Digital humanities and the library: Where do we go from here? C-EBLIP Journal Club, October 6, 2016

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by Carolyn Doi
Education and Music Library, University of Saskatchewan

Article: Zhang, Ying, Shu Liu, and Emilee Mathews. 2015. “Convergence of Digital Humanities and Digital Libraries.” Library Management 36 (4): 362-377. http://search.proquest.com/docview/1684384505/abstract/D65EF9A05834DADPQ/2

In October, the C-EBLIP Journal Club met to discuss an article focused on the evolving domain of digital humanities and its role with the academic library. The article in question, “Convergence of Digital Humanities and Digital Libraries” was published by Zhang, Liu and Matthews in Library Management, a journal that aims to “provide international perspectives on library management issues… highly recommended for library managers.”1 The article discussed ways that libraries might support scholarship in digital humanities (DH), digging into aspects of content, technology, and services that the library might develop for digital humanities scholars. I was compelled to select an article that addressed this subject, as I recently attended a web broadcast of the “Collections as Data” livestream where DH and librarianship were discussed together several times2, leading me to consider my own background in musicology and librarianship and how they might overlap through a digital humanities lens.

The members of the journal club chose to assess the article in question from a few different angles: context, audience, methodology, and findings, and conclusions. Our discussion of the article was aided by use of the EBL Critical Appraisal Checklist.3 Developed by Lindsay Glynn, this tool is made up of a series of questions that help guide the reader through assessment of the study including: study design, including population, data collection, study design, and results.4 We found that using the checklist allowed us to think critically about each aspect of the study design, to assess the reliability, validity, and usability within our own professional context. A summary of our discussion is presented below.

Context & Audience

During our conversation, we noted that this article is aimed at library managers, or those who may be in an administrative role looking to gain a quick picture of the role of libraries in interacting with digital humanities scholars. It was noted that the link between libraries and digital humanities has already appeared in the literature on many occasions, and that to get a fuller picture of how libraries might approach this collaborative work, reading other critical opinions will be of utmost importance. One may want to consult the list of resources provided by the dh+lib folks, which can be found on their website, to get a sense of some of the core literature.5

Methods

The methods section of this article describes how the researchers consulted various evidence sources to identify current challenges and opportunities for collaboration between DH and libraries. In this case, the authors state that they have combined findings from a literature review and virtual and physical site visits to “humanities schools, research centers, and academic libraries.” The databases were shared, though search terms were not. We felt that including this information would be helpful both for assessing the quality of the search and for other researchers hoping to replicate or build on the review. The search resulted in 69 articles, 193 websites, and 2 physical site. While discussing the validity of these evidence sources, we felt that while the literature and online site visits may provide a more representative selection of sources to draw conclusions from, the sample of physical sites was not large enough for sufficiently precise estimates.

Findings

Zhang, Ying and Mathews’ findings include both challenges and opportunities for collaboration between DH and digital library communities. Description of how the evidence was weighed or analysed to retrieve these results was not clearly outlined in the paper, and we felt that including such information would assist the reader to evaluate the usefulness and reliability of the findings. A summary of these findings is provided in the accompanying chart.

Challenges Opportunities
• “DH is not necessarily accepted as qualifying scholarship… novel methodologies and the theoretical assumptions behind their work have been questioned by their peers from traditional humanities schools of thought.” • Creating “knowledge through new methods”
• “The DH community has unbalanced geographical and disciplinary distributions… Related DH collections are not yet integrated. These digital collections are distributed in different schools, academic units, museums, archives, and libraries. Few efforts have been made to link related resources together.” • Working “across disciplines [that] are highly collaborative”
• “The technologies used in DH create barriers for new scholars to learn and for projects to be sustainable” • Producing a “unit of currency…[that] is not necessarily an article or a book, but rather, a project…usually published using an open web platform, allowing users to dynamically interact with underlying data,”
• Establishing “major scholarly communication, professionalization, and educational channels”

Conclusions

In the conclusion of the article, Zhang, Ying and Mathers present a positive perspective on the opportunities for collaboration between the DH and library community: “To make collaborative work more successful, we, LIS professionals, need to challenge ourselves to continuously grow new skill sets on top of existing expertise and becoming hybrid professionals. The DL community should strive to make ourselves more visible, valuable, and approachable to the DH community. Even better, the DL community need to become part of the DH community.”

On this point, the journal club’s conversation focussed on the capacity of libraries to take on these new collaborations, and whether we are necessarily prepared for such projects. These thoughts are echoed by Posner, who writes in her article, “No Half Measures: Overcoming Common Challenges to Doing Digital Humanities in the Library” that “DH is possible in a library setting…but that DH is not, and cannot be, business as usual for a library. To succeed at digital humanities, a library must do a great deal more than add ‘digital scholarship’ to an individual librarian’s long string of subject specialties.”6

The domain of DH is compelling and creative: it incorporates new methods, produces innovative means of dissemination, and combines diverse perspectives on research. Libraries are well positioned to contribute to this domain, though exactly how this should or can happen is not found in a one-size-fits-all answer. Zhang, Ying and Mathers present some good points that may serve to begin a conversation on how libraries and DH folks might work together. Further research on each of these points is up for further investigation for the librarian or administrator aiming to implement these strategies in their own institution.

