Ruth Rikowski's 41st News Update

I hope you are enjoying the summer. In one way or another, there always seems to be quite a lot going on in my life, and I can only ever really report on some of it. So, anyway, here are some of the latest highlights from me below.



1. VICTORIA PERSELLI INVITING ME TO GIVE A KEYNOTE SPEECH AT KINGSTON UNIVERSITY
I received a lovely, unexpected email ‘out of the blue’ from Dr. Victoria Perselli, Chair of Programme Directors, Education Doctorate and Course Director, MA Education (English Language Teaching), School of Education at Kingston University, inviting me to give a Keynote Speech at Kingston. Giving a Keynote will be a first for me, so is obviously special and something that I am excited about.

My talk will be in mid-September, 2010 and will be entitled ‘Information Technology: a form of liberation for females?’ I will look briefly at the traditional computing industry, which is very male-dominated, and then consider whether specific areas of IT can provide a new form of liberation for females; and in particular, whether social networking tools can help in this regard. I will argue that whilst these tools are useful they need to be used with care and they do not necessarily empower females; instead, they can even help to create new levels of vulnerability and can be time-wasting. Rather, females need to be more pro-active in general. I will then look briefly at the Feminist Library in London and drawing on my forthcoming book on digitisation, will argue that in order to preserve this wonderful collection the digitisation of some of this material could prove to be highly advantageous.



2. ALEXANDER RIKOWSKI OBTAINING AN UPPER SECOND HONOURS DEGREE IN PHILOSOPHY FROM KING’S COLLEGE...AND NEWS OF SOME OTHER RESULTS
Our eldest son, Alexander Rikowski recently obtained a 2:1 for his Philosophy degree at King’s College, London, which we were obviously all delighted about. He worked very hard for it; it was a very demanding degree, with weekly essays and involved reading the raw material of many of the great philosophers. Also, most of the other students there had been to public school, so came from very different and privileged backgrounds compared to Alex; so he had that to handle as well. Alex thought that these people were definitely being groomed specifically to enter into the upper class/upper-middle class. Interestingly, Alexander got his best mark (69%) in Marxism. In particular, he has worked out some ground-breaking and very important ideas in regard to justice; but more about that on another occasion.

Meanwhile, our middle son, Victor, got a good upper second overall at the end of his second year at Bangor University, working towards his degree in Music and Creative Writing there. He also got Firsts in courses on Music Composition and Creative Writing for Children; so that was all great, and once again, demonstrates the extent and range of his artistic and creative ability.

Finally, my second cousin Neil Whitehead (who designed our ‘Flow of Ideas’ website – www.flowideas.co.uk) got a Double Distinction for his Foundation Degree in Photography at Southampton University, so he is safely through to the degree programme! He is also already planning to self-publish his second book – showing great initiative for someone that is just embarking on a first degree, I think.


3. WRITING CONSULTANCY WORK
For the last few months I have become very passionate about dancing (something that I have always loved but have not taken quite so seriously before). But now, I am determined to learn many of the steps properly. So, believe it or not, I am now learning ballroom, sequence, salsa and argentine tango dancing. It has, and continues to be, truly wonderful!
Anyway, a few weeks ago, someone at one of the dances noted that I was writing something down, and came over and asked me if I was a writer. To cut a long story short, having established that I was indeed a writer, he then asked me if I would help him with some of his own writing, offering to pay me for this. This assignment has now been successfully completed. Which now leads me on to say that if others are interested in me working for them on this basis (in whatever writing/editing/publishing capacity), then please do feel free to get in touch, and we can explore the possibilities together!



4. FOUR NEW ITEMS UP ON MY ‘SERENDIPITOUS MOMENTS’ BLOG
There are four new items up on my ‘Serendipitous Moments’ blog: 3 items about some events in our local community which we not only went to but were involved with and one book review. The 3 local events were: the Forest Gate Carnival, the Big Lunch and Forest Roots. The choir that I am in, Forest Voices sang at both the ‘Forest Gate Carnival’ and ‘Forest Roots’ and our son Victor, played acoustic guitar and sang at both the ‘Big Lunch’ and ‘Forest Roots’. The Forest Roots event was a first for Victor; he has played at lots of venues in Bangor, North Wales (both with his band and on his own), but it was the first time that he had performed solo to a musically-appreciative community-based London audience. He played one of his own compositions, ‘Today’ (which he composed just the day before) and a country and western song ‘Choices’ by George Jones, from the album ‘Cold Hard Truth’. There were many different musical acts throughout the evening at ‘Forest Roots’, with the main act being the band ‘Acoustica’ – all very enjoyable.

The book review is a short one of a bestselling novel, ‘Highland Fling’ by Katie Fforde, which I found to be a pleasant read.



