ş TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction I Angela Repanovici, Manolis Koukourakis, Tereza Khechoyan
PART I Books on the Shelves of New Technology
The Book in the Era of Facebook and Twitter 2 Ismail Serageldin
Narrative Construction of Popularity Assessment Criteria on Weblogs: The Implications for Virtual Learning Environments 8 Cătălina-Ionela Rezeanu, Claudiu Coman, Angela Repanovici
The Importance of Digitizing Old Medical Books and Modern Medical Ethics Books in the Field of Medicine 19 Nadinne Roman, Elena Amaricăi, Silviu Caloian
The Usefulness of Social Networks for the Dissemination of Scientific Information 26 Ionel Şerban
PART II Information Society and Sources
The Interpretation of Knowledge Economy and the Problems of Its Rise and Development in Armenia 31 Tereza Khechoyan
Aspects on the Harmonization of Copyright and Related Rights in the Information Society in the European Union Legislation 39 Cristina Mihaela Salcă Rotaru
The Role and Importance of Information Sources. Case Study: The European Union’s Diplomacy and the Middle East Crisis at the Beginning of the 21st Century 48 Ana-Maria Bolborici
PART III Books in Education
The Level of Awareness on Scientometrics in Higher Education 55 Angela Repanovici, Manolis Koukourakis, Mihai Bogdan Alexandrescu, D. Cotoros, Liliana Rogozea, Daniela Popa
Romanian Students’ Perceptions of Bibliotherapy in the Educational Process66 Daniela Popa, Ane Landoy, Angela Repanovici
PART IV Reading for Life
Reading for Life: Biblio/Poetry Therapy with Different Target Groups 74 Judit Béres
The Role of Fairy Tales in the Self-Realization Process 85 Daniela Sorea
The Book and the Separate Room 101 Carmen Adriana Gheorghe
PART V Perspectives on Publications in Life Sciences
Biomechanics in Publication: Present State and Perspectives 107 Ileana-Constanta Rosca
Representative Publications for Medical Engineering 111 Corneliu Druga
PART VI Collections: Histories and Landmarks
The Second Life of Books from Private Collections 119 Elena Harconiţa
The Progress and Development of the Digital Library of “Lucian Blaga” University of Sibiu since 2007 137 Rodica Volovici, Cristina Pârvu
Revista BIBLIOTECA [“The Library” Review]: 1948-2018 – A Landmark in the Professional Community of Romanian Librarians 144 Elena Tîrziman, Maria Micle
The Journeys of Books 152 Robert Coravu
Author Index 158
INTRODUCTION
The book may be seen as a symbol, a miracle or a product. It used to represent and still represents the most important element of the spiritual connection between generations, between different professions, between education and multicultural systems. The book is the oldest economic model developed by libraries, an investment in a product which gives benefit to as many people as possible. In 2012, The Library of Congress (Washington, D.C., U.S.A.) had the initiative of organizing an annual meeting which would disseminate the vision of library leaders on the importance of the book. The meeting would gather all the categories involved in the book industry: writers, publishers, editors, professors, librarians. The goal was to create a platform for discussions on how to promote the book as a crucial element for culture and education enhancement. The power of information and its dissemination was discussed within the first edition, while keeping the book as a central element in all debates. After this first edition, the Summit of the book was organized yearly in different locations throughout the world: Singapore (2013), France (2014), Egypt (2015) and Ireland (2016). The event had a powerful international impact and in 2017 the 6th summit was hosted in Brasov (Romanaia) at the “Transilvania” University. The event was organized in collaboration with the Public Library and it took place in the University Aula between 16 and 17 October 2017. The collaboration between professionals, the sharing of knowledge, the skills and experiences related to the book, all presented in a multinational and multicultural environment, created a great opportunity for future projects. Key experts presented their best practices and their expertise in the history, technology, knowledge support and book dissemination. The internationality of the two-day event offered the opportunity to share information on various aspects of the book, as experts from eight countries were present. The summit gathered 35 papers throughout its four sections. The international speakers of the event were: John van Oudenaren, director of the World Digital Library – Library of Congress (U.S.A.); Ismail Serageldin, director of the Library of Alexandria and of the World Digital Library Executive Council (Egypt); Joumana Boustany, associate professor at Paris Descartes University (France); Manolis Koukourakis, director of Crete University Library (Greece); Jerald Cavanagh, Senior librarian at Limerick Institute of Technology (Ireland); Padraig Kirby, Senior librarian at Limerick Institute of Technology (Ireland); Tereza Kechoyan, Professor, Public Administration Academy of the Republic of Armenia, Yerevan (Armenia).
A. Repanovici, M. Koukourakis, T. Khechoyan II Introduction
All submissions for the Subsequent publication were subjected to a double-blind peer review process. Of all 35 papers presented, only 18 were approved for publication. Our editorial team would like to acknowledge the special support of Cultural Service of the American Embassy from Bucharest. Last but not least, we would like to thank the local Organizing Committee.
Angela Repanovici, Transilvania University of Brasov (Romania) Manolis Koukourakis, Crete University Library (Greece) Tereza Khechoyan, Public Administration Academy of the Republic of Armenia (Armenia)
PART I
Books on the Shelves of New Technology
The Book in the Era of Facebook and Twitter
Ismail Serageldin
Bibliotheca Alexandrina, Egypt
A hyper-connected culture of superficiality
We live in an era where the standard of communications is the 140-character Tweet! This is creating a culture of superficiality where celebrity replaces well-earned fame, and where opinion is everything. Truth is treated as a subjective statement, and the new media dominate public discourse. The illusion of knowledge is reinforced by the tremendous advances in the access to knowledge. We can instantly check any fact, find any bit of information we want - thanks to the age of the internet and the smart phone - and thus armed, we go forth into the world of the rapidly changing society in which we live. We advance, thinking that we know a subject because we retrieved a fact, not counting that that fact may be wrong for we live in the age of fake news, “alternative facts”, smear campaigns and distortions of all kinds; any person can easily set up a website, and post information to the net. Mobile telephony not only enabled us to reach anyone we want at any time and in any place, but also, its links with the internet made possible the liberation of many of the services of ICT from the anchor of the desk top and laptop computers. Hand-held devices are becoming the norm, and the penetration of mobile telephony is awesome. There are more mobile phone lines than there are human beings on the planet, and about three billion of these are smart phones. And the smart phone is barely 10 years old. In the meantime, social connectivity has also had an equally rapid growth, with Facebook alone accounting for over a billion connected persons in less than ten years. Content has grown apace, as people post on the net everything from videos and pictures to music and text. Today, the Internet is adding to the amount of data, and we possess about two Exabytes of data every day. Just how much is an Exabyte? Well if you converted all the text in the Library of Congress into digital format, an Exabyte would be 100,000 times more! The age of big data1 and social connectivity is here. Not that all of that content is particularly useful. Most of the self-centred tweets, the inane emails, and the gossipy WhatsApp chats are not particularly interesting or useful. Yet many of us spend a large part of the day reading bits of text and looking at images on a
1 “Big Data” has been a major issue in many research institutions and generally in circles concerned with ICT. See inter alia Kenneth Cukier and Viktor Mayer-Schonberger, Big Data: A Revolution that will Transform How We Live, Work and Think (Boston: Hodder & Stoughton, 2013); also Eric Siegel, Predictive Analytics: The Power to Predict Who Will Click, Buy, Lie, or Die (New Jersey: Wiley; 2nd edition, 2016); and also for the perspective of business, see inter alia Foster Provost & Tom Fawcett; Data Science for Business: What You Need to Know about Data Mining and Data-Analytic Thinking (CA: O’Reilly Media; 1st edition, 2013); and Mike Grigsby, Advanced Customer Analytics: Targeting, Valuing, Segmenting, and Loyalty Techniques (G.B & USA: Kogan Page; 1st edition, 2016). 3 Ismail Serageldin The Book in the Era of Facebook and Twitter
screen that we would never spend time reading off a printed page. Yet we feel compelled to do so. Our modern hyper-connected culture has inculcated into us a fear of missing something. We feel guilty if we leave emails unanswered, we worry about being left out of the circles of the chatrooms, then we complain that we are so busy that we cannot find the time to do what we really want to do. A real life echo of the questions that T.S. Eliot posed in the last century:
Where is the Life we have lost in living? Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information? —T.S. Eliot, The Rock, 1934.
We are entering the era of new realities with the emergence of Big Data and a powerful combination of machine learning, deep learning and Artificial Intelligence (AI). But the scale of the coming AI revolution promises change of such a magnitude, and at such a speed, that the international firm McKinsey has estimated will have 3000 times the disruptive effect of the industrial revolution2. But already the new realities of Internet and social connectivity are also creating an ideal environment where cyber-bullying and hate speech, and much more seriously, where fake news, smear campaigns and false data can flourish. But many are now asking, how can the awesome power of the new technologies from big data to machine learning to AI be harnessed to the task of dealing with fake news, falsehoods, cyber-bullying and hate speech? With so many young people relying entirely on the internet for finding out facts and even learning about events and issues, the absence of the book, more fleshed out, more thoughtful, more deliberate, is a loss. So we must try to ensure in the education of youth that we emphasize books as well as the new Media Literacy. Beyond inaccurate information, purposefully or accidentally distributed, at a time of superficiality in our interaction with the available information on the internet, there are other problems with the new culture of tweets and electronic texting. We think that everything is available on the internet – and it largely is – and that therefore people who are net-savvy are well-read and well-educated, and can discuss thoughtfully all aspects of an issue. But that is not true for two main reasons: • First, there is ample evidence that people gravitate towards sources of information that act as “echo chambers” to reinforce their prejudices, not to sample the wide array of opinion and information that is posted on the web every day; and • Second, that minorities may be bullied to the point where they do not dare express their view or in some cases, many teenagers—in their formative years – experience cyber-bullying, in addition to regular schoolyard bullying, to the point that some of them commit suicide.
So it is important in the formative school years that we teach Media Literacy as well as at least a part of the cannon of Western literature and humanities that promote values that are central to Western Culture. Then we must emphasize manners in how we speak, reminding ourselves that texting is no different than speaking directly to another person. The way the
2 “Compared with the Industrial Revolution, we estimate that this change is happening ten times faster and at 300 times the scale, or roughly 3,000 times the impact”, Cited in Book Excerpt from Richard Dobbs, James Manyika, and Jonathan Woetzel, The four global forces breaking all the trends, (McKinsey Global Institute, April 2015) http://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/strategy-and-corporate-finance/our-insights/the- four-global-forces-breaking-all-the-trends (accessed August 25, 2017). Ismail Serageldin 4 The Book in the Era of Facebook and Twitter message is communicated is important. That is another form of teaching manners. Cyber- bullying should be tackled early in the lives of children, and monitored and countered whenever possible. But many would go way beyond these formative years, and seek to limit freedom of expression. Indeed, there are many calls for promoting filtering the kind of speech that is posted on the internet in all its forms, and forcing the providers of platforms such as Facebook and Twitter and others to assume some responsibility for the material that is being posted on these most important platforms. Technical difficulties aside, and assuming that AI will enable us to develop some filtering capability, which even if it is not foolproof will still reduce considerably the phenomenon, there remains a fundamental question about whether that would be a desirable thing to do, or otherwise. Interfering with freedom of speech has never been a good policy3 , no matter who does it. It inevitably leads to a slippery slope that will harm that essential lifeblood of all societies which is freedom of speech and freedom of access to information. Countries that have tried to do so in the name of national security have found out very quickly the moral strain that it puts on society. Look at the US “Patriot Act”, passed by congress right after 9/11, which was intended to give the government the tools it needed to launch a “War on Terror”. It soon begat Guantanamo, rendition, enhanced interrogation techniques, outright torture and even extra-judicial killing, and all this in one of the most solid of democracies in the world. A footnote here. Librarians in America stood up to some of the most pernicious of the Patriot Act’s provisions, namely giving the right to the police to find out who was reading what in the libraries, and the criminalization of the librarian talking about it with anyone, even a lawyer. Four Librarians from Connecticut stood up and 80% of the public backed them up, and this particular provision of the Patriot Act was dropped4. In a great statement generally attributed to Voltaire, or at least fully reflecting his thinking, he is alleged to have said:
I disagree with what you say, but I am willing to fight to the death to defend your right to say it.
So for adults on the internet, I personally favour a vigorous debate where ideas will defeat ideas, and we rely on the foundation that children have received in home and school to form character and instill manners and promote critical thinking. For critical thinking is the essential antidote to the illusion of knowledge.
