PaleoNet: [EXTERN] Re: Downsizing

Wed Apr 3 07:56:50 UTC 2024

"Downsizing is hard"

Dear paleonetters

I experience similar things, and also see similar things happen with colleagues' hand libraries.

Just few months before retirement I accumulated quite some volume of a personal hand library in my field of expertise, over decades.

It not only has a number of literature that is virtually difficult to obtain today (often it took considerable effort to find out, collect) but as a whole reflects the development of my research interests/activity over long time.

OK, so what?:

Preserving hand/working libraries of individual researchers (professors, researchers) may become especially important if one curates research collections of experts if one wishes to follow changes in collection concepts or even the development of scientific hypotheses and their "solutions" in context of a scientific legacy. Hand libraries are far more than just a pile of papers and xerox copies. Often they include connected correspondence about a scientific content. Sometimes, xeroxed copies from articles in hand libraries - while still available electronically - contain the author's comments and scribbles while she/he was reading the paper, and so provide valuable opinions or critiques or alternatives that reviewers perhaps have overlooked. Hand libraries include unpublished (but valuable) research data sets and observations, protocols to experiments (even if experiments failed) and details to old techniques and methods. Such protocols may sometimes be more precise and more to the detail than in method's sections of published articles (because in older literature methodology sections were of less interest or had sometimes to be shortened on "command" of reviewers). Hand libraries may contain fotographs, notes and sketches of ideas that were never further followed or realized, or just contain documents of historic interest. Even collections of obituaries within a research area give an idea about a person's ancient scientific network, which can be extremely interesting for following up changes in scientific concepts (e.g., who is working with whom ? Who shares the same ideas with whom ? What team or school followed a different concept ?). Portions of a hand library may inform about the history of an entire discipline, industry branch, societal developments, or changes in climatic conditions of a geographic region where the person once had worked. Usually, hand libraries are organized by their creators, either using an electronic tool or an analogue cardfile system. These are the key to a hand library to spot a research topic or article/file relatively quickly. Thus, hand libraries are searchable and may help to recognize the researcher's thread of thought.

I just experienced all these things during my own previous curatorial work in micropaleo collections and especially while using an important archive and legacy on the Geology of Trinidad.

Unfortunately not every librarian is recognizing (can't recognize because its outside of their expertise) the value/importance of extended hand libraries and so do not put the necessary care and effort to merge orphaned hand libraries into a manageable system (which of course costs man power). The result is, that valuable literature collections, or blocs of them is discarded or becomes disentangled (and so loosing internal links and context) and then given as isolates to antiquariats. Even duplicates or triplicates of books, if available, are worth not to be discarded because there will come the day when only a single volume is available and then perhaps may be in a bad physical condition because the paper is altering and decaying. It is not seldom, that discarding hand libraries seems the cheaper and more satisfactory solution than keeping them organized for future researchers (seen so in universities and even in museums). But that is a fatal error ! We all are aware that electronic archival is not durable and so is no ultimate solution. Who in 200 years will be able to decipher our current pdfs and Microsoft's formats ? In contrast, ancient egyptian papyrus has survived thousands of years (under dry desert conditions...)

In my opinion not taking care about hand libraries of researchers is loss of science! (not to forget the amount of funding money and personal efforts that once had to be raised to carry out all the research).

It is sometimes also the attitude of younger scientists that everything older than about 1986-1990 (in about the period when pdf's raised to be common) is useless as everything older is out of interest and new and important are available in electronic format. What a misconception ! Many questions sparkling around in old science books have not scientifically been solved yet; taking them up in a modified perspective old ideas may lead to vibrating new research by using newest technologies. Sometimes, one may get a clue from older literature or hand libraries why some ideas/concepts were once followed while others remained in the drawers (these were not always reasons by logical scientific thinking but had sometimes to do with the power of individual experts).

I am just disappointed seeing that there is so little interest in keeping blocks of hand libraries of individuals.

They are often the "brain" and source of brilliant ideas to the scientific legacy of a researcher, even if it was not Charles Darwin.

More care and thoughts should be given on that matter.

Michael

PD Dr. Michael Knappertsbusch
Curator for micropaleontology
Natural History Museum Basel
West-European Micropaleontological Reference Center for the DSDP/ODP/IODP
Augustinergasse 2
4001-Basel
Switzerland

Tel. +41-61-266 55 64
Fax. +41-61-266 55 46

Email: michael.knappertsbusch at unibas.ch
Internet: http://micropal-basel.unibas.ch
Homepage Museum: http://www.nmbs.ch

________________________________
Von: PaleoNet <paleonet-bounces at lists.paleonet.org> im Auftrag von Tony Wright via PaleoNet <paleonet at lists.paleonet.org>
Gesendet: Mittwoch, 3. April 2024 03:58:20
An: 'A communications system for paleontologists.'
Cc: Tony Wright
Betreff: [EXTERN] Re: PaleoNet: Downsizing

Hi John,

Good to hear from your message and Nomen nudum that you are still in the land of the living. Your message is very interesting!

I have a query for you about personal libraries. Given the reluctance of institutional libraries in general to find space, resources and general interest in absorbing these libraries (for instance, see the fate of the Dorothy Hill/UQ departmental library) have you seen this problem discussed anywhere? What has happened with GA folk in recent years? I know that Des and Barry Webby passed on stuff to Londonderry (and so have I, but only largely unwanted stuff), but this must be a general problem, Like you I have spent a lot of $ collecting stuff and I have lots of the usual freebies which are now unobtainable.

Just a continuing thought.

Best wishes
Tony
From: PaleoNet [mailto:paleonet-bounces at lists.paleonet.org] On Behalf Of John Laurie via PaleoNet
Sent: Tuesday, 2 April 2024 11:25 PM
To: A communications system for paleontologists.
Cc: John Laurie
Subject: PaleoNet: Downsizing

Paleonetters,
Downsizing is hard.
https://blotreport.com/2024/03/31/old-friends/

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://lists.paleonet.org/pipermail/paleonet/attachments/20240403/ad661e6f/attachment-0001.htm>