New Books in Library Science

By: New Books Network
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  • Summary

  • Interviews with authors and scholars about new books in library science.
    New Books Network
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Art Literary History & Criticism Social Sciences
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Episodes
  • Selena Wisnom, "The Library of Ancient Wisdom: Mesopotamia and the Making of the Modern World" (U Chicago Press, 2025)

    Selena Wisnom, "The Library of Ancient Wisdom: Mesopotamia and the Making of the Modern World" (U Chicago Press, 2025)
    Mar 13 2025
    When a team of Victorian archaeologists dug into a grassy hill in Iraq, they chanced upon one of the oldest and greatest stores of knowledge ever seen: the library of the Assyrian king Ashurbanipal, seventh century BCE ruler of a huge swathe of the ancient Middle East known as Mesopotamia. After his death, vengeful rivals burned Ashurbanipal’s library to the ground - yet the texts, carved on clay tablets, were baked and preserved by the heat. Buried for millennia, the tablets were written in cuneiform: the first written language in the world. More than half of human history is written in cuneiform, but only a few hundred people on earth can read it. In The Library of Ancient Wisdom: Mesopotamia and the Making of History (U Chicago Press, 2025), Assyriologist Dr. Selena Wisnom takes us on an immersive tour of this extraordinary library, bringing ancient Mesopotamia and its people to life. Through it, we encounter a world of astonishing richness, complexity and sophistication. Mesopotamia, she shows, was home to advanced mathematics, astronomy and banking, law and literature. This was a culture absorbed and developed by the ancient Greeks, and whose myths were precursors to Bible stories - in short, a culture without which our lives today would be unrecognizable. The Library of Ancient Wisdom unearths a civilization at once strange and strangely familiar: a land of capricious gods, exorcisms and professional lamenters, whose citizens wrote of jealous rivalries, profound friendships and petty grievances. Through these pages we come face to face with humanity’s first civilization: their startling achievements, their daily life, and their struggle to understand our place in the universe. This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose new book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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    38 mins
  • The Library of Mistakes: A Conversation with Russell Napier

    The Library of Mistakes: A Conversation with Russell Napier
    Mar 10 2025
    The Library of Mistakes is a library located in Edinburgh, Scotland dedicated to financial and economic history. Russell Napier, the founder and keeper of the library is a professor at The Edinburgh Business School and investment manager. In this wide-ranging discussion, Russell discusses his work as a practitioner and a scholar of financial crises. He also discusses how and why he started a library, in addition to his writing on financial history. Professor Russell Napier is the author of The Solid Ground investment report for institutional investors and co-founder of the investment research portal ERIC- a business he now co-owns with D.C. Thomson. Caleb Zakarin is editor of the New Books Network. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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    55 mins
  • Lisa Kallman Hopkins and Bridgit McCafferty, "Innovative Library Workplaces: Transformative Human Resource Strategies" (ACRL, 2025)

    Lisa Kallman Hopkins and Bridgit McCafferty, "Innovative Library Workplaces: Transformative Human Resource Strategies" (ACRL, 2025)
    Mar 2 2025
    Good workplaces require both autonomy--giving employees a sense of ownership over how and where they work--and collaboration in pursuit of common goals. They see employees for who they are and support them, pay them enough money to live comfortably, and provide the resources, training, and support they need to be successful. Innovative Library Workplaces: Transformative Human Resource Strategies (2025, Association of College and Research Libraries) provides the tools you need to make your workplace a good one for your employees. Though this book took root during the pandemic, it is not of the pandemic: The changes wrought are permanent. Innovative Library Workplaces proposes a way forward after this monumental disruption, recognizing that neither the pandemic nor the work culture prior to it is a good model for what comes next. Bridgit McCafferty is the Dean of the University Library & Archives at Texas A&M University-Central Texas and has led the library for twelve years. Prior to this, she oversaw reference and instruction services. She has taken on major administrative projects for her university, including recently chairing the SACSCOC Accreditation Reaffirmation Compliance Committee. She is the author of Library Management: A Practical Guide for Librarians and the coauthor of British Postmodernism: Strategies and Sources. Lisa Kallman Hopkins is an associate librarian at A&M-Central Texas. She is the head of Technical Services and assistant dean of the University Library & Archives. In her role as head of Technical Services, she is directly responsible for systems, E-Resources, and agreements, and manages cataloging and acquisitions, interlibrary loan, e-reserves and textbook reserves. She is the university copyright specialist and copyeditor. In addition to Innovative Library Workplaces, she has submitted chapters to Transforming Acquisitions & Collection Services: Perspectives on Collaboration Within and Across Libraries and Technical Services: Adapting to the Changing Environment. Dr. Michael LaMagna is the Information Literacy Program & Library Services Coordinator and Professor of Library Services at Delaware County Community College. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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    1 hr and 3 mins

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