The Scout Report -- Volume 27, Number 49

Begun in early 2020 by art historian Hyejin Lee, the YouTube channel ArtStoryLab features short videos focused primarily on 18th-century European art. As of this writing, the channel includes 24 episodes on artworks, artists, museums, and more. For example, an 11-minute video from June 27, 2021, "[Peace of Art] How to Pay Attention Like Jean-Simeon Chardin," discusses the artist and includes an index to the works of art discussed. In that video, viewers will be treated to works such as Chardin's Glass of Water and Coffeepot, ca. 1761, located at the Carnegie Museum of Art. Each video also offers suggestions for further reading, such as the book Chardin and Rembrandt, written by Marcel Proust and translated by Jennie Feldman. Readers can follow ArtStoryLab on Instagram (@_artstorylab) for more information. [DS]

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Founded in 1993, the Islamic Networks Group (ING) is an organization dedicated to building peace and fostering an understanding of Muslims, Islam, and other marginalized and misunderstood groups, "to promote harmony among all people." This national network of speakers and educators works to promote diversity and cultural awareness through presentations, workshops, panels, social media campaigns, online curriculum, and more, in order to challenge stereotypes and prejudice. On the page linked above, visitors can navigate the menu at the top to sections for scheduling panels, presentations, and cultural diversity seminars for schools, colleges, community groups, law enforcement, corporate environments, healthcare, and more. Readers can also explore the educator curricula, become an ING speaker or affiliate, or join youth or interfaith programs. Visitors will also find details about the organizations' governance boards and staff, program information, impact statements, a blog, and information about upcoming events. Readers can follow on Twitter (@ING_org) to stay in touch. [RMP]

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Nebraska, the "Cornhusker State," is located at the crossroads of America near the geographic center of the continental U.S. It will come as no surprise, then, that Nebraska's history reflects the richly varied and complex nature of broader American history. Now, historians, educators, students, and tourists can explore the places, figures, and events that have shaped this history through the "layered, map-based multimedia presentations," of Omaha Historical's website and mobile app. On the page linked above, visitors will find 30 distinct "Stories" on topics such as the "ghost signs" in Omaha's old market district and the numerous historic cemeteries and buildings of Omaha and nearby Lincoln. Also of interest for potential travelers to the state are 10 "Tours," which compile and sequence various locations in Nebraska according to different themes, such as "Sites of Queer Representation in Nebraska," and "A Century of Lead Rain: Omaha's industrial Legacy," which allow users to conduct self-guided visits to these historic places. Omaha Historical is a project of University of Nebraska at Omaha Libraries, featuring student-created content and edited by Jason Heppler, Digital Engagement Librarian and Assistant Professor of History at the University of Nebraska at Omaha. [IM]

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Trees of Translation is an experiment in visualizing the translation of poetry and making the changelog of the process visible for readers. On the page linked above, readers will find poems by American poet Emily Dickinson and Chilean poet Victoria Ramirez, translated into the other's language (Dickinson from English to Spanish, Ramirez vice-versa). The translation process was encoded by the translators, using fan-shaped markings to indicate visible and erased text (readers can find more information about the technique in the Legend section). The resulting graphs - elegant, fan-like visualizations - are presented alongside the original and translated text. The techniques make the translations available for enjoyable viewing but not copying. Trees of Translation was created by Baltazar Perez, Ilana Levin, Simon Lopez, Rodrigo Olavarria, and Francisco Cardemil. [DS]

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CLOCKSS (Controlled LOCKSS) is a collaborative endeavor between research libraries and leading academic publishers that provides what's known as a "dark archive" to help sustain access to web-based scholarly content. A dark archive is a repository that doesn't grant public access but preserves the information contained as needed. As such, the material is only available if a trigger event occurs, with the open-source LOCKSS technology checking the stored data on a regular basis to make sure it remains viable and valid. In other words, if web-based content being stored in the archive is in danger of disappearing, CLOCKSS will "trigger" it and make it accessible again. Trigger events so far have been rare, but the project's website provides information about what resources have been triggered over the life of the project. With 12 different archive nodes, the project preserves authoritative versions of some 46 million journal articles, 25,000 serial and 260,000 book titles, as well as other materials and metadata. As of this writing, CLOCKSS has 300 participating libraries and 400 participating publishers. The project aims to keep operating costs low and make it possible for any institution to participate. With sustainability in mind, should the project fold for any reason, 4 of the 12 library nodes have committed to continued preservation of the archive's content. Details about joining CLOCKSS, and more information about the benefits of joining, are available on the page linked above. [REB]

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From the National Park Service (previously featured in the 06-19-2020 Scout Report), this collection features more than 20 paleontology activities, lesson plans, and materials for elementary, middle, or high school classrooms. The resources were "developed by education specialists in the National Park Service, fossil sites, or museums across the country," which should assure science teachers that these materials will be appropriate for the classroom and engaging for students. Best of all, the resources feature site-specific elements from the country's iconic national parks, preserves, and monuments. For instance, the lesson "Make Your Own Fossils" gets students to produce fossils like those found at Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument. Or, teachers can contact rangers from Agate Fossil Beds National Monument for a virtual field trip to see mammalian fossils in the plains of Nebraska. Whether the topic is stratigraphy, adaptation, biodiversity, animal behavior, or geology, teachers are sure to find something to integrate into their lessons. The page linked above also has contact information teachers can use to access older educational resources and additional materials. [MJZ]

