Sophie Bogdanski (right), Monographs Unit Librarian for the WVU Libraries, explains Banned Books Week to Shelia Shurina, an education junior, at a display in the Downtown Campus Library Alumni Lobby.

Banned Books Week, a national event that runs from Sept. 25-Oct. 2, has two goals. First, the annual observance is a celebration of the freedom to read. It is also a chance to educate people about the library’s responsibility to collect, provide access, and archive materials on all points of view and on any given topic without censorship.

“The library is a bias-free zone,“ Bogdanski said. “This freedom is essential on a university campus where students, faculty, and staff need to research both sides of controversial issues such as cloning.”

In spite of differing opinions about what is written in a book, people still have the right to read it. This right is embedded in the First Amendment of the Constitution.

Since 1990, the American Library Association’s (ALA) Office for Intellectual Freedom has recorded more than 7,000 book challenges from individuals and groups, including 515 in 2002. A challenge is a formal, written complaint requesting a book be removed from library shelves or school curriculum. About three out of four of all challenges are to material in schools or school libraries, and one in four are to material in public libraries.

Along with the display in the DCL, librarians and staff manned an information booth in the Mountainlair from 11 a.m.-1 p.m. during that week.

–Photo and story by Monte Maxwell, WVU Libraries

Until now, someone searching for a mix of resources to research a topic had to check Mountainlynx to find books, films and microfilm, then look elsewhere on the Libraries’ Web site to find available electronic journals.

It’s now one-stop shopping.

“If students and faculty know to go to Mountainlynx, then they can find the electronic journals they need,” said Linda Blake, electronic journals coordinator and science librarian.

Because the electronic journals are in the online catalog, they are treated like the more traditional items in the collection. This means users can search by keyword to find all available e-journals for a particular area.

For example, someone doing a keyword search on “Hemingway” would find 307 listings of materials available at the WVU Libraries, and one is an e-journal called the Hemingway Review.

Searching under the keyword “art” reels in 24 e-journals among thousands of books and other materials, “engineering” finds 390 e-journals, and “oil” recovers 16.

Users can also choose to narrow their search to just e-journals by setting the Quick Limits option on the Mountainlynx page to “electronic journals.” This mode would return only the 390 e-journals for engineering rather than all of the thousands books, videos and other resources.

Another benefit of these catalog listings is quick access to the material. The user simply clicks on the desired listing and heads directly to the e-journal.

Adding these listings to Mountainlynx is the second step in the Libraries’ plan to enhance access to more than 10,000 e-journals.

The first step was getting an alphabetical list of e-journals on the Libraries’ Web site. The next step is using the enhancements to better manage the resources and, in turn, to continue improving offerings to users.

Blake is excited about the possibilities. She heard statistics at a recent conference that show adding e-journals to the online catalog increases usage and expects the same to happen here.

“This trend is not going to stop,” Blake said. “We’re going to end up with more and more electronic journals and less and less print. And we have to manage them.”

–Monte Maxwell, WVU Libraries