Author Archives: Ekaterina Shibaeva

About Ekaterina Shibaeva

Information Coordinator. IFLA Social Science Library Section

Research Knowledge and Information: Research Support Service to All

In an effort to expand the SocSci partnerships and network of practice, we are launching a new blog post series “Social Science Libraries and Librarians Through the IFLA Global Lens”. This series will showcase the work of library professionals around the world, and the first one will be Dr. Muhammad Yousuf Ali from Karachi, Pakistan.

Dr. Muhammad Yousuf Ali is a professional librarian, information literacy trainer, and library researcher. He has completed the PhD 2023, from The Islamia University Bahawalpur, Punjab. He has done M. Phil from Hamdard University Karachi 2016 and MLIS from the University of Karachi with the distinction of 2nd Position, 2008.

Currently, he has been serving as an Associate Librarian at The Aga Khan University, Karachi since January 2017 till date. Before this, he served as Deputy Librarian at SMIU from September 2012 to Jan 2017;  also performed Job assignments at the Defence Central Library (DCL), Karachi from Aug 2009 to Aug 2012.

He has written 29 research paper in reputable research journals. His Research area of Interest are Web 2.0, Scholarly Communication, Academic Scholarly Networks Sites, Digital Literacy, and Social Media Networks. Since 2019 he has been working as a member of the IFLA Social Science Libraries Standing Committee (2nd term till 2027).

Social Science Activities

The  blog Research Knowledge and Information : Research Support Service to All in English language. You could find there most usfull information, related to Library Services, trends, research and research methodology and library technologies. This blog is helpful to librarians, library and information science students, researchers, and general readers.

The author is also available on YouTube 5Minutes Information Channel which has more than 100-plus videos related to topic (Research Methodology, Library Science, Information Science, Citation Style, Library Trends Library Technology and etc.)

Here you could find one Episode from the Series:

 

Attending the WLIC-2023: Participation and Discussions

Post by Abby Moore, Chair, Social Sciences Section (2023—2025)
September, 2023

I attended IFLA 2023 in Rotterdam, the Netherlands this summer and, as always, the congress was well organized, informative, innovative, and fun.

After a quick weekend in Amsterdam, I traveled to Rotterdam by train and arrived Sunday before the main congress started.

What I noticed almost immediately about the city was that it was clean and pleasant and ultra-modern. Essentially, it was really cool.

 

I rented a bike to get around the city, like the locals do, and used it as my main mode of transportation throughout my stay.

As someone who lives in a southern city in the US, I’m impressed with, and envious of, the bike-ability of the city. The public transportation system is also fantastic!

 

As usual, the opening session was delightful. The interpretive dance performance mesmerized the audience. Princess Laurentien of the Royal House of The Netherlands addressed the attendees and spoke about the importance of literacy and books and libraries.

The Cultural Evening was at the Rotterdam Zoo – what a night! There were DJs playing dance music, burgers and French fries, and tons of exotic animals, particularly the “creatures” that greeted us upon arrival and “waved” goodbye as we left.

Our Section (Social Sciences Libraries) hosted a session, Bringing Back Patrons to the Library: Promoting Community and In-Person Programming in a Digital World, that was extremely well received. I co-hosted the event with the in-coming chair of the Reference & Information Services section.

Our presenters were from all over the world: Greece, South Africa, and Taiwan. The presentations focused on special programs that encourage patrons to come back to libraries after the long and isolating lockdown caused by COVID. In Greece, a repurposed tobacco barn was converted into a new public library in which teens met weekly for their book club. This program was a collaboration between the public library and the local high school. In Johannesburg, South Africa, the public library brought children to the library via a coding boot camp that promoted problem solving skills, teamwork, and socialization. In Taiwan, active senior readers participated in a book club that evolved into a course, which provided lectures and professional development that promoted workforce revitalization for participants.

Attending the World Congress is always a highlight of the year for me, but being able to moderate a discussion with library professionals about the creative and innovative ways they’re promoting literacy and life-long learning, in-person, in their communities was absolutely the best part of the congress for me. Not only did I meet amazing librarians, I walked away with a new appreciation for public libraries and the impact they have on their patrons and communities.

SSLS planning for the 2021-23

On the 10th of September, 2021, the IFLA Social Sciences Libraries Section held their Business Meeting II of (in ZOOM format).

Donatus Düsterhaus, the Convenor of the Religions: Libraries and Dialogue Special Interest Group, sponsored by the Social Science Libraries Section, presented a brief resume of the session Facing the future: working together to improve the interreligious dialogue at IFLA WLIC 2021.

