University Library E-News
Special Collections & Archives launched its online exhibit, Past / Personal: Examining Oral History Narratives, presenting a curated selection from oral histories of “individuals who lived through significant historical events, participated in social movements, or experienced cultural trends that have shaped modern sociocultural perspectives.” We asked the curators to give us an overview of the project.
An event like no other.
The Oviatt Library is partnering with Gender and Women’s Studies, Queer Studies and The Pride Center to create a week-long series of lectures and presentations titled Sex in the Library: Scholarship, Exploration, and Intersectionality in the Archives.
“Historicizin’ & Contemporizin’ the Black Aesthetic: Keeping the Legacy Alive” is a unique journey into the Black experience, honoring the history and contemporary contributions of people of Black descent, whose experience is deeply embedded in the narrative of the American past, present and future.
The Oviatt Library is proud to host the spring 2016 exhibit, “Historicizin’ and Contemporizin’ the Black Aesthetic: Keeping the Legacy Alive.” Co-curated by Africana Studies professors Theresa White and Cedric Hackett, the exhibit is an inclusive look at African American and African culture from both past and present perspectives.
After almost a decade from planning to completion, CSUN’s Electronic Thesis and Dissertation (ETD) digitization project succeeds in moving the work of over 15,000 Master's students to an online repository that is accessible to researchers from around the globe.
In the most recent election cycle many of us became skeptical of what seems to be an overload of web-based information. CSUN students pay for the benefit of having quality, peer-reviewed research and information at their disposal in training for their postgraduate lives. To expand those resources, the Library in recent years has initiated and participated in projects to bring graduate student research theses online, from the present day all the way back to the university’s founding.
One of the wonderful things about libraries is that they transform to meet the needs of the community, embrace and experiment with new ideas, and provide spaces for research, culture and collaboration. In this issue of our eNews, we explore the Oviatt Library as a space for creativity, and how important the creative process is towards fostering student and community success. See Dean Mark Stover’s article [link] The Oviatt Library has undergone tremendous changes over recent years, and its Mission, Vision and Values reflect those changes. The Library as a creative space is reflected in our mission as creating “innovative physical and virtual spaces,” and providing “diverse education and cultural programming in support of student success.”
One of the many delights we have the privilege to enjoy in the Oviatt Library is the awe and spark of imagination that ignites every time students from local community schools visit us for a field trip tour. Over the last five years, the Oviatt has conducted 302 tours welcoming 5,435 visitors.
Ordinarily one might not find library subject headings particularly fascinating, but the Oviatt Library’s OneSearch discovery system has a new story to tell that radically changes the way students engage with information on critical topics. Thanks to the collaborative work of Luiz Mendes, chair of the the Library’s Collection Access and Management Systems department, and Israel Yanez, a cataloger at CSU Sacramento Library, in the display of certain library search results, illegal aliens has become undocumented immigrants.
For its first all-virtual exhibition, the Special Collections & Archives department presents, Los Angeles: On Film and On Record, now through July 30, 2021, which examines a selection of popular films that feature Los Angeles in the storyline and/or setting, and using film clips and digital images of archival and other primary sources, compares their vision to the documentary record of the “real” Los Angeles. Since opening August 22, 2020, the exhibit has had over 3,000 views. In keeping with its virtual genre and the Library’s support of student learning, the exhibit includes links to podcasts created by English students focusing on specific films in the exhibit for their final research assignment in their Honors Seminar class.
Ensuring that campus technologies are accessible to everyone is a shared California State University responsibility. To assist CSUN in that charge, we are fortunate to have in residence the diligent and highly skilled team working in the Universal Design Center (UDC). Housed in an unassuming nook on the Oviatt Library’s Garden Level, the staff of the Universal Design Center (UDC) works to ensure that the campus web environment is usable and accessible to everyone. The key underlying principle of universal design is that all individuals, regardless of disability, should have access to information.