Library Digital Magazine – Fall 2017

Welcome to the inaugural edition of the Library’s digital magazine, which highlights stories from around the library, the library in the news, and upcoming events. A new edition will be published at the start of every semester.

Around the Library

Female student standing in hallway looking at camera.

Library mini grants offer a wealth of resources

A recently-launched library program offers up to $1,000 to support innovative and collaborative projects that make a real-life impact by strengthening community partnerships, enhancing global scholarship, or advocating for diversity and inclusion.

Read how one student made the most of her mini grant.

Resident librarian program focuses on diversity

A new cohort of resident librarians are the first U-M participants in a nationwide program to support early career librarians from underrepresented communities and prepare them for leadership in the profession.

photo of Sheila Garcia

Sheila Garcia

photo of Edras Rodriquez-Torres

Edras Rodriquez-Torres

photo of Jesus Espinoza

Jesus Espinoza

Librarians train to lead

Four people pose for a photo together outside.

To ensure institutions keep up with innovations in higher education, staff members must be looking to the future. At the University of Michigan Library, librarians are doing just that.

New findings show China's research gains

photo of Marisa Conte

Taubman Health Sciences Informationist Marisa Conte co-led a team of U-M researchers that found growth in China's investment and influence in biomedical research as well as in discoveries and advancements by teams that involve researchers from multiple countries.

Library team hacks with the best

A woman stands on stage in front of a large screen.

Librarians and Library staff can hack with the best. In a recent campus-wide competition called Hacks with Friends, two of the final four teams in the competition featured library employees.

Library launches new publishing platform

Michigan Publishing visits the staff of ACLS Humanities E-Book in New York to discuss their selection of Fulcrum as their next-generation platform for reading, discovery, and preservation. The Fulcrum platform, hosted by the U-M Library and developed with the support of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, presents audiovisual materials, 3D models, and other complex digital objects in close relationship with the text.

Photo Gallery

The Library welcomed students back to campus with a "Party for Your Mind" that brought around 2300 students into the Library for games, prizes, and pizza.

Two students examine a chess board.
A female student plays a small gong in front of a crowd in an outdoor setting.
A group of students work on a puzzle together in a crowded room.
Three students stand together wearing Michigan Library tshirts at a table.
A student carries pizza past a block M.

Library In the News

Librarians spearhead fake news course

A woman works a computer at a large table.

The U-M Library has a long record of improving the way that students go about finding, evaluating and using information in their academic work. Now, a marked increase in the online dissemination of intentionally false information has led librarians to join with campus partners  to create a class aimed at helping students develop better critical evaluation skills of news items.

Read more about the fake news class.

Digitizing the Michigan Daily

A photo of the front of a newspaper title The Wolverine.

A partnership between the U-M Library and the Bentley Historical Library digitized 12 decades of the Michigan Daily. “This effort celebrates and preserves 125 years of editorial history for America’s greatest public university,” said Bentley director Terrence McDonald. “This database will be a gold mine of University of Michigan and state of Michigan history.”

Read more about the Michigan Daily digitization project.

Creating a world-class collection

Two woman look over a book in a library setting.

A new collection, born of a collaboration between a faculty member and a librarian, features a wealth of rare print materials and photographs documenting the history of dance in China. It also includes color slides and film reels captured during a Chinese-American dancer's visit to China in 1975, the final year of the decade-long Cultural Revolution.

Read more about the creation of the Chinese dance collection.

New York Times highlights the Library’s Orson Welles archive

“Letters, postcards, diaries and doodles from a teenage Orson Welles, along with unpublished scripts of his many incomplete projects from the ’50s and ’60s, have been acquired by the University of Michigan. The items, which came from his youngest daughter, Beatrice Welles, add to the already extensive trove of Welles memorabilia that the university holds as part of its Screen Arts Mavericks & Makers collection.”

Read about the latest Orson Welles acquisition.

Photo of man sitting with two yound children and a dog.
Book with writting and photos of two men
Hand drawing of a night in armor with a mace.

Homecoming Weekend — Welcome Back to the Library

U-M bicentennial logo

We look forward to seeing alumni in the Shapiro Undergraduate Library on Friday, October 27th, between 10:00 a.m. and 7:00 p.m.

  • Stop by for a free U-M Library scarf.
  • Record your personal U-M story on the Storycorps App for archiving in the Library of Congress.
  • Get an inside look at some of our collections and view demos as part of the U-M Third Century Expo, 4:00-7:00 p.m.
Logo reads StoryCorps

Current & Upcoming Exhibits

Illustration of men crowded around speaker in public forum

Reforming the Word: Martin Luther in Context

View Reforming the Word in the Audubon Room, Hatcher Library | September 5 to November 15

This exhibit displays manuscripts and early printed books to commemorate the 500th anniversary of the publication of Martin Luther's scathing critique of indulgences—a church practice that allowed Christians to buy off time from suffering for one’s sins in the afterlife—which marked a pivotal transformation in world history.

Illustration of clock tower on campus

Creating a Campus: A Cartographic Celebration of U-M's Bicentennial

Creating a Campus is on display in the Clark Library, 2nd Floor Hatcher | through December 20

Learn about the campus’ history and architecture and explore the campus that might have been. In honor of the University of Michigan’s bicentennial, we highlight the U-M Ann Arbor campus, both before its creation and throughout its continuous evolution.

Sketch of women in ball gowns.

The Life and Times of Lizzy Bennet

See The Life and Times of Lizzy Bennet in the Audubon Room, Hatcher Library | Nov. 20, 2017 - March 30, 2018

Marking the 200th anniversary of Jane Austen’s death, this exhibit showcases significant early editions of Austen’s works alongside materials revealing the historical milieu in which she and her characters lived.

Featured Online Exhibit & Digital Collection

Storied Acquisitions: Highlights from the University of Michigan Library Collections

In celebration of the University’s bicentennial, the Storied Acquisitions exhibit showcases treasures from a variety of collecting areas and explores the stories behind the development of some of our most distinctive collections. 

Decorative seventeenth-century map of the African continent
Decorative seventeenth-century map of the African continent
Decorative cover of a book of islamic poetry

John James Audubon's Birds of America and Viviparous Quadrupeds

Images in the John James Audubon's Birds of America and Viviparous Quadrupeds collection are selected from Audubon's world-renowned works known for their artistic as well as scientific merit: 1) The Birds of America from Original Drawings, often referred to as the “double-elephant folio” and published between 1827 and 1838, was the first work purchased for U-M Library in 1839. 2) The Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America, often referred to as the “imperial folio” and published between 1845 and 1848, was purchased jointly by the U-M Library and the William L. Clements Library in 2014.

Snarling wolverine
female and male loons
Pudgy raccoon

Support the Library

There are a variety of ways to support the mission of the library; find out how you can get involved.