bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
First report of Toxoplasma gondii seroprevalence in peafowls in Yunnan Province, Southwestern China
Authors: Tian Yi-Ming , Dai Fei-Yan , Huang Si-Yang , Deng Zu-Hong , Duan Gang , Zhou Dong-Hui , Yang Jian-Fa , Weng Ya-Biao , Zhu Xing-Quan , Zou Feng-Cai
Published: September 2012

Background

Toxoplasma gondii is an intracellular protozoan parasite infecting almost all warm-blooded animals, including birds, with a worldwide distribution. Surveys of T. gondii infection in wild birds have been reported extensively in the world, but little is known of T. gondii infection in peafowls worldwide. This study was performed to determine the seroprevalence of T. gondii infection in peafowls in Yunnan Province, southwestern China.

Methods

Sera from 277 peafowls, including 272 blue peafowls (Pavo cristatus) and 5 green peafowls (Pavo muticus) originated from two geographic areas in Yunnan Province were assayed for T. gondii antibodies using the modified agglutination test (MAT).

Results

Specific T. gondii antibodies were detected in 35 of 277 (12.64%) peafowls (MAT titer ≥ 1:5). Seropositive birds were found in both species, 33 in 272 blue peafowls and 2 in 5 green peafowls. There was no significant difference in T. gondii seroprevalence between the adolescent birds (6.74%) and the adult birds (6.67%) (P > 0.05). The geographical origins of peafowls was found to be highly associated with T. gondii infection in the present study, a statistically significant difference in T. gondii seropositivity was observed between peafowls from Kunming (31.08%) and those from Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture (5.91%) (OR = 10.956, 95% CI = 1.632-73.545, P = 0.014). Statistical analyses showed that there were no significant interactions between ages and geographical origins of peafowls (P > 0.05).

Conclusions

The results of the present survey indicated that infection of peafowls with T. gondii is widespread in Yunnan Province, which has significant public health concerns and implications for prevention and control of toxoplamosis in this province. To our knowledge, this is the first seroprevalence report of T. gondii infection in China’s southwestern Yunnan Province.
Modeling of shear-wall dominant symmetrical flat-plate reinforced concrete buildings
Authors: Abdo Mohamed Abdel-Basset
Published: September 2012

Flat-slab building structures exhibit significant higher flexibility compared with traditional frame structures, and shear walls (SWs) are vital to limit deformation demands under earthquake excitations. The objective of this study is to identify an appropriate finite element (FE) model of SW dominant flat-plate reinforced concrete (R/C) buildings, which can be used to study its dynamic behavior. Three-dimensional models are generated and analyzed to check the adequacy of different empirical formulas to estimate structural period of vibration via analyzing the dynamic response of low- and medium-height R/C buildings with different cross-sectional plans and different SW positions and thicknesses. The numerical results clarify that modeling of R/C buildings using block (solid) elements for columns, SWs, and slab provides the most appropriate representation of R/C buildings since it gives accurate results of fundamental periods and consequently reliable seismic forces. Also, modeling of R/C buildings by FE programs using shell elements for both columns and SWs provides acceptable results of fundamental periods (the error does not exceed 10%). However, modeling of R/C buildings using frame elements for columns and/or SWs overestimates the fundamental periods of R/C buildings. Empirical formulas often overestimate or underestimate fundamental periods of R/C buildings. Some equations provide misleading values of fundamental period for both intact and cracked R/C buildings. However, others can be used to estimate approximately the fundamental periods of flat-plate R/C buildings. The effect of different SW positions is also discussed.
Hydrothermal synthesis, characterization, and investigation of optical properties of Sb3+-doped lithium silicates nanoparticles
Authors: Alemi Abdolali , Khademinia Shahin , Dolatyari Mahboubeh , Bakhtiari Akbar
Published: September 2012

The hydrothermal synthesis and optical properties of undoped and Sb3+-doped lithium metasilicate and lithium disilicate nanomaterials were investigated. The microstructures and morphologies of the synthesized Li2−2x
Sb2x
SiO3 and Li2−2x
Sb2x
Si2O5 nanoparticles were studied with powder X-ray diffraction and scanning electron microscopy techniques, respectively. The synthesized undoped and doped lithium metasilicate and lithium disilicate nanomaterials, respectively, are isostructural with the standard bulk Li2SiO3 (space group Cmc21) and Li2Si2O5 (space group Ccc2) materials. The electronic absorption and photoluminescence spectra of the synthesized materials are studied. The measured optical properties show dependence on the dopant amounts in the structure.
NOTCH1 inhibition in vivo results in mammary tumor regression and reduced mammary tumorsphere-forming activity in vitro
Authors: Simmons Matthew J , Serra Ryan , Hermance Nicole , Kelliher Michelle A
Published: September 2012

Introduction

NOTCH activation has been recently implicated in human breast cancers, associated with a poor prognosis, and tumor-initiating cells are hypothesized to mediate resistance to treatment and disease relapse. To address the role of NOTCH1 in mammary gland development, transformation, and mammary tumor-initiating cell activity, we developed a doxycycline-regulated mouse model of NOTCH1-mediated mammary transformation.

