The Quill’s Quote for Today

“A man who uses a great many words to express his meaning is like a bad marksman who, instead of aiming a single stone at an object, takes up a handfull and throws at it in hopes he may hit.”

Samuel Johnson

Embargoes and Moving Walls

What’s an embargo? What’s a moving wall?

Thousands of journals are now accessible online through full-text databases provided by Doherty library.  Due to that fact, some of our regular users have experienced the embargo.  Still others have run into a moving wall.  Have you?  Many publishers will not license a journal to a full text database without an embargo.  An embargo is a delay in making the full text content electronically available for articles cited in the database.  The moving wall can be said to represent that time period or gap between the latest issue of a journal available in the online database and the most recently published issues of the journal.  Embargoes vary – some titles have very short embargoes, perhaps a week or a month, others can have full text embargos that last up to a year or longer.  Publishers say they manage “print erosion” and maintain revenue opportunities through embargoes or moving walls.  In other words, libraries still have to maintain many print subscriptions in order to provide their users with the latest content available in embargoed journals, thus ensuring that publishers will not be faced with multiple cancellations of titles they choose to make available through online databases.

Rachel

The Slick Endowed Collection in Business Ethics

The Sally S. and William T. Slick, Jr. Endowed Collection in Business Ethics

Over the years, Doherty library at the University of St. Thomas has benefited from the generosity of individuals and families in the form of endowed library collections.  Endowed collections typically set aside a sum of money in trust for the regular purchase of library materials in a particular subject area or genre, thus insuring that that collection will continue to grow in perpetuity.  In 1996, the Sally S. Slick and William T. Slick, Jr. Endowed Collection in Business Ethics was established to create a collection of material in the Doherty Library to support the Center for Business Ethics and the Cullen Trust Endowed Chair in Business Ethics at the University of St. Thomas.  Recent purchases include books about business ethics, social ethics, moral and ethical aspects of corporate culture, conflicts of interest, the role of human conscience in business and corporate history.  Books purchased by this endowment are identified by a bookplate placed in the front of each volume acquired for the collection.  The material is shelved throughout the Doherty library.  To survey our latest purchases for the collection, click the “Endowed Collections” tab in the Doherty library catalog and select the “Slick Collection in Business Ethics.”

Rachel

Bibliography of the History of Art

Bibliography of the History of Art 

The library recently replaced its primary art history indexing source with the Bibliography of the History of Art.  The Bibliography of the History of Art (BHA) provides indexing and abstracting to 4,300 periodicals related to the history of art, an increase of over twenty-fold from our previous Arts database.  In addition to articles, BHA also provides subject access to art-related books, conference proceedings, dissertations, art exhibition catalogs and dealer’s catalogs.  The coverage focuses on European and American art from late antiquity to the present.  Indexing encompasses the traditional fine arts – painting, sculpture, drawing, prints, etc. – and architecture, as well as the decorative and applied arts – crafts, graphic arts, folk art, etc.  It is produced by the Getty Research Institute and the Institut de l’Information Scientifique et Technique (INIST).  The BHA includes and greatly extends the coverage of two art indexing and abstracting services.  Its predecessor databases are the RAA (Repertoire d’Art et d’Archéologie) and the RILA (International Repertory of the literature of Art).  Those resources, combined with current indexing & abstracting makes BHA one of the most comprehensive bibliographies of scholarly writing about the history of Western art available.

Rachel

A New Encyclopedia of Philosophy from Macmillan

Encyclopedia of Philosophy  (Macmillan Reference, 2006)

Noted Austrian musicologist Otto Erich Deutsch once observed that “Reference works should initially be published in their 2nd editions.” Doherty library has recently received the 2nd edition of the Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2006) from Macmillan. The new encyclopedia greatly expands upon the original edition which was published nearly 40-years ago. The original 1967 set, edited by Paul Edwards, consisted of 8 volumes in 2,163 pages. The new edition consists of 10-volumes in 7,799 pages. It contains more than 2,100 entries, including more than 450 completely new articles. A 21-member editorial board oversaw contributions from hundreds of scholars, with Donald M. Borchert of Ohio University acting as editor-in-chief. Some original articles remain, while many more of them were updated by their original authors. Accompanying bibliographies were also updated. Useful new features include a thematically grouped index, e.g. “ancient philosophy” or “philosophy of science,” as well as greatly updated and expanded bibliographical essays on the literature of philosophy. This overview of the secondary literature— the standard dictionaries, encyclopedias, journals and subject bibliographies—may prove particularly useful to beginning scholars.According to a reviewer in Choice, “the second edition better reflects a growing global vision within this field of study to include subject areas that have recently surfaced within academic programs, e.g., applied ethics, feminist philosophy, terrorism, and various national and religious philosophies.” The set also includes over 1,000 biographical entries.

Rachel

Welcome to Doherty library’s News Blog

Welcome to the Doherty library’s online newsletter & blog.  This blog will replace our online newsletter and it will serve as the primary way of communicating news of interest concerning the library. 

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