Books in this new culture
But where are the books in this new world of 140 character tweets and Facebook posts? Books remain plentiful, and there is an ever increasing number printed and sold every year. The wide range of books written and sold go from Sci-Fi to romance novels, and the resilience of the essay as a form of writing suggests that public receptivity to the book, with its attributes of depth and length, and the interactivity between author and reader, is still strong. But what will the book bring to a generation of youngsters who have grown up
3 There is a long and extensive literature on the importance of defending free speech. A most recent contribution is Timothy Garton Ash, Free Speech: Ten Principles for a Connected World (NH: Yale University Press; 2017). See also David Cole, “Why We Must Still Defend Free Speech” in September 2017 Issue of The New York Review of Books. 4 For more on the Librarians who stood against the patriot act, see: Connecticut Four – Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connecticut_Four. In general, the four Connecticut librarians filed a lawsuit known as Doe v. Gonzales, challenging the constitutional validity of National Security Letters (NSL) issued by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) under the USA PATRIOT Act. 5 Ismail Serageldin The Book in the Era of Facebook and Twitter
surrounded by the new media, and whose social relations are much more defined by Facebook than by neighbourhood, school or family? Fundamentally, we live in a complex world, full of complex societies that are the result of that most complex of creatures: The human being. We need to learn to look at ourselves, and to look at others. It is that complexity that the book – and only the book – can address. First, let us define the “book” in today’s world. The book is defined as a collection of words of a certain length, usually of the order of 40,000 words. Whether it is in electronic or print or audio form, is less important. It is through an unfolding narrative that the words acquire meaning and substance in a creation where the whole is far more than the sum of the parts. The length of the product is necessary to qualify as a book, because the complex ideas, and the narrative arc of a book cannot be cut short without significant loss. I am not only talking of the novel, but also of any effort to spell out something worth knowing and worth understanding in any level of depth. Only thus can we drill into the opacity of character, the unpredictability of the human mind, and try to gain insight into our complex interrelationships as human beings. How else can we probe how love and hate coexist, or how passions for abstract causes can be unleashed? Great literature in every age has also spoken to us through the prism of multi- faceted lives, and even through showing us the mechanisms of how experiences in early childhood have shaped our evolution into adulthood. All humans struggle to develop that schizophrenic balance between individualism and dependency that our identifications with parents and siblings as we struggle from childhood through adolescence and into adulthood, and how that struggle can shape the complicated beings we become. Books for age, for every reader, good books, help us navigate that necessary evolution. The 2017 Nobel Prize for Literature has been awarded to the British author Kazuo Ishiguro and the Nobel Committee specifically mentioned that he “… was most associated with the themes of memory, time, and self-delusion”. Themes such as these need the vehicle of the book to be expressed, explored and appreciated. Books … good books… great books allow us to craft mirrors in which we see ourselves and our societies, and to create windows through which we see the world. All of that cannot be done in the brevity and superficiality of continuous connectivity and short messages. It requires reflection, and appreciation. Interaction with great authors and intellectuals is a training that we all need, for it enables us to approach complex problems with the thoughtfulness and lucidity that they deserve. And in today’s society, with the endless complex choices we have to make as citizens in this rapidly changing world, it is the reading of books that remains the best means to the formation of judgment, and the development of the means to engage in fruitful public discourse. To know others, to know our society, to know ourselves, and to be true to our innermost conscience. Thus, we can turn to the Bard’s great lines:
To thine own self be true, for it must follow as dost the night the day, that canst not then be false to any man.5
Complex societies, complex choices
So, despite the echo chambers and the ingrained prejudices, despite the spread of fake news, smears and outright lies, we need to encourage the civility of our public discourse, the
5 William Shakespeare, Hamlet, inspired by Socrates ("Know thyself", quoting Pythia, the Oracle of Delphi). Ismail Serageldin 6 The Book in the Era of Facebook and Twitter marginalization of hate groups and, we must promote lucidity of our public discussions. We live in complex societies and the slogans of t-shirts and bumper stickers are not adequate to discuss real alternatives for social action. Even when all agree on the basic facts, the selection of the course of action can be very difficult, as we can see in the reform of healthcare in the US. Let us stop here for a parable. It is a story that I owe to my friend Amartya Sen6. You meet three children with a flute and they ask you to help them decide who should get the flute. The first child is poor and has no toys, while the other two are rich and have many toys. The facts are not contested. Thus it is “fair” to let the poor child have the flute. Now consider the same three children, but the middle child says that she is a talented musician, she enjoys playing the flute. The other two have no musical abilities at all, and they enjoy listening to her play. Again, the facts are not contested. She should get the flute. Now let’s consider a third scenario, again where the facts are not contested: The third child contends that even if the first is poor and the second is talented, he is the one who made the flute. He took the reed and made the holes and turned it into a flute. Surely it is only fair that he should get the result of his own work. What we have here is some, and only some, of the criteria of social choice: equity in the first case, utility in the second and entitlement in the third. All social problems and policies involve a mix of these dimensions, and choosing in a fair way has a lot to do with how society values these different dimensions and the weights that we put on each of these at a particular moment in the history of that society. To redress past injustices, it may well be very necessary to put the emphasis on one or the other of these dimensions. That is frequently the case when allocating quotas or according compensatory preferential treatment to some underprivileged group in a society. Clarity in the political debate, civility in our public discourse, and lucidity in our social intercourse can ensure that social cohesion is enhanced and not undermined by the use of such methods. Only through the training of books in childhood and throughout adulthood can we become better citizens. The echo chambers of the social media tend to divide societies and make discussion of complex subjects impossible. So, if Social Justice has many dimensions, how do we get there? The two pillars of achieving Social Justice are, to my mind, Freedom and Equality. Freedom entails the exercise of rights, and equality may need to take into account the innate inequalities between individual capabilities. Each of these points needs some discussion.
Freedom, rights and equity
“… to be free is not merely to cast off one’s chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others.” - Nelson Mandela
Freedom is about the ability to decide, to choose. But we very quickly notice that many in society are not able to choose, even if the law guarantees them that right. Thus, extreme poverty severely limits the choices open to an individual. Lack of education or illness can also be important constraints in an individual’s ability to fulfil his or her potential, not to mention social attitudes towards gender or ethnicity. Therefore, the exercise of rights needs the empowerment of individuals with certain capabilities that allow them to effectively practice such rights. To many, society’s assistance to each individual to ensure that they acquire such capabilities becomes itself a human right since it is necessary to exercise these rights. Without that, there can be no Social Justice. Amartya Sen has cogently argued about the importance of balancing rights and capabilities to ensure the exercise of freedoms, and
6 See: Amartya Sen, The Idea of Justice (Mass: Belknap Press, 2011). 7 Ismail Serageldin The Book in the Era of Facebook and Twitter
he recast the issues of development as broadening the space of freedom in which people can thrive. But if freedom is ultimately to allow each person to live as fully as they can, then the inherent differences between people challenge us in terms of the inequalities that they will generate. People are multi-dimensional and we are unequal in our endowments in various dimensions: musical talent, ability in sports, physical strength, educational achievement, entrepreneurial drive, and so on. To measure equality before the law is but a start. Some people would see fairness as the provision of equal opportunities only. If the result is to have some who are as rich as Bill Gates and some who are extremely poor, so be it. Others, most of us in fact, would see that a society where some people are lighting cigars with thousand dollar bills and others are starving is inherently unjust, whatever the starting position was and whatever the procedural guarantees have been. Extreme inequality is corrosive. It hardens the attitudes of the rich and powerful towards the poor and lowly. It builds acceptance of the incongruity of wealth amidst misery and exclusion, undermines the very notions of social justice and social cohesion, makes a mockery of fairness, and leads to the slippery path of class warfare as the only means of redress.
Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey, Where wealth accumulates, and men decay. —Oliver Goldsmith, The Deserted Village, 1770
And that brings us back to the issue of freedom of expression. Solutions to societal problems need reflection, discussion, and the ability to articulate new and novel solutions that will use the technologies of our time. All the new ideas face an uphill battle, for as Carrie Chapman Catt observed, there is no written law that has ever been more binding than unwritten custom supported by popular opinion. Without investing in books to develop our critical thinking and educate our taste, we risk falling prey to our opinions inherited from our parents or superficially acquired from our friends, as John Fitzgerald Kennedy (JFK) remarked: The great enemy of truth is not the lie—deliberate, contrived and dishonest—but the myth—persistent, persuasive and unrealistic. Too often we hold facts to the clichés of our forebears. We subject all facts to a prefabricated set of interpretations. We enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought. —JFK
Envoi
Finally, to conclude this discourse, I believe that the book is here to stay, and that the new generation will indeed use tweets and Facebook, but they will also find their own way to write their own books, in their own language. And like the best of the legacy of the previous generations, they will be books that will connect with the past, understand the present and invent the future. Throughout human history it has been so, and it is very much part of our humanity.
Narrative Construction of Popularity Assessment Criteria on Weblogs: The Implications for Virtual Learning Environments
Cătălina-Ionela Rezeanu,1 Claudiu Coman,1 Angela Repanovici2
1 Social Sciences and Communication, Transilvania University of Brasov, Romania 2 Product Design, Mechatronics and Environment, Transilvania University of Brasov, Romania
Introduction
Today’s pupils and students are the first generations with digital socializing experience. This is why, when teachers request them to complete documenting activities, they will first call upon web sources and only after will they search physical libraries.1 The possibilities offered by digital socializing platforms, such as blogging, can help teachers supervise the documenting process and stimulate students` reflexivity in choosing information. In the last decades, on the international level, there is a tendency for teachers to use blogging platforms to enhance the learning and teaching process. Some of these blogs are known, read, and commented upon in the international academic communities, contributing to the popularization of specialized knowledge among researchers, teachers, and students, as well as the outside public, helping in growing the prestige of discipline, universities, students, and teachers. More recently, scholars have shown how blogs can enhance learning by: increasing learners motivation, information retention and engagement2, developing reading skills,3 stimulating collaboration,4 creating personally meaningful contexts for education.5 Blog- based learning recommendations were proposed to improve education mainly in the fields of: foreign languages,6 politics,7 business,8 or health.9 Halavais10 explained how blogging
1 A. C. Halavais, “Weblogs and collaborative web publishing as learning spaces,” in The International Handbook of Virtual Learning Environments, ed. Joel Weiss, Jason Nolan, Jeremy Hunsinger and Peter Trifonas (Dordrecht: Springer NL, 2006), 1215-1235. 2 L. Noel, “Using blogs to create a constructivist learning environment,” in Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences 174 (2015): 617-621. 3 S. F. S. A. Fattah, “The Effectiveness of Using Blogs as an Independent Learning Tool to Develop Reading Skills for University Students,” Journal of Education and Practice 7(32) (2016): 65-73. 4 A. M. Marques, R. Krejci, S. W. M. Siqueira et al, “Structuring the discourse on social networks for learning: Case studies on blogs and microblogs,” Computers in Human Behavior 29(2) (2013): 395-400. 5 H.-I. Hwan‐Ik and Y. L. Lee, “Exploring new potentials of blogs for learning: Can children use blogs for personal information management (PIM)?” British Journal of Educational Technology 45(5) (2014): 916-925. 6 S.-T. A. Hung and H.-T. D. Huang, “Blogs as a learning and assessment instrument for English- speaking performance,” Interactive Learning Environments 24(8) (2016): 1881-1894. 7 S. Xu, “Research on Ideological and Political Education of Southwest Petroleum University Students in Micro Blog Era,”” Creative Education 7(2) (2016): 287-292. 9 Cătălina-Ionela Rezeanu et al. Narrative Construction of Popularity Assessment Criteria on Weblogs
platforms can be useful for teachers in managing the educational activities. This way, the learning process becomes experience-based and decentralized, expanding outside the physical bounds of the classroom and transforming into an accessible medium for the outside public. So, in the author`s view the blog can contribute to the democratization of knowledge access and the reduction of the asymmetric relationship between the student and the teacher. According to the cited author, when students involve themselves in generating content for the blog, the learning experience becomes more authentic and more aim-based, because the potential audience of blog posts is far more extensive than the exposure to traditional assignments. Through blogs, students can create their network of specialists and collaborators to help them in the learning process. Based on the same source, by posting the assignments on didactic blogs, teachers might lay the foundations for a student discussion platform aggregating students` patterns of understanding the tasks. Furthermore, by actively participating in the understanding process, students develop the skill to approach experts, to ask for clarifications, or to work with peers to ease the application of the new information. The author concludes educational blogs can be an important step towards meeting the imperative of lifelong learning extended beyond the formal school environment. There are also some attempts to identify specific factors that enhance learning through blogs (experiential learning, perceived self-efficacy, perceived usefulness;11 the use of entry- dominant bloggers;12 frequency of interactions: the degree of visiting, remaining and utilising the blog13), although the literature on this topic is still scarce. Therefore, to have positive learning effects, blogs must be visited. Blog popularity is not simply attained by posting as it requires meeting a specific set of criteria regarding the digital medium and its audience. This is why, within this paper, we aim to find the main characteristics which a Romanian blog must have, to be considered popular. Based on the results of a narrative analysis, we have showed 5 such criteria: (1) originality; (2) utility; (3) topicality; (4) subjectivity; and (5) coherence; and formulated recommendations for making blogs more efficient as learning environments.