Methods

Mammary gland development was analyzed by using whole-mount analysis and by flow cytometry in nulliparous transgenic mice maintained in the presence/absence of doxycycline (or intracellular NOTCH1). Mammary tumors were examined histologically and immunophenotyped by staining with antibodies followed by flow cytometry. Tumors were transplanted into mammary fat pads under limiting dilution conditions, and tumor-initiating cell frequency was calculated. Mammary tumor cells were also plated in vitro in a tumorsphere assay in the presence/absence of doxycycline. RNA was isolated from mammary tumor cell lines cultured in the presence/absence of doxycycline and used for gene-expression profiling with Affymetrix mouse arrays. NOTCH1-regulated genes were identified and validated by using quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR). Mammary tumor-bearing mice were treated with doxycycline to suppress NOTCH1 expression, and disease recurrence was monitored.

Results

Similar to published studies, we show that constitutive expression of human intracellular NOTCH1 in the developing mouse mammary gland inhibits side branching and promotes luminal cell fate. These mice develop mammary adenocarcinomas that express cytokeratin (CK) 8/18. In vivo limiting-dilution analyses revealed that these mammary tumors exhibit functional heterogeneity and harbor a rare (1/2,978) mammary tumor-initiating cell population. With this dox-regulated NOTCH1 mammary tumor model, we demonstrate that NOTCH1 inhibition results in mammary tumor regression in vivo and prevents disease recurrence in four of six tumors tested. Consistent with the in vivo data, NOTCH1 inhibition reduces mammary tumorsphere activity in vitro. We also identify the embryonic stem cell transcription factor Nanog as a novel NOTCH1-regulated gene in tumorspheres and in mouse and human breast cancer cell lines.

Conclusions

These data indicate that NOTCH1 inhibition results in mammary tumor regression in vivo and interferes with disease recurrence. We demonstrate that NOTCH1-transformed mouse mammary tumors harbor a rare mammary tumor-initiating population and that NOTCH1 contributes to mammary tumor-initiating activity. This work raises the possibility that NOTCH therapeutics may target mammary tumor-initiating cells in certain human breast cancer subtypes.
Community-Researcher Partnerships at NIAID HIV/AIDS Clinical Trials Sites: Insights for Evaluation and Enhancement
Authors: Kagan Jonathan M. , Rosas Scott R. , Siskind Rona L. , Campbell Russell D. , Gondwe Daniel , Munroe David , Trochim William M. K. , Schouten Jeffrey T.
Published: September 2012

Background: Community engagement has been a cornerstone of National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID)'s HIV/AIDS clinical trials programs since 1990. Stakeholders now consider this critical to success, hence the impetus to develop evaluation approaches. Objectives: The purpose was to assess the extent to which community advisory boards (CABs) at HIV/AIDS trials sites are being integrated into research activities. Methods: CABs and research staff (RS) at NIAID research sites were surveyed for how each viewed (a) the frequency of activities indicative of community involvement, (b) the means for identifying, prioritizing, and supporting CAB needs, and (c) mission and operational challenges. Results: Overall, CABs and RS share similar views about the frequency of community involvement activities. Cluster analysis reveals three groups of sites based on activity frequency ratings, including a group notable for CAB-RS discordance. Conclusions: Assessing differences between community and researcher perceptions about the frequency of and challenges posed by specific engagement activities may prove useful in developing evaluation tools for assessing community engagement in collaborative research settings.
Connecting Boston's Public Housing Developments to Community Health Centers: Who's Ready for Change?
Authors: Battaglia Tracey A. , Murrell Samantha S. , Bhosrekar Sarah Gees , Caron Sarah E. , Bowen Deborah J. , Smith Eugenia , Kalish Richard , Rorie Jo-Anna
Published: September 2012

