General Interest
The Folger Shakespeare Library opened in 1932 as a gift to the United States from Henry Clay Folger and his wife Emily Jordan Folger. Located in Washington, DC, the Library continues to be administered by a board of governors from Amherst College, Mr. Folger's alma mater. As one might imagine, the site has a great deal to offer those looking for materials related to Shakespeare, and the "Discover Shakespeare" area is a good place to start in this regard. In this area, visitors can learn about Shakespeare's life, his works, and even view images from some of his rare folios held by the Library. Scholars and others will find that the "Use the Collection" area is invaluable as well. Here visitors can learn about fellowship programs offered by the Library, and more importantly, they can also browse through their digital collection, which contains over 20,000 images. These images include books, theater memorabilia, manuscripts, and letters. Finally, visitors can also sign up to receive electronic news updates and also learn about their upcoming theatrical productions. [KMG]
A number of organizations have offered the general public selections from the secret tapes made by President Richard Nixon between 1971 and 1973, but the Nixon Tapes project under the direction of Professor Luke A. Nichter at Texas A&M University-Central Texas aims to bring together a complete online audio archive of all the tapes in question. The project is well under way, and the site contains a tremendous number of full-length tapes and transcriptions. It's no small task, as the sound quality on the tapes ranges from unintelligible to acceptable. Visitors can click on the "Audio & Transcripts" area to listen those tapes that are currently available. The project is an ambitious one, and it will certainly warrant several return visits. [KMG]
http://www.bl.uk/takingliberties
Britain has a rich and divergent set of traditions when it comes to freedoms and rights, and this highly interactive and well-designed online exhibit lets users explore some of the events, issues, and debates involved with such matters. The exhibit is meant to complement an in situ exhibit that ends in March 2009, and visitors can get started by looking over the "Star Items" section of the site. In this section, visitors can look over 40 "key icons of liberty and progress, from the Magna Carta to the Declaration of Human Rights." The documents are arranged chronologically and by theme, such as "Rule of law" and "Parliament and people". Moving on, the "Audio & Video" area includes a four-minute introduction to the exhibition, a lecture on the Magna Carta, and a "virtual curator". The site is rounded out by the "Taking Liberties" interactive feature, which allows users to learn how they stand in regards to current debates on freedoms in society, detention without charge, and the right to privacy. [KMG]
The Ohio Digital Resource Commons (DRC) is a place to learn about the historic, instructional, cultural, and creative works of those in the Ohio University system, as well as the liberal arts colleges of Ohio. Although not all of the Ohio schools save material with the DRC, many of them elect to do so. Higher education institutions, as well as K-12 institutions are allowed to save their work via the central network, as long as the work has archival merit. Visitors will want to click on "Communities and Collections" on the left hand menu to browse the vast resources available. Some of the communities included are "Art and Architecture", "Multi-Subject Video", and "OhioLINK Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Center". Within each community are some notable collections including, "Archaeological Atlas of Ohio", "Encyclopedia of Physics Demonstrations", and the "Kent State Shootings Oral Histories". In order to see a list of the archives available to search, visitors should click on "Advanced Search", under the blank search box near the top of the page. The scrollable box next to the archives category includes such choices as "Oberlin Digital Commons", "Scholarly Commons at Miami University", and "Digital Archive of Literacy Narratives". [KMG]
http://www.australiadancing.org/
For those who are enamored of dance or looking to learn more about it, the Australia Dance Collection: a Directory of Resources should prove eminently interesting. This sleek-looking directory of resources provides links to dance education and training, dance performances, dance history, dance news, and the list goes on. For information specifically on dance in Australia, the links at the top of the page, entitled "People", "Companies", "Performances", and "Oral Histories" are the gateways to the dance contributions to the cultural heritage of Australia. Ausdance, Australia's professional dance organization, is also represented on this website, and has links entitled "Profession", "News", "Resources" and "Events". Ausdance has eight different state and territory organizations that can be accessed by their abbreviations, i.e. NSW, Vic, Qld, and are listed at the bottom of each section of the Ausdance website. The Related Links menu, found back on the homepage of the Australia Dancing Website, contains a selection of dance sites that are divided up into the categories "Portals", "Directories", "Resource Collections", and "Reference Texts". Each category has a dozen or more links to visit, including one under Reference Texts entitled "Mir iskusstva: Serge Diaghilev's Art Journal" with drawings from an art journal conceived by the man behind the Ballets Russes companies. The drawings are lovely and rich, and promote the Russian arts and craft movement, rather than Realism, which was the style dominant in Russia at the time. [KMG]
http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/tuliatexas/
The PBS series Independent Lens features documentaries and dramas by independent filmmakers. The documentary, TULIA, TEXAS, which will air in February 2009, is about a small town in Texas that experienced a rash of arrests by an undercover narcotics agent ten years ago. The arrests were for cocaine sales, and were mainly of the town's African American residents. On the homepage for the film, visitors can click on "Watch Preview", on the top right side of the page, to see a trailer. To learn about the people in the film, visitors can click on "Read More About the Film" in the middle of the page. There are several short clip provided, which can be viewed by rolling over still pictures from the clips, and clicking on the "Watch Video" prompt as it appears. For visitors interested in seeing a screening of the documentary in their community, click on the "Get Involved" tab near the top of the page. In addition to a list of locations throughout the United States where the film will be screened, there are also links to PDFs of a "Discussion Guide" and a "Facilitator's Guide". [KMG]
The International Indian Treaty Council (IITC) is "an organization of indigenous peoples from North, Central, South America, the Caribbean and the Pacific working for the sovereignty and self determination of indigenous peoples." To achieve their broad goals, the IITC works to support networks of indigenous peoples around the world through their policy work in areas that include global trade, women's rights, reproductive health, and the environment. On their homepage, visitors can browse through thematic headings on the left-hand side of the page, such as "Treaty Conferences", "Cultural Rights", "Health/Toxics", and about a dozen additional listings. Visitors should also click on the "Web Content" tab to read flyers, United Nations resolutions, and draft declarations. Also, visitors can sign up to subscribe to the IITC's electronic news updates here. [KMG]
http://special.st-andrews.ac.uk/saspecial/
At this website, visitors can enjoy selected digitized images from the collections of St. Andrews University Library, which, in its own words, "holds one of the largest and most important collections of historic photography in Scotland", due in part to the friendship between Sir David Brewster (Principal at St. Andrews from 1838 to 1859) and pioneering photographer William Henry Fox Talbot. The digitized collection includes over 1000 images created by Talbot, including portraits of David Brewster, and plates from Talbot's book, "The Pencil of Nature". Other early photographers in the collection are Dr. John Adamson, David Octavius Hill, Robert Adamson (Dr. Adamson's younger brother and student), and Thomas Rodger. The web-accessible portion of the collection is currently a small percentage of the 300,000 items in the collection; however, St. Andrews plans on adding to it "until virtually the whole collection will be searchable from remote sites." [DS]
