Posts filed under ‘academic libraries’
IMing at the ref desk with pornbots
Sometimes we librarians get instant messages from sexy robots while we we’re at the reference desk. Here’s one way of dealing with it. Thanks, Steve Lawson!
It’s a comic — it’s a guide to the library
The clever librarians at Miller Library at McPherson College in McPherson, Kansas have made a guide to the library disguised as a comic book, Library of the Living Dead. The library guide part is fairly straightforward, but there’s a nice action-filled story to put the information in context (sort of). My favorite part is probably when the zombies get extra excited about librarian brains. Unfortunately, the Miller Library uses the Dewey Decimal system (most academic libraries use Library of Congress). Here’s the announcement, and here’s the comic. Thanks, BoingBoing!
Edible books
Several libraries sponsor edible book contests, usually on or around April 1. The image at left shows a Goodnight Moon Pie from the Duke University Libraries Edible Book Festival of 2010. The International Edible Book Festival folks claim that at least 23 countries have held such festivals. The Pikes Peak Library District and the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs had some great entries in their 2010 festival.
Nice try, CC students.
Colorado College Humanities Liaison Librarian Steve Lawson writes: “On a very busy Sunday of third week [end of fifth block, February 2011], a student asked me about these “reserved” signs on a few tables in the second floor atrium. The library was full of people studying, even sitting on the floor, but these two tables were open with their reserve signs. This was either a pretty good prank or an excellent psychology experiment: you can’t reserve the tables in the main second floor reading area.” Thanks, Steve Lawson!
Jus Reign The Library Study Song
I’m not sure what library this is, anybody know? Thanks, Dina Wood!
Library dance parties
Several institutions of higher learning offer (or suffer) library dance parties during exam week. Oberlin College’s five-minute dance breaks recently got some NPR coverage; this video shows a sampling (sans music) at about 1:07 and forward. The University of Montana, Allegheny College, the University of North Carolina-Wilmington, the College of Charleston, the University of Virginia, the University of Miami, and many others also host (deliberately or not) dance parties small and large. Thanks, Carol Dickerson, Ray English, and others!
Surprise dance at the UNL library
Students at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln perform a choreographed dance to My Chemical Romance’s “Teenagers” during the university’s “dead week” in December 2010. The youtube description calls it a flash mob, but to my mind a flash mob would be bigger and perhaps less choreographed; this seems more like a show. Excellent shenanigan, whatever they may call it. Thanks, Gwen Gregory!
Christmas tree made from the NUC
In 2006, the University of Aalborg library in Denmark had an excellent Christmas tree made of (green) volumes of the National Union Catalog. Later, libraries at Loyola Marymount University and the University of San Francisco had similar trees. Thanks, Erin McKean!
A jungle in the library
photo by Scott Johnson
Colorado College student Max Robillard, of CC’s Integrative Design Club, created a small jungle at CC’s Tutt Library using plants found throughout the building. He says:
“I saw it as a simple, easy public space intervention. I just wanted to give people in the library something new, and to offer them a pseudo-shelter, or retreat, from the public space that the library is. My friends and I put it together on Sunday afternoon, and we took it down Monday night.”
Thanks, Carol Dickerson!
20 Heroic Librarians Who Save the World
So glad someone has gathered together these heroic librarians from books, TV, and film. In particular I call your attention to the bookaneers in China Mieville’s excellent novel Un Lun Dun. About time somebody wrote a novel where a prophecy is a crock. Thanks, io9!
Library Shenanigans 