Discovery: Where Researchers Start

Where History Begins: As the Archive Turns Digital, and the Library Becomes an Archive

Though the humanities and social sciences vary dramatically by and even within discipline, I’m going to focus in my talk on how research libraries function in my own discipline of history. Libraries are less places of discovery than gateways of access. Of course libraries have subscriptions to online journal content, but for researchers they very crucially have subscriptions to primary source collections. As more special collections libraries digitize their holdings and make them available via their own websites, a research library’s collection becomes less important as a means to these research materials.

And yet what libraries still have--though they may not yet value-- is the strata of material that is beginning to inform analysis of how scholarship has evolved. For a journal and book publisher, I have come to understand our place within libraries as part of the layers forming a corpus for researchers engaged in the study of the discipline's origins as much as the research contained within the journal’s pages. This turn toward the study of the past’s past is quite important, and represents a larger pattern of reflecting on the history of knowledge production in many disciplines. Perhaps libraries may even need to reconsider deaccessioning.

Beyond the index: research and discovery services in a health sciences library

Electronic journals dominate the health sciences library landscape, but the average library user is more able than ever to access journal content through channels that obscure the library's role as a content provider. Despite the improved functionality of centralized indexes of journal articles offered by library discovery tools, health sciences researchers just aren't using them. How are researchers finding their way to the library, and how does the library connect with researchers? 

This presentation examines the trends and metrics used to gauge user engagement with library discovery platforms at a health sciences library and how they influence design and configuration decisions. It discusses new types of library-licensed resources that present challenges for discovery, and specialized services that allow the library to meet the users where they are.

Configuring Knowledgebases for Discovery and Access

Virginia Tech's recent switch from one knowledgebase and discovery service provider to another gave us an opportunity to review the primary means our patrons use to access our resources. Through a combination of vendor statistics and website analysis, we recognized that alternate means of access were often ignored by librarians and that care would need to be taken to ensure users could access the resources they need, regardless of where they started their search. That resulted in updated LibGuides, choices in configuring the knowledgebase, and new emphasis in training sessions.