Library Blogs

American Spy is a brilliantly-written Cold War thriller about a black female FBI agent, Marie Mitchell, who is constantly being turned down for high-profile assignments because of her race and gender. When a CIA agent offers her an assignment in Burkina Faso, she accepts it, even though she suspects she was offered it because she's a black woman. She is supposed to help the CIA bring down Thomas Sankara, Burkina Faso's president. Then she falls in love with Sankara, and starts to question her beliefs. Will she continue with her assignment, even if it means betraying the man she loves?

U-M Library’s Library Search launched in 2018 as a unified search engine application containing five previously distinct interfaces: Catalog, Articles, Databases, Online Journals, and Library Websites. Library Search was a big change for users, and an increase in user support requests suggested that further exploration was needed to pinpoint user pain points. The authors began an exploratory study that helped understand users’ experiences and identified areas for continued work.

Digital Content & Collections (DCC) relies on content and subject experts to bring us new digital collections. This year, 16 digital collections were created or significantly enhanced. Here you will find links to videos and articles by the subject experts speaking in their own words about the digital collections they were involved in and why they found it so important to engage in this work with us. Thank you to all of the people involved in each of these digital collections!

Did you know that August is American Artist Appreciation Month? Learn about 50 American artists with help from the Library!

How does one get valid data without traumatizing or alienating students and faculty in a trying time? According to this author, by taking an empathetic approach to planning and implementing an assessment project, you can minimize negative impacts to your community.

Check out some new ebook acquisitions to the Library's browsing collection! This post highlights some non-fiction titles.

Still looking for a video game-related class to take in the Fall? This blog post lists the classes that still have open spots. We also share details about what our services will look like (as far as we know) during the Fall term.

How to add ordered metadata fields in Samvera Hyrax. Includes example code and links to actual code.

Check out some new ebook acquisitions to the Library's browsing collection! This post highlights ten fiction titles.

Protest is the right to freedom of assembly, freedom of association, and freedom of speech. It is integral to democracy. This July, learn more about the history, culture, and politics of protest in the United States.