Background: Despite close proximity to community health centers, public housing residents are at increased risk of uncontrolled chronic disease, in part because of underutilization of routine health care. Objectives: To assist in program planning, the Partners in Health and Housing Prevention Research Center (PHH-PRC) used the Community Readiness Model to compare readiness of public housing developments and community health centers to address community-identified health priorities. The model assumes that program success to affect change depends on matching the community's level of readiness to address the issue. Methods: Key respondent interviews were conducted across 15 communities: Eight housing developments and seven health centers. Interviews were scored across six dimensions on an anchored, 9-point scale and averaged to provide a composite readiness score. Higher scores indicate increasing levels of readiness. Interview transcripts were reviewed for consistent themes. Results: Health centers scored significantly higher (mean, 5.88) than housing developments (mean, 3.33), corresponding with the Preparation stage of readiness compared with the Vague Awareness stage, respectively. Both scored highest in Existing Programs and Resources and lowest in Knowledge of Efforts. Qualitative analysis revealed a lack of existing partnerships between housing developments and health centers as well as significant social barriers preventing housing residents from engaging in care. Conclusion: We found a mismatch in readiness to address community health priorities. Although health centers have programs to address health issues, community awareness of programs is limited and barriers to engaging in care persist. The model provided a useful tool for engaging communities into shared program planning.
A Community Translational Research Pilot Grants Program to Facilitate Community-Academic Partnerships: Lessons From Colorado's Clinical Translational Science Awards
Authors: Main Deborah S. , Felzien Maret C. , Magid David J. , Calonge B. Ned , O'Brien Ruth A. , Kempe Allison , Nearing Kathryn
Published: September 2012

Background: National growth in translational research has increased the need for practical tools to improve how academic institutions engage communities in research. Methods: One used by the Colorado Clinical and Translational Sciences Institute (CCTSI) to target investments in community-based translational research on health disparities is a Community Engagement (CE) Pilot Grants program. Innovative in design, the program accepts proposals from either community or academic applicants, requires that at least half of requested grant funds go to the community partner, and offers two funding tracks: One to develop new community-academic partnerships (up to $10,000), the other to strengthen existing partnerships through community translational research projects (up to $30,000). Results and Conclusion: We have seen early success in both traditional and capacity building metrics: the initial investment of $272,742 in our first cycle led to over $2.8 million dollars in additional grant funding, with grantees reporting strengthening capacity of their community- academic partnerships and the rigor and relevance of their research.
Engaging the Deaf American Sign Language Community: Lessons From a Community-Based Participatory Research Center
Authors: McKee Michael , Thew Denise , Starr Matthew , Kushalnagar Poorna , Reid John T. , Graybill Patrick , Velasquez Julia , Pearson Thomas
Published: September 2012

Background: Numerous publications demonstrate the importance of community-based participatory research (CBPR) in community health research, but few target the Deaf community. The Deaf community is understudied and underrepresented in health research despite suspected health disparities and communication barriers. Objectives: The goal of this paper is to share the lessons learned from the implementation of CBPR in an understudied community of Deaf American Sign Language (ASL) users in the greater Rochester, New York, area. Methods: We review the process of CBPR in a Deaf ASL community and identify the lessons learned. Results: Key CBPR lessons include the importance of engaging and educating the community about research, ensuring that research benefits the community, using peer-based recruitment strategies, and sustaining community partnerships. These lessons informed subsequent research activities. Conclusions: This report focuses on the use of CBPR principles in a Deaf ASL population; lessons learned can be applied to research with other challenging-to-reach populations.
Partnership for Implementation of Evidence-Based Mental Health Practices in Rural Federally Qualified Health Centers: Theory and Methods
Authors: Hunt Justin B. , Curran Geoffrey , Kramer Teresa , Mouden Sip , Ward-Jones Susan , Owen Richard , Fortney John
Published: September 2012

Background: Mental health and substance abuse are among the most commonly reported reasons for visits to Federally Qualified Health Centers (CHCs), yet only 6.5% of encounters are with on-site behavioral health specialists. Rural CHCs are significantly less likely to have on-site behavioral specialists than urban CHCs. Because of this lack of mental health specialists in rural areas, the most promising approach to improving mental health outcomes is to help rural primary care (PC) providers deliver evidence-based practices (EBPs). Despite the scope of these problems, no research has developed an effective implementation strategy for facilitating the adoption of mental health EBPs for rural CHCs. We sought to describe the conceptual components of an implementation partnership that focuses on the adaption and adoption of mental health EBPs by rural CHCs in Arkansas. Methods: We present a conceptual model that integrates seven separate frameworks: (1) Jones and Wells' Evidence-Based Community Partnership Model, (2) Kitson's Promoting Action on Research Implementation in Health Services (PARiHS) implementation framework, (3) Sackett's definition of evidence-based medicine, (4) Glisson's organizational social context model, (5) Rubenstein's Evidence-Based Quality Improvement (EBQI) facilitation process, (6) Glasgow's RE-AIM evaluation approach, and (7) Naylor's concept of shared decision making. Conclusions: By integrating these frameworks into a meaningful conceptual model, we hope to develop a successful implementation partnership between an academic health center and small rural CHCs to improve mental health outcomes. Findings from this implementation partnership should have relevance to hundreds of clinics and millions of patients, and could help promote the sustained adoption of EBPs across rural America.
Community-Responsive Research Priorities: Health Research Infrastructure
Authors: Jones Bonnie , Lightfoot Alexandra , De Marco Molly , Isler Malika Roman , Ammerman Alice , Nelson Debi , Harrison Lisa , Motsinger Brenda , Melvin Cathy , Corbie-Smith Giselle
Published: September 2012