1“Library Management.” https://ulrichsweb.serialssolutions.com/title/1478296246359/117078

2Library of Congress. “Collections as Data: Stewardship and Use Models to Enhance Access” September 27, 2016. Accessed November 4, 2016: http://digitalpreservation.gov/meetings/dcs16.html

3EBL Critical Appraisal Checklist. http://ebltoolkit.pbworks.co/f/EBLCriticalAppraisalChecklist.pdf

4Glynn, Lindsay. “A critical appraisal tool for library and information research”, Library Hi Tech 24, no. 3 (2006): 387 – 399. http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/07378830610692154

5“Readings” dh+lib. Website. Accessed November 4, 2016. http://acrl.ala.org/dh/dh101/readings/

6Posner, Miriam. “No Half Measures: Overcoming Common Challenges to Doing Digital Humanities in the Library.” Journal of Library Administration 53, (2013): 43-52. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01930826.2013.756694

This article gives the views of the author(s) and not necessarily the views of the Centre for Evidence Based Library and Information Practice or the University Library, University of Saskatchewan.

Ethics are for everyone!

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by Moriana Garcia
Carlson Science and Engineering Library, University of Rochester
and
Kristin Bogdan
Engineering Library, University of Saskatchewan

In this blog post, we would like to put out a call to action – that librarians seriously consider taking whatever ethics training is available at their home institution, whether they have a specific requirement to do so or not. We came together as research collaborators due to a mutual interest in visual research methods, and our plan to employ those methods in our practice. We intend to publish the research, so we began our journey through the research ethics process. The more we learned about it, the more we realized that this training could have an impact in many areas of our work.

In libraries we collect data about the people that use our spaces, collections, and online resources all of the time. This can be benign and completely anonymous, like gate counts, or specific to individuals, like patrons borrowing records. The systems that we use to provide content to our communities collect information in ways that we don’t even think, and may not fit within our professional or personal sense of ethics. Patrons’ privacy is a common topic of discussion in public libraries, but not so frequently in academic ones. An organization that is trying to change that is the Library Freedom Project. The group, a partnership among librarians, technologists, attorneys, and privacy advocates, aims to promote intellectual freedom in libraries by educating librarians on government and corporate surveillance threats, privacy rights of the population, and the responsibility of libraries to protect those rights. Their website provides access to several educational resources on these topics, and it is a good starting point for librarians interested in privacy issues.

Research ethics training is one way to become more aware of the ethical issues that we face in our practice and in our research. We both went through the Collaborative Institutional Training Initiative (CITI) Program online training. This training is regulated by the Interagency Advisory Panel on Research Ethics (PRE) in Canada or the Office of Human Subject Protection in the United States. These offices aim to protect the rights and welfare of human research subjects at the institutional level. They usually manage the local Research Ethics Board (REB), or Institutional Review Board (IRB) in the U.S., which reviews, approves and follows up on any research project involving human subjects, and provide education and training for researchers on ethical research issues and human subjects safety. Training on human subject research traditionally covers the historical development of human subject protections, as well as current regulatory information and ethical issues related to the topic. An intimate understanding of concepts such as vulnerable populations, consent, and what is known as the three research pillars in research ethics — respect for persons, beneficence and justice — is an important part of the training. You can get more information about these topics in the Belmont Report.

Ethics training will increase your awareness of any possible ethical issues and where you can go for help. Much of the assessment work that we do as librarians will qualify as exempt when it comes to ethics, but you still need to get approval from your ethics office if you want to publish. At the 2016 C-EBLIP Fall Symposium, the keynote speaker, Margaret Henderson, suggested that you should get ethics approval for any project where there is even a remote chance that it will be used for research. Another suggestion from Margaret that could facilitate ethics approval is having a shared set of research instruments (surveys, interview and focus questions protocols) that librarians could use for their evaluation and assessment activities. Using the same instruments as others will take out some of the stress of creating new surveys before going through the ethics process and it will make it easier to compare results across different libraries, which would create a base of LIS research that would be of great value to the profession.

In conclusion, it is well worth the time to go through the ethics training. Going through this process will also help you talk to faculty about their research and allow you to point them in the direction of the research ethics office. Ideally, we would go through the training in our LIS education in order to get a sense of the requirements of doing research on human subjects. We work with vulnerable communities all of the time, so understanding how our practice and research impacts them is in the best interest of everyone.

References:
Henderson, M. “Collaborating to Increase the Evidence Base in Library and Information Practice.” C-EBLIP Fall Symposium. October 12, 2016.

This article gives the views of the author(s) and not necessarily the views of the Centre for Evidence Based Library and Information Practice or the University Library, University of Saskatchewan.