5. PROPOSAL FOR A THIRD INTERNATIONAL MEETING FOR PROGRESSIVE LIBRARY ORGANISATIONS
Having completed his interviews with progressive librarians in various parts of the world, Al Kagan, African Studies Bibliographer and Professor of Library Administration Africana Collections and Services at the University of Illinois Library is now hoping to bring about a third international meeting for progressive library organisations. He is currently pooling ideas and I wish him every success with this worthwhile project.



6. NEWS ITEM FROM JESSICA (JIA LIU), ONE OF THE CONTRIBUTORS TO MY FORTHCOMING BOOK PERSPECTIVES ON DIGITISATION, FOCUSING ON A PROFESSIONAL CONVERSATION BETWEEN Dr. JIA LIU & Prof. ELMAR MITTLER
Below is another news items kindly sent to me by Jia Liu (who likes to be known as Jessica (following on from 2 news items from her in my last newsletter, No. 40, in item 4). This news item focuses on a professional discussion that she had with Professor Elmar Mittler.


“VISIT BY PROFESSOR ELMAR MITTLER
Recently I visited Professor Elmar Mittler, my former supervisor when I implemented a research project with the fellowship of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, in the historical building of the Göttingen University and Lower-Saxony State Library (SUB Göttingen).

Prof. Elmar Mittler (http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elmar_Mittler) had been the director of SUB Göttingen from 1990 to 2006. Before that he had been the director of the Heidelberg University Library and the Bad State Library in Karlsruhe. The deepest impression I have had about him was his open mind and kind attitude. With his leadership, SUB Göttingen has been one of the biggest research libraries all over the world and he has a very high reputation in the worldwide library circle. Though he retired in 2006, obviously he’s still been very energetic and active in a variety of fields. During our last meeting, I invited him to talk a little on several points. This is what he said:

“ “ Activities for the time being
In respect of librarianship, I’m currently the chairman of the Consortium of European Research Libraries (CERL, http://www.cerl.org/web/), which is aimed at promoting Europe's cultural heritage in manuscript and print. On the one hand, it develops the database, the Heritage of the Printed Book in Europe, c. 1450 - c. 1830, a database of records from major European and North American research libraries. Also, it develops services and tools. The CERL Thesaurus provides multi-lingual information about names of persons and places found in catalogues of books of the hand-press period. And the CERL Portal offers cross-searching of catalogues of European manuscript materials, with the option to search selected early-printed books databases. So far 30 European libraries have been involved in CERL.

In the meantime, I give lectures on the book history in the Department of History of the Göttingen University. My main interest is how historians take advantage of modern techniques in the virtual research environment. I focus on the book heritage and book database. I teach in the Department of Book Science of the University of Mainz as well.

Cooperation with libraries of the United Kingdom

In addition to cooperating with some libraries of the United Kingdom within the activities of CERL, the Göttingen University Library collaborates on LIBER (Ligue des Bibliothèques Européennes de Recherche, in English, Association of European Research Libraries, at URL http://www.libereurope.eu/) with some English leading academic research libraries. The Göttingen University Library plays the leading role in these two organisations. I had been the president of LIBER for 4 years and now my successor continues the work.

On the other hand, the other European project my successor is running is open-access.net (http://open-access.net/de_en/homepage/), the platform providing open access to scholarly information.

Cooperation between your library and Chinese libraries
In the last two years, the Göttingen University Library had cooperation with the Shanghai Library. In the meantime, our library takes part in information exchange with Chinese libraries. This activity is mainly driven by the German National Library of Science / Technology and University Library Hannover (Technische Informationsbibliothek / Universitätsbibliothek Hannover, TIB Hannover). The main field related is nature science.

Current status of the German libraries
German libraries have the same financial problem[1]. The background is that the price of the science journal increases but the library budget keeps the same as before. There is no difference between the staff cost and the maintaining cost and they belong to one budget. Under the case that the whole budget shrinks, in order to keep the maintaining cost, the library director has to reduce the personnel. The libraries are really under great pressure and such situations started about 6 years ago in Germany.

On the other hand, German research libraries get additional funding these years. The German students began to pay the tuition, some part of which is used to maintain and develop the library. A part of the tuitions has been taken advantage by the Göttingen University Library to provide longer service time. Besides, there are some investment programmes of the government to support the library. The additional funding is used to refresh the new building of the Göttingen University Library. That’s the similar situation in other German libraries. “ “





7. MICHAEL WILBY – WINNER OF THE PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAY PRIZE 2010: ‘THE SIMPLICITY OF MUTUAL KNOWLEDGE’
http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all~content=a923143368~frm=titlelink Michael Wilby, a former A-level philosophy student of Glenn Rikowski’s (in the early 1990s) at Epping Forest College, won the Philosophical Essay Prize, 2010, for his essay on ‘The Simplicity of Mutual Knowledge’. Upon leaving Epping Forest College, Michael went on to obtain a degree in philosophy and then a PhD from the University of York, and he now teaches at Anglia Ruskin University, on the Cambridge campus. We were obviously delighted to find out about Michael winning this prize and wish him every success in the future. Michael is the son of the famous journalist, Peter Wilby, columnist of the Sunday Observer and the Guardian, and former editor of the Independent on Sunday and the New Statesman.