Clarifying the concepts of blog and blogosphere
A blog is a website updated with entries (posts), grouped by categories and displayed chronologically. The term weblog was introduced by Jorn Barger in 1997 by joining two words: the web referring to the Internet network and log, referring to logging. In 1999, Peter Merholz proposed using the shorter term of blog. Although the term blog or weblog is most often used, a series of partial synonyms have been introduced: the online journal,
8 Y.-S. Wang, C.-R. Li, C.-H. Yeh et al., “A conceptual model for assessing blog-based learning system success in the context of business education,” The International Journal of Management Education 14(3) (2016): 379-387. 9 K. Lien, A. Chin, A. Helman et al., “A Randomized Comparative Trial of the Knowledge Retention and Usage Conditions in Undergraduate Medical Students Using Podcasts and Blog Posts,” Cureus 10(1) (2018). 10 Halavais, “Weblogs and collaborative web publishing as learning spaces,” 1215-1235. 11 J. E. Tang, T.-I. Tang and C.-H. Chiang, “Blog learning: effects of users' usefulness and efficiency towards continuance intention,” Behaviour & Information Technology 33(1) (2014): 36-50. 12 B. K. Pursel and H. Xie, “Patterns and Pedagogy: Exploring Student Blog Use in Higher Education.” Contemporary Educational Technology 5(2) (2014): 96-109. 13 T. Karvounidis, K. Chimos, S. Bersimis et al., “Evaluating Web 2.0 technologies in higher education using students' perceptions and performance,” Journal of Computer Assisted Learning 30, no. 6 (2014): 577-596. Cătălina-Ionela Rezeanu et al. 10 Narrative Construction of Popularity Assessment Criteria on Weblogs the Internet log, or the personal page. It has also been agreed upon using the term blogosphere for the blogging network (first used in 1999 by Brad L. Graham). Even if they are similar to personal journals, blogs show some differences:14 the blog presents information in the order of the most recent posts; the blog is public, its content grows from one day to the next and is accessible in real-time to those who follow it; the blog provides readers with the opportunity to search their content for the exact information of interest. What separates a blog from a journal is the potential or actual link with other blogs, and possibility of setting up virtual communities and social networks. Another feature of blogs is the ease with which visitors can write comments on the posts they have read, thus turning them into discussion and debate platforms. Moreover, in a blog, time does not flow in one direction, as the author can always return over time and modify the posted information. The blog offers an opportunity to tell a story in a mediated forum, to a potentially wide, distant, and invisible audience. Links to other pages and comments can become devices for the authors` self-expression. Blogs create contexts to establish a personal voice, a categorical attitude or a clear motivation15. However structured, chaotic, or impersonal they may seem, online journals reflect an intimate portrait of their author that builds over time. Briefly, someone's blog can become a tool for impression management. As the blog interacts with the audience even when the author is not online, the virtual identity resources being the references and the connections with other users, the online environment, unlike the offline one, allows for better self-performing and greater control over information released to the public.16 The most important feature of the blog is that it is part of a network of other blogs. If blogs are published texts that contain the thoughts of certain authors, the blogosphere is a social phenomenon. Although young, the blogosphere has the potential to evolve into a self-contained public sphere by teaching readers to identify with someone different from them, recognize and respect the fundamental rights of everyone.17
The magnitude of the blogosphere and the motivation to start a blog
In the last decades, the number of blogs has been steadily rising. If, by 2004, there were about 5 million blogs, in 2005, there was an explosion of their number reaching up to 50 million.18 Currently, it is estimated that their number is past 150 million.19 In 2007, the
14 Carmen Holotescu, Emerging Technologies in Education. Conceiving and Building a Microblogging Platform for Formal and Informal Learning (Bucharest: Politehnica Publishing House, 2015). 15 B. Graham, “Why I Weblog,” in We've Got Blog: How Weblogs Are Changing Our Culture, ed. John Rodzvilla (Cambridge, MA: Perseus Publishing, 2002). 16 Daniel Chandler, ”Personal home pages and the construction of identities on the web,” last modified March 7, 2014, http://visual-memory.co.uk/daniel/Documents/short/webident.html (accessed 10 April, 2018). 17 M. A. Froomkin, “Habermas@ discourse.net: Toward a critical theory of cyberspace,” Harvard Law Review 116, no. 3 (2003): 749-873. 18 Jeremy Wright, Blog Marketing: The revolutionary new way to increase sales, build brand, and get exceptional results (Columbus: The McGraw-Hill Companies, 2006). 19 Brandon Gaille, “How Many Blogs are on the Internet,” WPVituoso, November 20, 2013, https://www.wpvirtuoso.com/how-many-blogs-are-on-the-internet (accessed 10 April, 2018). 11 Cătălina-Ionela Rezeanu et al. Narrative Construction of Popularity Assessment Criteria on Weblogs
Romanian blogosphere added over 20,000 blogs,20 in 2018, their number exceeded 95,000, producing more than 160,000 posts per month and more than 110,000 comments.21 Recent studies have identified multiple individual motives supporting the idea of having a blog. In some acceptations, people blog for:22 (1) expressing creativity; (2) storing and sharing experiences with others; (3) keeping in touch with friends and family; (4) sharing skills and knowledge; (4) mobilizing others for civic actions or for entertainment; (5) storing resources and important information for oneself; (6) influencing others` ideas; (7) forming knowledge-networks; and (8) earning money. A more recent study concluded the main reasons why bloggers have decided to open a blog are23: (1) to become freelancers; (2) to express their creativity; (3) to form an audience; (4) to teach others what they know; and (5) to earn more money.
The potential of blogs to become virtual learning environments
The exponents of the Personal Learning Environment approach, according to which learners control and manage their own learning activity (receiving support only for learning objectives, learning process management, and communication with the learning community) recommend the blog as a tool to ease its implementation24. By interacting through blogs with other learners, students can become guides in others learning process, setting the foundation for collaborative learning communities. Specifically, the blog can support students in explorative learning and reflection on learning activities, and teachers in supervising students` progress.25 In this regard, scholars proposed to ask students to do digital video reporting assignments uploaded to a blogging platform, as opposed to the usual written assignment26, or to comment on a minimum of three posts from their colleagues per week and encouraged them to respond consistently to the most recent blog comments27. Another proposed tactic was to appoint a student for each course assignment, to post the homework on the class blog 48 hours before the offline course and to ask the other students to post
20 “O analiză a blogosferei românești bazată pe RoBloggersSurvey 2007 [An analysis of Romanian blogosphere based on RoBloggersSurvey 2007],” Timsoft, last modified November 5, 2007, http://www.timsoft.ro/ejournal/analiza_ro_blogosfera2007.html (accessed 10 April, 2018). 21 ”Despre ce volum de informații/audientă vorbim când spunem «Social Media din .ro»? [What volume of information/audience are we talking about when we say «Social Media fom .ro»?],” Zelist Monitor, last modified 2018, https://www.zelist.ro/monitor (accessed 10 April, 2018). 22 Lenhart and Fox, “Bloggers. A portrait of the internet’s new storytellers.” 23 ”State of the Blogging Industry,” ConvertKit, last modified 2017. https://convertkit.com/reports/blogging (accessed 10 April, 2018). 24 M. A. Chatti, M. Jarke and M. Specht, “The 3P learning model,” Journal of Educational Technology & Society 13, no. 4 (2010): 74-85. 25 M. Derntl and T. Mazzurana, “Case study on student blogs in a blended learning course,” in Learning and Instruction in the Digital Age, ed. Michael Spector, Dirk Ifenthaler, Pedro Isai as, Kinshuk and Demetrios Sampson (New York: Springer US, 2010), 309-25. 26 P. Willmot, M. Bramhall and K. Radley, “Using digital video reporting to inspire and engage students,” The Higher Education Academy (2012): 1-7. 27 A. C. Halavais, “Blogging Course Texts: Enhancing Our Traditional Use of Textual Materials,” in Learning Through Digital Media: Experiments in Technology and Pedagogy, ed. R. Trebor Scholz (New York: The Institute for Distributed Creativity, 2011), 16-24. Cătălina-Ionela Rezeanu et al. 12 Narrative Construction of Popularity Assessment Criteria on Weblogs comments on that post.28 This way, students can already prepare arguments to participate in offline discussions in the classroom. Similarly, scholars recommend students be offered 5- 10 minutes at the end of each offline lesson to post their thoughts and progress on the subject, on their own personal blogs29. Such a task can stimulate students' independent and reflexive learning skills as blogs record dialogue through comments. According to the same source, another teaching task may be to ask students to use the blog to show progress of independent documenting activity before being exposed to lectures or research projects on a new topic. Moreover, requesting students to post and comment on photos on a dedicated blog can be a tactic to ease the transition from formal learning to informal one30. The author suggests the blog can become a useful tool for students to share experiences of discovering a new language or culture. A more advanced implemented strategy was to develop a mobile blogging system to create virtual student classes, giving them the opportunity to post comments from real life contexts31. The unprecedented development of digital technologies over the last decades predicts the 21st century will present a proliferation of formal and informal learning digital literacy. In this context, both teachers and students need to get acquainted with various digital platforms (including blogging) to develop their digital fluency. Therefore, using blogs as teaching tools is not easy, and can raise a number of issues caused by the lack of students and teachers familiarity with this communication platform. To surpass these limits, there is a need for: teaching objectives be transparent, pupils participate in their creation, and teachers take on the facilitator's role in the learning process32. It is also desirable that, in certain virtual contexts, students to be allowed to choose discussion moderators or even blog administrators. Furthermore, the cited author emphasizes the importance of accommodating students with self-directed learning, to the detriment of traditional methods of problem solving and assessment. The author believes digital educational technologies are not a panacea, but they have the potential to form essential skills such as associating learning with dialogue and participation. The next step after inserting blogging platforms in the teaching medium is to use more complex integration platforms. In this regard, Dietrich and Ippolito33 present the Blackboard teaching platform, which allows students to download texts, upload their assignments, post on discussion threads, and create assignment calendars, while teachers can give customized feedback on homework or record student presence. The cited authors advocate for The Pool, which allows for the creation of collaborative projects where the level and type of individual contribution can be set. Moreover, the platform separates the projects into three stages (intent, approach and relieves). In the first stage the students can discuss and vote for the most important project tasks that need to be carried out. After the
28 M. Zer-Aviv, “When Teaching Becomes an Interaction Design Task. Networking the Classroom with Collaborative Blogs,” in Learning Through Digital Media: Experiments in Technology and Pedagogy, ed. R. Trebor Scholz (New York: The Institute for Distributed Creativity, 2011), 35-44. 29 Helena Gillespie, Helen Boulton, Alison Hramiak and Richard Williamson, Learning and teaching with virtual learning environments (Exeter: Learning Matters Ltd., 2007). 30 A. Kukulska-Hulme, “Learning Cultures on the Move: Where are we heading?” Educational Technology & Society 13, no. 4 (2010): 4–14. 31 Y.-M. Huang, Y.-L. Jeng and T.-C. Huang, “An Educational Mobile Blogging System for Supporting Collaborative Learning,” Journal of Educational Technology & Society 12, no. 2 (2009): 163-75. 32 Halavais, “Weblogs and collaborative web publishing as learning spaces,” 1215-1235. 33 Craig Dietrich and Jon Ippolito, “A Path towards Global Reach The Pool,” in Learning Through Digital Media: Experiments in Technology and Pedagogy, ed. R. Trebor Scholz (New York: The Institute for Distributed Creativity, 2011), 273-282. 13 Cătălina-Ionela Rezeanu et al. Narrative Construction of Popularity Assessment Criteria on Weblogs
last stage, students have the opportunity to assess different components of their colleagues' contributions numerically (concept, perception, and technical).
Narrative construction of popularity criteria on blogs
In Romania, in the period between 2006-2007 blogging had an unprecedented development. 2006 was considered the most important year for blogging in Romania, because: the number of blogs has tripled compared to the previous year,34 the first Romanian blogs award festival was held as well as the first Romanian conference about the personal branding built through blogs, and the Internetics digital communication festival introduced a special category of prizes devoted to personal blogs. Worthy of note is the 2007 initiative by the Olympiads of Communication student contest to introduce a special section for blogs. We have conducted a narrative analysis of online data produced in the aforementioned period on the most popular Romanian blogs. We operationalized the popularity within the blogosphere by the following dimensions: (1) notoriety - the blogs mentioned by at least 5 respondents in the research ”RoBloggerSurvey 2006”; (2) interactivity - the blogs with the biggest number of visitors' comments; (3) loyalty - blogs with large numbers of subscribers; and (4) efficiency - blogs nominated for the ”RoBlogFest 2006” competition. Based on this operationalization, we identified the following data sources: research on Romanian blogs RoBloggers Survey 2006, where 46 popular blogs were identified; the Romanian Blogging Awards RoBlogFest 2006, where 19 blogs have been nominated in 7 categories (the most niche blog, the best-written blog, the most informative blog, the blog that makes you think, the most interesting / original blog and the best blog). At the same time, we used narratives from the ”Heritage for Europe - Time Capsule” project (170 posts from 100 blogs), lasting from 5 December to 10 January 2007, with the purpose of collecting posts containing personal and/or collective memories. In this paper we used data and narrative analysis taken from an unpublished dissertation thesis35. We used the qualitative-constructivist analysis of the self-narratives. The analysis involves the gradual processing of data, by asking questions and responding to them based on content. To read and analyse a narrative from a constructivist perspective means to keep interpretation as close as possible to that of the narrators and their readers. After coding the data, we highlighted 5 themes that represent the narrative construction of 5 popularity criteria on Romanian blogs: (1) originality; (2) utility; (3) topicality; (4) subjectivity; (5) and coherence. These are considered necessary by authors and their audiences for a blog to be considered popular. Originality has its source in subjectivity and utility. Genuine personal blogs featuring life experiences that are considered authentic, and also expert blogs that make a subjective selection of objective data are considered to be original by their audience. So, personal or professional experience act as originality criteria. This relation also works in reverse, and the utility is valued by subjectivity. In this particular case, a blog is interpreted as useful by its author. The usefulness is related to the fact that the content of a blog is perceived as useful if it meets the expectations of its audience. The greatest importance in interpreting a blog as popular is the impression of coherence it produces. The author of the blog should be able to integrate the originality, the subjectivity,
34 “O analiză a blogosferei românești bazată pe RoBloggersSurvey 2006 [An analysis of Romanian blogosphere based on RoBloggersSurvey 2006],” Timsoft, last modified August 20, 2006, http://www.timsoft.ro/ejournal/analiza_ro_blogosfera2006.html (accessed 10 April, 2018). 35 Cătălina.-Ionela Rezeanu, “The blog: personal branding, impression management, and narrative construction of the self in the virtual space” (unpublished PhD diss., University of Bucharest, 2007). Cătălina-Ionela Rezeanu et al. 14 Narrative Construction of Popularity Assessment Criteria on Weblogs the usefulness and the topicality of the posted information into a coherent strategy. On the blog, consistency can be achieved in three ways: temporal coherence, causal coherence and thematic coherence. The temporal coherence means the connections among different information is made by their sequence in time, and it is often complemented by spatial placement. Causal coherence is based on the idea that the unity of a narrative can not only be linear but also branched by causal links. Thematic coherence refers to the selection of events around themes that overdo them. Through its nature, the blog is a tool that facilitates all these five strategies. In the virtual environment, there is a pressure for bloggers to make creative productions as the competition and innovation are stronger. This online environment allows for creativity exercises as data about the others is fragmented and the lack of information is supplemented by imagination. In other words, it is much easier for the bloggers to be original by relying on what makes its audience imagine about them. The impression of subjectivity gets new valences on the blog. With its facilities, the blog encourages constant information updating. First, the blog sorts the information so that the most recent post is always on the first page. Then, in a typical blog, there is a calendar view of the data to which posts have been added. By being able to group information into categories, the blog allows the manifestation of utility and subjectivity. The categories that most blogs authors use are ”useful” and ”personal”. In addition, by placing the blog in one of the already known classifications (personal or niche) allows the reader to catalogue the type of information in it (subjective or useful). Archiving all blog posts as well as the existence of search engines that search for information based on keywords are ways of facilitating the utility. In an online journal, coherence becomes a legitimacy criterion. Since in the virtual environment there is no possibility of verifying the discourse by confronting it with nonverbal language, the veracity of the information is assessed by the impression of coherence and the absence of contradictions.
