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Rajeswari S. Raina (Ed.) (2015), Science, Technology and Development in India: Encountering Values. New Delhi: Orient BlackSwan, xvii + 294 pp., ₹750.00, (hardback), ISBN: 978-81-250-5855-7.

Purpose We investigated the way in which structured, multiyear conversations about race and institutional racism occurred in suburban secondary schools with changing racial demographics. Research Framework The study draws on interpretive research traditions, in that we assume that how teachers understand race and racism will influence how they work with colleagues and students. As such, the research examines to what extent talking about race and learning about institutional racism affects educators’ mental models and their classroom practices. Method Secondary schools in three districts that had participated in ongoing professional development related to racial equity were selected. Grounded theory methods were used for data collection, coding, and analysis of interviews with teachers and administrators. Findings This study revealed that principal leadership affected teachers’ engagement in this work. When this occurred, teachers made meaningful changes in classroom practices and their school communities. The primary findings of the study are: (1) fear of being considered racist was a barrier for White teachers and administrators that impeded collective focus on racial achievement gaps; (2) principals’ deep personal engagement over a period of several years encouraged a process of confronting and mitigating this fear, and helped teachers engage with the implications of race for school and classroom practices. Significance Discomfort, a critical element in confronting racial inequities in schools, requires school leaders, particularly principals, to authentically participate and engage in order to foster teacher change.

The development of information literacy and learning practices in everyday spaces is explored.Data for the study was collected using photo voice technique. Data analysis was conducted using photos and analysis of group transcripts. Participants describe how they tapped into social, physical and digital sites to draw information in the process of (re) forming their information landscapes, building bridges into new communities and maintaining links with family overseas. Media formats were identified according to their appropriateness as fit for purpose, suggesting that the enactment of information literacy was agile and responsive to need at the moment of practice. The results indicate that everyday spaces provide opportunities to develop information literacy practices, which support informal learning. Findings of the study conclude that information literacy is played out in a series of digital, vernacular and visual enactments, which shape the information landscape.

There are known gender differences in book preferences in terms of both genre and author gender but their extent and causes are not well understood. It is unclear whether reader preferences for author genders occur within any or all genres and whether readers evaluate books differently based on author genders within specific genres. This article exploits a major source of informal book reviews, the Goodreads.com website, to assess the influence of reader and author genders on book evaluations within genres. It uses a quantitative analysis of 201,560 books and their reviews, focusing on the top 50 user-specified genres. The results show strong gender differences in the ratings given by reviewers to books within genres, such as female reviewers rating contemporary romance more highly, with males preferring short stories. For most common book genres, reviewers give higher ratings to books authored by their own gender, confirming that gender bias is not confined to the literary elite. The main exception is the comic book, for which male reviewers prefer female authors, despite their scarcity. A word frequency analysis suggested that authors wrote, and reviewers valued, gendered aspects of books within a genre. For example, relationships and romance were disproportionately mentioned by women in mystery and fantasy novels. These results show that, perhaps for the first time, it is possible to get large-scale evidence about the reception of books by typical readers, if they post reviews online.

N. Lalitha and P.K. Viswanathan (Eds). 2015. India’s Tryst with Bt Cotton: Learning from the First Decade. New Delhi: Concept Publishing Company Pvt. Ltd., pp. 294, ₹950. ISBN: 978-93-5125-108-8

In October 1998, the first international conference on “Empirical Investigation of Social Space” was held in Cologne, Germany. The motivation was to bring together social scientists interested in both traditional and modern methods of constructing social spaces, in line with the work of Pierre Bourdieu. A particular focus was put on methodological and statistical research on correspondence analysis and its application within the social sciences. This contribution reports on the second conference was held in October 2015 in Bonn, Germany.

Carlos Nunes Silva (Ed.), Urban Planning in Lusophone African Countries, Ashgate Publishing Limited, England, 2015, pp. 243, US$ 138, ISBN: 978-1-4724-4487-5 (Hardback).

G. S. Iyer, A China Primer: An Introduction to a Culture and a Neighbour. New Delhi: Vij Books India Pvt Ltd, 2016, pp. 178, ₹ 750. ISBN 978-93-85563-24-9

The purpose of the study is to investigate the knowledge backgrounds of library directors from top universities in mainland China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan to provide support for director selection and training in Chinese university libraries. The study selected 19 library directors from top universities in mainland China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. The data were collected mainly from official homepages of the selected university libraries or library organizations in combination with some supplementary information from individual departments of targeted university libraries. Most library directors from top universities in mainland China and Taiwan were educated at the universities in which they currently work and lack management experience. Such directors tend to be well-known scholars from fields other than library and information science. In contrast, library directors from top universities in Hong Kong have more diverse professional backgrounds, including significant experience working overseas in library and information science. The administrators and hiring committees of Chinese universities should focus on selecting library directors with diverse and advanced qualifications, as well as developing relevant laws and regulations to ensure that the selection of these directors remains competitive on the world stage. Although some studies of academic library directors have already been conducted, few studies have focused on Chinese library directors. This paper revealed the different models of knowledge backgrounds between directors of top universities in mainland China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan.

