The Soul of W.E.B. Du Bois: A Tribute to the Black Church

A program of gospel music, poetry, and oratory will be presented, featuring artists from UMass Amherst, St. John’s Congregational Church, and the Springfield community on February 26, 3 p.m., at the St. John’s Congregational Church, 643 Union St., Springfield.

The program will include St. John’s Congregational Church Choir, Progressive Community Baptist Choir, and others, in addition to readings and multimedia presentations.

In 2011, the Du Bois Center at UMass Amherst entered into a collaborative partnership with St. John’s Congregational Church in Springfield, Massachusetts. The partnership links the Church to UMass Amherst’s educational and cultural resources while building awareness of the Du Bois Center.

Each year, the Church and the Du Bois Center co-produce a tribute event featuring gospel, poetry, and oratory in the Du Boisian tradition, performed by multiple choirs and UMass Amherst students and faculty. 

For more information, contact Brooks Fitch, 413-545-6483, duboisfriends@library.umass.edu.  

GCC Library bets on the Pats!!!!

The Librarians at Greenfield Community College are so
confident that their beloved New England Patriots will be victorious in this
weekend’s Super Bowl against the New York Giants that they have decided to put
their books where their mouths are.

The staff of the GCC Library has agreed to a friendly wager
with the Librarians of the Arthur A. Houghton Jr. Library at Corning Community
College in Corning, New York. The
Libraries have agreed to exchange books of a regional flavor, depending on the
result of Sunday’s matchup.

Eric Poulin, Coordinator of Library Services at GCC, pitched
the idea to Sarah Weisman, the Associate Dean of Learning Services at Corning,
and Corning President Kate Douglas. Douglas
was a longtime administrator and faculty member at Greenfield before becoming
the 6th President of Corning this past July.

Poulin says that he is very much looking forward to watching
a Patriots victory this weekend and receiving a few titles with a regional New
York flavor as a result.

If the Patriots win, the Corning librarians will send a
package of books to Greenfield that are New York-themed, including a title by
Elmira, NY children’s author Ted Arnold, as well as Summer In a Glass—a book about the wineries of the Finger Lake
region, where Corning is located.

If the Giants win, the GCC Library will send a package of
books to Corning that are Massachusetts and New England-themed, including the
children’s classic Make Way For Ducklings
by Robert McCloskey, as well as Home Town
by Tracy Kidder. Kidder is a member of
the Board of Trustees at GCC.

Part of the agreement between the two libraries is that the
titles will have book plates attached to them to commemorate the historic
wager, and to acknowledge the victory by the opposing team.

The game is a rematch of the 2008 Super Bowl, won by the
Giants by a score of 17-14.

Fundraiser @Mount Holyoke College President's House for South Hadley Public Library Building Project

Library supporters and advocates are cordially invited to a reception hosted by the South Hadley Public Library Building Committee and Mount Holyoke College President Lynn Pasquerella to support fundraising efforts for a new library in South Hadley:

Wednesday, February 15, 2012, 5:15 to 7:00 p.m.

The President's House 45 College Street Mount Holyoke College

To support South Hadley’s public library and attend this event, please contact the South Hadley Public Library Building Committee by February 9 at <MHC.SHPLreception@gmail.com> or by telephone at 413-534-7735.

A minimum $50 per person donation is requested with all proceeds to fund the construction of the new South Hadley Public Library.  Drinks and light refreshments will be provided.

Naming opportunities are still available for leadership donations and specific information about leadership partnering will be available at the event.  More information about the new library project may be found at its website, www.shadleylib.org/NEWSHPL.html. 

Parking is available in the south end of the Village Commons parking lot. Please pass through the gate on the south edge of the lot to go to the President’s House.

Exhibit: To The Village - An Experiment in American Democracy

UMASS AMHERST LIBRARIES HOST EXHIBIT

TO THE VILLAGE SQUARE:

AN EXPERIMENT IN AMERICAN DEMOCRACY

~ Lionel Delevingne and the Antinuclear Movement ~

The UMass Amherst Libraries host an exhibit, “To the Village Square: An Experiment in American Democracy,” through May 1, 2012, in Du Bois Library on the Lower Level and continuing on Floor 25 in Special Collections and University Archives.  The exhibit features photographs by photojournalist Lionel Delevingne covering the antinuclear movement.

New England was the epicenter of the antinuclear movement of the 1970s and 1980s.  Sparked by the proposed construction of nuclear power plants in Montague, Mass., and Seabrook, N.H., a grass-roots movement blossomed in the region, drawing on a long tradition of non-violent political protest.  Shortly after arriving in the United States from his native France in 1975, the photojournalist Lionel Delevingne began covering the antinuclear movement, including the long history of civil disobedience and occupation at Seabrook, the aftermath of the Three Mile Island disaster, and other protests from New York to South Carolina and Europe.