Learning to Let Go: The Perfectionist’s Struggle

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by Laura Thorne
UBC Okanagan Library

Striving for excellence motivates you; striving for perfection is demoralizing.
– Dr. Harriet Braiker

Last week, I attended C-EBLIP’s third annual Fall Symposium. There were so many great presentations, but there were two in particular that I kept thinking about in the days following – Angie Gerrard’s Changing Your Research Plan En-Route and The Elephant in the Room: Imposter Syndrome and Librarian Researchers by Jaclyn McLean. Both presentations tackled often-encountered, but rarely discussed topics that come up when conducting research – our emotions and personalities. Gerrard discussed the emotional challenge associated with research not going according to plan and the need for professional vulnerability, while McLean discussed imposter syndrome and feeling like you’re not good enough, even when you’ve accomplished so much. They led me to think about a related issue that I’ve struggled with in my career and while doing research – perfectionism.

Like many librarians I know, I am a perfectionist. Perfectionism can be an excellent trait. It can lead to high quality work and can motivate me to always strive to do my best. But it can also be challenging. While I wouldn’t diagnose myself with atelophobia, at times my perfectionism has been paralyzing and has prevented me from taking risks, trying new things, or even completing what I’ve started. There are drawbacks to thinking everything you do needs to be perfect or the best.

Studies show that perfectionism is rampant in academia (Charbonneau, 2011;
Dunn, Whelton & Sharpe, 2006; Sherry, Hewitt, Sherry, Flett & Graham, 2010; Rockquemore, 2012; Shives, 2014) and is something many of our students also struggle with while at university (Çapan, 2010; Eum & Rice, 2011; Jiao & Onwuegbuzie, 1998). While knowing I’m not alone is of some comfort, one of the biggest professional struggles I’ve had to overcome is learning to let go of projects, especially my writing.

You could say my entire career thus far has been an experiment in letting go, in telling myself, “It’s good enough, just send it out,” but nowhere has this needed to be repeated as much as in my research. For the most part, my research is not something I have to do; it’s something I want to do. I do it largely outside of my regular everyday work and is truly a labour of love. Because of this, there tends not be set deadlines (I attempt to set them for myself, but I’m not the strictest timekeeper), and I either a) procrastinate or b) agonize over tiny details instead of just getting it over with and letting it go.

Some of the tricks I’ve found useful in combatting my perfectionism and learning to let go:
• Embrace the mantra of good enough: This isn’t to say do the bare minimum, but accepting that perfection is unattainable and realizing that a finished project is a good project makes it easier to make progress on your research.
• Fight the urge to procrastinate: For me personally, it’s easy to procrastinate – it gives you an out for why something isn’t perfect. But this only exacerbates the problem.
• Set deadlines for yourself (and stick to them): This helps with the procrastination!
• Don’t go alone: Having a research partner or team has been incredibly helpful in learning to let go and can work as a support system when you’re obsessing about the details and unable to see the bigger picture.
• Love the draft: By completing drafts of my work, whether it be a research proposal or an article, I can slowly get used to the idea of letting go of my work in a staged process before sending it out into the world.
• Develop a network you trust: When you’re unsure of or fighting with a project, it’s useful to have a network of people you can talk to and receive feedback. It makes it easier to let go of a project when I know someone I respect thinks it’s good. And I do the same for them!
• Don’t re-read after you’ve submitted your work: This should go without saying, but unfortunately, I had an awful habit of re-reading an item right after I’ve hit submit or send. As I’m reading through, I’m thinking “I should have changed this or that that” and making myself feel dreadful instead of happy that I’ve finished. It’s an exercise in torture and since I’ve stopped, I feel much less critical of the work I’ve done and can actually celebrate a job well done.

“Too many people spend too much time trying to perfect something before they actually do it. Instead of waiting for perfection, run with what you got, and fix it along the way.”
– Paul Arden

References (and further reading)

Çapan, B. E. (2010). Relationship among perfectionism, academic procrastination and life satisfaction of university students. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 5, 1665-1671.

Charbonneau, L. (2011). Perfectionist professors have lower research productivity. University Affairs. Retrieved from http://www.universityaffairs.ca/news/news-article/perfectionist-professors-have-lower-research-productivity/

Dunn, J. C., Whelton, W. J., & Sharpe, D. (2006). Maladaptive perfectionism, hassles, coping, and psychological distress in university professors. Journal of Counselling Psychology, 53(4), 511.

Eum, K., & Rice, K. G. (2011). Test anxiety, perfectionism, goal orientation, and academic performance. Anxiety, Stress & Coping, 24(2), 167-178.

Hibner, H. (2016, Jan 19). Don’t overthink it: How librarians can conquer perfectionism with mindfulness. [Web log post]. Retrieved from https://librarylostfound.com/2016/01/19/dont-overthink-it-how-librarians-can-conquer-perfectionism-with-mindfulness/

Jiao, Q. G., & Onwuegbuzie, A. J. (1998). Perfectionism and library anxiety among graduate students. The Journal of Academic Librarianship, 24(5), 365-371.