The Problem: A disconnect exists between research resources and the health and health care needs of people those resources are designed to serve. While a great deal of research is being produced at academic institutions across the country, the topics investigated are often driven by researchers' interests or by funding announcements focused on specific research areas of interest to the funder. Purpose of the Article : The purpose of this article is to describe a process that connects community identified health priorities with research funds as well as capacity building efforts. Key Points: The North Carolina Translational and Clinical Sciences Institute (NC TraCS) developed a process to identify the health priorities of North Carolina communities through a partnership with the network of county Healthy Carolinians partnerships. The priorities identified were obesity, youth issues, healthcare delivery/access, mental health/ substance abuse, specific chronic diseases, cancer/tobacco, and injury/ violence. NC TraCS then used these research priorities to guide pilot funding and facilitate research capacity building. Conclusions: Tapping into an established community-based network and linking researchers to community-identified priorities ensures that NC TraCS addresses the most pressing health needs of North Carolina's residents.
Quantitative Assessment of Participant Knowledge and Evaluation of Participant Satisfaction in the CARES Training Program
Authors: Goodman Melody S. , Si Xuemei , Stafford Jewel D. , Obasohan Adesuwa , Mchunguzi Cheryl
Published: September 2012

Background: The purpose of the Community Alliance for Research Empowering Social change (CARES) training program was to (1) train community members on evidence-based public health, (2) increase their scientific literacy, and (3) develop the infrastructure for community-based participatory research (CBPR). Objectives: We assessed participant knowledge and evaluated participant satisfaction of the CARES training program to identify learning needs, obtain valuable feedback about the training, and ensure learning objectives were met through mutually beneficial CBPR approaches. Methods: A baseline assessment was administered before the first training session and a follow-up assessment and evaluation was administered after the final training session. At each training session a pretest was administered before the session and a posttest and evaluation were administered at the end of the session. After training session six, a mid-training evaluation was administered. We analyze results from quantitative questions on the assessments, pre- and post-tests, and evaluations. Results: CARES fellows knowledge increased at follow-up (75% of questions were answered correctly on average) compared with baseline (38% of questions were answered correctly on average) assessment; post-test scores were higher than pre-test scores in 9 out of 11 sessions. Fellows enjoyed the training and rated all sessions well on the evaluations. Conclusions: The CARES fellows training program was successful in participant satisfaction and increasing community knowledge of public health, CBPR, and research methodology. Engaging and training community members in evidence-based public health research can develop an infrastructure for community-academic research partnerships.
Material and Documentary Evidence for the Practice of Early Christian Baptism
Authors: Jensen Robin M.
Published: September 2012

In his most recent book, Baptism in the Early Church , Everett Ferguson presents an extensive survey of the extant documents pertaining to early Christian baptism. In his final chapters, Ferguson supplements this literary study with analysis of the art and architecture associated with the rite, especially ancient baptismal fonts. From this combined review of texts together with artifacts, Ferguson concludes that baptism was universally (and normatively) accomplished by submersion of the both head and body, and that baptism was usually a rite of adult immersion until the fifth or sixth century, with exceptions made for infants in danger of death. This essay begins by summarizing the movement from outdoor to indoor baptism and the establishment of separate structures for the rite by reference to both documentary and archaeological evidence. Then, turning to the administration of the water, and attending to the depths and design of existing ancient fonts, it argues against any universal practice, particularly of submersion. Instead, in many places, pouring or affusion of water would have accomplished immersion over adult candidates while they stood in the font. Finally, this essay presents evidence for a more inclusive practice of infant and adult baptism from the third through the sixth or seventh centuries. Overall, it appears that neither archaeological nor iconographic records are easily deployed to prove that early Christian practice adhered to any universal or consistent norms with regard to submersion or baptism of adults.
Baptism as Dying and Rising with Christ in the Teaching of Augustine
Authors: Burns J. Patout
Published: September 2012

The symbolic action of baptism—washing or burial in water—became separated from its assigned effects as a result of continuing conflicts in African theology over the efficacy of the ritual. Augustine focused on the baptismal oath to Christ as the basis for an indestructible and unrepeatable dedication. The forgiveness of sins was accounted for by the baptizand's being joined into Christ's death, a destruction of the flesh bearing the "likeness of sin," and thus of the sin itself. The symbolic causality of Christ's sacrifice did not relate the liberation from sin to the water ritual.
Everett Ferguson's Baptism in the Early Church : A Liturgical Appraisal
Authors: Senn Frank C.
Published: September 2012

