International Librarianship?

I just finished my semester and I'll be honest, it rocked my socks off. I had a class in Young Adult Literature and one in the History of Books and Libraries (I know - THAT'S what heaven looks like). The class about books and libraries got me so jazzed that it's something I'd like to pursue. I've been thinking about getting a second masters when I'm done with this one, and I think I'd like to do it in History and study the history of books and maybe libraries (books first, libraries second). That way I can study a broad range of time (like, all of it) and isolate one common theme - the book. Awesome? yes.

Also, one of my dear professors has taken an interest in our move to Israel and we talked on the phone about possible opportunities I might have in Jerusalem. She said that I should spend a bit of time just getting myself into the library scene. Find out what library students in Israel would do and do it (You know, like "think about what at Maverick would do and then do that"). She said ask for tours of all of the libraries and archives, familiarize yourself with the faculty at the University. She advised not to show up and say "I'm a MLIS student and I'd like an internship" (which was my original plan but now sounds dastardly arrogent), but to get my feet wet and slowly become part of the library scene in Israel. That's right, the library scene! She suggested that I take the International Librarianship class that San Jose State offers in the fall and I think I'll do just that. She suggested I join the Israel chapter and get really involved. I'm really looking forward to the library opportunities this move will offer.

And here is where all the threads meet. If I were to do a Masters in history focusing on books and libraries I have this secret plan to study at all of the Universities where we live. If we live in Syria, I could study the book/library movement in at University of Damascus, or if we live in Egpyt I could study at Cairo. Well, I wouldn't even have to study at the Universities, I could just study the movements in the areas we live in - become an expert. Every region has a book history, and since the actual history of books, language and libraries is in the Middle East I kind of think I'm in for a treat.

Teaching Technology (The Blog Lives)

Sadly, during the most exciting semester of my library career my blog suffered tremendously. I had the most to write about, and I wrote the least!

Anyway, every Thursday night I help teach blogging classes as the local library and I absolutely love it. Today was my first class back from a short break, and it's just the best way to spend an evening. There was a dear elderly woman tonight who just couldn't keep up and I sat with her throughout the class and we worked together to create her blog and make a few posts. She actually typed on one of her practice posts "I am at the library tonight. A very nice young girl is helping me". How sweet is that!?

I had forgotten how much I LOVE teaching technology. It's one of my favorite parts of being a librarian. So, I guess we'll add one more specialization to the growing lists of specializations I'd like to have... archives, special collections, public libraries in general, outreach/programming, technology..... That kind of makes me a plain old generalist doesn't it?

Medieval Manuscripts Ahoy!

These are the clamshell boxes that BYU's conservator made for the Vulgate Bible "Bibila Sacra" and the Breviary - which is a book of religious devotions, prayers, things a religoius person should do and repeat.

This was  page from the Breviary - this is all written and decorated by hand.  It's absolutely stunning.  This letter is called an Historiated Letter.  

This past week I made an appointment with a curator of the BYU special collections to go see a few manuscripts that were created in the 14th and 15th centuries.  I was a little bit nervous too ask if I, a mere mortal, could view such precious items stowed away in the BYU vaults, but I realized "Wait, I am a Masters student in library science - I have some book cred!". 

Anyway, I had an assignment for my "History of Books and Libraries" class (which is blowing my mind) to look at a manuscript prior to 1500 and discuss some things regarding it's physical description, history and context, etc. 

Max can verify that I almost cried several times.  I'm out of control, I know.  It was really an amazing thing.  I'll post more about it later (because I'm slacking on my homework right now) but here is a link to the wiki I made for my assignment. 

Brooke's Manuscript Wiki

 The Mr.  let me take pictures, which was also amazing.  I looked at "Breviary, Toledo 1400", "Polychronicon (1342)", and a Vulgate Bible from the 1300's.  

I told Max afterward that I was pretty sure I wanted to go to book conservatory school.  We'll see how that goes.  

This is the breviary with it's original binding of Moroccan leather.   Amazing.  

Dead is the New Pink

I read this paragraph in a book review for a book I was looking into today on Amazon:

Dead is the new pink. The formerly living occupy a huge amount of creative space these days -- in television ("Ghost Whisperer," "Medium"), film ("Corpse Bride," "Just Like Heaven"), novels like Alice Sebold's The Lovely Bones, even a highly regarded show of spirit photography at the Metropolitan Museum of Art

In literature I've even heard someone refer to this as a subgenre entitled "Dead-Narrator Tales". Woa. This concept is especially prevalent in YA lit and as I have a YA lit class this semester I've already read a few.

YA lit is notorious for stretching boundaries and defying limits, sometimes obnoxiously. I feel like sometimes the author's primary question is 'How can I create a story so niche oriented, so diverse in it's plot and characters, so 'off the charts' that teens everywhere will buy it and come to proms held in its honor?' (don't get me wrong, I loved Twilight and Stephanie Meyer's ascent to fame was much more innocent than I'm suggesting) I know! A paraplegic Vegan who secretly raises unicorns that have special powers over the stock market! Yeah, and she suffers from a sex addiction, but can't tell her Meth attic Mom!

This dead narrator thing, however, is a clever new twist. I think I kind of like it. But by this time next year I'm sure I'll be "so over it" as they tell me the teens say these days. Just when you think edgy YA lit topic have been tapped out (Drugs? too overdone Sex? too obvious) someone says, "What About Dead People?" Awesome.