Rockquemore, K. (2012). Overcoming academic perfectionism. [Web log series]. Retrieved from https://www.insidehighered.com/career-advice/overcoming-academic-perfectionism

Sherry, S. B., Hewitt, P. L., Sherry, D. L., Flett, G. L., & Graham, A. R. (2010). Perfectionism dimensions and research productivity in psychology professors: Implications for understanding the (mal)adaptiveness of perfectionism. Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science, 42(4), 273-283. doi:10.1037/a0020466

Shives, K. (2014, Nov 11). The battle between perfectionism and productivity. [Web log post]. Retrieved from https://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/gradhacker/battle-between-perfectionism-and-productivity

This article gives the views of the author(s) and not necessarily the views of the Centre for Evidence Based Library and Information Practice or the University Library, University of Saskatchewan.

Non-Attachment as an Antidote for Procrastination

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by DeDe Dawson
Science Library, University of Saskatchewan

I have a weakness for popular psychology books and I’m a wee bit of a cynic, too – so when I came across Oliver Burkeman’s book The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can’t Stand Positive Thinking I knew it would be good. And it is good, very good: entertainingly written and thought-provoking. After returning my borrowed library copy I actually went out and bought my own copy and re-read it! Now that is an endorsement.

But what does this have to do with research?

I wasn’t expecting to find advice to apply to my research in this book – but sometimes when you least expect it the most useful nugget of wisdom lands on your lap!

Each chapter in the book explores a different counter-intuitive route to happiness. In chapter three, “The Storm before the Calm”, Burkeman discusses the Buddhist philosophy of non-attachment. Essentially, Buddhists believe that the root of all suffering is attachment. It is a very human and understandable tendency to cling to things we like and avoid things we don’t. Both of these tendencies can be considered attachments though. The examples Burkeman uses are:

“Develop a strong attachment to your good looks – as opposed to merely enjoying them while they last – and you will suffer when they fade, as they inevitably will; develop a strong attachment to your luxurious lifestyle, and your life may become an unhappy, fearful struggle to keep things that way.” (Burkeman, 2012, p. 53)

So, the Buddhist approach to life is to practice non-attachment: to be non-judgmentally aware of these feelings and impulses but not get hung up on them. Once we stop struggling to be positive and happy then we might actually experience some peace! Counter-intuitive… but compelling.

And now the connection to research… Virginia Wilson wrote candidly in this blog a few weeks ago about her struggles with procrastination – a common curse of academics when they get to the “write-up” portion of a research project. We’ve all heard the inspirational quotes, the motivational tips, and other well-meaning advice. Burkeman states that most of these tips and tricks don’t work simply because they are more about putting you in the mood to get things done, instead of how to actually get things done.

It turns out that non-attachment can be a practical way to get things done.

If you wait until you’re in the right mood to get things done… then you’ll never get things done:

“Who says you need to wait until you ‘feel like’ doing something in order to start doing it? The problem, from this perspective, isn’t that you don’t feel motivated; it’s that you imagine you need to feel motivated. If you can regard your thoughts and emotions about whatever you’re procrastinating on as passing weather, you’ll realise that your reluctance about working isn’t something that needs to be eradicated or transformed into positivity. You can coexist with it. You can note the procrastinatory feelings and act anyway.” (Burkeman, 2012, p. 69)

The emphasis in the above quote is mine. These last two sentences are the ones I underlined and starred in the book (my copy – not the library copy!). After this passage Burkeman goes on to describe the daily rituals of some highly productive and famous writers – they rarely include techniques meant to inspire or motivate, instead they are routines that provide structure whether or not the writer happens to feel motivated at the time.

An aside: My artist husband claims he needs to be inspired to paint – and guess what? He doesn’t get much painting done. I always tell him: “Just sit down and paint, the inspiration will come!”

So, this is my advice to myself and my fellow procrastinating writers: recognize that you don’t feel like it… then just sit down and write. It is very similar to Lorie’s advice to Virginia: “Just do it!”

Oh, and read this book:
Burkeman, O. (2012). The antidote: Happiness for people who can’t stand positive thinking. New York: Faber and Faber, Inc.

This article gives the views of the author(s) and not necessarily the views of the Centre for Evidence Based Library and Information Practice or the University Library, University of Saskatchewan.

Considering collaborations

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by Margy MacMillan
Mount Royal University Library

Most of my work in Library and Information Practice involves other people so it’s not surprising that working on building and using an evidence base for this work has brought me into close collaboration with people across the library, the campus, and global libraryland*. Reflecting on these experiences has illuminated some patterns and common factors in positive collaborations as well as some aspects that require attention at the beginning to ensure everyone stays friendly at the end.

One of the most important things is to align conceptions of realistic timelines, milestones and deadlines. In one group I worked with, this was evident even in small things – if we said we’d meet in the lobby at 7:30 to catch a shuttle to a conference, we were all there by 7:00. This congruence happened naturally among us, but is something that most groups I’ve been part of have had to work out. While the set dates of publications and presentations can be helpful motivators, developing a schedule that all collaborators are comfortable with should be part of the early planning stages.