Gene Hayworth, the outgoing Chair of the Section, presented a draft of the annual review, which was accepted without any comments. The Report is forwarded to the Division Chair for approval and will be published after all the procedures are passed.

Speaking about the Action Plan for the period 2021-2023 SC members agreed to continue working on the webinar session series Research Methods in Librarianship, From A- Z: designing, implementing and disseminating your research. The series will be organized in cooperation with the LTR section and members of the IFLA Journal Editorial Board. In 2022 we are planning up to 3 events to be organized. The beginning of the series is available on our YouTube channel.

The planning for WLIC-2022 is going to be organised during the upcoming months when all the procedures become clear.

IFLA Social Science Libraries Section will start to introduce members of the Standing Committee on the pages of social media.
Follow our social media accounts on Facebook & Twitter to get to know us better!

Facing the future: working together to improve the interreligious dialogue

The session, organised by RELINDIAL – Religions: Libraries and Dialogue Special Interest Group (sponsored by the Social Science Libraries Section), was titled “Facing the future: working together to improve the interreligious dialogue” and was held on Wednesday the 18th of August. The programme – due to the concept of our SIG – fitted well into the IFLA’s sub-theme Libraries Enable.

The session was moderated by SIG’s Convenor Donatus Düsterhaus, who shared the information about RELINDIAL, its work and plans. There were three presentations by colleagues from Africa, America and Europe.

• The first presentation came from Ubong Ottong from the University of Calabar in Nigeria. Libraries as the Impetus for Religious Tolerance in Nigeria U. Ottong talked about the country of Nigeria and there was a focus on a study that examined the influence of libraries on religious tolerance in Nigeria.

The Presentation Description is available on the WLIC website for participants with the subscription, the video of the presentation is published on the event page.

• The second presentation was done by Margot Lyon who is Director of Business Development at Atla (American theological Library association). She presented ideas about Religion in the Public Square: Best Practices and Opportunities for Libraries and Religious Literacy. In her paper, she provided an overview of best practices and programs related to the broad topic of Religion in the Public Square and how these activities can frame, inspire and connect initiatives and opportunities related to religious literacy and libraries.

The full paper with Session transcript (12 pages) is available on the WLIC website for participants with the subscription.

• The third contribution came from Nada Dimitrikevic and Suzana Tanasijevic from Serbia. They talked about manuscripts of the old Serbian church. Revival of the past for the future – preservation of old Serbian church manuscripts and printed books.

The Presentation Description is available on the WLIC website for participants with the subscription.

During the Question and Answer Session, we had more than 20 participants.
The SIG RELINDIAL is planning a webinar Serie this autumn about themes related to the Interreligious dialogue in libraries in the world. For more information please follow our social media accounts on Facebook & Twitter.

“August 23, 2018: Workshop on text mining and the HathiTrust Research Center at the IFLA in Kuala Lampur, Malaysia.

Are you attending the IFLA 2018 World Library and Information Congress?

Join us at Dr. Abdul Latiff Library at the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (National University of Malaysia) on August 23, 2018 for a day-long text mining workshop for librarians hosted by the IFLA Social Science Libraries Satellite Meeting.

This workshop will be led by instructors from the IMLS-funded project “Digging Deeper, Reaching Further: Libraries Empowering Users to Mine the HathiTrust Digital Library Resources” (DDRF). DDRF provides a workshop curriculum that teaches library and information professionals to concepts and methods in text mining and related digital scholarship methods, with a focus on the tools and data from the HathiTrust Research Center. The aims of the DDRF workshops are to empower librarians to become more conversant in digital scholarship and engage with digital projects at their institutions.

Here are some of the exciting things you can expect to learn and become familiar with during this session:

Building a corpus of texts in a HTRC Workset, and using it to conduct text analysis on your collection of works;
Gathering data through web scraping;
Cleaning data, dirty OCR, and clean OCR;
Using Python for text mining;
Topic modeling and other approaches for text analysis.
Time: 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. with a break for lunch. All are encouraged to attend, and no experience is necessary!

Registration here: Seating will be limited, so please register at: https://htrc-ddrf-ifla.eventbrite.com

Updates and room directions will be sent to registrants just prior to the event date, and you can visit http://teach.htrc.illinois.edu for information about the workshops.

Questions:http://teach.htrc.illinois.edu/
Please contact htrc_workshop@library.illinois.edu with any questions.