Implications for the field of education
Applying the suggestions formulated in the literature to materialise the potential of blogs to become virtual learning platforms is necessary, but not sufficient. The research presented above suggests, to be visited, known, and appreciated, blogs are required to meet particular assessment criteria (originality, subjectivity, topicality, utility, and coherence). To meet the originality criteria, educational blogs should not duplicate the information that students already have access to, but encourage their original syntheses (selection of concepts, theories, and methods considered by students as atypical or controversial) and passing them through the personal experience filter. Thus, teachers can ask students to read independently to find unconventional and counter-intuitive theories and methods of research. Moreover, students can use the blog to nuance the abstract information already learned with examples from their daily life, being stimulated to produce their own interpretations and even make changes to the established theories of the studied disciplines and topics. To create an environment that stimulates the production of innovative ideas, teachers can give appraisal rewards to students who actively participate in comments on blog posts, motivating them to post their own interpretations of interpretations written by their peers. Also, an educational blog should be managed by a prestigious teacher, with most of the posts being uploaded by students on themes that illustrate innovative theories with authentic daily life experiences. The fact that the blog is compatible with multimedia content, publishing facilities can ease the originality strategy. In this regard, one could use the recommendation to give students assignments that they can solve by blogging their photo reports or by responding to comments on teacher-uploaded content. 15 Cătălina-Ionela Rezeanu et al. Narrative Construction of Popularity Assessment Criteria on Weblogs
Applying the criterion of subjectivity, educational blogs should rely on creating the impression of authenticity. In particular, such blogs should not mimic the teaching materials used in the course, but instead tune them through the subjective-interpretive narratives of the students. In this way, visiting such a blog would create an experience similar to exposure to a documentary on a specialist topic. Blogs could be used by teachers to train students in using the theoretical and methodological tools of disciplines, to analyse their own life experiences, and to become aware of their own progress in the learning process. For instance, the experience of international mobility may be an opportunity to ask students to share this situation with their colleagues by constantly posting to a dedicated section of the blog (both about the theoretical content they were exposed to and about the academic or specific cultural process from the new context). Not just international mobility, yet their own learning path (with upsides, downsides, or difficulties) can also be a pretext for self- analysis on the blog. Teachers could ask students to post monthly personal observations on their individual documenting process, or to post at the end of each course session, sharing personal reactions and informed changes relative to the subjective understanding of the taught subject. Especially for Social Science students, the educational blog can be a platform where they can upload their own research journal, posting observations, difficulties, subjective impressions filled using audio, photo, or video content (interviews, mental maps, research routes, etc.). Respecting the criterion of subjectivity in operating blogs as educational platforms could contribute to the formation of students' abilities for reflexivity and critical thinking, being an important step towards encouraging self-directed learning and the democratization of access to knowledge. By encouraging students to appropriate the assimilated didactic content, the impression of authenticity they transmit the audience could improve the image of higher education. To meet the utility and topicality criteria, educational blogs should be more similar to specialized blogs (niche) managed by credible personalities in the field. That is why it is important for well-known teachers and professionals being visible on these blogs to give credibility to posted content. On the one hand, such blogs need to be coordinated by teachers and, on the other hand, must include guest posts from well-known specialists in the field. In the latter case, teachers can use the widely spread AMA (Ask Me Anything) or Q & A (Question & Answer) tactics in which a celebrity in the field responds through blog comments to questions posed by students. To build an educational blog with useful and up- to-date content, teachers might post links to news about recent events of great interest (from the socio-political-economic realm) asking students to comment on them using their theoretical-methodological tools from their domain of study. In turn, students can be encouraged to search for and post news about the latest research in their field of study, which can become pretexts for online discussions using comments or video-conferences. To be considered coherent, educational blogs should be managed by a teacher to make sure the content is integrated through a unitary approach. A first tactic might be to narrow the content of the blog to a thematic area (for instance, in the field of sociology, blogs, such as, Sociological Images, Sociological Cinema or Creativity via Sociology) are relatively popular. Another strategy could be for a teacher to moderate comments, guiding the debate, to ensure students' arguments are consistent. In this regard, it is also recommended assigning a student for each theme, who will post their homework on the blog 48 hours before the offline lesson on that particular theme, and ask the other students to comment on the post, to ensure consistency between the content of the offline course and the online blog; also, asking students to use the blog to advance their independent reading activity before being exposed to lectures or research projects on a new topic could help shape a coherent strategy of self-directed learning. The temporal or spatial consistency can be ensured by classifying blog content by space-time criteria. Narrative time coherence can be Cătălina-Ionela Rezeanu et al. 16 Narrative Construction of Popularity Assessment Criteria on Weblogs sustained by imposing on the students a certain frequency of subjective content posting on the blog. Causal consistency can be maintained by regularly organizing blog discussions where students are encouraged to find causal links among different contents. To ensure thematic consistency, it is important for the teacher to post blog pages that thematically classify information and update them regularly. Based on these debates and synthesis pages, the blog administrator should constantly insert hyperlinks that causally link old and new content and revise tags to consistently optimize the classification of information.
Conclusions
In a context in which national policies were launched forbidding the use of mobile phones during classrooms to reduce the propensity to access new media, we stand for a different approach. We consider that even a simple and longstanding interactive platform such as the blogging one has potential to enrich the future of learning in formal educational institutions. Since the research presented revealed that the five narrative criteria of blog popularity function interdependently, the criterion of consistency being the most important, the next step, after using blogs as digital educational environments, is the adoption of complex integrative educational platforms. Although we live in a time when information can be instantly accessed almost anywhere and at any time and young generations are the early adopters of new technologies and new media, the literature on their potential to enhance education in formal institutions is still scarce. By using a narrative-constructivist approach in analysing blogs, and taking a personal learning environment perspective in formulating teaching recommendations, this paper tries to fill this gap. It pleads for the need to consider particular contextual popularity criteria (originality, utility, topicality; subjectivity, and coherence) in order to activate the positive effects of blogs as virtual learning environments. The results can inspire practitioners in field of formal education in planning teaching activities and formulating assignments for students. For researchers, they can be useful both as a methodological tool to assess popularity in the blogosphere and as a source of hypotheses about the dimensions of popularity that influence learning. To surpass the limitations of this study (lack of generalizability of qualitative results, secondary analysis of not very recent data), future research could orient towards testing the mediation effects of the identified criteria on the positive influence of blogs on education, by applying advanced quantitative analyses on representative samples collected from blogs that are popular in the present time.
References
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The Importance of Digitizing Old Medical Books and Modern Medical Ethics Books in the Field of Medicine
Nadinne Roman,1 Elena Amaricăi,2 Silviu Caloian1
1 Faculty of Medicine, Transilvania University, Braşov, Romania 2 Victor Babes University of Medicine and Pharmacy Timisoara, Romania
Background
Medical technologies and research have flourished over the last century, starting from empirical experiments on patients in the early 1900s reaching now studies on genetics, neurorobotics and remote surgery through telemedicine It is important for the integrity of healthcare process that medical practitioners and especially researchers in this domain to achieve knowledge concerning the medical field evolution and bioethics development during the last century. One of the key elements for acquiring knowledge is access to information. The difficulties or the opportunities that medical staff and researchers encounter in gathering information is discussed and analysed in this paper.1 Taking into account the accessibility of the information. we bring into discussion the usefulness and effectiveness of digital libraries. Does the academic world keep up with the new digital technology or the safest way to access books, especially old and rare, is by going to local or university libraries? 2Given the technological advances in access to information and the new generation of students who use the virtual environment as a source of information, free digital libraries are a safe source of education without cost implications, so it is also important for teachers to be able to properly guide their students in the process of teaching.3
Objectives
The primary objective of this paper is to analyse the ease of access to online digital libraries regarding the old medical books which can provide useful information about old medical techniques and the current medical ethics books which can provide helpful information in ethical challenges or dilemmas which can occur in medical practice. The secondary purpose is to accomplish a ranking of digital libraries for researchers, students, academic staff and regular people. In this study, we focus on medical books as well as on books and papers that provide information on bioethics and ethics of medical research. The analysis of digital
1 A. Repanovici, “Marketing Research about Attitudes, Difficulties and Interest of Academic Community about Institutional Repository” in Proceedings Of The 3rd International Conference On Management, Marketing And Finances (2009), 88-95. 2 J.V. Lombardi, Academic Libraries in a Digital Age. D-Lib Magazine, 2000. 3 L. Rogozea, F. Leasu, L. Cristea, L., G. Sechel, “Bioethics, technical and scientific progress in medicine-an educational point of view” in the 6th WSEAS/IASME International Conference on EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGIES (Kantaoui, Sousse, Tunisia, 2010).
Nadinne Roman et al. 20 The Importance of Digitizing Old Medical Books… libraries wishes to provide useful data for academic researchers and patients who wish to access this type of information, considering that with the medical evolution, regular people are becoming more and more informed in the online environment.4
Method
We have searched the online environment interrogating Google search engine. The criteria used for digital libraries analyse were: English language and free digital libraries. After selecting the main 15 databases we have performed a search based on keywords related to medical ethics and medical books. We have analysed the number of books and documents available in these 15 digital libraries and created a ranking based on this criterion. A SWOT analysis of the digital databases accessibility and search functions for accessing old medical and medical ethics books was accomplished.
Results and discussions
Deficiencies
From the analyse of 15 digital libraries, all of them contains medical books and medical ethics books, but many aspects concerning the quantity and the quality of books or papers, and also the ease of searching are important elements to discuss. The search was made taking into account the number of books, manuscripts, articles and languages in which resources are found. Another element in our study is the use of Boolean operators as search tools, both in the digital library and inside documents or books. One of the items that was elementary during the comparison of digital libraries was the oldest manuscript or the oldest book that can be found in the library in the study context. The majority of digital libraries have a poor search engine system, being difficult to search by topic or subject. The majority of digital library books use Boolean operators and afford online reading of books and papers. Although most of medical books are less related to medical ethics. Important sources of old medical ethics books and information are available through the digital libraries, from Aristotle’s „Nicomachean Ethics” book from 350 BC, translated to English, to 2017 publications related to bioethics. The European Library gives the possibility to add the manuscript/book in Mendeley and Zotero, a very useful instrument that can be used by researchers. Medical Heritage Library send the reader to http://mhl.countway.harvard.edu or https://archive.org/details/medicalheritagelibrary, in the Medical Heritage Collection. Even when we are searching into http://mhl.countway.harvard.edu page, the results are shown in archive.org. We were unable to establish the older book/manuscript. Europeana Collections has some similarities with The European Library, when searching medical books, the oldest manuscript appears the same as http://www.theeuropeanlibrary.org/tel4/, although has a distinct link page.
4 L. Dima, A. Repanovici, D. Purcaru, L. Rogozea. “Informed Consent And E-Communication In Medicine” Revista Romana De Bioetica (2014): 37-46.