Related to the question of time, is motivation. Understanding why your collaborators are interested in the project and how it fits into their lives can help determine feasible timelines. If one partner needs to analyse data as part of planning for a new service and another sees the potential of this analysis to inform wider work through publication, the partners will have to accept different commitment and energy levels for different parts of the project. In situations like these, colleagues and I have often taken the lead at different stages: gathering, initial analysis, submission and write-up. While we all contributed to these stages, leading different parts was an effective way to align aspects of the projects with our skills and motivations, and ensured that no one felt overburdened.

A crucial aspect in both of these collaboration was that we trusted each other to do the work. That trust was built on frank discussions of available time and competing priorities, acknowledgements of each others’ expertise, and shared understanding of tasks and expectations. Looking back those have been key factors in all of the successful collaborations I’ve been a part of.

Nancy Chick, Caitlin McClurg, and the author, collaborating on a cross-disciplinary project.

Nancy Chick, Caitlin McClurg, and the author, collaborating on a cross-disciplinary project.

Openness to others’ expertise is, of course, critical when you are working across disciplinary boundaries. Your partner may be more comfortable in a different research methodology, or simply a different citation style, and developing a shared language around the project is critical. Disciplines bring distinct terminologies and conventions around knowledge creation and dissemination (to see this in action, bring a table of mixed faculty together, open the discussion of author name order, and stand back). These differences affect the questions you ask, the evidence you value, the analysis you undertake and the audience(s) for the final product.Just as you would when coding data, nothing works quite so well as writing down decisions once you find  consensus.  It’s easy (and occasionally disastrous for a project) to make assumptions about shared understandings working with people in your own discipline, but I’ve found these groups can have just as divergent thinking as cross-disciplinary ones. The early communicaiton stage is often skipped on the assumption that as members of the ‘hive mind’ of librarianship we have common conceptions of  information literacy, or what term we should use for patron/user/client/ or how open does a publication need to be to count as OA?.

Much of this: negotiating meaning across disciplines, negotiating time zones and spelling conventions across borders and oceans, or negotiating variations in motivation regardless of other differences or similarities, is a matter of making the tacit explicit, of learning how to say what we mean, what we need, and what we can do clearly and without apology.

It turns out that this really is one of the great unsung benefits of collaboration. Working with others has taught me more about my professional self than any other activity. It has made me think about my values as a librarian, as a researcher, and as a teacher, and in articulating those values to others I have found a strengthened sense of purpose. Negotiating the meaning of information literacy, whether with library colleagues or with other faculty has given me a more nuanced personal definition, and helped me enact and communicate that definition in my teaching and scholarship. I have found that these meaning-making tasks have been far more productive and authentic when I have worked on them as a means to collaboration than when I have considered them as ends in themselves.

Try starting your next collaboration with the kind of conversation that engages participants in self-explanation, where tacit assumptions and definitions are brought into the light of others’ questions, probed for nuance, and made explicit. There is no guarantee this will lead to a trouble-free project of course, but according to the OED ‘explicit’ does derive from the classical Latin explicitus: free from difficulties… so it just might.

*A semi-mythical place where all information is well-organized, all colleagues are congenial and collegial, and timezones prove no barrier to productive conversations.

For a longer discussion of collaboration in research, I highly recommend the “Coda on Collaboration” chapter of Critical Reading in Higher Education: Academic Goals and Social Engagement by Karen Manarin, Miriam Carey, Melanie Rathburn, and Glen Ryland, 2015, Indiana University Press.

This article gives the views of the author(s) and not necessarily the views of the Centre for Evidence Based Library and Information Practice or the University Library, University of Saskatchewan.

A small experiment to improve Facebook engagement

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By Joanna Hare
Run Run Shaw Library, City University of Hong Kong

As I am sure is the case at many academic libraries, I am the sole person responsible for maintaining the Library Facebook Page. This means that a lot of my time is spent planning and scheduling content, with not as much time as I would like spent collecting evidence for the purpose of improving content. I regularly check and download Facebook Insights reports to keep an eye on how our page is doing, and of course I always pay attention to how much interaction a particular post is getting through comments, likes, or shares. Recently, however, I trialed a small experiment to see if I could improve the performance of a particular type of post: a weekly link to the Library’s Books of the Week blog.

Books of the Week is a place to share recommended Library books, usually related to a current event such as the Olympics or the beginning of semester. In the past, a feed was created so all new blog posts would be automatically posted to the Facebook page. This was causing a number of problems, such as the timing and number of posts becoming unpredictable, and the posts being poorly formatted in Facebook. Most importantly, the Facebook posts coming automatically from the blog were getting zero engagement, and the Reach of the posts was very low. A change was clearly needed.

I decided to stop the blog posting automatically to Facebook, and manually post the item myself. I created a simple graphic to be used each week, and posting manually meant I could write the accompanying status to be more timely and unique. Even though manually posting the item each week only takes a few minutes, in terms of my job description and job performance I knew I would need to justify if this increased manual work was worth the effort.