This essay analyzes Everett Ferguson's massive study of Baptism in the Early Church using questions from the catechetical tradition: what is baptism? what are its benefits? how can water do such great things? what is the significance of such a bathing? why does the church baptize infants? These questions get at the phenomenological, theological, ritual, liturgical, and pastoral issues in baptism. I consider baptism to be an extended ritual process of initiation rather than as a discrete ritual act. I question Ferguson's view about submersion in ancient baptismal practice and offer a wider view of the ancient church's practice of infant baptism.
Baptism and Cosmic Allegiance: A Brief Observation
Authors: Hart David Bentley
Published: September 2012

For most of the Christians of the earliest centuries, as Ferguson's book exhaustively illustrates, baptism was understood as nothing less than a personal rebellion against the cosmic, political, and spiritual order of ancient paganism. As pagan culture slowly disappeared and was replaced by a Christian culture, the baptismal rite's explicit transfer of a new Christian's allegiance from the old gods to the risen Lord became less necessary and, ultimately, largely unintelligible. The gradual introduction of infant baptism reflected the transformation of the ancient religious milieu, as the understanding of baptism as renunciation of evil gods and demons gave way to a concern to nurture souls from birth until death within the Christian community. Changes in baptismal meaning and practice in late antiquity and the early Middle Ages suggest that further developments lie ahead, as late modern Christianity confronts a post-Christian future in the developed world.
Social Discovery Systems in Public Libraries: If We Build Them, Will They Come?
Authors: Spiteri Louise F. , Tarulli Laurel
Published: September 2012

If the public library catalogue is to continue to have relevance to its users, it needs to move beyond its current inventory model, where all content is designed and controlled by library staff and client interaction with catalogue content is limited, to a social catalogue, where users can contribute to, and interact with information and with each other. The goal of this report is to present the results of an analysis of four months worth of log analysis of two social discovery systems used in two Canadian public libraries to examine: (a) how public library users interact with social discovery systems; (b) how usage compares between the two social discovery systems; and (c) whether the use of the features in social discovery systems is consistent over time. Results suggest that clients are making limited use of the social features of the system that allow them to interact with the catalogue records and with one another.
Tags in the Catalogue: Insights From a Usability Study of LibraryThing for Libraries
Authors: Pirmann Carrie
Published: September 2012

Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH), the standard subject language used in library catalogues, are often criticized for their lack of currency, biased language, and atypical syndetic structure. Conversely, folksonomies (or tags), which rely on the natural language of their users, offer a flexibility often lacking in controlled vocabularies and may offer a means of augmenting more rigid controlled vocabularies such as LCSH. Content analysis studies have demonstrated the potential for folksonomies to be used as a means of enhancing subject access to materials, and libraries are beginning to integrate tagging systems into their catalogues. This study examines the utility of tags as a means of enhancing subject access to materials in library online public access catalogues (OPACs) through usability testing with the LibraryThing for Libraries catalogue enhancements. Findings indicate that while they cannot replace LCSH, tags do show promise for aiding information seeking in OPACs. In the context of information systems design, the study revealed that while folksonomies have the potential to enhance subject access to materials, that potential is severely limited by the current inability of catalogue interfaces to support tag-based searches alongside standard catalogue searches.
Capitalizing on Information Organization and Information Visualization for a New-Generation Catalogue
Authors: Julien Charles-Antoine , Guastavino Catherine , Bouthillier France
Published: September 2012

Subject searching is difficult with traditional text-based online public access library catalogues (OPACs), and the next-generation discovery layers are keyword searching and result filtering tools that offer little support for subject browsing. Next-generation OPACs ignore the rich network of relations offered by controlled subject vocabulary, which can facilitate subject browsing. A new generation of OPACs could leverage existing information-organization investments and offer online searchers a novel browsing and searching environment. This is a case study of the design and development of a virtual reality subject browsing and information retrieval tool. The functional prototype shows that the Library of Congress subject headings (LCSH) can be shaped into a useful and usable tree structure serving as a visual metaphor that contains a real world collection from the domain of science and engineering. Formative tests show that users can effectively browse the LCSH tree and carve it up based on their keyword search queries. This study uses a complex information-organization structure as a defining characteristic of an OPAC that goes beyond the standard keyword search model, toward the cutting edge of online search tools.
The Legacy of the Library Catalogue for the Present
Authors: Miksa Francis
Published: September 2012

The specter of impending change in library catalogues is strong but not very clear. In an attempt to help the clarification process, the first part of the present report discusses historical themes from the modern library catalogue legacy that has developed since the mid-nineteenth century—the origins and subsequent dominance of the dictionary catalogue for more than a century, considerations of library catalogue users and use over the same period, developments apart from the library catalogue during the twentieth century that have affected it, and aspects of the idea of the objects of a catalogue. In a second part, the general environment for the most recent period of library catalogue development is described, after which aspects of the historical legacy are used as a basis for raising questions relevant to impending library catalogue change.
Trends in Twitter Hashtag Applications: Design Features for Value-Added Dimensions to Future Library Catalogues
Authors: Chang Hsia-Ching , Iyer Hemalata
Published: September 2012

