Library Blogs

The words we choose matter and having a shared vocabulary around user experience research is an important component of the work. This post presents definitions of user experience, user research, and usability testing, while examining how they intersect and why determining the frame of your research is good practice. Plus the one phrase we try not to use...

This is the latest in a series of British village mysteries, set in Cornwall, England in the early 1970s. The two protagonists, widow Eleanor Trewynn and her niece, Detective Sergeant Megan Pencarrow, hunt for spies at a peace conference and track down two criminals who have kidnapped Megan's almost-boyfriend Nick and a lawyer who's an acquaintance of Eleanor's. This series is perfect for fans of Agatha Christie.

Walking up to the tables and chairs set up on the 1st floor of the UGLi, I wasn’t sure what to expect. I had heard of Café Shapiro but had never attended one before, or any event like it. For those who don’t know, Café Shapiro is an event held in the Shapiro Undergraduate Library that features original student poems and short stories. Students are nominated by their professors to read their work at the event, and anyone can come and listen.

Historian Catherine Fletcher tells the fascinating story of Alessandro de' Medici, the first Duke of Florence and arguably the first person of African descent to rule a European state.

While the start of the 2017 college football season is still a long way off, you can binge on the glorious and fascinating history of Michigan Football year round by visiting the library. The Hatcher and Shapiro Libraries have enough books about Bo Schembechler, the Big House, and our famous football rivalries to satisfy even the strongest appetite for gridiron history.

This historical novel tells the story of the brilliant Renaissance artist Fra Filippo Lippi and Lucrezia Buti, the woman who inspired him.

Starting last October, I worked as the University of Michigan Library Student Engagement Ambassador. With six other wonderful ambassadors, we aimed to actively publicize library resources and services to the campus community through events and social media. We functioned in two different teams: the programming team focused on creating and planning events while the social media team concentrated on publicizing by making posts on Facebook and Twitter. The system was flexible enough to chime in and share ideas on both parts through our whole group meetings. I soon noticed that viewing the library from a student’s perspective could be effective.

We are pleased to announce the opening of a new exhibit from the Special Collections Library. It includes an extraordinary selection of magical, religious, and medical artifacts held at Special Collections, the Papyrology Collection, and the Kelsey Museum of Archaeology. These objects are an extraordinary evidence of how people coped with physical and mental ailments from antiquity through the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.

Quantitative data gives you the hard numbers: what, how many times, when, generally who, and where. Quantitative data also leaves out the biggest and possibly most important factor: why.

Insider view of the Shapiro Design Lab from the Library Student Engagement Ambassadors. The Ambassadors had the fantastic opportunity to tour the Shapiro Design Lab and find out all about what different facilities and capabilities they have there. We even got to try out some of the equipment, which was pretty cool!