Based on an experiment described in this article, I started a log of the variables when posting Books of the Week each week. The log included a link to the post, a description of the post such as the image dimensions, length of the accompanying status, and the time and date of the post. Then, each week I recorded the basic units of measurements for the post provided by Facebook: the Reach and the Post Clicks. I was less interested in likes, comments, and shares in this instance – of course I kept a record of them in my log – but metrics like Reach and Post Clicks are sufficient to see if people are engaged with your content without taking the extra step to ‘like’ a post: “…just because someone didn’t click on your specific post, if that post encouraged them to click anywhere else on your page, you’ve done a good job!” (Cohen, 2014)

For the first four weeks, I saw marked improvement in terms of the Reach, rising from 43 in the first week to 185 by the fourth week. At this point, I tweaked the method of posting. Rather than posting a link then adding the graphic as an attachment, I posted the graphic as a photo, with an html link in the description. Crucially, after digging into my Insights reports I found Facebook categorises the first type of post as a ‘Link’ and the second type as a ‘Photo’. The difference is very small in practice, and looks like this:

figure1_sample-fb-posts_jhare
Fig 1: Image on the left shows a ‘Link’ post type. The second image shows a ‘Photo’ post type.

After making this change, the increase in the post’s Reach was remarkable – the figure jumped to over 500. Over the next 6 weeks I continued this method of posting, and the posts consistently reached over 800 users. Once in the six week period I reverted to the first method, and the Reach dropped to 166. I returned to the second method, and the Reach increased again, which has remained at or above 800 since I stopped keeping a record of the variation each week.

Much of the literature and the marketing material about using Facebook recommends that page managers use images to engage their audience, so I suppose these results are not surprising. I did not however expect there to be such a difference in Reach simply because my post originated as a ‘Photo’ rather than a ‘Link’, when the content is essentially the same.

The general visibility of the posts was much improved with this method, but the change in the actual click through rate to the blog was less dramatic. On average around 5 people each week clicked on the post. My Insight reports show 2-3 of the clicks were to expand the image or description, while on average 0-1 people clicked the link to visit the blog. Quite disappointing!

Despite this, I do not think the exercise was in vain. Firstly, seeing for myself that images truly do have a greater Reach according to Facebook’s algorithm is useful for all future posting practices. Secondly, I think it is valuable to have our posts become more visible on Facebook, increasing our presence on the platform in general. It seems that the manual effort (which is really only around 10- 15 minutes each week – especially now as my colleagues assist in drafting the text and modifying the image!) is worthwhile given the marked increase in the post’s Reach, and the small increase in people who are clicking on the post. This is just a small scale way of using Facebook Insights, and in future I hope to use Insights more strategically in designing and delivering the Library’s Facebook content. In the coming weeks I will be experimenting with a more coordinated approach to Facebook including a paid advertising campaign, and I look forward to sharing some of the results with the C-EBLIP community.

References:

Busche, L. (2016, February 20). 10 Marketing Experiments You Can Run Yourself to Improve Your Reach on Social Media. Retrieved September 27, 2016, from https://designschool.canva.com/blog/marketing-experiments/

Cohen, D. (2014, August 6). Post Clicks, Other Clicks Are Important Metrics for Facebook Page Admins, Too. Retrieved September 27, 2016, from http://www.adweek.com/socialtimes/post-clicks-other-clicks-are-important-metrics-for-facebook-page-admins-too/300388

This article gives the views of the author(s) and not necessarily the views of the Centre for Evidence Based Library and Information Practice or the University Library, University of Saskatchewan.

More Data Please! Research Methods, Libraries, and Geospatial Data Catalogs: C-EBLIP Journal Club, August 25, 2016

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by Kristin Bogdan
Engineering and GIS Librarian
University Library, University of Saskatchewan

Article: Kollen, C., Dietz, C., Suh, J., & Lee, A. (2013). Geospatial Data Catalogs: Approaches by Academic Libraries. Journal of Map & Geography Libraries, 9(3), 276-295.

I was excited to have the opportunity to kick-off the C-EBLIP Journal Club after a brief summer hiatus with a topic that is close to my heart – geospatial data! This article was great in the context of C-EBLIP Journal Club because it introduced the basics of geospatial data catalogs and the services around them, and provided an opportunity to look at the methods used by the authors as part of an ALA Map and Geospatial Information Round Table (MAGIRT) subcommittee research project.

Most of the group was unfamiliar with geospatial data catalogs, so the introductory material provided a good base for further discussion. There was good material about the breadth of the different metadata standards involved and how they are applied at the different levels of data detail. There was also good discussion about the importance of collaboration and the OpenGeoportal consortium in developing geospatial data catalogs.

One of the key themes of our discussion was that we would have liked to see more information about the research design and more data. We would have liked to see mention of the ethics process that the authors went through before carrying out their study. Our group had questions about the process that the subcommittee used to choose their sample, as it seemed like it was fairly limited. The authors acknowledge that this was not meant “to create a complete inventory” (p.281), but it seemed like it could have been broader to be more representative. We would also have liked to see the questions that were asked during the interviews and more of the qualitative data from the interviews themselves. It was unclear how structured the conversations with the catalog managers were and how the data presented in the tables and the conclusions were derived. The information presented in the tables was not consistently organized and seemed like it would have been more useful in the context of the interview. The pie chart they used on page 283 to show the “Approaches to Developing Geospatial Data Catalogs” was not as useful as a table of the same information would have been, as there are 5 pie sections to represent 11 data points.