21 Nadinne Roman et al. The Importance of Digitizing Old Medical Books…
Table 1. Digital libraries ranking for medical old books and medical books free content
No. Web address Medical ethics book (from year) Medical/medicine books (from year) 1. http://www.theeu 25,330 results from 76 collections, 28,702 results, from year ropeanlibrary.org/t from 1600 1196 (Arabic manuscript) el4/ 2. http://www.medic http://mhl.countway.harvard.edu - 199425 results, from 50 alheritage.org/ 21159 text results databases and over 40 languages 14 dialects 3. https://wellcomeli 3072 results, free and online texts, 30831, free online texts, brary.org/ from 1700 from year 1700, 30746 eBooks 4. http://www.archiv 1379 results: scientific articles, books, 22,196- texts-2 collections- e.org publications from 1740 to 2017 from year 1479 5. http://netlibrary.n 42 results, from 1900 176,875 eBooks, from year et 1100 6. http://muse.jhu.ed 648 results, collection dedicated to 4924 results u bioethics 7. https://www.euro 208 results – articles, books, sounds, 982 results - texts, peana.eu video manuscripts, articles, from year 1196 8. https://www.wdl. 12 results, 1 relevant 840 results, manuscripts, org/ texts and books, from 500 AC, Arabic, Chinese, Latin 9. http://nuremberg. 165 results, from 1936 150 results, from year 1919 law.harvard.edu 10. http://www.infom 21 results, including Aristotle's ethics, 114 results- not very relevant otions.com/alex/ translated into English 11. http://www.guten 14 results, from 1896 (7 relevant) 59 results from 1889 to 2000 berg.org 12. http://digilibraries 8 results, from 1896 ((3 relevant) 41results, from-1880 .com 13. http://www.bartle 4 results, from 1900 1- greys anatomy by.com/ 14. http://onlinebook 5 books and 1 journal: British More journals then books, s.library.upenn.edu Medical Ethics access only by browsing /subjects.html through pages, very useful medical journal 15. www.ibiblio.org more like a search engine, links to other web pages
Availability
On digilibraries.com, the search is difficult, and the majority of documents are not available online for reading or documenting, being necessary to download the file on the personal computer. Muse project and Netlibrary have the same inconvenience regarding the availability to inspect online the document. The European Library has just an indexing of the titles and often sends it to the author/ publication page which may require subscription or costs for viewing the document. The most accessible digital library is archive.org, both in terms of the quantity and quality of documents, as well as the search facilities for keywords within manuscripts, books and texts. It is possible online documentation and the use of bookmarks by creating a user profile, but also downloading documents on personal computer.
Nadinne Roman et al. 22 The Importance of Digitizing Old Medical Books…
Addressability
Many academic people and researchers use free sources for their research, teaching classes or for study, because most of the Academic databases are expensive and not everyone have subscription.5 Usually Google Scholar and PubMed in medical field are used as databases for research. But for historical aspects, digital libraries may be used with success! Another important segment considering the addressability of online documentation is represented by students, which access the online environment for the individual study. As technology of information is evolving, the ease of access through digital libraries is facilitated by telephone applications and internet access through mobile phones, making this process accessible by open access without subscriptions or payment.6 The importance of the digitization of literary resources, especially regarding to the old medical book, as well as the texts and documents that denote the evolution of medical practitioners and medical ethics, is reflected in the teachers’ opportunity to create a complete and complex framework regarding the student’s perception of this field evolution and medical development. At the same time, by open access to this kind of resources, the students, as well as other researchers in the field, have the possibility of documentation and later by discovering the history, they create the possibility to achieve their own judgment, especially in bioethical dilemmas and challenges.7
5 A. Repanovici, L. Rogozea, R. Miclaus. “Analysis Of The Impact Of History” in Bulletin of the Transilvania University of Braşov, 6(51) (2009): 173-176. 6 L. Rogozea, F. Leasu, L. Cristea, G. Sechel G. “Bioethics, technical and scientific progress in medicine-an educational point of view” in the 6th WSEAS/IASME International Conference on EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGIES (Kantaoui, Sousse, Tunisia, 2010). 7 R. Miclăus, C. Nemet, V. Burtea, L. Rogozea, “History of balneology – a new way to teach using e- tools” in Proceedings of the 7th WSEAS International Conference on Education Technology (EDUTE 11) (Iasi, 2011), 155-158.
23 Nadinne Roman et al. The Importance of Digitizing Old Medical Books…
SWOT analysis
THREATS
Copyright protection Free acces to medical information for nonmedical users The damage of the hard disks where the data is stored STRENGHTS
Free online acces to academic papers and old books/old medical books Easy access by searching inside documents Exceeding the distance barriers for access to old manuscripts OPPORTUNITIES
Increasing the visibility of academic and research staff Cumulating knowledge about medical ethics and medicine Create a complete framework to understand the evolution of medicine and medical ethics WEAKNESS ES Some libraries begin to charge access costs Lack of international funds/charity Lack of library staff Advanced scanning devices and necessary methods for maintaining old books / manuscripts
Nadinne Roman et al. 24 The Importance of Digitizing Old Medical Books…
The use of different ways of teaching ethics at the university, to heterogeneous groups of students, whose previous education is different and whose level of knowledge and base is also different, must be the result of multidisciplinary cooperation.8
Strengths and opportunities
Teachers and students, who need academic articles, book chapters, or medical specific feature books have an increased opportunity in achieving knowledge given by the free online access to academic journals and medical literature books in healthcare study. Regarding the researchers and academic staff, they have an increased visibility arisen from the free online digital access to their papers and research. Increasing visibility in the academic community is an important element in professional academic development. And users of this type of electronic resources are growing.9 The emergence of numerous medical technologies and techniques used in modern medicine gave rise to new responsibilities of physicians and practitioners. Integrating morality, medical ethics, as well as public health policies, requires the creation of a comprehensive and complex framework for addressing ethical-medical contexts both from the perspective of the health service provider and from the perspective of the healthcare consumer.10 22 years ago, Adam et al. made predictions about digital libraries and predicted access to information that was inaccessible so far for decades, regarding old documents or rare books that will be available through digital libraries. Nowadays, access to such information has become easy through internet facilities and digital libraries.11
Conclusions
The online environment stores a wealth of information, and access to information is easy, based on search engines. Filtering the information received from the online environment is very important, especially for the average user. In the context of this review, medical students, who increasingly use this tool for individual documentation, are given access to medical information through the availability of free virtual libraries representing a secure source of documentation. Teachers or educators also benefit from the existence of digital libraries, with a variety of materials at no cost, which they can use in the educational process. Research and visibility are facilitated and enhanced in the academic environment through digital libraries, facilitated by information technology. In the online environment there are some digital libraries that provide abundant medical and bioethics literature that can be easily used by students, teachers or researchers. Threats that lie on digital libraries are the lack of staff and advanced technology for storing and
8 L. Rogozea, R. Miclaus, C. Nemet, A. Balescu, I. Moleavin. “Education, Ethics and E- Communication in Medicine” in 8th WSEAS International Conference on Multimedia, Internet and Video Technologies/8th WSEAS International Conference on Distance Learning and Web Engineering (2008), 197-201. 9 B.L. Folb, “Clinical and academic use of electronic and print books: the Health Sciences Library System e-book study at the University of Pittsburgh.” J Med Libr Assoc. (2011): 218–228. 10 J.M. Mann, “Medicine and Public Health, Ethics and Human Rights” The Hasting Center Report (1997): 6–13. 11 N.R. Adam, M. Halem, S. Naqvi, “Promising research directions in Digital Libraries” in Lecture Notes in Computer Science, ed. Bhargava B.K., Yesha Y. Adam N.R. (Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer, 1995), 21-22.
25 Nadinne Roman et al. The Importance of Digitizing Old Medical Books…
scanning documents. These elements should be considered to enable the development of information technology in the virtual and academic environment.
The Usefulness of Social Networks for the Dissemination of Scientific Information
Ionel Şerban
Transilvania University of Brasov (DPMM Department) Romania
Introduction
The rise of social networking is obvious in the last years. Not so long ago, it used to be enough to be present on the Internet for the one-way broadcasting and dissemination of information. Today, social networks such as Facebook and Twitter are creating new forms of social interaction, dialogue, exchange and collaboration. Social-media enables users to swap ideas, post updates and comments, or to participate in activities and events, while sharing their wider interests. 1The negative impact of social networking is also obvious. This chapter will highlight the positive impact that social networking has on the dissemination of information, research and books, in a century where the speed of innovation is rapidly increasing. The expectations, in terms of research, publications, and books are increasingly higher in close relation to maintaining the laws of copyright. There is the concern that the amount of information available on social-media might break copyright laws.
Academic research social networking
ResearchGate is a free social network for researchers from any scientific field.2 This provides access to applications like web.2.0, search for semantics of articles, file-sharing, and a public file server. Moreover, there is the possibility to use forums, methodological discussions, groups or create your own blog within the network, etc. ResearchGate is built by scientists, for scientists. It started when two researchers discovered first-hand that collaborating with a friend or colleague on the other side of the world was no easy task. Founded in 2008 by physicians Dr. Ijad Madisch and Dr. Sören Hofmayer, and computer scientist Horst Fickenscher, ResearchGate today has more than 13+ million members. We strive to help them make progress happen faster.3 An exclusive feature of the network is the semantic search engine, not only in internal resources, but also in bibliographic databases such as PubMed, CiteSeer, arXiv, NASA Library, etc. Specific to this search engine is the ability to perform searches within the published works. The platform proposes similar methods to facilitate members' connection. By analysing user information in its profile, it will suggest groups, members with similar interfaces or possible literature of interest. It also allows the job selection by field of activity or state.
1The rise of social networking. Changing the web as we know it (2010), http://www.itu.int/net/itunews/issues/2010/06/35.aspx (accessed October 10, 2017). 2 https://ro.wikipedia.org/wiki/Researchgate (accessed October 10, 2017). 3 https://www.researchgate.net/about (accessed October 10, 2017).
27 Ionel Şerban The Usefulness of Social Networks for the Dissemination of Scientific Information
Using this social network researchers have the opportunity to download free of charge previously published documents, without breaking copyright laws.4 It helps to ease communication, forcing users to publish general notes as well as short scientific articles.5 Important are also Information Literacy skills to select and fins the scientific information.6 Also, researchers have to know open access sources, like institutional repositories.7 Considering, also the great impact of old book digitized, which was hard to get access to, today, social networking might be a good gateway for old manuscripts dissemination, which aren’t given the right attention due to the fact that they aren’t online on the internet. From the internet we can find 5 reasons why everybody should join ResearchGate.8 These are: the access to papers, getting advice from researchers, send your work, make contacts and find jobs. This social network also gives a RG score which has the purpose, also not yet declared, to differentiate the researchers according to some criteria. Several studies on the RG score, concluded that details about the calculation method are not published, and also the RG score was "not transparent and irreproducible".9 The incorporation of the journal impact factor into the RG score, was criticized and suggested that it should "not be considered in the evaluation of academics." The results confirmed in a second "response" study, which also found the score to depend mostly on journal impact factors. The RG score was found to be negatively correlated with network centrality, i.e., that users that are the most active (and thus central to the network) on ResearchGate usually do not have high RG scores. It was also found strongly positively correlated with Quacquarelli Symonds university rankings at the institutional level, but only weakly with Elsevier SciVal rankings of each authors. While it was found to be correlated with different university rankings, the correlation in between these rankings themselves was higher.10
4 https://www.antropologi.info/blog/anthropology/2009/selv-archiving-repositories-is-researchgate- the-solution (accessed October 10, 2017). 5 See: O. Florea, I.C. Roşca, “Stokes' second problem for a micropolar fluid with slip” Plos One 10(7), (2015): published online; C. Drugă, I. Roşca, A. Repanovici, R. Necula, “Design and construction of an experimental stand for total hip and knee prosthetics testing” E-Health and Bioengineering Conference, Sinaia, Romania, (2017): 398- 401; D. Cotoros, C. Drugă, A. Stanciu, “Statistical analysis of forces developed by fingers” E-Health and Bioengineering Conference, Sinaia, Romania, (2017): 21-24; B. Braun, M. Baritz, FEM modelling of shoes insoles components for standing and walking simulation, 2017, https://www.researchgate.net/publication/312252475_FEM_ modelling_of_shoes_insoles_components_for_standing_and_walking_simulation (accessed October 10, 2017); https://www.researchgate.net/publication/319271314_Biomaterials_Polylactic_acid_and_3D_printin g_processes_for_orthosis_and_prosthesis?_sg=Oh4WS3ZpBfjvqa6PZ6L- A8Q8GKCdiE3rhe_4uiE582zIoxqvAc67KFSDQOO4LKN5R1JuMuGdFamqTj0 (accessed November 2, 2017). 6 A. Repanovici, I. Barbu, L. Cristea, “Information literacy learning model for engineering students” in the 5th IASME/WSEAS International Conference on Engineering, (2008): 73- 78. 7 A. Repanovici, “Marketing Research about Attitudes, Difficulties and Interest of Academic Community about Institutional Repository” in the Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Management, Marketing and Finances, (2009): 88-95. 8 5 Reasons Why You Should Join ResearchGate, http://toptipbio.com/why-you-should-join-researchgate (accessed October 10, 2017). 9 P. Kraker, E. Lex, A critical look at the ResearchGate score as a measure of scientific reputation, 2015,https://www.researchgate.net/publication/277393116_A_Critical_Look_at_the_ResearchGate_ Score_as_a_Measure_of_Scientific_Reputation (accessed October 10, 2017). 10 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ResearchGate (accessed October 10, 2017).
