The University of Cincinnati seeks a visionary and dynamic leader to serve as dean and university librarian. Reporting directly to the provost and senior vice president for academic affairs, the dean is the chief administrator over numerous venues, facilities, collections, and oversees a diverse faculty and staff. The dean is also a member of the Council of Deans and actively participates in the governance of the university. As the intellectual and administrative leader of the Libraries, the next dean will play a key role in developing new ideas and forging consensus among stakeholders to build upon current and past successes and further strengthen the Libraries’ presence on campus. Continue reading
Category Archives: UC Libraries
University of Cincinnati Press title, “Equity and Inclusion in Higher Education: Strategies for Teaching,” named a 2022 Choice Outstanding Academic Title
“Equity and Inclusion in Higher Education: Strategies for Teaching,” edited by UC’s Rita Kumar and Brenda Refaei, and published by the University of Cincinnati Press, has been named a 2022 Choice Outstanding Academic Title.
Each December, Choice publishes its list of Outstanding Academic Titles. This prestigious list reflects the best in scholarly titles, both print and digital, reviewed by Choice during the previous year and brings with it the extraordinary recognition of the academic library community. The list is quite selective, containing approximately ten percent of some 5,000 works reviewed annually in Choice, a publishing unit of the Association of College and Research Libraries, a division of the American Library Association. Continue reading
Journey to Challenger Deep
Have you ever wondered what it really looks like at the bottom of the ocean? Few people in the world can answer this question, and Dr. Dawn Wright (@deepseadawn) is one of them. In the summer of 2022, she ventured to the deepest point on Planet Earth known as Challenger Deep in a two-person submersible. Through this historic journey, Dr. Wright became the first Black person and only the fifth woman to travel so deep in the ocean. The purpose of the journey was to collect data to add to the efforts to map the entire ocean floor. Currently, researchers have only mapped 24% of the ocean floor.
To learn about the journey and Dr. Wright, visit the Geology-Mathematics-Physics Library, 240 Braunstein Hall, and explore the exhibit on the expedition and Dr. Wright.
A representation of the depth of Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench by John Nelson
UC Libraries closed for Thanksgiving Holiday
The University of Cincinnati Libraries will be closed Thursday, November 24 and Friday, November 25 for Thanksgiving, with some locations closed the remainder of the holiday weekend and many library locations closing early on Wednesday, November 23 at 5pm. Check the listed hours for each library location’s specific hours.
Have a safe and happy Thanksgiving!
‘Indigenous Dispossession.’ UC Libraries exhibit highlights laws, treaties and policies that resulted in mass Indian Removal
In honor of Native American Heritage Month, the University of Cincinnati Libraries’ RESPECT (Racial Equity Support Programming to Educate the Community Team), presents the exhibit “Indigenous Dispossession: U.S. laws & policies promoting European settlement and Western Expansion resulting in Indian Removal from tribal, ancestral lands.”
Rant Che Wai Me. From the McKenney and Hall digital collection.
On display on the 4th floor lobby of the Walter C. Langsam Library, the exhibit begins by listing the justification for European Settlement on Native American lands through the Doctrine of Discovery and Manifest Destiny, the ideas that the United States is destined to expand its dominion and to spread democracy and capitalism across the entire North American continent. The exhibit then goes on to list laws and acts such as the Northwest Ordinance, Indian Removal Act and the General Allotment Act that all contributed to the removal of Native American peoples from their tribal homes. It also includes information on the Indian Civilization Act, which aimed to “civilize” and “Christianize” Native children. What resulted was a loss of their culture and identity and a system of abuse.
Ne Sou A Quoit – A Fox Chief. From McKenney and Hall digital collection.
The second part of the exhibit, on display on the 5th floor lobby, outlines steps to rectify the early treatment of Native Americans by granting citizenship and ending allotment of tribal lands with such policies as the Indian Citizenship Act, the Indian Reorganization Act and the Indian Self-Determination and Education Assistance Act. It is noted, however, that while legislation around self-determination and self-governance offers a certain degree of independence and protection under the law, the legacy of displacement, oppression and neglect in American public policy affects Native communities and families to this day.
The exhibit highlights the collections of UC Libraries by featuring prominently illustrations from George Catlin who traveled the North American continent from 1830-1838 to chronicle the people, customs and traditions of Native American tribes and from Thomas Loraine McKenney and James Hall’s “History of the Indian Tribes of North America.”
From George Catlin’s “The Printed Works.”
To learn more, a bibliography of works from the collections of UC Libraries is available in print at the exhibit and online as a PDF.
The exhibit helps the RESPECT group in their mission to draw awareness of Systemic Racism, defined as “policies and practices that exist throughout a whole society or organization, and that result in and support a continued, unfair advantage to some people and unfair or harmful treatment of others based on race.”
Announcing the poets for the Nov. 30 Poetry Stacked
The University of Cincinnati Libraries and the Elliston Poetry Room announce the next set of poets for Poetry Stacked, a semi-regular poetry reading series held in the 6th floor east stacks of the Walter C. Langsam Library.
At the next event, scheduled for Wednesday, Nov. 30 at 4:30pm, three poets will read original works.
- Rebecca Lindenberg is the author of Love, an Index (McSweeney’s) and The Logan Notebooks (Mountain West Poetry Series), winner of the 2015 Utah Book Award. She’s the recipient of an Amy Lowell Traveling Poetry Fellowship, an NEA Literature Grant, and a seven-month fellowship from the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, among other awards and honors. Her work appears in Poetry, American Poetry Review, Tin House, The Believer, McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern, The Missouri Review, Best American Poetry 2019 and elsewhere. She’s a member of the poetry faculty at the University of Cincinnati, where she also serves as poetry editor of the Cincinnati Review.
