libraries are in malls or shopping centers but has an informal tally of around two dozen such branches. One of those opened as far back as the 1960s, but the idea seemingly has grown in popularity in the last decade.
Some locations are arranged like traditional libraries, while others resemble a bookstore. There's also a handful of libraries with arts centers, museums and even apartment buildings.
In Wichita, Kan. there's a library in a grocery story, and a small annex opened by the Chicago Public Library to offer best-sellers to patrons in a visitor center in the city's historic Water Works Pumping Station along Michigan Avenue.
Meanwhile, traditional libraries are trying to become more convenient. Leslie Burger, executive director of New Jersey's Princeton Public Library, said her library in downtown Princeton has a cafe, a bookstore selling donated books, return boxes around town and will mail books to borrowers. This summer, it started hosting a farmer's market.
"It's really that public libraries are really in the midst of some amazing transformation," Burger said. "I think the point of all this is we have multiple generations that we're serving right now and what we're trying to do is surprise and delight our customers."
More people are visiting public libraries, with the Institute of Museum and Library Services showing an almost 20 percent increase from 1999 to 2008, even though the number of librarians remains the same and more libraries have decreased hours and flat or decreased funding.
While there was a bump in library use as the economy faltered, libraries have been seeing consistent growth over the last decade, said Larra Clark, project manager in the Library Association's office for Research and Statistics.
In the face of budget concerns, Feldman, who is also executive director of Ohio's Cuyahoga County Public Library in suburban Cleveland, said a shopping center location can be a good for people and the library system.
Opening a new location in a strip mall nine months ago, one of her branches found affordable rent because of the large number of vacant shops. And since the library is arranged like a bookstore with a self-service focus, they only need the equivalent of 2 1/2 staffers compared to the 11 needed for a full stand-alone branch, she said.
For Bookmarks in Dallas, the owners of NorthPark paid for the mall space to be converted into a library and charge only $1 a year for rent. The library's programs are sponsored by a local energy company.
Curled up reading a book to her 4-year-old son at Bookmarks, 31-year-old Priscilla Gluckman said they came for a yoga class and stayed to read. On such visits they also usually have lunch or shop at NorthPark, which offers higher-priced storefronts like Neiman Marcus and Carolina Herrera.
Bookmarks, she said, is a nice contrast to the consumerism.
"It was just perfect. It was just a nice clean place that wasn't trying to market you something - just a book," she said. "NorthPark is so high-end. It was so refreshing to see this little pocket of childhood."
---
Online:
American Library Association, http://www.ala.org/
Bookmarks, http://dallaslibrary2.org/branch/bookmarks.php
from: AP
Friday, July 9, 2010
Kids find summertime haven in libraries, parents find day care
by: Lolly Bowen
It was a warm and sunny day outside, but Xavier Parker, 10, was deep into a computer game at Thurgood Marshall Public Library when his father walked in and told the boy he was about to go to a store.
"Stay in here," Xavier's father, Jimmy Giles, said, leaving the boy in charge of his 6- and 8-year-old brothers. "Don't go anywhere until I come back and get you."
Giles is a single father and he doesn't like his boys roaming their Englewood neighborhood or playing outside because it's not safe, he said. So nearly every day the boys walk to the library and sometimes stay there for hours.
"They love it here," he said. "They don't want to leave."
In Chicago neighborhoods like Austin and Englewood and suburban communities such as Chicago Heights and Zion, many libraries serve as makeshift summer camps. They're a place where parents with limited means leave their kids for part of the day, and where children escape the streets.
Many of these children spend the day at the library without the guidance of a parent, said Susan Neuman, professor of educational studies at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, who is writing a book on public libraries and education. As a result, some librarians have developed informal regimens and systems for managing the daily influx of unsupervised kids.
Some organize learning activities and develop curricula. Others forgive late fees and extend the amount of time children can stay on the computer. In one case, the librarian keeps bread, peanut butter and jelly on hand so he can share his lunch with children who say they are hungry.
"Librarians … they are the hidden stars of our communities," Neuman said. "Librarians act as substitute mother teachers. They have taken it upon themselves to fill this role. They are doing it and doing it well, even if it is not something they wanted to do."
The phenomenon is not new, but in this economy, Neuman said a larger number of parents will rely on the library this summer in place of camp for their kids. The increase is expected even as some libraries struggle with reduced hours and fewer staff, she said.