Ionel Şerban 28 The Usefulness of Social Networks for the Dissemination of Scientific Information
Along with ResearchGate we can find other academic social networks, such as: Academia.edu, Google Scholar, Google Academic, Mendeley, Zotero, but which do not have the same popularity as the first one. All these social networks offer informal education. Recent studies have concluded that considering the multiple profiles, that a researcher has, it is time consuming to manage all of them so it is recommended to strategically select the social network that meet their goal although it is very difficult and there is little information that might help you choose.11 American Physiological Association recommends a management guide of the online presence of every person. This guide can show that ResearchGate provides community interaction features that help distinguish it from other platforms. Their users can: ask academic questions and respond to questions; follow other researchers and receive notifications of their work; ask authors to upload full versions of their papers using the “request full text button;” request feedback on their work; create project logs, used to update work more easily and for a specific research project. Before using these services, researchers should check the archiving policies of each journal before choosing to upload or share papers so that they do not violate the copyright policies.12 Some researchers say that if the public content of the social networking isn’t filtered it may cause universities or companies to think twice before hiring a person on the job market.13
Discussion and Conclusions
In conclusion this type of social networking might be successful in disseminating information worldwide but considering reaction of some researcher’s coalitions, due to copyright infringement, the access to some papers might be forbidden. Even though there will still present interest due to the possibilities to interact on research areas of interest. All the information, papers, books transferred over the internet should carefully be taken into consideration so that there should not be any copyright infringement. Although this is very difficult and in many cases only depends on the users trust and good behaviour. In a world where internet connectivity is the one of the main activity this types of research social networking might offer the possibility to detect, discuss, interact and lead to improvement in many areas of interest. Considering all the recent studies it is a good start to find which of the many social networks fits you best considering your goals and time limitation for managing your profile.
References
Braun, B. and M. Baritz. FEM modelling of shoes insoles components for standing and walking simulation, 2017.
11 K. Fatima, E. Carlos, Academic Social Networking Sites: A Comparative Analysis of Their Services and Tools, 2015, https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/bitstream/handle /2142/73715/380_ready.pdf. 12 http://www.apa.org/science/about/psa/2017/02/academic-social-networking.aspx (accessed October 10, 2017). 13 See articles: V.R. Brown, E.D. Vaughn, “The writing on the (Facebook) wall: The use of social networking sites in hiring decisions” Journal of Business and Psychology, 26(2), (2011): 219-225; W.P. Smith, D.L. Kidder, “You’ve been tagged! (Then again, maybe not): Employers and Facebook” Business Horizons, 53(5), (2010): 491-499.
29 Ionel Şerban The Usefulness of Social Networks for the Dissemination of Scientific Information
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/312252475_FEM_ modelling_of_shoes_insoles_components_for_standing_and_walking_simulation (accessed October 10, 2017). Brown, V.R. and E.D. Vaughn. “The writing on the (Facebook) wall: The use of social networking sites in hiring decisions.” Journal of Business and Psychology, 26(2), (2011): 219-225. Cotoros, D. and C. Drugă, A. Stanciu. “Statistical analysis of forces developed by fingers.” E-Health and Bioengineering Conference, Sinaia, Romania, (2017): 21-24. Drugă, C. and I. Roşca, A. Repanovici, R. Necula. “Design and construction of an experimental stand for total hip and knee prosthetics testing.” E-Health and Bioengineering Conference, Sinaia, Romania, (2017): 398- 401. Fatima, K. and E. Carlos. Academic Social Networking Sites: A Comparative Analysis of Their Services and Tools, 2015. https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/bitstream/handle /2142/73715/380_ready.pdf. Florea, O. and I.C. Roşca. “Stokes' second problem for a micropolar fluid with slip.” Plos One 10(7), (2015): published online. Kraker, P. and E. Lex. A critical look at the ResearchGate score as a measure of scientific reputation, 2015.https://www.researchgate.net/publication/277393116_A_Critical_Look_at_the_ ResearchGate_Score_as_a_Measure_of_Scientific_Reputation (accessed October 10, 2017). Repanovici, A. and I. Barbu, L. Cristea. “Information literacy learning model for engineering students.” In 5th IASME/WSEAS International Conference on Engineering, (2008): 73- 78. Repanovici A. “Marketing Research about Attitudes, Difficulties and Interest of Academic Community about Institutional Repository.” In the Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Management, Marketing and Finances, (2009): 88-95. Smith, W.P. and D.L. Kidder. “You’ve been tagged! (Then again, maybe not): Employers and Facebook.” Business Horizons, 53(5), (2010): 491-499.
Internet sources: The rise of social networking. Changing the web as we know it, 2010. http://www.itu.int/net/itunews/issues/2010/06/35.aspx (accessed October 10, 2017). 5 Reasons Why You Should Join ResearchGate. http://toptipbio.com/why-you-should-join- researchgate (accessed October 10, 2017). https://ro.wikipedia.org/wiki/Researchgate (accessed October 10, 2017). https://www.researchgate.net/about (accessed October 10, 2017). https://www.antropologi.info/blog/anthropology/2009/selv-archiving-repositories-is- researchgate-the-solution (accessed October 10, 2017). https://www.researchgate.net/publication/319271314_Biomaterials_Polylactic_acid_and_3 D_printing_processes_for_orthosis_and_prosthesis?_sg=Oh4WS3ZpBfjvqa6PZ6L- A8Q8GKCdiE3rhe_4uiE582zIoxqvAc67KFSDQOO4LKN5R1JuMuGdFamqTj0 (accessed November 2, 2017). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ResearchGate (accessed October 10, 2017). http://www.apa.org/science/about/psa/2017/02/academic-social-networking.aspx (accessed October 10, 2017).
PART II
Information Society and Sources
The Interpretation of Knowledge Economy and the Problems of Its Rise and Development in Armenia
Tereza Khechoyan
Public Administration Academy of the Republic of Armenia, Armenia
Understanding the term, concept, and phenomenon of knowledge economy
Historical overview
The term “Knowledge Economy” was introduced by Fritz Machlup. In 1962, the economist published an influential study1 that measured the production and distribution of knowledge in the United States. Machlup’s calculations gave rise to an entire literature on knowledge economy, its policies and measurement. However, knowledge economy as a phenomenon raised before the researchers’ scientific approach to it. For discussing and analysing the phenomenon of knowledge economy, we should approach the social and economic evolution of society. Industrialisation made huge changes in global economy and gave a start to the formation of the industrial society. Many scientific sources use the term industrial revolution to underline the importance of its changes and transformations in global economy. In the sense of economic efficiency, industrialisation made two important changes: the automation of production and the diversification of economy (a structure which in fact complicated it). These changes generated following important transformations for organizations: 1. Automation of production by putting production on technological base. 2. Transformation of the need for manual labour into a more qualified one 3. The complication of management functions and the emergence of strategic management in all stages of top-management (marketing, logistics, production, sales, finance, etc.)
In terms of knowledge economy, we can see the initial signs for raising knowledge based economic system. Thus, the first point concerns the technological and innovative aspects of the production, which requires generating and creating knowledge, to be more precise the know-how. The second and third points refer to using or applying knowledge. In these terms one can see that knowledge economy phenomenon revealed from industrialization. In other words, the academic concept, here as used by sociologists, reflects a shift in an industrial economy from manual to technical and scientific skills, a change which has
1 Fritz Machlup, The Production and Distribution of Knowledge in the United States (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1962).
Tereza Khechoyan 32 The Interpretation of Knowledge Economy serious implications for the kind of qualifications required by students entering the job market.2 Though the term and concept of knowledge economy or knowledge based economy was popularized and meets in academic materials during the next stage of evolution called information society, the revealing of the phenomenon owe to industrialization and industrial economy and society. It reflects to the case when the concept and its phenomenon appears and starts its formation before the academic researchers start to study it. The other important aspect of the knowledge economy term historical overview refers to its technological basis. Are sense and perception of knowledge economy determined and delimited to only technological frameworks and scopes? Definitely no. As one can see from the above listed points, though the first two points requires technological skills, the third one concerning to the administrative and strategic management of the organization may not demand technological skills and the technology itself. Though the technological knowledge plays grand and principal role in modern economy, the knowledge based economy requires and supposes generating, transferring, processing and using knowledge in general.
Modern interpretation: Trends and Implications
The modern interpretation of knowledge economy is influenced in many ways by nowadays’ social and economic tendencies: globalization, information society and technological and scientific progress. Knowledge economy is evidence in all developed countries and a challenge for developing countries with few natural resources. The economic growth is considered in the context of knowledge economy. Economic growth increasingly depends on the ability to acquire new knowledge and apply it in all areas of life.3 As it was mentioned before, the term “knowledge economy” was introduced by Fritz Machlup.4 Anyway the term was popularized and put in to use by Peter Drucker.5 Machlup defines the term as “One of the economy sectors, in which knowledge is produced, processed and managed.” Drucker uses another definition: “A type of economic system, where knowledge plays essential role and knowledge production leads to economic development.” As we can see, Drucker in his definition links the knowledge economy to economic growth. In this context we should distinguish the two different concepts: knowledge economy and knowledge based economy. The first one is a sector of economy, a market where the main product – knowledge is generated, used and transferred. The second one is an economic system. There are two organizations, which are strongly integrated into researching and studying knowledge based economies: OECD and World Bank. OECD in its report defines the knowledge based economies as “economies which are directly based on the production, distribution and use of knowledge and information6”. The OECD uses the term “knowledge economy” to draw attention to the importance of knowledge in all economic activities. The definition has been evolving from focusing just on manufacturing industries
2 Robert Cowen, Andreas M. Kazamias, International Handbook of Comparative Education (Springer International Handbooks of Education, 2009), 519-520. 3 Olena Vinnychuk, Larysa Skrashchuk, Igor Vinnychuk, “Research of Economic Growth in the Context of Knowledge Economy”, Intellectual Economics (2014), 116–127. 4 Fritz Machlup, The Production and Distribution of Knowledge in the United States (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1962). 5 Drucker PF, Post-Capitalist Society (New York: Harper Bus, 1993). 6 OECD Report “Knowledge Based Economy,” 1996, p. 7.
33 Tereza Khechoyan The Interpretation of Knowledge Economy
that make intensive use of technology to including services that are also heavily knowledge based. The World Bank uses the following definition: “A knowledge economy is one where organizations and people acquire, create, disseminate and use knowledge more effectively for greater economic and social development.7” World Bank developed the knowledge economy measuring indicators, which are already in common use worldwide. Introduced by World Bank there are 2 indicators for measuring knowledge economy: 1. Knowledge Index 2. Knowledge Economy Index (ranked).
The countries are divided into 4 groups from 0 (worst) to 10 (best) points. The knowledge economy index is calculated by 109 structural and qualitative indicators, which are grouped in 4 types. 1. Economic Incentive and Institutional Regime 2. Education and Human Resources 3. Innovation System 4. Information and Communication Technology.
As we have seen, modern interpretation of knowledge economy gives great importance to its connection to economic growth and of course to its influence on it. Another tendency in researching of knowledge economy concept is linked to terms like science economy and “scientification” of economy. Science linkage with industry is found not only in science- based industries, such as pharmaceuticals and electronics, but also in many other industries.8 Academic sector is getting more involved in patenting activities, and that scientific knowledge generated in the sector is being utilized not only in science-based industries, but also in many others. The transformation from science (paper) of academic field to technology (patents) of industry field happens faster and smoother. With all productive researches in the field of knowledge economy, there are still problems with measuring the knowledge itself and its impact on economic growth. Studying the theme of knowledge economy we have encountered some difficulties and incomprehensibilities in the terms of interpretation of the phenomenon and term of knowledge economy. We considered important and useful for further researchers to identify, distinguish, define and divide the main problems into 4 groups: 1. There are no all-purpose indexes or other indicators that can be adopted to calculate all types of economies. In fact, every economy is a separate case because of its unique structures, strengths, weaknesses and challenges. We consider that the World Bank's indexes cannot be used as universal for all types of economies, because very often they are not indicative for the situation in the economy. 2. Often there is no correlation between knowledge economy index components and IT sector development in some countries (including case of Armenia). 3. The term of knowledge economy is still on it’s stage of formation. The meaning and implication of the term are still “floating”. Very often researchers imply different concepts by the term of knowledge economy. 4. The impact of knowledge economy development on economic growth of whole economy is obvious. Nevertheless, the mechanism by which the knowledge economy influences the economic growth is still under examination.
7 World Bank Institute Report, “The Knowledge Economy, The Kam Methodology And World Bank Operations,” 2006, p. 4. 8 Kenta Ikeuchi, Kazuyuki Motohashi, Ryuichi Tamura, Naotoshi Tsukada, CEPR’s policy portal 2017 https://voxeu.org/article/new-indicators-science-intensity-industry (accessed December 15, 2017).
Tereza Khechoyan 34 The Interpretation of Knowledge Economy
In this work, for the case of Armenia we will use the term knowledge economy implying the economic sector and the term knowledge based economy implying the economic system. But in some cases the use of the term of knowledge economy will imply the economic system of knowledge itself. We want to underline the link between knowledge economy and knowledge based economy. The main aim of knowledge economy development is to form a knowledge based economy. In other words, the final point of the development of economic sector of knowledge is the formation of knowledge based economic system.
Knowledge economy problems in Armenia
Current Situation and Indexes
During the Soviet Union years, Armenia was in the first places with indicator of number of scientists per capita among soviet republics. The exact sciences were the most developed during those years (Physics and Engineering). After the independence a big number of scientists have been migrated due to difficult social and political situation and absence of infrastructures. We must note that during the soviet years the Armenian economy of science and knowledge was a part of a big soviet system. After the independence, as a result the economic ties were severed between the small parts, and the links between science and economy became dysfunctional. The discussion on knowledge economy formation and development started in most recent years, and it is inked to the development of IT sector of Armenia. The IT sector of Armenia during last 7 years is developing very rapidly, in average 20% per year. In fact, IT sphere is the main driving force in rising and developing of knowledge economy in Armenia. As it was mentioned above World Bank measure the knowledge economy by indexes. In this paper we are focused only in World Bank data. The most important indexes for Armenia are represented in the Table 19.