The Twitter hashtag is a unique tagging format linking Tweets to user-defined concepts. The aim of the paper is to describe various applications of Twitter hashtags and to determine the functional characteristics of each application. Twitter hashtags can assist in archiving twitter content, provide different visual representations of tweets, and permit grouping by categories and facets. This study seeks to examine the trends in Twitter hashtag features and how these may be applied as enhancements for next-generation library catalogues. For this purpose, Taylor's value-added model is used as an analytical framework. The morphological box developed by Zwicky is used to synthesize functionalities of Twitter hashtag applications. And finally, included are recommendations for the design of hashtag-based value-added dimensions for future library catalogues.
New Discovery Services and Library Bibliographic Control
Authors: Han Myung-Ja
Published: September 2012

To improve resource discovery and retrieval, libraries have implemented new discovery services, such as next generation catalogues, federated search, and Web-scale discovery, in addition to their traditional integrated library systems. These new discovery services greatly improve the user experience by utilizing existing cataloguing records housed within the library system or in combination with metadata from other sources, both in and outside of libraries. However, to maximize the functionality of these discovery services, libraries must reexamine current cataloguing practices and the way libraries control the bibliographic description to better serve the user's needs. This report discusses how new discovery services use the cataloguing records and the challenges that libraries encounter in bibliographic control to work with new discovery services, including the quality of cataloguing records, granular levels of bibliographic description, and integration of user-generated metadata into the cataloguing records. Each of these aspects requires further discussion.
Rethinking the Authorship Principle
Authors: Smiraglia Richard P. , Lee Hur-Li
Published: September 2012

The fundamental principle of order in the library catalogue is the authorship principle, which serves as the organizing node of an alphabetico-classed system, in which "texts" of "works" are organized first alphabetically by uniform title of the progenitor work and then are subarranged using titles for variant instantiations, under the heading for an "author." We analyze case studies of entries from (1) the first documented imperial library catalogue, the Seven Epitomes ( Qilue [七略]), in China; (2) Abelard's Works , which featured prominently in the 1848 testimony of Antonio Panizzi; and (3) The French Chef and the large family of instantiated works associated with it. Our analysis shows that the catalogue typically contains many large superwork sets. A more pragmatic approach to the design of catalogues is to array descriptions of resources in relation to the superwork sets to which they might belong. In all cases, a multidimensional faceted arrangement incorporating ideational nodes from the universe of recorded knowledge holds promise for greatly enhanced retrieval capability.
Competitive Usability and the Catalogue: A Process for Justification and Selection of a Next-Generation Catalogue or Web-Scale Discovery System
Authors: Gallaway Teri Oaks , Hines Mary Finnan
Published: September 2012

This case study demonstrates how competitive usability testing informs the selection and purchase of a next-generation catalogue (NGC) or Web-scale discovery system (WSDS) to enhance a current library catalogue. Using competitive usability techniques, the authors explain how different NGCs and WSDSs solve issues that catalogue users may face when searching for materials in the online catalogue. The goal of this study is to provide a framework that identifies concrete evidence in support of purchase recommendations for an effective system that adequately addresses locally identified issues with catalogue searches. The process of selecting live system implementations from peer institutions is outlined. Steps include surveying library staff about their current library catalogue. Survey results and documented reference questions provided the foundation for user tasks created by testers for use in this study. This multifaceted research design resulted in a case study that captures current issues that users encounter in the discovery and access to library materials and shows how to include competitive usability techniques as part of a purchase rationale while assessing how well a variety of next-generation discovery and access systems address users' issues.
Historical and Current Implications of Cataloguing Quality for Next-Generation Catalogues
Authors: Schultz-Jones Barbara , Snow Karen , Miksa Shawne , Hasenyager Richard L.
Published: September 2012

Discussions of quality in library cataloguing are traced from early library science literature to current debates. Three studies that examine dimensions of quality cataloguing in academic libraries, public libraries, and school libraries and a review of vendor processes update the issues surrounding a definition of bibliographic record quality and quality assurance processes. The implications of perceptions of bibliographic record quality on next-generation catalogues are presented with emphasis on the shift in the cataloguer's judgment from rigid standards for transcription to meeting the requirement for more metadata that matches the user need of find-ability.
Comparative User Experiences of Next-Generation Catalogue Interfaces
Authors: Majors Rice
Published: September 2012