Delevingne is a recipient of many awards including the National Endowment of the Arts/Humanities (NEA), University & College Designers Association (UCDA), University Professional & Continuing Education Association (UCEA), and Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE).

“To the Village Square” includes dozens of Delevingne’s photographs, some of the movement’s most memorable images, along with materials drawn from the rich antinuclear collections held in the UMass Amherst Libraries’ Department of Special Collections and University Archives.

For more information, contact Anne Moore (545-6888, amoore@library.umass.edu).

Ideas Have Consequences: The Radical Pedagogy of W.E.B. Du Bois

The UMass Amherst Libraries will host the 18th Annual Du Bois Lecture on February 23, 2012, at 4:30 p.m., at the Cape Cod Lounge, Student Union, UMass Amherst.  Keynote speaker Derrick P. Alridge will give a talk "Ideas Have Consequences: The Radical Pedagogy of W.E.B. Du Bois."  Refreshments will be served.  The event is free and open to the public.

Derrick P. Alridge, an educational and intellectual historian, is Professor in the Curry School of Education at the University of Virginia. Previously, he served as Professor of Education and African American Studies and Director of the Institute for African American Studies at the University of Georgia.

Alridge has published The Educational Thought of W.E.B. Du Bois: An Intellectual History; Message in the Music: Hip Hop, History, and Pedagogy (an edited volume with James B. Stewart and V.P. Franklin); and numerous articles in the fields of history, education, and African American Studies.  Alridge also serves as an associate editor for the Journal of African American History and is Distinguished Lecturer for the Association for the Study of African American Life and History.   Currently, he is writing The Hip Hop Mind: An Intellectual History of the Social Consciousness of a Generation and conducting research on the role of education and schooling in the civil rights movement.

Professional Tools to Improve Your Library Service

Librarians and Trustees–

Don’t forget that the Massachusetts Library System (MLS) maintains a collection of professional books and resources at its Whately Office. The materials are accessible in person or by request, searchable by author, title, subject and a variety of other search keys on MassCat: http://masslibsystem.masscat.org/. Professional materials will help you perform better and access new ideas and techniques. Many of these titles are expensive for smaller libraries, and larger libraries don’t always have the budget for them either. These materials on children’s services, readers advisory, budget, planning, surveys, and a host of other topics are available for the asking. Libraries can place their own requests to borrow items by following the instructions found on the MLS website: http://www.masslibsystem.org/mls-professional-collection/.

The six regions built this collection, and the MLS is continuing to support it. The Western MA Library Club’s Humphrey Fund also contributed for almost 20 years. The collection is a great resource, and it is housed in the Whately Office. Give it a try online and take a look at the holdings when you are in Whately. Contact either MLS office if you need assistance.

Congressman Neal visits GCC Library

We were very pleased yesterday in The Library at Greenfield Community College to be visited by Congressman Richard Neal and Representative Paul Mark! They toured our new library, and were seemingly quite pleased with the facility. We are always very thankful for the ongoing support that we receive from our elected officials. (Photo by Paul Franz)

Time running out on survey!

Please take 5 minutes out of your day to fill out the MLS' Strategic Planning Survey! It can be accessed by clicking onto this link:

http://www.zoomerang.com/Survey/WEB22E9Z6S39UA/

It is crucial that the needs of our libraries are articulated to those who make decisions that affect them. So, your participation in this is really important. The deadline is January 23rd.

Thanks!

Exhibit: The Gesture in Light: Illuminated

The UMass Amherst Libraries host an exhibit, “The Gesture in Light: Illuminated,” by Theresa Antonellis from Monday January 9, 2012 through Sunday May 11, 2012, in the Science and Engineering Library, Lederle Lowrise, UMass Amherst.  A reception will be held Thursday, February 2, from 4-6pm.  The exhibit consists of a related series of framed prints featuring photo-enhanced light photography.  

Theresa Antonellis is the Director of the UMass Student Union Art Gallery and a second year graduate student in the University’s MFA program in Studio Arts.  She graduated magna cum laude from Mount Holyoke College as part of the Frances Perkins Scholarship program. With double majors in Art Studio and Art History, Antonellis was the recipient of the Fitz-Randolf Prize for Outstanding Work.  Recent participation in juried art exhibitions include Art In Nature (Fruitlands Museum - Harvard, MA); Paperworks  (Joshibi University of Arts And Design -Tokyo, Japan); and Arches Exhibition (Boston Printmakers Guild, Framingham, MA).

“My interests include the drawn line as a record of human gesture, patterns in nature, the mirrored image and evidence of time found in accumulation of layers,” says Antonellis.  “In choosing to work in non-representational methods, the work both negates and invites the gaze. The intention is that the images will engage the viewer in a meditative discovery of familiar places and events both in the mind and in nature.”  

For more information, contact Madeleine Charney (413-577-0785, mcharney@library.umass.edu).