Trial of Social Explorer
This trial is active until June 30, 2013, or until the subscription contract review is complete. Use the following link to access: https://libproxy.library.unt.edu/login?url=http://www.socialexplorer.com
Social Explorer is an online research tool designed to provide quick and easy access to current and historical census data and demographic information. The easy-to-use Web interface lets users create maps and reports to better illustrate, analyze, and understand demography and social change. In addition to being a comprehensive data resource, Social Explorer also offers features and tools to meet the needs of both demography experts and novices. To learn more about Social Explorer, visit http://www.socialexplorer.com/pub/aboutus/home.aspx.
New Interface for Electronic Resources
After two months of development, UNT Libraries is pleased to announce the release of a new interface for helping you find databases, e-journals, and e-books. As of December 17th, 2012, the library’s old Electronic Resources System has been retired, and the new replacement interface has become part of the Library Catalog.
We recognize that databases and e-journals are integral to academic research and teaching, and we have striven to ensure that the new interface is familiar enough that you can use it right away without throwing you off balance or requiring you to learn something brand new. That is one advantage of merging these functions with the catalog. In fact, the new interface allows you to use existing catalog features to help you find and manage these resources—records will now appear in your catalog searches, and you can save and export these records just as you always could with catalog records.
We believe that these new tools represent a substantial improvement over the previous, out-dated ER system, but, as always, we welcome your input and feedback about this new implementation.
The Thanksgiving Switch
You can find all kinds of interesting things in the Texas Digital Newspaper Collection of The Portal to Texas History. Who knew:
Prior to the 1940s, Thanksgiving was a holiday declared each year by presidential proclamation. State governors then chose whether to observe the holiday in their own states. Controversy ensued in 1939 when President Roosevelt selected a non-traditional date for Thanksgiving.
In 1939, Texans observed Thanksgiving both on November 23, as declared by President Roosevelt, and on November 30, the traditional "last Thursday."
Borger Daily Herald (Borger, Tex.), Vol. 14, No. 1, Ed. 1 Thursday, November 23, 1939, p. 1
Citizens of Tulia, Texas were firmly in favor of the traditional date.
The Tulia Herald (Tulia, Tex), Vol. 30, No. 46, Ed. 1, Thursday, November 16, 1939, p. 1
Students at Howard Payne College reasoned that Thanksgiving should be celebrated for the entire week from November 23 to November 30.
The Yellow Jacket (Brownwood, Tex.), Vol. 26, No. 10, Ed. 1, Thursday, November 23, 1939, p. 2
Two years later, in December 1941, Congress passed a joint resolution officially establishing Thanksgiving Day as a legal public holiday to be observed on the fourth Thursday in November each year. President Roosevelt signed the measure into law on December 26, 1941. (See 1941 Cong Rec 10130 and 55 Stat 862.) Apparently, a new federal holiday wasn't big news compared to the start of World War II. We have been unable to find any mention of the Thanksgiving legislation in our newspaper collection.
The Texas Digital Newspaper Collection in The Portal to Texas History contains more than 109,000 historic newspaper issues. Find more about Thanksgiving at http://texashistory.unt.edu/explore/collections/TDNP/browse/?q=thanksgiving&t=fulltext.
--submitted by Nancy Reis, Publications Specialist, Digital Libraries Division
Photograph: [A turkey looks at the camera] by José L. Castillo http://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth24004/
The Osterhout Papers
J. P. Osterhout was a lawyer and judge in Texas, as well as postmaster of Belton, Texas for several years; he also published a newspaper and ran for Congress (though he lost all three elections).
Most of the items in the collection are letters, sent between Osterhout and his family while he traveled as a circuit judge, and among his children while they were at college. They discuss local news, such as a fire in Belton; news from school, such as Gertie Osterhout's letter about life at Baylor College; and various family news.
Other items of interest include certificates of appointment and similar documents as well as documents related to the Union Baptist Association and Baylor College.
For more information about J. P. Osterhout, also check out his biography on The Handbook of Texas Online.
--submitted by Hannah Tarver, Head, Digital Projects Unit
Students Respond to "Social Media and Digital Communities: A Roundtable Discussion"
On Friday, September 21, 2012, Dr. Jennifer Way’s graduate art history seminar on 20th-21st century art attended “Social Media and Digital Communities: A Roundtable Discussion,” a session featured at the Digital Frontiers 2012 conference sponsored by the UNT Libraries. The roundtable speakers and titles of their presentations included Jennie Fleming, “Examining Flickr’s The Commons: What does creative interaction with digital image archives mean for users and institutions?,” Robert Emery, “Telling Stories of The Dallas Way: Finding LGBT History and Creating Community Using Social Media,” Heidi J. Wachter, “RevolutionaryAct.com and ExperienceLife.com,” and Mariette Papić, “Digital Rights, Media and Practice: The Right to Bear Arms in The Information Age.” Spencer Keralis, UNT Libraries’ Director for Digital Scholarship, moderated the roundtable.
Students in Way’s seminar are studying how recent scholarship on belonging illuminates contemporary and historical art and art history. They are considering how art and culture foster belonging to a place as well as a nation, and the ways that places index belonging, inclusion and exclusion. A primary concern is the way the creation and use of works of art participate in facilitating someone or something belonging or not. There are also questions of what counts as a belonging and how this relates to someone belonging to someone, thing or a place. Ways of facilitating belonging include civilize, salvage, domesticate, diplomacy, accommodate, remember. Examples of forms of belonging include autochthony, citizenship, memory and heritage. Ways of not belonging encompass but are not limited to outsiderness, alienation, dislocation, refugee, and homelessness.
What follows are the short papers Way charged her students with writing to explore connections between the roundtable and their seminar studies:
Digital Frontiers' Social Media and Digital Communities Roundtable and Questions of Belonging
Individual papers are also available in the UNT Digital Library.
--submitted by Ann Howington, NDNP Coordinator for Texas Digital Newspapers, Digital Newspaper Unit