8. RECENTLY RELEASED FILM ‘INCEPTION’ INCLUDES SYNTHESISER PROGRAMMING BY HOWARD SCARR, A FRIEND OF GLENN RIKOWSKI’S
http://www.loudouni.com/people/2010-07-23/music-behind-inception
Some of my family went to see the newly released film ‘Inception’ recently, which they thoroughly enjoyed. What was particularly exciting for Glenn though was that his friend Howard Scarr from undergraduate university days, (they played in a regressive band called ‘Wavering on Ether’ along with Vincent Woodward and Derek Roche, at the University of East Anglia), did the synthesiser programming for the music in the film, working with Hans Zimmer in the process. Glenn said that the music was powerful and intense and really made the film tick. Howard went on to become a member of England’s first all-synthesiser band, ‘Zorch’, which came back to the University of East Anglia (UEA) to perform in 1976 (where we saw them play). See Zorch at MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/zzorch



9. ‘BLUE SEAS THINKING’
Glenn spotted in the Guardian (EducationGuardian, 20th July 2010, p. 9) an article about the sociologist Dr Karen Throsby, from Warwick University. ‘So what?’, you might well ask. Well, Karen used to be a neighbour of ours, and then by a total coincidence, she went to work at Warwick University with Glenn Rikowski’s good friend, Mike Neary. The article ‘Blue Seas Thinking’ by Chris Arnot, looks at Karen’s research which explores what motivates people to engage in extreme sports such as Channel swimming. Karen has obtained funding from the Economic and Social Research Council in order to undertake this research. She herself enjoys swimming long distances and says that it is relaxing and ‘empties the mind’. I love swimming, but do not think I would at all enjoy long distance swimming. Anyway, we wish Karen every success with her research.



10. CLARIFICATION OF THOUGHT, EXPLANATIONS, WRITING AND COMMUNICATION
In my previous newsletter (No. 40), item 9 focused on the utilitarian philosopher, J.S. Mill. In this item, I referred to the benefit to be gained from the clarity of thought and communication, and remarked on the fact that J.S. Mill was particularly good in this regard. Also, that he was assisted in this process by his wife Harriet Taylor. In this news item I would like to explore this a little more.

I am of the opinion that the fact that Mill was a child prodigy and that he had to think so deeply and intensely from such a young age, must have helped him in the long-run to improve the style and clarity of his writing. Mill had a mental breakdown when he was just 20 years old, following on from his rigorous childhood upbringing. This must have resulted in him having to rethink his whole way of thinking and of expressing himself quite radically in various ways, I would have thought, the result of which led to his having greater clarity of thought, and also probably assisted with his production of beautiful, enticing and pleasant writing. This feel for his writing was what came across to me very powerfully when I first read his work as an undergraduate.

Now, a talent and ability like this can be very under-estimated, I think. We can take it all too much for granted; it all seems so obvious. But the person has probably gone through a lot of pain; a lot of deep and complex thought-processes, grappling with complicated topics, in order to arrive at what can then seem to be a simple conclusion and outcome; whilst also perhaps creating something beautiful. After all, J.S. Mill’s philosophy has been the bedrock of western democracy in many ways, but few people really clearly recognise this as such (most everyday people do not really appreciate where much of it comes from). It has just all become embedded in the bedrock of our society. In this way, Marx probably gets more credit than Mill actually. Whilst I think, obviously, that Marxism in the long-term is the most effective way forward; we clearly need to analyse capitalism and then move beyond it, at some point. But meanwhile, Mill has helped to make the world that we currently inhabit far more pleasant and tolerable. Also, many philosophers really write quite badly when it comes to style and clarity (take Kant and Aristotle, as examples), and Mill really stands out as someone very different; as someone that cares about his readers and the experiences they are having. Indeed, such writing is an art form in itself.