In light of the questions around the data collection, the leap from the tables of responses to the recommendations seemed fairly large. In general, the lists of questions to consider when determining how to implement a geospatial data catalog were helpful but they aren’t really recommendations. The cases that they present provide some ideas about the staffing and skills required to create a geospatial catalog, but they are vague. The first case seemed unnecessary, as it states “The library has determined that there is a clear need to provide access to the library’s spatial data and other spatial data needed by the library’s customers. However, the library does not have the technology, staffing, or funding needed to develop a spatial data catalog.” It would have been nice to see some alternative solutions for those without the ability to create a full-blown data catalog like suggestions about some practices that could be put in place to start building the foundation of a geospatial data catalog like specific cataloging practices or file-type considerations.

Our discussion concluded with reflection on how carefully and critically we read articles in our general research lives. One of the great things about Journal Club is that we have the opportunity to really interrogate and dissect what we are reading. The ensuing discussion is an opportunity to see the article from many different perspectives. This makes us better researchers in two ways: we are trained to more thoroughly evaluate the things we read and we take that into consideration in the research that we produce.

This article gives the views of the author(s) and not necessarily the views of the Centre for Evidence Based Library and Information Practice or the University Library, University of Saskatchewan.

What is Transliteracy?

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by Dr. Suzana Sukovic
Executive Director Educational Research and Evidence Based Practice, HETI
New South Wales, Australia

Transliteracy as a concept originated in the work of academics who were involved in digital building and tinkering, people who got their hands dirty with some practical work while thinking theoretically (see Transliteracies Project http://liu.english.ucsb.edu/transliteracies-research-in-the-technological-social-and-cultural-practices-of-online-reading/ and Transliteracy Research Group Archive https://transliteracyresearch.wordpress.com/ ). And that is the essence of transliteracy – it is an abstract idea, but also an embodied practice and sensory experience. Transliteracy is neither an idea nor a practice: it is both. It is hardly surprising that librarians at the coalface of information and digital work embraced the concept as they recognised it in their everyday work with information, knowledge and technology.

But what is it exactly? A short answer is that transliteracy is about a fluidity of movement across a range of technologies, media and contexts.

A longer answer is more layered as it is based on a careful analysis of research data:

Transliteracy is an ability to use diverse analogue and digital technologies, techniques, modes and protocols
• to search for and work with a variety of resources
• to collaborate and participate in social networks
• to communicate meanings and new knowledge by using different tones, genres, modalities and media.
Transliteracy consists of skills, knowledge, thinking and acting, which enable a fluid ‘movement across’ in a way that is defined by situational, social, cultural and technological contexts.

A study into transliteracy on which this definition is based provides plentiful examples of transliterate behaviours. A historian presents research data on a website for community use, responds to online queries about family connections, puts people from the community in touch with each other and notes their experience for research purposes. An academic studies parks as public spaces and uses GPS, digital and hard-copy maps, hand drawings made by park visitors, audio-recordings and then publishes reports, brochures, academic journal articles and a website with multimedia. A teenager explores a known fictional text by taking a perspective of an inanimate object or a minor character and expresses her creative reading in a digital story. High school students and scholars alike use resources in analogue and digital forms, create new content, and collaborate and communicate in a variety of modes.

As any educator would have noticed, there are a number of skill sets and capabilities packed in the definition and examples. We can represent transliteracy conceptually with different capabilities as its main components.

Transliteracy conceptual model Sukovic
Figure 1 Conceptual model of transliteracy

Transliteracy comes to the fore in information and technology rich environments, so it is based on information and ICT capabilities. It also encompasses creativity, critical thinking, and communication and collaboration. These are the main skill and knowledge components of transliteracy. These defining components are not situated wholly in the transliteracy framework as they can be observed regardless of transliteracy. Literacy and numeracy underpin transliteracy in the same way they enable any learning.

In order to understand and appreciate transliteracy, it is helpful to understand ‘ICT’ as a label for analogue and digital information and communication technologies, and their many combinations. ‘ICT’ often refers to digital technologies. However, the book, and traditional radio and television are also technologies designed to carry information and facilitate communication. As the line between different types of technologies becomes increasingly blurry, familiar technologies become a thing of the past and old technologies undergo a revival, any technology that helps us to transmit information and communicate is relevant to transliteracy.

Transliteracy existed well before digital technologies, but contemporary ways of interacting with information and digital tools sped up, broadened and changed our daily ‘movement across’ information and technological fields. As technologies, skills and contexts in which we live and work are constantly changing, transliteracy becomes a literacy of the modern era. It is integrative in a sense that it doesn’t want to replace other useful ways of thinking about information and technology. Rather, it provides an integrative framework for bringing together modern literacies (e.g. information, digital, media literacy). It also provides a framework for connecting rational-emotional, analytical-creative and theoretical-practical ways of thinking and working, which enable us to live effectively and creatively with abundant information around us.

The next post in this series will introduce transliteracy palettes and consider the development of transliteracy in formal and informal learning environments.