One of the presumed advantages of next-generation library catalogue interfaces is that the user experience is improved—that it is both richer and more intuitive. Often the interfaces come with little or no user-facing documentation or imbedded "help" for patrons based on an assumption of ease of use and familiarity of the experience, having followed best practices in use on the Web. While there has been much gray literature (published on library Web sites, etc.) interrogating these implicit claims and contrasting the new interfaces to traditional Web-based catalogues, this article details a consistent and formal comparison of whether users can actually accomplish common library tasks, unassisted, using these interfaces. The author has undertaken a task-based usability test of vendor-provided next-generation catalogue interfaces and Web-scale discovery tools (Encore Synergy, Summon, WorldCat Local, Primo Central, EBSCO Discovery Service). Testing was done with undergraduates across all academic disciplines. The resulting qualitative data, noting any demonstrated trouble using the software as well as feedback or suggested improvements that the users may have about the software, will assist academic libraries in making or validating purchase and subscription decisions for these interfaces as well as help vendors make data-driven decisions about interface and experience enhancements.
Old Hopes, New Possibilities: Next-Generation Catalogues and the Centralization of Access
Authors: Barton Joshua , Mak Lucas
Published: September 2012

Next-generation catalogues can be viewed as the latest manifestation of a tendency in library catalogue history to strive for centralization of access to collections—a single portal for the discovery of library resources. Due to an increasing volume of published materials and the explosion of online information resources during the Internet age, the library does not currently provide centralized access to its various information silos, nor does it provide a user-friendly search and retrieval experience for users whose expectations are shaped by Google and other major commercial Web sites. Searching across library resources is a complicated task, bearing high-attention "transaction costs" for the user, which discourage the use of library resources. Libraries need access systems that minimize complexity, easing discovery and delivery of resources for user populations. Here, the authors review past efforts of centralization of access, consider the potential of next-generation catalogues in the context of this historical tendency toward centralization of access, and describe what goals underlie that centralization.
Library Catalogues of the Future: A Social Space and Collaborative Tool?
Authors: Tarulli Laurel , Spiteri Louise F.
Published: September 2012

Next-generation catalogues are providing opportunities for library professionals and users to interact, collaborate, and enhance core library functions. Technology, innovation, and creativity are all components that are merging to create a localized, online social space that brings our physical library services and experiences into an online environment. While patrons are comfortable creating user-generated information on commercial Web sites and social media Web sites, library professionals should be exploring alternative methods of use for these tools within the library setting. Can the library catalogue promote remote readers' advisory services and act as a localized "Google"? Will patrons or library professionals be the driving force behind user-generated content within our catalogues? How can cataloguers be sure that the integrity of their bibliographic records is protected while inviting additional data sources to display in our catalogues? As library catalogues bring our physical library services into the online environment, catalogues also begin to encroach or "mash-up" with other areas of librarianship that have not been part of a cataloguer's expertise. Using library catalogues beyond their traditional role as tools for discovery and access raises issues surrounding the expertise of library professionals and the benefits of collaboration between frontline and backroom staff.
Virtual Browse: Designing User-Oriented Services for Discovery of Related Resources
Authors: Lynema Emily , Lown Cory , Woodbury David
Published: September 2012

Although academic libraries are increasingly converting stacks into collaborative spaces and physical books and journals are being replaced by their electronic counterparts, the concept of browsing as a means of discovery is seeing a resurgence in the world of search and discovery. While many users start their online research with electronic databases and library catalogues, interviews with North Carolina State University Libraries patrons provide evidence that physically browsing the shelves to find similar materials is still common. A growing awareness of the need to preserve this type of serendipitous discovery as a complement to keyword searching is inspiring the development of online virtual browsing tools that replace and enhance physical access to library stacks.
The Messiah and the Bodhisattva: Anti-Utopianism Re-Revisited
Authors: Kalmanson Leah
Published: September 2012

This essay takes a comparative approach to the question of politics in the work of Emmanuel Lévinas. Oona Eisenstadt finds political potential in Lévinas’s idea of the Jewish “stubbornness” that refuses a utopian messianic age and persistently devotes attention to the present. But how can this capacity for stubborn persistence be developed? Twelfth-century Zen Master Dōgen grapples with the question of whether Zen’s emphasis on enlightenment in the present moment encourages an uncritical acceptance of the world as it is. His notion of “practice-enlightenment” neither defers enlightenment to a future state nor reduces it to the simple acceptance of reality. Rather, enlightenment is the very exertion of effort necessary for practices such as meditation. Here, practice-enlightenment becomes a model for strategies—embodied ritual practices—that develop our capacity for compassionate mindfulness and thereby train us to maintain the urgency of the face-to-face relation in political contexts.
Building Slovak Jewry: Communal Reorientation in Interwar Czechoslovakia
Authors: Klein-Pejšová Rebekah
Published: September 2012