At the south suburban Chicago Heights library, Norma Rubio gathers names and phone numbers of the children and gets them library cards. She gives them extra time on the computers and asks the older children to help by clearing tables and organizing books.
Rubio considers it her responsibility to look after the children left alone there. After all, she was once a bored kid growing up in Chicago Heights, she said. The library was such a refuge for her that she was eventually offered a job there.
"Where else will they go?" said Rubio, head of the children's department. "Mom is at work or busy. Parents don't have money for summer camps or recreation leagues.
"Me, myself, I'd rather (librarians) have them in here, than in the streets in trouble," she said.
In Robbins, Priscilla Coatney has developed a rigid curriculum, and the 30 to 40 children who gather there in the afternoons write book reports, conduct science experiments and garden. But she's careful to explain to parents that the library is not a free baby-sitting service.
"When they're here, we keep them and make sure they are engaged," she said. "We are excited about these children."
In north suburban Zion, the children without parents are especially welcomed, said Carol Cramer, the youth services coordinator. They need the library the most.
"We like to see our library used," she said.
There are a handful of children who come in daily on their own to the Maywood library in the west suburbs, said Sheila Ferrari, head of youth services there. So she makes the most of the time.
"It's kind of what we're here for. … It's natural for them to come here," she said.
Chicago Public Library branches have a summer reading program for children. But librarians have been known to secretly forgive fines, issue library cards and act as teachers and guardians. They read books to children roaming alone, push them into special programs and give them assignments to keep busy. When there are scuffles or too much noise, the security guards are called and privileges taken away.
At the Austin branch on the West Side, sometimes working parents will send their children to the library, then call to make sure they are there, said Elroy Christy, branch manager.
"When they tell their parents they're at the library, it alleviates anxiety," he said. "This is where they can get a cold drink of water. This is where they can use the restroom. This is where they are never turned away."
At Thurgood Marshall Library in Englewood, branch manager Jan Brooks is hesitant to discuss it, but he has at times checked out books in his own name for children and paid their late fines. He has even taken children outside to the fenced-in courtyard and shared his peanut butter and jelly sandwich with the ones who don't have a lunch.
"I guess I'm more of a grandfatherly, spoil-the-child type rather than a strict-parent type," Brooks said. "So you're running around, that's no big deal for me. If you're talking, it doesn't bother me. That's so insignificant compared to what we could do to help a child."
On a recent afternoon at the Thurgood Marshall branch, 13 elementary school-age children crowded around the eight computer terminals. A couple of the children squeezed into one chair, and others pulled up their own to watch YouTube videos and play games.
When the phone rang, it was a parent looking for a daughter. Brooks walked around asking for Tiera. The checks are part of his daily routine, Brooks said.
"I allow the kids to call home and tell their parents they're here," Brooks said. "Technically we're not supposed to do that, but I think it's a good idea to let the parents know they're here and they're reading."
At the Chicago Heights library, Kevin Fleming is content sitting in front of a computer surrounded by his younger brother, Devin, his cousins and friends.
"It feels good in here," the animated 11-year-old with closely cropped black hair said, flapping his arms to absorb the chilly air conditioning. "I get to sit and rest. I get to get on the Web sites that I want."
When school lets out for summer break, it's at the library on West 15th Street where Kevin escapes from trouble and violence after summer camp is over, he said.
"He is there mostly everyday," Kevin's mother, Davita Dillard said. "It's fine with me, if that's where he likes to go."
Kyle Counts, 12, said he and his friends walk together to their local branch on Mondays and Fridays. Sometimes they read, but mostly they play computer or board games.
"Here, there's stuff to do and I've made new friends."
from: Chicago Tribune
It was a warm and sunny day outside, but Xavier Parker, 10, was deep into a computer game at Thurgood Marshall Public Library when his father walked in and told the boy he was about to go to a store.
"Stay in here," Xavier's father, Jimmy Giles, said, leaving the boy in charge of his 6- and 8-year-old brothers. "Don't go anywhere until I come back and get you."
Giles is a single father and he doesn't like his boys roaming their Englewood neighborhood or playing outside because it's not safe, he said. So nearly every day the boys walk to the library and sometimes stay there for hours.
"They love it here," he said. "They don't want to leave."