See the previous post: Transliteracy: the art and craft of ‘moving across’
http://scitechconnect.elsevier.com/transliteracy-art-of-moving-across/

This post was first published on the LARK blog http://lark-kollektive.blogspot.com.au/

Transliteracy in Complex Information Environments_final

Transliteracy in Complex Information Environments is scheduled to publish in November. If you would like to pre-order a copy, please visit the Elsevier Store. Apply discount code STC215 at checkout for 30% off the list price and free global shipping.

This article gives the views of the author(s) and not necessarily the views of the Centre for Evidence Based Library and Information Practice or the University Library, University of Saskatchewan.

Confessions of a Procrastinating (at times) Researcher

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By Virginia Wilson, Director
Centre for Evidence Based Library and Information Practice (C-EBLIP)

When I sat down this morning to write out a comprehensive to-do list, I had to turn away from it for a moment. In my research section, there’s a bit too much going on. I’m in the middle of three research projects – one of which is a solo project and is hanging on far longer than I would have hoped. If it were a child, my data would be starting kindergarten this fall. My other two projects are collaborations. They are moving along, which I attribute to the accountability that comes from working with others. I sometimes look at co-workers and colleagues whom I admire and wonder “how do they get it all done?”

Regarding my solo project, I think my procrastination has been fueled by the feeling of not having a big enough chunk of time to really get into it. That’s merely an excuse, of course. I do have time, and I have had the time, and even if there are not great stretches of it, I should be able to be productive. But the longer I don’t do it, the easier it is to not do it. One of my collaborators, Lorie, said, (and I paraphrase): You can get a lot done in a couple hours or a half a day. You just do it! Just do it. That’s it, really. Don’t think about it, don’t mull it over, don’t wonder, don’t ponder, and for heaven’s sake, don’t read any more literature…just do it. As Yoda says, “Do. Or not do. There is no try.” I’ve been doing a lot of “not doing” on this solo project. So, enough of that! I’m going to enlist all of you as my accountability buddies. I’m declaring here in print that I will write that paper by Spring 2017.

How am I going to do this, you ask? I’m going to take advantage of the C-EBLIP Writing Circle. Every two weeks, a group of us gets together, shares progress and goals, and then writes for a couple of hours. It’s surprisingly effective! I also did some looking around for other productivity techniques and came across a post on lifehacker (and who doesn’t want to hack their life, am I right?) where they outline the five best productivity methods based on “your” votes. The Pomodoro Technique looks pretty interesting. I just need a “simple timer and a little discipline.” Hmm, okay. I’ll set the timer for 25 minutes, start it, and get to work. After I’ve worked for 25 minutes, the timer goes off, and I get a 5 minute break. Apparently, that is one “Pomodoro.” And I go on from there. The key is “short, sustained bursts.” There are some other productivity techniques listed, including a secret from Jerry Seinfeld. I do fear, however, that I will end up procrastinating by exploring more and better productivity techniques!

So, there you go. Probably more than you needed to know about my inner research psyche, but I surely cannot be alone when it comes to following through on research projects. I look to role models for inspiration, which is helpful. But probably the biggest drive for my solo research project right now is the age of the data. It’s still viable, I’m sure of that, but it really needs to get out there. If anything, I owe it to the folks who took the time to share their stories with me. So, that’s a good motivator, too. If you have similar stories to share, or some interesting productivity techniques, I’d love to hear about them.

This article gives the views of the author(s) and not necessarily the views of the Centre for Evidence Based Library and Information Practice or the University Library, University of Saskatchewan.

Late Summer Break

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by Virginia Wilson
Director, Centre for Evidence Based Library and Information Practice

A week of August is gone already and soon we’re all going to lament, “Where did the summer go??” Or, if you’re in the land down under, you might cheer, “Yay, winter is over!” Regardless, Brain-Work is taking a bit of a break for the remainder of August and will return in September with our current roster of blog writers eager and ready to go. We’ll have some familiar faces as well as some new additions to the lineup. In 2016/17, we’re going to be blogging like never before! If you’ve always wanted to try your hand at writing a blog post but don’t want the commitment of your own blog, consider writing for Brain-Work. You can contact me to sign up or if you have any questions. Info for contributors is here: Brain-Work info.

A reminder that the C-EBLIP Research Network is in recruitment mode. The Research Network is an international affiliations of institutions who support librarians as researchers and/or are interested in evidence based library and information practice. You can find out more information or fill out a form to join here: C-EBLIP Research Network.

And the C-EBLIP Fall Symposium: Librarians as Researchers is set to go on Wednesday, October 12, 2016. Set in the lovely Paris of the Prairies, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, the third annual symposium features a networking breakfast, an international keynote speaker, a single track session, and lots of time for meeting, greeting, talking, and sharing. Registration will open closer to the end of August, so plan now to attend. You can find out all kinds of Symposium stuff here: C-EBLIP Fall Symposium

Teaser: Selinda Berg and I are cooking up an exciting new C-EBLIP Research Network initiative. I can’t say much more at this point, but be on the look out for something new coming this fall.