Amy M. Elliott

Albertsons Library: A Library for the 21st Century

Peggy S. Cooper et al. — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 13:00:49 PDT

After five years of flat budgets, give backs, hold backs, and cut backs, the faculty, students and university administration love Albertsons Library more than ever before. Why? Because we’ve instituted a paradigm shift from building a collection of materials to building a collection of services. On-demand ordering of all faculty requests; ordering of ILL requests, immediate response to LIBQUAL survey results, focus groups, and user suggestions; creation of individual faculty library pages; and active and attentive library liaisons are a few of the services we have implemented to win the love of our users. Participants in this session will see and hear about many of our collection services and have the opportunity to share their techniques, tools, and ideas as well. We’re hoping we all take away a few ideas for sharing the love at your Library!

(R)Evolution in the Information Industry: What the Information Industry Can Learn from the Music Industry

Amy M. Elliott — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 10:40:08 PST

A failure to adapt to and adopt new and changing technology caused the music industry to crash, a fate that the information industry currently faces. This paper is an overview of the music industry's crash, as a result of emerging digital technology, and the lessons that the information industry can learn from the music industry's mistakes in order to avoid its own crash now that technology allows for quicker, easier, and cheaper publication. In the 1980s and 1990s record companies refused to effectively adapt to and adopt the new digital technologies of CDs, MP3s, and digital recording. This resulted in a slow downward spiral toward the demise of major record companies. Though the music industry has recently embraced digital technologies and is trying desperately to catch up, it is much too late for them to return to their former power and economic status.

Today the information industry (including publishers, vendors, libraries and universities) faces a similar struggle with new digital technologies, especially institutional and digital repositories, which could result in publishers and vendors facing the same fate as record companies. This paper will give an overview of both industries as well as the mistakes which the music industry could have avoided and that the information industry should take as cautionary tales. It will also look at potential solutions, or ways to circumvent the music industry's mistakes and consider the future of publishing, vendors, libraries, universities, and institutional repositories and offer ideas for the success of the information industry as a whole.

(R)Evolution in the Information Industry: What the Information Industry Can Learn from the Music Industry (Slide Set)

Amy M. Elliott — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 14:27:36 PST

A failure to adapt to and adopt new and changing technology caused the music industry to crash, a fate that the information industry currently faces. This proposal is an overview of the music industry's crash, as a result of changing technology, and the lessons that the information industry can learn from the music industry's mistakes in order to avoid its own crash now that technology allows for quicker, easier, and cheaper publication. In the 80s & 90s record companies refused to effectively adapt to and adopt the new technologies of CDs, MP3s, and digital recording. This resulted in a slow downward spiral toward the demise of major record companies. Though the music industry has recently embraced new technologies and is trying desperately to catch up with technology, it is much too late for them to return to their former power and economic status.

Today the information industry (including publishers, vendors, libraries and universities) face a similar struggle with new publishing technologies, especially Institutional Repositories, which could result in publishers and vendors facing the same fate as record companies. This session will give an overview of both industries as well as the mistakes which the music industry could have avoided and that the information industry should take as cautionary tales. We'll also look at potential solutions, or ways to circumvent the music industry's mistakes. Discussion will be encouraged and attendees can expect to consider the future of publishing, vendors, libraries, universities, and institutional repositories and offer their ideas for the success of the information industry as a whole.

Partial Annotation of The Sound and the Fury

Amy M. Elliott — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 12:27:25 PDT

A partial annotation of William Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury, this project focuses on the Quentin section, specifically, pages 125-145 of the First Vintage International Edition, October 1990. Annotations define and explain selected words and phrases from the text that are likely to be unknown, unfamiliar, or misunderstood by the average reader. This project examines linguistics, archaic words, and colloquialisms in some depth, while still including aspects of rural life (i.e. facts, folklore, customs, songs, and sayings); references to local history, laws, and customs; analogues; and various allusions and references. Further, it reflects extensive research drawn from literary criticism, numerous dictionaries and other reference materials, and linguistic text books. All entries are organized by page and line number.

What a Character: Zora Neale Hurston’s Autobiographies

Amy M. Elliott — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 12:24:46 PDT

Zora Neale Hurston’s Dust Tracks on a Road is a complicated text that reflects a complicated woman, and one that falls somewhere between the categories of autobiography and biography. While the work cannot be completely discounted as autobiographical, it contains themes surprisingly reminiscent of James Weldon Johnson’s The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man. Like Johnson’s autobiography of a fictional man, Hurston’s account contains hard to believe situations that lead readers to question its authenticity and verisimilitude. Additionally, Hurston’s stance on the race issue, a preaching of one view while practicing another, leads to questioning. Further, Dust Tracks on a Road exhibits similarities, sometimes freely admitted by Hurston, to her novel Their Eyes Were Watching God so that a reader begins to question which of Hurston’s texts is the better autobiography. Ultimately, the reader concludes that Dust Tracks on a Road simply displays that Hurston was first and foremost a novelist, and this work tells the “autobiography” of her most successful character -- Zora Neale Hurston.

Hope from Hopelessness: Finding Contemporary Southern Literature through Anne Tyler’s Use of The Sound and the Fury

Amy M. Elliott — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 12:20:43 PDT

Critical debate focuses on the trend of Southern writers and the classification of their work within the tradition of Southern literature. One side of the argument supports contemporary writers as part of the Southern literary tradition. That is, it proposes that contemporary Southern writers continue to write Southern literature not by writing with the same style and magnitude as Faulkner and Warren, but by basing their writing on this tradition and modernizing it. An excellent example lies in Anne Tyler’s use of William Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury as a foundation for her Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant. Through characterization and structure Tyler builds on traditional Southern literature to create contemporary Southern literature. By borrowing from Faulkner’s characterization of the Compson family, as each of the Tulls align with an equivocal Compson, and through her structure, which mimics Faulkner’s, Tyler continues to write in the Southern literary tradition. However, as much as Tyler’s characters align with Faulkner’s, it is precisely the differences in the characters, constructiveness and hope opposed to Faulkner’s destruction and hopelessness, that make Tyler’s work a piece of contemporary Southern literature.

Thinking Globally and Reading Diversely: Issues of Gay and Lesbian International Literature for Young Adults

Amy M. Elliott — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 12:06:49 PDT

Young adults need information on issues of sexuality in a way that relates to them. This becomes particularly important to young adults who identity as gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered, or queer, as well as those who may be questioning their sexualities. This paper examines one form of information: the young adult novel. It looks at the presence, lack, and need for international GLBTQ young adult literature. It surveys the genre’s past and present and speculates on its future. It discovers that although publishers have significantly increased GLBTQ and international GLBTQ young adult literature in the last few years, there is still quite a gap to be filled.