In Chicago neighborhoods like Austin and Englewood and suburban communities such as Chicago Heights and Zion, many libraries serve as makeshift summer camps. They're a place where parents with limited means leave their kids for part of the day, and where children escape the streets.
Many of these children spend the day at the library without the guidance of a parent, said Susan Neuman, professor of educational studies at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, who is writing a book on public libraries and education. As a result, some librarians have developed informal regimens and systems for managing the daily influx of unsupervised kids.
Some organize learning activities and develop curricula. Others forgive late fees and extend the amount of time children can stay on the computer. In one case, the librarian keeps bread, peanut butter and jelly on hand so he can share his lunch with children who say they are hungry.
"Librarians … they are the hidden stars of our communities," Neuman said. "Librarians act as substitute mother teachers. They have taken it upon themselves to fill this role. They are doing it and doing it well, even if it is not something they wanted to do."
The phenomenon is not new, but in this economy, Neuman said a larger number of parents will rely on the library this summer in place of camp for their kids. The increase is expected even as some libraries struggle with reduced hours and fewer staff, she said.
At the south suburban Chicago Heights library, Norma Rubio gathers names and phone numbers of the children and gets them library cards. She gives them extra time on the computers and asks the older children to help by clearing tables and organizing books.
Rubio considers it her responsibility to look after the children left alone there. After all, she was once a bored kid growing up in Chicago Heights, she said. The library was such a refuge for her that she was eventually offered a job there.
"Where else will they go?" said Rubio, head of the children's department. "Mom is at work or busy. Parents don't have money for summer camps or recreation leagues.
"Me, myself, I'd rather (librarians) have them in here, than in the streets in trouble," she said.
In Robbins, Priscilla Coatney has developed a rigid curriculum, and the 30 to 40 children who gather there in the afternoons write book reports, conduct science experiments and garden. But she's careful to explain to parents that the library is not a free baby-sitting service.
"When they're here, we keep them and make sure they are engaged," she said. "We are excited about these children."
In north suburban Zion, the children without parents are especially welcomed, said Carol Cramer, the youth services coordinator. They need the library the most.
"We like to see our library used," she said.
There are a handful of children who come in daily on their own to the Maywood library in the west suburbs, said Sheila Ferrari, head of youth services there. So she makes the most of the time.
"It's kind of what we're here for. … It's natural for them to come here," she said.
Chicago Public Library branches have a summer reading program for children. But librarians have been known to secretly forgive fines, issue library cards and act as teachers and guardians. They read books to children roaming alone, push them into special programs and give them assignments to keep busy. When there are scuffles or too much noise, the security guards are called and privileges taken away.
At the Austin branch on the West Side, sometimes working parents will send their children to the library, then call to make sure they are there, said Elroy Christy, branch manager.
"When they tell their parents they're at the library, it alleviates anxiety," he said. "This is where they can get a cold drink of water. This is where they can use the restroom. This is where they are never turned away."
At Thurgood Marshall Library in Englewood, branch manager Jan Brooks is hesitant to discuss it, but he has at times checked out books in his own name for children and paid their late fines. He has even taken children outside to the fenced-in courtyard and shared his peanut butter and jelly sandwich with the ones who don't have a lunch.
"I guess I'm more of a grandfatherly, spoil-the-child type rather than a strict-parent type," Brooks said. "So you're running around, that's no big deal for me. If you're talking, it doesn't bother me. That's so insignificant compared to what we could do to help a child."
On a recent afternoon at the Thurgood Marshall branch, 13 elementary school-age children crowded around the eight computer terminals. A couple of the children squeezed into one chair, and others pulled up their own to watch YouTube videos and play games.
When the phone rang, it was a parent looking for a daughter. Brooks walked around asking for Tiera. The checks are part of his daily routine, Brooks said.
"I allow the kids to call home and tell their parents they're here," Brooks said. "Technically we're not supposed to do that, but I think it's a good idea to let the parents know they're here and they're reading."
At the Chicago Heights library, Kevin Fleming is content sitting in front of a computer surrounded by his younger brother, Devin, his cousins and friends.
"It feels good in here," the animated 11-year-old with closely cropped black hair said, flapping his arms to absorb the chilly air conditioning. "I get to sit and rest. I get to get on the Web sites that I want."
When school lets out for summer break, it's at the library on West 15th Street where Kevin escapes from trouble and violence after summer camp is over, he said.