There was no Slovak Jewry before the creation of Slovakia from the former northern counties of the pre-World War One Kingdom of Hungary. The emergence of both is tied to conditions created by the movement from empire to nation-state following the Habsburg Monarchy's collapse. Both are phenomena of interwar state building. Jews in Slovakia remapped their belonging to the territory through postwar self-defense and economic adaptation to the new environment, the development of Jewish national political strategies for negotiating the Jewish relationship to the state and surrounding society, and a transformation of the built Jewish communal landscape. Slovak Jews defined themselves geographically rather than nationally, as belonging to the territory of Slovakia within the liberal Czechoslovak state and the specific set of opportunities and challenges that reality presented.
Negotiating Jewish Belonging in Postwar Slovakia (1945–48)
Authors: Cichopek-Gajraj Anna
Published: September 2012

After the Second World War, the Czechoslovak state redrew the boundaries around its national/ethnic community, defining anew who belonged and who did not. This process primarily involved the redefinition of the criteria for citizenship. Jewish survivors were among those who negotiated for the recognition of their citizenship. Since the Czechoslovak government did not grant Jews legal status as a national minority, Jewish survivors could be freely classified as Slovaks, Czechs, Germans, or Magyars. The latter two translated into refusal of citizenship and expulsion. This article discusses how Magyar-speaking Jews in Slovakia struggled to secure Czechoslovak citizenship through dialogue and conflict between their representatives, local administrations, and the central government.
The Picaresque Voice of Bare Life: Jerzy Kosinski’s The Painted Bird
Authors: Malkmus Bernhard
Published: September 2012

This essay explores the juridico-political framework of Jerzy Kosinski’s The Painted Bird and the ways in which the novel’s narrative structure supports and undermines this framework. With reference to Giorgio Agamben’s work, it traces the concepts of the biopolitical body (bare life), state of exception, and sovereignty in how the novel dramatizes the relation between victim and perpetrator in Nazi-occupied Eastern Europe. Within this context, it singles out the notion of the homo alalus (speechless human) as a specific kind of bare life and discusses its functions in the novel. The picaresque voice reflects both the muted voice of the victim and the self-assertive voice of memory. Kosinski uses the picaresque template to articulate this dual voice as an art of giving testimony to bare life. This testimonial appropriation of the picaresque template can be read as a challenge to Agamben’s overdetermination of the concepts of bare life and sovereignty.
Jewish Survival, Divine Supervision, and the Existence of God
Authors: Mizrahi Moti
Published: September 2012

In this paper, I discuss an argument for the existence of God known as “The Argument from the Survival of the Jews.” This argument has the form of an Inference to the Best Explanation (IBE). It proceeds from the phenomenon of Jewish survival to the existence of God as the best explanation for this phenomenon. I will argue that, even if we grant that Jewish survival is a remarkable occurrence that demands an explanation, and even if we gloss over the difficulties in defining the terms “Jewish” and “survive,” the argument ultimately fails as an argument for the existence of God. It fails because it postulates divine supervision in order to explain Jewish endurance, but it doesn’t provide any clues as to what might be the underlying mechanism at work.
What are we to do without exile? On mnemonic traces and communality in the work of Ilana Salama ortar
Authors: Yerushalmy Merav
Published: September 2012

This article explores the work of Ilana Salama Ortar and her performance of the fraught histories of Israel-Palestine and their mnemonic traces. The article focuses on questions of exile, migration and the common in Ortar's work and in contemporary theory more generally, and asks how
aesthetic practices, and Ortar's in particular, may allow for a shared, or common performance of memory and absence, without obliterating the specificities and differences of sites and histories. These issues are framed in the article within the ongoing discussions of the aesthetic and the
political in the last decade, and more specifically within the discourse of commonunality, of relational aesthetics and of the changing notions of critique and criticality. The article concludes with a brief exploration of Martin Buber's work on relationality and asks how his work might be
relevant to today's theoretical discourse of the common, and how its historical specificity might help us reconsider the often overlooked contingency of contemporary theory.
Cultural translation and the musafir: A conversation with Robin Yassin-Kassab
Authors: Rashid Catherine
Published: September 2012

I interview Robin Yassin-Kassab, a British Syrian novelist who is a prescient observer not only of British secularism and Arabism, but also of the recent Arab revolutions. His writings range from journalism on Israeli bombardments, to meditations on Sufism; they hail Islamic tales as
inherently nomadic, whilst remaining attentive to the particularities of the Levant. Although in the early stages of a literary career - he is currently writing his second novel - Yassin-Kassab is paving the way for more multifaceted forms of engagement with post-9/11 cultural stereotypes.
REVIEWS
Authors: Brioni Simone , Romero Eugenia R.
Published: September 2012

SCREENING STRANGERS: MIGRATION AND DIA SPORA IN CONTEMPORARY EUROPEAN CINEMA, YOSEFA LOSHITZKY (2010) Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 214 pp. ISBN: 9780253221827, h/bk, $ 65.00, p/bk, $ 24.95

WRITING GALICIA INTO THE WORLD: NEW CARTOGRAPHIES NEW POETICS,
KIRSTY HOOPER (2011) Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 186 pp. ISBN: 9781846316678, h/bk, £ 65.00