Table 1. Indexes concerning knowledge economy in Armenia
Indicator Measure Units 1995 2000 2012 Knowledge Unweighted Index (0=lowest; 10=highest) 5.01 5.27 4.88 economy Weighted by index population Index (0=lowest; 10=highest) 5.25 5.57 5.08 Unweighted Index (0=lowest; 10=highest) 5.74 5.35 4.57 Knowledge Weighted by Index population Index (0=lowest; 10=highest) 6.07 5.75 4.84 Knowledge Unweighted Rank (1=the best) 76 62 75 economy Weighted by rank population Rank (1=the best) 67 58 71
The World Bank's indexes are very often not indicative and illustrative for separate cases, and the case of Armenian is among them. The presented indexes cannot explain the phenomenon of fast development of IT sphere in Armenia, which is always one of the driving forces of knowledge economy. According to the presented index values, Armenia is far from having developed knowledge economy, and its rank illustrates it (75). Nevertheless, Armenian IT sector is showing a big growth year by year. This contradiction may be
9 The World Bank’s Knowledge Assessment Methodology (KAM: www.worldbank.org/kam).
35 Tereza Khechoyan The Interpretation of Knowledge Economy
explained by the structure of knowledge economy index, which as we mentioned above, contains 4 types of indicators’ groups. Only one of the four represents the information technologies’ indicators. The other three concern the educational, institutional and innovation systems, which are in fact at an early stage of reforms in Armenia. We consider that the development of IT sector in a country generally may proceed from development of educational, institutional and innovation systems or at least the development of all four must happen similarly and accordingly, but the Armenian case shows that this chronology and logics can be broken. The Armenian IT sector shows growth despite the bad situation in other three aspects: educational, institutional and innovation systems. So, that’s why the knowledge economy indexes are not indicative for the Armenian case. It’s obvious that the formation and raise of knowledge economy in Armenia has started from the development of IT sphere, and that’s why we suggest to study and discuss of knowledge economy in Armenia first of all in the terms of IT sector.
IT sector of Armenia
The IT and high-technology sector is one of the fastest growing sectors in the Armenian economy. In 2017 there are more than 600 IT companies in Armenia. The IT sector during the last 5 years shows growth in average 20% per year10. In 2016, the IT sector made 4.7% of the GDP of Armenia. According to non official statistics the total number of skilled personnel working in IT sphere has reached 15 00011. Besides, Armenia is passing through “startup boom”: in 2016, there were 100 new IT companies registered in Armenia. About 13% of the companies operate in the high-technology domain, while the rest are IT companies. One of the driving factors of sector growth was its attractiveness for foreign companies to establish branches in Armenia. The prime competitiveness factor was the availability of relatively cheap and competitive human resources in Armenia. There are some important stakeholders in development of IT sphere in Armenia: 1. Enterprise Incubator Foundation (EIF) is one of the largest technology business incubators and IT development agencies in the region, operating in Yerevan, Armenia. Established in 2002 within the framework of the World Bank’s “Enterprise Incubator” project, it is called to support the development of information and communication technology sector in Armenia through creating a productive environment for innovation, technological advancement and company growth. 2. Union of Information Technology Enterprises (UITE) is a key figure in developing IT sphere and knowledge based economy in Armenia. The Union represents the voice of all IT companies in Armenia and uses all resources to conduct the technologic sector development in Armenia managing different projects and events. UITE plays also crucial role in developing the educational system for IT sphere. UITE developed and implemented the program called “Technical Laboratories in every school”. The chain of laboratories calls „Armath”. 3. The Foundation for Armenian Science and Technology (FAST) launched in 2016 aims at building an ecosystem that drives technological innovation and scientific
10 The Global Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) Unit. The World Bank “IT Skills Assessment in Armenia,” 2014, p. 4. 11 The important factors of the 2018 for IT sector of Armenia; December 2017 https://ittrend.am/2017/12/30/armenian-it-2017/.
Tereza Khechoyan 36 The Interpretation of Knowledge Economy
advancement in Armenia and beyond. FAST intends to mobilize the scientific, technological, and financial resources of the Armenian and international communities. FAST was established under IDeA (Initiative for Development of Armenia) foundation. 4. Tumo Center for Creative Technologies is a free of charge digital media learning center in Yerevan, Armenia. Since its opening in 2011, the center has provided thousands of students aged 12–18 an open environment where they can use the latest in digital tools, learn from media professionals, and explore the intersection of technology and art.
There are some important annual events which promote the development of information technologies and engineering in Armenia. Here are some of them: 1. The largest regional DigiTec Expo organized every year. The Expo of 2017 hosted about 150 companies and 70000 visitors. EXPO is founded and organised by Union of Information Technology Enterprises. 2. Sevan Startup Summit is a yearly non-formal startup event. Sevan Startup Summit is a new format of a business platform where the participants have an opportunity to improve and acquire new knowledge, obtain new valuable contacts, discover new possibilities of cooperation and partnership, compete with their teams and ideas and win grants and get investment. 3. BarCamp Yerevan is a "non-conference" in the sphere of information technology or "IT, new media and Internet. A "non-conference" is the unofficial, informal part of the conference supporting open discussions and a free exchange of ideas and opinions. The main target audience of the BarCamp is engineers/developers/programmers of all flavors, project managers, entrepreneurs, new media activists, designers, educators and all professionals who are building the next generation Web.
Despite the weak cooperation between Government of Armenia and IT sector and also usually belated responses to IT sphere needs and problems, there have been done some governmental steps towards developing knowledge economy: 1. Strategy on Development of Science for 2011-2020 (May 2010). The principal targets of the Strategy are the following: Creation of a system capable of sustaining the development of science and technology; Development of scientific potential, modernization of scientific infrastructure; Promotion of basic and applied research; Creation of a synergistic system of education, science and innovation; and Becoming a prime location for scientific specialization in the European Research Area. 2. Science and Technology Development Priorities for 2010-2014 (May, 2010) 3. Action Plan on the Development of Science for 2011-2015 (June 2011) 4. IT Sphere Development Annual Program 5. Tax Exemption for IT companies referring to “bypassing” value-added tax (VAT) 6. The Law on promoting the IT Sphere in the Republic of Armenia (December 2017).
The problems of IT sphere in Armenia
Despite the fast development of IT sector in Armenia, some problems block its advancement and expansion. The first problem refers to educational system in Armenia.
37 Tereza Khechoyan The Interpretation of Knowledge Economy
The problem has two sides. The first side concerns the lack of graduates in IT field. According to World Bank annually IT sphere demands 2000 new specialist, but universities can “give” only 450. The second side of the problem refers to the quality of higher education. The higher education system in Armenia lacks competitive dynamism and efficiency when it comes to IT skills. The quest to join the European Higher Education Area compels Armenia to reform. Armenia is undertaking reforms through the Bologna process in order to join the European Higher Education Area. Currently, private sector does not place high value on university degree in their recruitment practices, indicating the diminishing role and image of higher education in the sector.12 Teaching programs are not meeting the market needs. The knowledge given in the universities are too much theoretical and does not include the applied part. There is not enough scientific and practical approach in higher education system. A big number among IT sphere employees are self-taught specialists. The second problem concerns the outsourcing model of IT companies in Armenia. The majority of IT companies starts their activities by outsourcing model for international companies due to qualified and cheap labor market. Though it is a good point to start, but it slows down the development of the company. This point is becoming a problem, because demand for IT specialists is increasing at a very high rate and Armenia starts to lose its competitive advantage. Nevertheless, during the recent years we can see a shift from outsourcing model to the model of development its own product. In this case another obstacle appears. The outsourcing model is a good start for the company because of financial stability, but if an IT company starts its activity by own product model, the problem of financing and investments stands. The investment institutions are still on the stage of formation in Armenia. Another issue is the peculiarity of Armenian IT sector. The majority of Armenian IT companies are only software developers and engineers. Software Engineering is the study and application of engineering to the design, development, and maintenance of software. System engineering is an interdisciplinary field of engineering that focuses on how to design and manage complex engineering projects over their life cycles. As one can see system engineering is much more complex and ''ambitious'' field. The lack of system engineers and system engineering knowledge in Armenia limits the possible range of products development. Here the absence of necessary infrastructure also plays role. Reciting the IT sphere problems we must also mention the lack of entrepreneurial knowledge among IT sector businesspersons. Nowadays market is structured in a way, where a good product is not enough to conquer the market and clients. Marketing, branding, management and sales knowledge plays grand role in representing IT products in international markets. IT sector specialist and managers need a higher level of entrepreneurial knowledge and skills to monetize and merchandise their products. The absence of financial and technical infrastructure (venture funds, angel investors, crowdfunding models) is a big challenge for Armenian IT companies. Banks as a rule do not give loans to startups because of higher risks and absence of methodology to evaluate the proposed business models and plans. Venture funds do not play significant role in financing it startups. Angel investors are a rare phenomenon in Armenia. Though the Government tries to develop mechanism for financing IT startups in their seed round, the financing problems in round A and B are a big challenge. There is a developing a tendency, when a big and financially “rich” IT company invests in new startups in Armenia. The cooperation between Government and IT sector is very weak. The responses of public authorities to the
12 The Global Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) Unit. The World Bank “IT Skills Assessment in Armenia,” 2014, p. 6.
Tereza Khechoyan 38 The Interpretation of Knowledge Economy needs and problems of IT sphere are usually belated, insufficient and not effective. The cooperation between academic field and IT sector is also at a low rate. There is an acute need of research and development organizations in Armenia. During recent years, a discussion on developing and founding IT clusters in cooperation with Government, academic organizations and IT private sector has started. Concluding, we must say that the raise and development of knowledge economy in Armenia is strongly connected to IT sphere. We must study and discuss the knowledge economy in Armenia first of all in terms of IT sphere. The phenomenon of fast development of IT sphere in Armenia with all challenges and problems is really a big achievement and the start of forming the knowledge based economy in Armenia has been given due to IT sphere. The future development of knowledge economy should be based on the achievements of IT sphere. Of course, it will demand the cooperation between all stakeholders and interested parties.
References
Cowen, Robert and Andreas Kazamias. International Handbook of Comparative Education. 519- 520. Springer International Handbooks of Education, 2009. Vinnychuk O. and L. Skrashchuk, I. Vinnychuk. “Research of Economic Growth in the Context of Knowledge Economy.” Intellectual Economics (2014). OECD Report “Knowledge Based Economy” (1996). World Bank Institute Report “The Knowledge Economy, The Kam Methodology and World Bank Operations” (2006). Ikeuchi Kenta, Motohashi Kazuyuki, Tamura Ryuichi, Tsukada Naotoshi, CEPR’s policy portal 2017. https://voxeu.org/article/new-indicators-science-intensity-industry (accessed December 15, 2017). The Global Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) Unit. The World Bank “IT Skills Assessment in Armenia” (2014).
Aspects on the Harmonization of Copyright and Related Rights in the Information Society in the European Union Legislation
Cristina Mihaela Salcă Rotaru
University Transivania of Braşov, Faculty of Law, Romania
Complexity of the legislative framework
On European Union (EU) level, through Directive 29 of 2001 on the harmonization of certain aspects of copyright and related rights in the information society,1 three important issues have been achieved: the adaptation of EU copyright law and related rights to technological developments, especially in the information society; the implementation of the WIPO International Treaty on Copyright and the implementation of the WIPO International Treaty on Interpretations and Enforcement and phonograms. This directive is part of a set of EU normative acts in the field of intellectual property protection and respect, orphan works regulations or collective rights management, in other words, the copyright field. As EU legislation is in line with international legislation in the field, a brief look at it needs to be done. The first step was taken by the EU through Council resolution of 14 May 1992 on Increased protection for copyright and neighbouring rights2, showing that:
Whereas advances in technology have encouraged the exploitation of literary and artistic works throughout the world; whereas the protection of copyright and neighbouring rights should therefore be consolidated at national, Community and international level; Whereas, because of the level of protection they guarantee for literary and artistic works, rights of performers, producers of phonograms and broadcasting organizations, the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic works enshrined in the Paris Act of 24 July 1971 (Paris Act of the Berne Convention), and the International Convention for the Protection of Performers, Producers of Phonograms and Broadcasting Organizations (Rome Convention) of 26 October 1961 enjoy a wide and increasing international acceptance;3 it is necessary that “the Member States of the Community, in so far as they have not already done so, undertake, subject to their constitutional provisions, to become by 1 January 1995
1 Published in JO L 167, 22.6.2001, p. 10-19. 2 Council Resolution of 14 May 1992 on increased protection for copyright and neighbouring rights, published in J.O. C 138, 28.05.1992, p. 01. 3 http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/EN/TXT/?uri=uriserv:OJ.C_.1992.138.01.0001.01.ENG&toc=OJ:C:1992:138:TOC
Cristina Mihaela Salcă Rotaru 40 Aspects on the Harmonization of Copyright… parties to the Paris Act of the Berne Convention and the Rome Convention, and to introduce national legislation to ensure effective compliance therewith.”4 Therefore, at EU level, in addition to international treaties that have been ratified by the EU as an international law entity, its internal regulations, which may be in the form of regulations, decisions or directives, apply. Following the study on the related legislation, it can be seen that the vast majority of the normative acts governing intellectual property, copyright and related rights in the EU are regulated under the directives.5 It implies that they must be transposed by the Member States into their national legislation. Among the existing normative acts at both international and European level, the present study will only refer to those that address elements of copyright protection and related rights in the light of current issues arising from the existence and development of the information society.