Similarly, I also aim to write clearly and to give readers something of the ‘feel good’ factor when I write. I now think that this can also probably be partly explained by the fact that, like Mill, I also had to think so very maturely as a child. But also like Mill, this can mean that my work is not always appreciated as much perhaps as I would like it to ideally be (both for my own satisfaction and for the long-term benefit of society at large). In my first book, on globalisation, for example, I grappled with many very deep and complex issues. Once I had sorted these out I was then able to explain these issues fairly simply and clearly to my readers. But then, some people rather than appreciating what I had done just seemed to think that it was all very obvious really; indeed, that perhaps I had even been repeating myself in parts (this became apparent from some of the book reviews). Heavens! Marx was also sometimes criticised for repeating himself; but that is because capitalism is circular and mad in so many ways, so in our efforts to explain it all, we can indeed, sometimes seem to be going round in circles. But rather what we really witness is a genius endeavouring to deal with something very complex.

So, people who develop important new theories can often summarise the main theories/conclusions simply; perhaps, in just a couple of lines. Others can then say, ‘well that is easy – what is all the big fuss about?’, without appreciating the pain, struggles, work and depth of thought that the person has gone through to arrive at this ‘oh so simple conclusion’. So, as and when some of us do develop new theories, we need to be careful about how we handle and present them to the world, I think. This is something that I am very mindful of these days.

Meanwhile, thinking about this further and building on the work of Wittgenstein, we should remember that the purpose of language is to communicate and understand each other, and within this we use different words and concepts to convey meaning in order to arrive at the same conclusion. The important thing is that we understand each other. So, for example, Existentialism means that ‘existence precedes essence’. But some will say, ‘well, what on earth does that mean?’ So, then we need to offer a simpler and clearer explanation. Whilst others might say that existentialism means ‘freedom and responsibility’. But this could be interpreted as being quite right-wing; this would then have to be explained in more depth. The existentialist, Sartre, for example, was after all, very left-wing. And so these are the sorts of problems that we can come up against and why we need to be mindful of the people that we are conversing with and remember that we communicate in order to effectively understand each other. And coming full circle, Mill was brilliant at this.

Making something that involves a lot of hard work and/or heart ache appear afterwards to be easy, can apply to many areas of course, and not just to writing. It can apply to organising a successful music gig, for example, or to the beautiful decorating of a house. We do not always want to go into details about the mundane effort undertaken in order to arrive at the beautiful outcome; rather, sometimes we just want people to enjoy and celebrate the finished result. And on that note, I will end this section.



11. VIDEO OF MY PRESENTATION ON ‘GLOBALISATION AND INTERNATIONALISM’ AT LONDON SOUTH BANK UNIVERSITY (PART OF THE CERTIFICATE IN LEARNING AND TEACHING IN HIGHER EDUCATION) NOW AVAILABLE ONLINE AT:
http://www.libr.org/isc/events/minitalk.html
As part of the Certificate in Learning and Teaching in Higher Education (CLTHE), that I studied for a couple of years ago at London South Bank University, we had to give a talk that was observed by half a dozen other people (both fellow student-teachers and teachers) and we received feedback on our performances. The presentations were also videoed. Now seems an appropriate time to inform subscribers about this video, and the fact that it has now been made available on the Information for Social Change website – see http://www.libr.org/isc/events/minitalk.html

In my talk, I drew on some of the material from my book, ‘Globalisation, Information and Libraries’; and considered, in particular, the terms ‘Globalisation’ and ‘Internationalism’, in themselves. In addition, I delivered the presentation through the interactive lecture approach. This involved inviting participation from the audience as I was giving my talk.

Prior to this, I had been asked on a number of occasions by George Bell to give some guest lectures to masters students (on the MBA and International courses) on the topic of globalisation at South Bank. I related this to the term ‘Internationalism’, which was the term that George had been using, trying to obtain funding on this topic. The understanding was that, through giving these guest lectures (which were on a variety of topics and proved to be both demanding and time-consuming, albeit also enjoyable), that I would then be integrated into the masters programme, but this never came about (at least, so far, to date it has not come about)! The topics I spoke on included: ‘Globalisation’; ‘Leadership in the New Economy’; ‘MBA: the way forward – what next?’; ‘Knowledge Management and the Knowledge Revolution’; ‘Knowledge Transfer’ and ‘Knowledge Management across Cultures’. In regard to my lecture about possible ways forward for the MBA, for example, I suggested that it could prove to be highly beneficial if ‘hot topics’ such as globalisation, knowledge management and the knowledge revolution, IT and transferring knowledge across cultures were clearly incorporated into the MBA programme. The students found my lectures very interesting and seemed to be very pleased indeed excited, to be engaging with a published author. Also, many of them, like me, approached the topics from a left-wing, critical stance, which I found to be very heartening.




Many thanks to Jessica (Jia Liu) for providing information for item 6.


Best wishes

Ruth

30th July 2010




[1] The problem means that since the budget of the Canadian libraries was reduced, the personnel had to be shrunk again and again.