"He is there mostly everyday," Kevin's mother, Davita Dillard said. "It's fine with me, if that's where he likes to go."
Kyle Counts, 12, said he and his friends walk together to their local branch on Mondays and Fridays. Sometimes they read, but mostly they play computer or board games.
"Here, there's stuff to do and I've made new friends."
from: Chicago Tribune
Thursday, July 8, 2010
Scholastic makes inroads into Arabic children's book market
Sensing a business and cultural opportunity, Scholastic carefully translates English-language books like "Heidi" and "The Magic School Bus" to be used at schools in several Arab-speaking countries.
by: Geraldine Baum
Reporting from New York — — The publisher was on a rare and delicate mission to translate and mass-market books from America for a part of the world that often rails against American values.
Carol Sakoian, a vice president of Scholastic Inc., brought a small group of Arab officials into a conference room to screen a stack of stories. They read and read, about caterpillars, volcanoes, Amelia Earhart, and a big red dog named Clifford.
Who would imagine that Clifford could be considered inflammatory?
To observant Muslims he is, because dogs are considered ritually unclean. Scholastic wanted to be careful not to appear culturally imperialistic, so Clifford was put in the "no" pile.
The education ministers, who came from Bahrain, Lebanon and Jordan, drew up a list of 27 "no-nos," according to Sakoian. "No dogs, no pigs, no boys and girls touching, no magic," she said, naming a few.
They liked values and talk of honesty and cooperation among children. Anything that hinted at overly independent children or religion was eliminated. The colorful "I Spy" series was excluded after a tiny dreidel was spotted in a picture.
Scholastic, the world's largest publisher and distributor of children's books, first weeded its list of thousands of titles down to 200 and later 80. They were translated into Arabic, and over the last three years, almost 17 million copies have been shipped from a plant in Missouri to elementary schools across the Middle East and North Africa.
Initially these American imports were greeted with doubt in some quarters. A Jordanian father was so wary of reading materials coming from America that he read every Scholastic book in his son's classroom. It took him a week to get through 40 titles, but eventually he gave his approval.
When similar books were offered in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, educators were also skeptical. After all, Israel's friend, the U.S. government, was involved in underwriting the project. "Why would the United States make all these clearly expensive books available to us for free?" Tharat Zeid, a Palestinian Authority official, said local educators wondered.
After examining the books and learning that other Arab countries were using them, Zeid said the ministers decided, "Why not put politics and suspicions aside and benefit from them?" Two years later, with Scholastic's "My Arabic Library" collections in 103 of 800 public schools, West Bank educators are clamoring for more and for training to show teachers how better to use them.
Chip Rossetti, an Arabic literature translator who writes about publishing in the Middle East, said a movement is growing to encourage a culture of reading for pleasure, which has mostly been a pastime of the elite. Beyond Cairo and Beirut — the publishing capitals — bookstores and well-stocked libraries are rarities in the Arab world, said Rossetti, noting that, though online sales are growing, books remain too pricey for most.
"I can't point to an Arab Roald Dahl, Maurice Sendak or Beverly Cleary," he said. "I know there are efforts to change that, but in these countries education tends to be more about rote learning, less about free reading."
The U.S. and other Western governments have funded Arabic translations, particularly of textbooks. But Scholastic's Arabic publishing effort is by far the largest, experts agree.
During an interview near the publisher's global headquarters in Lower Manhattan, Sakoian said that she'd long ago set her sights on selling to the vast Arab market. She first approached a private foundation to underwrite translations but got nowhere. In post- 9/11 America, none was interested in supporting Arab culture, she said. The U.S. State Department eventually paid for translations through a democracy-building initiative and for printing about half the books.
But Scholastic had a long way to go before it started printing. First, it had editing to do even of classics. Because Islam does not acknowledge the celebration of birthdays, "Ladybug's Birthday" was renamed "Ladybug's Anniversary." Ms. Frizzle's students on "The Magic School Bus" were given Arabic-sounding names, skirts were lengthened, body parts were covered and the skin tone and hair of the Swiss orphan girl in "Heidi" was darkened for the Arabic edition. (A tiny church steeple on the cover picture of Heidi's village escaped notice, however. "We just couldn't catch everything," Sakoian said.)
Scholastic scoured the books to eliminate anything that could be interpreted as American propaganda. In a book about shapes, a flag was removed from the Pentagon building in Washington, D.C. "This was a publishing project, not a diplomatic project," Sakoian said.
