Polger, Mark Aaron. Library Signage and Wayfinding Design: Communicating effectively with your users. Chicago: ALA Editions, 2022. 128 pp. ISBN: 978 0 8389 3785 3. £54.
Stivers, Julie. Include (Shared Foundations Series). Chicago: ALA Editions, 2022. 228 pp. ISBN: 978 0 8389 1917 0. £52.
An invaluable acquisition for library staff on a most relevant subject
THE subject matter of this book is a hot topic across the librarianship profession at present. There are many engaging and thought-provoking chapters and contributions which, although taken from practi- tioners working in academic libraries in the USA and Canada are extremely pertinent to counter parts working in academic institutions in the UK and worldwide. The book is divided into six sections, each of which contain some areas of personal interest. In particular: Recruitment, Retention and Promotion includes chapters focusing on ageism encountered by older female librarians, disability issues and promotional bar- riers encountered by librarians of colour. The Professional Development section provides an insight into developing cultural competence, cultural humility and cultural intelli- gence. The section on Rein- forcing The Message contains a disturbing revelation that only 52 per cent of surveyed Amer- ican Research Libraries have a diversity statement and many of these are not prominent on respective websites. The Assessment section reminds us that Diversity, Equity and Inclusivity strategies should not merely focus on counting staff numbers in represented groups but concentrate on effective retention of these staff. Finally, in the Afterword section, the book editors comment that the diversity ‘umbrella’ has expanded in recent years to
October-November 2023
A scholarly study of thoughts and insights from a great bygone era
COMMONPLACE books, scrapbooks and albums were created in the nine- teenth century to enable our ancestors to retrieve quotations and snippets of information for future use.
Lee, Corliss and Lym, Brian, (eds). Implementing Excellence in Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion: A handbook for academic libraries. Chicago: Association of College and Research Libraries, 2022. 492 pp. ISBN 978 0 8389 3910 9. £111.
include sexual orientation, political and religious beliefs, but disappointingly, there are no chapters dealing with these areas within the content. Given the strong focus on
inclusion and disability aware- ness, the use of the term ‘brain- storming’ (used to reference a meeting in one of the chapters) may offend some readers. The term is often now replaced by other terms in modern texts. Overall, this book is an excellent read, expensive, but it would be an invaluable acqui- sition for a staff library since much of the content is of rele- vance to employees throughout an organisation, not just those within the library environment.
Keith Daniels
Academic Liaison Librarian, University of Bedfordshire
The practice was widespread and was often affectionately named: Coleridge named his ‘Flycatchers’, and George Eliot hers as ‘The Quarry’. The practice was not confined to the humanities and the labo- ratory handbooks of Hum- phrey Davey and Michael Faraday reveal a fascinating exposition of the thoughts of both chemists.
Technological and social changes altered methods for gathering, storing, and organising information in nineteenth-century Britain. The explosion of print culture enabled readers to cut-and- paste extracts from newspa- pers cheaply instead of copy- ing out quotations by hand. It was clearly important for such material to be organised. An early pioneer of indexing was John Locke who devised an index based on commonplace books. The American John Todd developed this further in his Index Rerum which simplified Locke’s index and abandoned his use of Latin. The book is divided into two sections: Organizing ideas and Organizing people. Considerable space is given to commonplace books in both sections. The first half of the book contends that methods for organising knowledge developed in line with prevail-
Hess, Jillian M. How Romantics and Victorians Organized Information: Commonplace books, scrapbooks and albums (Oxford Textual Perspectives). Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2022. 336 pp. ISBN 978 0 1928 9607 0. £18.99.
ing thought of the time. The second half of the book shows how scrapbooks enabled the Victorian to organise people, through books of mourning and collections of physi- cal objects such as pressed flowers and photographs. The book contains a feast of fascinating anecdotes ranging from a lock of Milton’s hair to a detailed description of Tennyson’s last moments. An extensive bibliography is provided and the book is abundantly illustrated. This thoughtful and scholarly study offers a perceptive insight into the ways in which writers and scientists worked and organised their material.
Diana Dixon
INFORMATION PROFESSIONAL 51
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