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How do evolutionary biologists and paleontologists loosen up after work? For scientists James Lamsdell, Amanda Falk, and Curtis Congreve, it involves enjoying some beers while engaging in lively, critical discussions of scientific papers - and digressing into pop culture topics such as movies, video games, and music. Palaeo After Dark is bi-weekly podcast covering fossils, evolutionary history, ancient ecology, and more. In each 90-minute episode, the hosts discuss several recent scientific papers, critically examine the findings, and consider what each new discovery might mean for our understanding of the planet's natural history. Recent episodes have addressed why rabbits are small ("Amanda Loves Watership Down"), how climate influences evolutionary patterns ("Ramble On"), and the behavior of herbivorous dinosaur species ("Salty Tooth"). All episodes can be found on the page linked above or on most podcatcher apps. Additionally, visitors may want to check out the "Palaeo Film Club," which includes commentary tracks for films such as Evolution. Listeners can follow the podcast on Facebook (@PalaeoAfterDark) to stay up-to-date. [MJZ]

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A wonderful compendium of information, TrowelBlazers was created by four women dedicated to "highlighting the contributions of women in the 'digging' sciences: archaeology, geology, and palaeontology, and to outreach activities aimed at encouraging participation, especially from under-represented minorities." The four creators - Brenna Hasset, Tori Herridge, Suzanne Pilaar Birch, and Rebecca Wragg Sykes - are based at educational institutions and museums in the U.S. and the U.K., and all have backgrounds and expertise in archeology and related fields. At the heart of the site are two main sections featuring blog posts and articles covering a variety of interviews, biographies, drawings, poetry, videos, and more. For instance, a recent blog post includes a beautifully crafted animation (or "TrowelToon") about Zheng Zhenxiang, who was the first female archaeologist in China. The animation was created by Genevieve Cheung and Sara Duckworth as part of the 2021 University College London TrowelBlazers Digital Fieldwork Project. (For those interested, more information about other students who participated and their projects can be found in a later post.) Another recent article provides a brief overview of the career of Gertrude Labib Nassim, who was an Egyptian geologist and one of the first women in Egypt to earn a science PhD. Her geological research in the 1940s and 1950s concerned desert nickel and oolithic hematite deposits. Interested readers can follow the project on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram (@trowelblazers on all three platforms). [REB]

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Letters from Gondwana is a blog, published since 2013, musing on paleontology, literature, and the history of science. The blog is the creation of paleontology student Fernanda Castano of the University of Buenos Aires. Readers will find themselves surprised by the topics covered in each post, which may include recent paleontological findings, discussions of key (and sometimes forgotten) figures in the history of paleontology, or exegeses of works of literature. For instance, a post from Halloween 2021 considers the 1929 short story "The Hounds of Tindalos," written by Frank Belknap Long, relating the mysterious, fractal "hounds" of the story to some of the bizarre and diverse creatures found in the fossil record. Another post, from April 15, 2021, explores Leonardo da Vinci's discovery of what was probably a fossilized whale in a cave in the Tuscan countryside. Letters from Gondwana is sure to intrigue students and practitioners of paleontology, and the quirky mix of science and story will make this blog intriguing for general readers as well. [MJZ]

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Dinosaurs are fascinating and exciting for young students, which makes them a useful subject for science teachers to deploy in lessons about geology, evolution, the fossil record, taxonomy, and other topics. From the American Museum of Natural History (previously featured in the 06-18-2018 Scout Report), this collection features curriculum resources designed for Grades 5-8. Among the materials are individual classroom activities (labels as "Hands-On"), lesson plans ("Educator Materials"), and related content ("Articles"). Each resource features a complete description and downloadable materials, including PDFs for activities and mp3 files for audio content. Best of all, the materials draw on the museum's collections and exhibits. Educators will want to check out lesson plans such as "What Teeth Tell Us," "Functions of Feathers," and "What is a Fossil?" Teachers can also explore other "Curriculum Collections" from the museum for other subjects such as biodiversity, ecology, earthquakes, the solar system, climate and weather, and architecture. The American Museum of Natural History, located in New York City, is one of the "world's preeminent scientific and cultural institutions." Readers can follow the museum on Facebook (@naturalhistory) or Twitter (@amnh). [MJZ]

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Last featured in the 06-24-2016 Scout Report, Palaeocast has continued to regularly release quality content exploring evolution and the history of life on this planet. Listeners can catch up with recent episodes on bats (Episode 130), penguins (Episode 129), and crocodiles (Episode 121/122).

The award-winning podcast Palaeocast is "a free web series exploring the fossil record and the evolution of life on earth." Launched in 2012, the show now has more than 125 episodes. Installments range in length from about half an hour to an hour. Each episode introduces listeners to a range of paleontology-related topics and maintains factual integrity by "sourc[ing] all materials from professional academics, letting experts tell the story of their own research." For example, Episode 111, "Diversity in Palaeontology," features conversations with various scholars, reflecting on "some of the issues within our science and the ways they are being addressed." Episode 110, "The Fin-Limb Transition and Early Tetrapod Biodiversity," explores "the water-land transition." Episodes are organized on the page linked above by geologic era (Cenozoic, Mesozoic, Paleozoic, and Precambrian). Listeners can also find Palaeocast on Google Play, Stitcher, and other popular podcast platforms. The podcast is funded by the Palaeontological Association and the Paleontological Society. Listeners can also follow along on Twitter and Facebook (@palaeocast on both platforms). [MMB] [MJZ]

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