Still, she often found herself in the role of diplomat as Scholastic attempted to develop translations that would be acceptable across the Arab world. Although modern Arabic remains the official, unifying language, most people use local dialects with vocabulary that may differ from country to country. Again, Sakoian convened an Arab panel to review every word and phrasing in every book. They pored over dictionaries and, when there were disputes, turned to the Koran as the arbiter of what is correct.
Scholastic had 80 manuscripts ready to go to the printer when it was pointed out there were no accent marks — and without them the books couldn't be read. They were added, and by late 2007, Scholastic began printing in Arabic in its Jefferson City, Mo., plant and shipping to Bahrain, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco and Iraq, where U.S. soldiers delivered books to battle zones. Scholastic has since sent collections along with teaching manuals to 23 Arab-speaking countries.
For the publisher, which ships 1 million books a day out of Jefferson City, the Arabic books represent only a small part of its $2-billion business. But Sakoian sees greater business and cultural opportunities ahead. "Parents in these countries are like parents everywhere," she said. "They want their children educated, and this is basic stuff. Spiders, penguins and alligators do not belong to America."
Shereen Kreidieh Hasbini, a children's book publisher in Beirut, said Scholastic should have included books about Arabic culture. "A mixture of books that deal with issues that they face in their life with some translations would have made it a rich collection," she wrote in an e-mail.
Already, this literary infusion has transformed some children in a poor, religious neighborhood on the West Bank into critical thinkers. After using Scholastic books, sixth-graders at Al Bireh Elementary School in Ramallah found they preferred nonfiction to fiction, a report about life in India to a tale of a 19th century "Heidi." (Yara Firas, 11, didn't like the classic about the orphan sent to live with a grumpy grandfather. "I do not like sad stories," Yara said.)
Second-graders were mesmerized by a book about ethnicity, "We Are All Alike We Are All Different," said their teacher Ahlam Said: "The students could not understand this book because we do not have different ethnic groups here as there may be in the West. I tried to explain ... some understood but others did not. It is OK because they were able to get an idea about different ethnic groups from around the world."
Al Bireh's principal, Abu Baker, noticed that a book about African Americans gave students insight not only into how others live but also into themselves. They realized "they are not the only ones suffering because of the political situation in Palestine and the occupation, but that there are other people in other parts of the world who are also suffering from maybe different reasons," she said.
from: LA Times
by: Geraldine Baum
Reporting from New York — — The publisher was on a rare and delicate mission to translate and mass-market books from America for a part of the world that often rails against American values.
Carol Sakoian, a vice president of Scholastic Inc., brought a small group of Arab officials into a conference room to screen a stack of stories. They read and read, about caterpillars, volcanoes, Amelia Earhart, and a big red dog named Clifford.
Who would imagine that Clifford could be considered inflammatory?
To observant Muslims he is, because dogs are considered ritually unclean. Scholastic wanted to be careful not to appear culturally imperialistic, so Clifford was put in the "no" pile.
The education ministers, who came from Bahrain, Lebanon and Jordan, drew up a list of 27 "no-nos," according to Sakoian. "No dogs, no pigs, no boys and girls touching, no magic," she said, naming a few.
They liked values and talk of honesty and cooperation among children. Anything that hinted at overly independent children or religion was eliminated. The colorful "I Spy" series was excluded after a tiny dreidel was spotted in a picture.
Scholastic, the world's largest publisher and distributor of children's books, first weeded its list of thousands of titles down to 200 and later 80. They were translated into Arabic, and over the last three years, almost 17 million copies have been shipped from a plant in Missouri to elementary schools across the Middle East and North Africa.
Initially these American imports were greeted with doubt in some quarters. A Jordanian father was so wary of reading materials coming from America that he read every Scholastic book in his son's classroom. It took him a week to get through 40 titles, but eventually he gave his approval.
When similar books were offered in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, educators were also skeptical. After all, Israel's friend, the U.S. government, was involved in underwriting the project. "Why would the United States make all these clearly expensive books available to us for free?" Tharat Zeid, a Palestinian Authority official, said local educators wondered.
After examining the books and learning that other Arab countries were using them, Zeid said the ministers decided, "Why not put politics and suspicions aside and benefit from them?" Two years later, with Scholastic's "My Arabic Library" collections in 103 of 800 public schools, West Bank educators are clamoring for more and for training to show teachers how better to use them.