Applied Theatre: International Case Studies and Challenges for Practice is the second edition of the book that was awarded the Distinguished Book of the Year Award by the American Alliance for Thea...

Nicole Coviello and Helena Yli-Renko (Eds), Handbook of Measures for International Entrepreneurship Research, Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar Publishing, 2016, 656 pp.

The digitization of the Freimann Collection, unique works belonging to the Wissenschaft des Judentums (Academic Study of Judaism), was a collaborative, international initiative to virtually reconstruct a cultural Jewish heritage collection that suffered losses during World War II. These works comprised the first engagement with pre-modern Jewish religious texts using modern research methods of academia. Building off a pre-war published catalog, the project brought together remnants of the original library collection in Germany and collections that were gathered in one of the main exile locations of German-speaking Jews in the United States. The freely accessible texts ensure the enhancement of scholarship by providing long-term discovery to an unlimited audience. Digitization and virtual reconstruction are not only crucial from a digital preservation standpoint, but also allow researchers to envision the works in the context of their intellectual and historical significance. The project also generated models for international collaboration and large-scale digitization workflows.

African digital libraries have evolved beyond the ‘preservation or access’ debate of the 1990s, and the concomitant compulsion to (un-)systematically convert cultural heritage collections from analogue to digital formats. The challenge now lies in the agility to respond to user needs, to match the selection for digitisation with a more strategic approach towards research relevance and potential research outputs. This paper will examine the symbiotic relationship between preservation, cultural heritage and scholarship in a case study on the description and documentation of extinct African languages. It proposes that the new point of focus lies in digital scholarship, enabling both technical innovation and more intellectual engagement in revisiting the digital library to review, correct and augment transitory records through a new scholarly interpretation of African cultural heritage.

Keshavan Nair, Higher Standard of Leadership—Lessons from the Life of Gandhi, 2010, New Delhi: Tata McGraw Hill Publications, pp. 157, ₹ 175, ISBN 978-1-881052-58-6 (hardcover: alk paper).

s presented at the 69th Annual Meeting / 69e Reunion annuelle June 2 – 6, 2015, Victoria, British Columbia

V. Santhakumar, Economics in Action—An Easy Guide for Development Practitioners, New Delhi: SAGE Publications, 2013, 350 pp.

Camfield, L. editor. 2014: Methodological Challenges and New Approaches to Research in International Development. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. xix + 340 pp. £70 cloth, £66.50 e-book. ISBN: 978 1 137 29361 9 (cloth), 978 1 137 29363 3 (ebook).

No abstract

Handbook on the Economics of the Internet Bauer Johannes M & Latzer Michael (eds) Handbook on the Economics of the Internet, Edward Elgar Publishing: Cheltenham and Northampton, MA, 2016; 590 pp.: £205.00.

Sanjay Kumar and Praveen Rai, Measuring Voting Behaviour in India, New Delhi, SAGE Publications, 2013, pp. xv + 174, ₹350.

Manoj Kumar Sinha (Ed.), Business and Human Rights, New Delhi: SAGE Publications, 2013, 401 pp.

Collections are no longer the main attraction in libraries, and libraries are working to find new paths to tread. One strategy is to focus on reading and literature in new and surprising ways. The aim of this article is to enrich an understanding of activities situated in the span between readers’ advisory and audience development. This is achieved through an analysis of opinions and reflections expressed by 13 managers and librarians in all six county libraries in Denmark. The interviews are analysed through the model which merges three concepts: cultural policy, new public management and professional logics. Our findings show that Danish librarians’ views on readers’ advisory and audience development strike a balance between the experience and empowerment rationales with a prevailing focus on users. A user orientation and focus on user experiences have created a situation wherein the notions of passion, commitment, enthusiasm become central to the work of librarians who champion and manage these activities. However, this strategy has limitations related to the choice of content and intended user groups. Audience development, founded on dedication and experience, tends to cater for users who look and think like librarians.

DAVID COOPER (2011), The University in Development: Case Studies of Use-Oriented Research. Cape Town: HSRC Press. 390 pp. PB. AUD58.00.