- Manuel Iris. Poet Laureate Emeritus of the City of Cincinnati, Ohio (2018-2020). He received the “Merida” National award of poetry (Mexico, 2009) for his book Notebook of Dreams, and the Rodulfo Figueroa Regional award of poetry for his book The Disguises of Fire (Mexico, 2014). In 2016 two different anthologies of his poetic work were published: The Naked Light, in Venezuela; and Before the Mystery, in El Salvador. His first bilingual anthology of poems, Traducir el silencio/Translating Silence, was published in New York in 2018. This book won two different awards in the International Latino Book Awards in Los Angeles, California, in that same year. In 2021, he became a member of the prestigious System of Art Creators of Mexico (Sistema Nacional de Creadores de Arte). His latest book The Parting Present/Lo que se ira received the Reader’s choice award from the Ohioana Library Association, and was also recognized at the 2022 International Latino Book Awards.
- Rome Hernández Morgan is a second-year doctoral student in English, Creative Writing at the University of Cincinnati where she is a Provost Fellow. She received her MFA from the University of Arkansas. She translates from Spanish and Portuguese and her poetry has appeared in Blackbird, The Journal and New Ohio Review.
UC Libraries closed Friday, Nov. 11 for Veterans Day
UC Libraries will be closed Friday, Nov. 11 in observance of Veterans Day.
Regular library hours will resume Saturday, Nov. 12.
To learn more about veterans at UC, check out this online exhibit from the Archives and Rare Books Library entitled “School & Country: Military Life at the University of Cincinnati.”
A Forgery amongst Renaissance and Baroque Paintings at DAAP!
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Exhibit of paintings-possibly Renaissance and Baroque from UC’s art collection
DAAP Art History Prof. Chris Platts invites direct observation of these works of art from UC’s art collection to aid his classes (ARTH 5184 & ARTH 3021) in determining style, iconography, materials, function, patronage, and deeper symbolic meanings of the works. Prof. Platts is teaming up with UC geology and chemistry professors to give his students the chance to study an in-house mineral collection as a basis for analysis of paint pigments and how they were made in the Renaissance time period. As a class activity, the students will analyze these paintings from paint chips to date them and attempt to identify which one is a forgery.
Exploring Mont Reid’s Surgeries with Drs. John Bossert & William Camm
Join the Henry R. Winkler Center for the History of the Health Professions in the Stanley J. Lucas, MD Boardroom in the Donald C. Harrison Health Sciences Library Thursday, Nov. 10 at noon as Drs. John Bossert and William Camm lead a discussion while viewing three surgical films of one of the early 20th century’s finest surgeons, Mont Reid.
The three surgical films on view will include Cholecystectomy with Gallstones (1935), Toxic Thyroid & Cesarean Section (1935) and an Ovarian Cyst and Inguinal Herniotomy (1935). While the film rolls, Drs. Camm and Bossert will discuss surgical methods of Mont Reid’s, while at the same relating interesting anecdotes about his life and work. Audience feedback, questions, and discussion is encouraged. Light refreshments will be provided (registration is not required).
Prominent civil rights attorney Al Gerhardstein donates papers to the University of Cincinnati
Al Gerhardstein, noted Cincinnati civil rights attorney, has donated to the University of Cincinnati Libraries’ Archives and Rare Books Library, papers documenting his nearly 50-year career in civil rights litigation and advocacy, with focuses in reproductive rights, prisoner’s rights, policing, employment discrimination, and lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) rights.
Material to be found in the extensive collection includes briefs, pleadings, depositions, trial transcriptions, newspaper, magazine and journal articles, as well as correspondence and speeches spanning Gerhardstein’s career and notable legal cases. There are 184 boxes available for research, with 45 more boxes sealed under court order.
Excerpt from letter notifying Mr. Gerhardstein that his case was entered into the Supreme Court.
Prominent cases in the collection include:
- Obergefell v. Hodges, the 2015 U.S. Supreme Court case establishing marriage equality for same-sex couples in all 50 states. Gerhardstein represented Jim Obergefell in this fight to be recognized as the husband of John Arthur.
- Planned Parenthood Association of Cincinnati v. Project Jericho, et al., which was a lawsuit against anti-abortion groups for their continued harassment of women seeking abortion and their providers, after a member of one of the groups firebombed the Margaret Sanger Center abortion clinic in 1985.
- Prisoner rights lawsuit in response to the 1993 Lucasville Prison riots, where Gerhardstein represented inmates against prison officials for failure to protect them during the riot and the forces that caused the riot.
- Litigation to declare unconstitutional Article XII, which was voted into the Cincinnati City Charter in 1993 and actively prohibited Cincinnati from protecting LGBT people from discrimination.
- Creation of the Collaborative Agreement as a partnership between the ACLU, Black United Front, the city of Cincinnati and the Cincinnati Fraternal Order of Police, which re-oriented the philosophy of policing in Cincinnati towards a Community Problem Oriented Policing (CPOP) model. It was the result of a civil rights action filed on behalf of a class of African American citizens of Cincinnati based on discriminatory policing including racial profiling, excessive force and disproportionate arrests of African Americans. The success of the Collaborative Agreement made Cincinnati a national role model for police reform.