Chip Rossetti, an Arabic literature translator who writes about publishing in the Middle East, said a movement is growing to encourage a culture of reading for pleasure, which has mostly been a pastime of the elite. Beyond Cairo and Beirut — the publishing capitals — bookstores and well-stocked libraries are rarities in the Arab world, said Rossetti, noting that, though online sales are growing, books remain too pricey for most.
"I can't point to an Arab Roald Dahl, Maurice Sendak or Beverly Cleary," he said. "I know there are efforts to change that, but in these countries education tends to be more about rote learning, less about free reading."
The U.S. and other Western governments have funded Arabic translations, particularly of textbooks. But Scholastic's Arabic publishing effort is by far the largest, experts agree.
During an interview near the publisher's global headquarters in Lower Manhattan, Sakoian said that she'd long ago set her sights on selling to the vast Arab market. She first approached a private foundation to underwrite translations but got nowhere. In post- 9/11 America, none was interested in supporting Arab culture, she said. The U.S. State Department eventually paid for translations through a democracy-building initiative and for printing about half the books.
But Scholastic had a long way to go before it started printing. First, it had editing to do even of classics. Because Islam does not acknowledge the celebration of birthdays, "Ladybug's Birthday" was renamed "Ladybug's Anniversary." Ms. Frizzle's students on "The Magic School Bus" were given Arabic-sounding names, skirts were lengthened, body parts were covered and the skin tone and hair of the Swiss orphan girl in "Heidi" was darkened for the Arabic edition. (A tiny church steeple on the cover picture of Heidi's village escaped notice, however. "We just couldn't catch everything," Sakoian said.)
Scholastic scoured the books to eliminate anything that could be interpreted as American propaganda. In a book about shapes, a flag was removed from the Pentagon building in Washington, D.C. "This was a publishing project, not a diplomatic project," Sakoian said.
Still, she often found herself in the role of diplomat as Scholastic attempted to develop translations that would be acceptable across the Arab world. Although modern Arabic remains the official, unifying language, most people use local dialects with vocabulary that may differ from country to country. Again, Sakoian convened an Arab panel to review every word and phrasing in every book. They pored over dictionaries and, when there were disputes, turned to the Koran as the arbiter of what is correct.
Scholastic had 80 manuscripts ready to go to the printer when it was pointed out there were no accent marks — and without them the books couldn't be read. They were added, and by late 2007, Scholastic began printing in Arabic in its Jefferson City, Mo., plant and shipping to Bahrain, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco and Iraq, where U.S. soldiers delivered books to battle zones. Scholastic has since sent collections along with teaching manuals to 23 Arab-speaking countries.
For the publisher, which ships 1 million books a day out of Jefferson City, the Arabic books represent only a small part of its $2-billion business. But Sakoian sees greater business and cultural opportunities ahead. "Parents in these countries are like parents everywhere," she said. "They want their children educated, and this is basic stuff. Spiders, penguins and alligators do not belong to America."
Shereen Kreidieh Hasbini, a children's book publisher in Beirut, said Scholastic should have included books about Arabic culture. "A mixture of books that deal with issues that they face in their life with some translations would have made it a rich collection," she wrote in an e-mail.
Already, this literary infusion has transformed some children in a poor, religious neighborhood on the West Bank into critical thinkers. After using Scholastic books, sixth-graders at Al Bireh Elementary School in Ramallah found they preferred nonfiction to fiction, a report about life in India to a tale of a 19th century "Heidi." (Yara Firas, 11, didn't like the classic about the orphan sent to live with a grumpy grandfather. "I do not like sad stories," Yara said.)
Second-graders were mesmerized by a book about ethnicity, "We Are All Alike We Are All Different," said their teacher Ahlam Said: "The students could not understand this book because we do not have different ethnic groups here as there may be in the West. I tried to explain ... some understood but others did not. It is OK because they were able to get an idea about different ethnic groups from around the world."
Al Bireh's principal, Abu Baker, noticed that a book about African Americans gave students insight not only into how others live but also into themselves. They realized "they are not the only ones suffering because of the political situation in Palestine and the occupation, but that there are other people in other parts of the world who are also suffering from maybe different reasons," she said.
from: LA Times
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