Housekeeping for end of term

As finals get underway we know it’s easy to forget the little things, but please remember to return any books you have out to the library as you pack up your dorm room!

And while you are here, check our Lost and Found. Any items remaining on Monday, May 21 will be discarded or donated.

Late Night Reference Starts Sunday 5/6!

Need help?

We can help you find that last source you need for your paper, cite your sources properly, and lots more.

Reference librarians will be available through chat until 11 PM , Sunday May 6th through Thursday May 10! Use the meebo box right on this blog, or on any page in the library website. Our meebo box is even embedded in most library databases!

We’re also on AIM, YIM, GoogleTalk, and MSN Messenger at: librariansfsu.

The Library will also be open the following extended hours through May 17:

• Sundays: 1pm – Midnight
• Mondays-Thursdays: 7:30am – Midnight
• Fridays: 7:30am – 5pm
• Saturdays: Noon – 10pm

CMM Collection Dedication

In a ceremony on April 20, 2012, Fitchburg State University dedicated the W. Barnett Pearce records, the first component of the Coordinate Management of Meaning (CMM) Collection in the University Archives.  This collection marks a major scholarly gift to FSU and provides faculty, students and other researchers access to important communication theory research materials.  

CMM Theory was developed by W. Barnett Pearce and Vernon E. Cronen and posits that communication is a two-sided process involving the making and managing of meaning, and coordinating action.  Pearce was a professor emeritus in the School of Human & Organization Development at Fielding Graduate University.  He served on the faculties of the University of North Dakota, University of Kentucky, University of Massachusetts at Amherst, and Loyola University Chicago.  Improving the quality of communication was his driving professional commitment, first taking the form of developing a conceptual understanding of communication in CMM, and, more recently, integrating scholarship with the practice of designing and facilitating communication, particularly in public meetings about community issues.  As a practitioner, he worked on six continents through the nonprofit Public Dialogue Consortium and the for-profit Pearce Associates.  He cofounded the CMM Institute for Personal and Social Evolution.  He published eleven books and numerous scholarly articles.   

The Pearce Records including published and unpublished writings by Pearce, research materials important to the development of CMM and related to the work of others applying CMM, and materials related to the practice of Pearce as an educator, trainer and consultant.  The collection includes approximately 18 linear feet of papers, correspondence, published monography, video and audio recordings, and electronic records.  

The Pearce Records are the first group of materials of what will become a much larger CMM Collection.  The University Archives will soon receive the papers of Vernon Cronen which will be added to the collection.  The Archives are collaborating with the CMM Institute to create a research destination at Fitchburg State University for those interested in researching CMM.   Those interested in viewing the Pearce Records are encouraged to make an appointment in advance with Kate Wells, the Reference and Special Collections Librarian.  

Trial Databases!

The library is pleased to announce trials of several new databases:

American Antiquarian Society Historical Periodicals Collection – Digital access to the most comprehensive collection of American periodicals published between 1691 and 1877 – includes digitized images of more than 7,600 American magazines and journals. (Available through May 21.)

Early American Newspapers – Cover-to-cover reproductions of hundreds of historic newspapers, with more than one million pages of full-text. (Available through May 4.)

Film & Television Literature Index with Full-Text – Comprehensive bibliographic and full-text database covering the entire spectrum of television and film. Subject coverage includes film & television theory, preservation & restoration, screenwriting, production, cinematography, technical aspects, and reviews. (Available through May 31.)

Check these out and let us know what you think in the comments!

It’s National Poetry Month – Celebrate at the library!

“National Poetry Month is a month-long, national celebration of poetry established by the Academy of American Poets. The concept is to widen the attention of individuals and the media—to the art of poetry, to living poets, to our complex poetic heritage, and to poetry books and journals of wide aesthetic range and concern. We hope to increase the visibility and availability of poetry in popular culture while acknowledging and celebrating poetry’s ability to sustain itself in the many places where it is practiced and appreciated.” (Poets.org)

 

Some great ways to celebrate National Poetry Month:

1. Read some poetry! Check out the display of poetry at the reference desk, or read some favorites at www.poets.org.
2. While you’re at the desk, take a poem for your pocket. Better yet, take two and give one to a friend!
3. Download the Poem Flow app to your iPhone.
4. Write a poem. You don’t need to be Shakespeare to have something to say.
5. Put a poem in an unexpected place. In a book. On the back of a grocery list. On a postcard to a distant friend.

Introduction to Poetry by Billy Collins

I ask them to take a poem
and hold it up to the light
like a color slide

or press an ear against its hive.

I say drop a mouse into a poem
and watch him probe his way out,

or walk inside the poem’s room
and feel the walls for a light switch.

I want them to waterski
across the surface of a poem
waving at the author’s name on the shore.

But all they want to do
is tie the poem to a chair with rope
and torture a confession out of it.

They begin beating it with a hose
to find out what it really means.

1000 Years of English

The library is excited to announce that we now have access to the full Oxford English Dictionary online!

From the OED’s site:

“600,000 words … 3 million quotations … over 1000 years of English.

The Oxford English Dictionary is widely regarded as the accepted authority on the English language. It is an unsurpassed guide to the meaning, history, and pronunciation of 600,000 words— past and present—from across the English-speaking world.

As a historical dictionary, the OED is very different from those of current English, in which the focus is on present-day meanings. You’ll still find these in the OED, but you’ll also find the history of individual words, and of the language—traced through 3 million quotations, from classic literature and specialist periodicals to films scripts and cookery books.

The OED started life more than 150 years ago. Today, the dictionary is in the process of its first major revision. Updates revise and extend the OED at regular intervals, each time subtly adjusting our image of the English language.”

Access the OED online through the library’s Research Databases, or try it here!

Do tweets need to be cited? YES!

As communication changes, so too do the methods by which we give credit. Believe it or not, there is now a standard for citing tweets in MLA format for academic research:

Last Name, First Name (Username). “Tweet in its entirety.” Date, Time. Tweet.

Full information from the Modern Language Association can be found here.

Need help citing something unusual? Ask a Librarian!