The European Union vision on the harmonization of copyright and related rights with other rights
When it comes to harmonization, at least the following aspects need to be taken into account: the definition of the scope and terms, the identification of the problems subject to harmonization, the possible exceptions and the basic legislative framework and the extended one by way of connection.
Defining the problem
When defining the information society under EU law, this term is shown “describes a society where a significant degree of activity focuses on the creation, distribution, use and reuse of information” which “offer opportunities like teleworking, ehealth and elearning to name but a few” but which also has negative effects through “new forms of crime, such as cyber crime, as well as data protection and intellectual property violations.”6 Since the meeting of the 1994 European Council in Corfu, when discussing the need to develop and implement legislation to help develop an information society, it has been shown that unprecedented technological revolution in the area of information opens up vast possibilities for economic progress, employment and the quality of life, while simultaneously representing a major challenge, but that it requires to creating a clear and stable regulatory framework (notably as regards access to markets, compatibility between networks, intellectual property rights, data protection and copyright) and setting an example in areas which come under their aegis.7
4 Resolution of 14 may 1992, point 1. 5 Directive 83 of 1993 on the coordination of certain rules concerning copyright and rights related to copyright applicable to satellite broadcasting and cable retransmission; Directive 9 of 1996 on the legal protection of databases; Directive 84 of 1998 on the legal protection of services based on, or consisting of, conditional access; Directive 84 of 2001 on the resale right for the benefit of the author of an original work of art; Directive 48 of 2004 on the enforcement of intellectual property rights; Directive 116 of 2006 on the Term of Protection of Copyright and Certain Related Rights; Directive 115 of 2006 on rental right and lending right and on certain rights related to copyright in the field of intellectual property; Directive 24 of 2009 on the legal protection of computer programs; Directive 28 of 2012 on certain permitted uses of orphan works; Directive 26 of 2014 on collective management of copyright and related rights and multi-territorial licensing of rights in musical works for online use in the internal market. 6 http://eur-lex.europa.eu/summary/glossary/information_society.html. 7 European Council at Corfu 24 - 25 June 1994, Presidency Conclusions, White Paper, http://www2.consilium.europa.eu/media/21207/corfu-european-council.pdf., p.5.
41 Cristina Mihaela Salcă Rotaru Aspects on the Harmonization of Copyright…
On the international level, in 1996, the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) by The Copyright Treaty establishes new international regulations and clarifies the interpretation of certain existing regulations in order to find appropriate solutions to the issues raised by developments in the economic, social, cultural and technical, having regard to the evolution and convergence of information and communication techniques which have a considerable impact on the creation and use of literary and artistic works.8 This Treaty seeks to maintain a balance between the rights of authors and the interests of the general public, particularly in the fields of education, research and access to information, as is apparent from the Berne Convention. The WIPO Copyright Treaty was signed by the EU on 20 December 1996, ratified on 14 December 2009 and entered into force on 14 March 2010.9 The transposition of the Treaty provisions into EU law was made through the Directive 29 from 2001 on the harmonization of certain aspects of copyright and related rights in the information society. The preamble to this directive states that the proposed harmonization will help to implement the four freedoms of the internal market and refers to respect for fundamental principles of law, in particular property, including intellectual property, freedom of expression and public interest.10 Referring to the information society, the preamble also states that technological development has multiplied and diversified the creativity, production and exploitation vectors. Even if new concepts for the protection of intellectual property are not needed, current legislation on copyright and related rights needs to be adapted and supplemented to adequately reflect economic realities such as new forms of exploitation.11 Another effect of Community harmonization through the implementation of the Directive is that of avoiding significant differences in protection through decisions resulting from legislative action promoted at Member State level with possible negative effects on the free movement of services and products incorporating or based on ownership intellectual. The impact of such legislative differences and legal uncertainty is becoming more important with the evolution of the information society, which has already led to the intensification of the cross-border exploitation of intellectual property.
Limitations and exceptions
Rights are legally aware of the existence of corresponding obligations, i.e. any right belonging to a person corresponds to an obligation belonging to another person. In the exercise of copyright and related rights, the right-holder is entitled to demand or oblige others to fully respect the legal content of these rights. Social reality and the complexity of rights sometimes lead to limitations or exceptions to the exercise, the recognition of rights. Neither copyright nor related rights have escaped interference with the existence and exercise of other rights. The protection of copyright and related rights comes into contact with: Promoting education and culture, leading to exceptions or limitations of public interest for education and education purposes. However, these must not be achieved by
8 WIPO Copyright Treaty (WCT), adopted in Geneva on December 20, 1996, Preamble, p.1, http://www.wipo.int/wipolex/en/treaties/text.jsp?file_id=295157. 9 http://www.wipo.int/treaties/en/remarks.jsp?cnty_id=3P. 10 Directive 29 on 2001, preambul, pc.(3), http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/TXT/?qid=1511787691474&uri=CELEX:02001L0029-20010622. 11 Idem, pc.(5).
Cristina Mihaela Salcă Rotaru 42 Aspects on the Harmonization of Copyright…
sacrificing strict protection of rights or by tolerance of the illegal forms of distribution of counterfeit or pirated works. Public communication acts, understood in a broad sense. The Directive states in paragraph 23 of the preamble that acts of public communication mean any communication to a public not present at the place of origin of the communication. This right includes exclusively any transmission or retransmission of any kind of work to the public, whether cable or cable, including broadcasting. The rights and interests of users of protected objects analyzed in the light of the new electronic environment and the increase in cross-border exploitation of works. In this situation, it is even more evident the importance of legislative harmonization which otherwise would lead, through national exceptions, to direct negative effects on the functioning of the internal market in the field of copyright and related rights. Scientific research, for the benefit of public institutions, such as libraries and archives. Use for the benefit of persons with disabilities, public safety or administrative or judicial proceedings.
As a conclusion, these exceptions and limitations to the exercise of copyright and related rights concern the reproduction right and the right of public communication.
Legislative framework combined
Starting from the provisions of Directive 29 of 2001 on the harmonization of certain aspects of copyright and related rights in the information society, we find that they are in line with the provisions of: Directive 9 from 1996 on the legal protection of databases12 which is referred to when 'technical measures' are taken into account for the protection of copyright and related rights and sui generis right as governed by Directive 9 of 1996; Directive 31 of 2000 on certain legal aspects of information society services, in particular electronic commerce in the internal market.13 This directive, which regulates information society services, envisages a wide range of online business activities, including book sales. Directive 115 of 2006 on rental and lending right and certain rights related to copyright in the field of intellectual property14 which repealed Directive 100 of 1992. In this situation, a distinction is made between the distribution right provided for by Directive 29 of 2001 and the rental or loan rights provided for in Directive 115 of 2006. Harmonization of provisions also refers to the establishment of exceptions or limitations for the benefit of certain non-profit institutions, such as public libraries and equivalent institutions, as well as archives without the right to reproduce. Directive 116 of 2006 on the term of protection of copyright and related rights15 and repealing Directive 93/98 / EEC Directive 24 of 2009 on the legal protection of computer programs16, which repealed Directive 250 of 1991. The link with this normative act is given by the possible existence of the technical measures used in connection with the computer programs and the exceptions provided by this directive.
12 Published in JO L 77, 27.3.1996, p. 20-28. 13 Published in JO L 178, 17.7.2000, p. 1-16 14 Published in JO L 376, 27.12.2006, p. 28-35 15 Published in JO L 372, 27.12.2006, p. 12-18 16 Published in JO L 111, 5.5.2009, p. 16-22
43 Cristina Mihaela Salcă Rotaru Aspects on the Harmonization of Copyright…
By establishing these legal links, the principles and norms specific to the placement of copyright protection and related rights in the context of the information society are developed.
Aspects regarding difficulties of unitary interpretation of the provisions
If the provisions on the regulatory scope of Directive 29 of 2001 are clear, the exceptions and limitations provided for therein are those which raise questions as to their interpretation in concrete situations. Considering that the over 20 exceptions and limitations provided for in Article 5 of the Directive cover a wide range of situations regarding: the protection of the reproduction right provided for in Article 2; the right to publicize works and to make available to the public other protected objects provided for in Article 3; and the exclusive right of the author of distribution provided for in Article 4, differences of practical interpretation were expected to occur. Including the interpretation of the exceptions should be made by corroborating several normative acts, such as the above. In this regard, in Case Productores de Música de España (Promusicae)/Telefónica de España SAU in which a reference for a preliminary ruling was made, it is stated that
Community law requires that, when transposing those directives, the Member States take care to rely on an interpretation of them which allows a fair balance to be struck between the various fundamental rights protected by the Community legal order. Further, when implementing the measures transposing those directives, the authorities and courts of the Member States must not only interpret their national law in a manner consistent with those directives but also make sure that they do not rely on an interpretation of them which would be in conflict with those fundamental rights or with the other general principles of Community law, such as the principle of proportionality.17
By judgment of the Court (Fourth Chamber) of 16 July 2009 in Infopaq International A / S v Danske Dagblades Forening, a practical aspect of the exception concerning the transitional nature of the act of reproduction is settled. In the present case, starting from the idea that the parts of a work are protected by copyright if they contain some of the elements which are the expression of the author's own intellectual creation, it is established that:
The act of printing out an extract of 11 words, during a data capture process consisting in scanning of newspaper articles followed by conversion into text file, electronic processing of the reproduction, storage of part of that reproduction and printing out, does not fulfil the condition of being transient in nature as required by Article 5(1) of Directive 2001/29 on the harmonisation of certain aspects of copyright and related rights in the information society and, therefore, that process cannot be carried out without the consent of the relevant right-holders.18
Another exception brought before the Court concerns the private copy. In this respect, a distinction shall be made between the copy made by equipment, apparatus and digital
17 Case C-275/06, studied at http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/SUM/?uri=CELEX:62006CJ0275&qid=1511811389802. 18 Case C-5/08, pc. 63-73, studied at http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/TXT/?qid=1511811389802&uri=CELEX:62008CJ0005.
Cristina Mihaela Salcă Rotaru 44 Aspects on the Harmonization of Copyright… reproduction media, made available, in law or in fact, to private users and copy made by equipment, apparatus and digital reproduction media that are not made available to private users and which are clearly intended for use other than the making of copies for personal use. In the first situation, as a result of applying the exception, the use of a fee paid by those who hold such equipment for fair compensation of copyright and related rights is presumed to be the use of all the functions performed by such equipment, including the reproduction function.19 More recently, one case20 calls into question the protection of copyright and related rights, expressed in the form of reproductive rights and public communication, in the case of 'unavailable' books which do not or are no longer the subject of publication. As is also apparent from paragraphs 30 and 31 of the judgment, the harmonization made by Directive 29 of 2001 cannot be limited to the benefit of the rights guaranteed but must also be taken into account when exercising the rights. In particular, bring into question the way of applying the preventive character of the provisions of art. (2) and (3) of the Directive when the author's prior consent for reproduction and publicity acts must be obtained. Since the law it does not specify the way or the form in which this consent must be given, ie explicitly or implicitly, verbally or in writing, in order to give meaning to the law and not without content the principle of the author's prior consent, it must be understood that even the implicit consensus may be accepted, with the condition to the existence of effective prior information. Otherwise, any act of reproduction or public communication, even if it is done on the basis of a national normative act based on the provisions of art. 5 of Directive 29 of 2001 do not comply with the principles governing this legal act. The judgment states in paragraphs 43 to 45 and 52 that
a mere lack of opposition on their part cannot be regarded as the expression of their implicit consent to that use. This is all the more true considering that such legislation is aimed at books which, while having been published and commercially distributed in the past, are so no longer. That particular context precludes the conclusion that it can reasonably be presumed that, without opposition on their part, every author of these ‘forgotten’ books is, however, in favour of the ‘resurrection’ of their works, in view of their commercial use in a digital format. Admittedly, Directive 2001/29 does not preclude national legislation, such as that at issue in the main proceedings, from pursuing an objective such as the digital exploitation of out-of-print books in the cultural interest of consumers and of society as a whole. However, the pursuit of that objective and of that interest cannot justify a derogation not provided for by the EU legislature to the protection that authors are ensured by that directive
As some authors state, there is a lack of information on the level of conceptualization of informed consent in European and East European countries.21
19 Judgment of the Court (Third Chamber) of 21 October 2010. Padawan SL against Sociedad General de Autores y Editores de España (SGAE). Case C-467/08, studied on http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/TXT/?qid=1511811389802&uri=CELEX:62008CJ0467. 20 Cauza C-301/15, Marc Soulier și Sara Doke împotriva Premier ministre și Ministre de la Culture et de la Communication, http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/TXT/?qid=1511817016817&uri=CELEX:62015CJ0301. 21 Lorena Dima, Angela Repanovici, Daniel Purcaru et al., “Informed Consent and E-Communication in Medicine,” Revista Romana De Bioetica 12 (2) (2014): 37-46.
45 Cristina Mihaela Salcă Rotaru Aspects on the Harmonization of Copyright…
Conclusions
The protection of copyright and related rights, even though they benefit from regulations that have, at least in the field of international law, a considerable length of time, are constantly changing. These changes are due either to the effect of the evolution of the technique on these modes of expression, or to the exercise of these rights, or to the refining of the regulatory way, by the existence of more and more connections with other domains and other fundamental rights. It remains to be decided how the national specificity, allowed both by the transposition rules of a directive and by the provisions of Directive 29 of 2001, must or may take into account the fundamental rights enshrined in the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union in determining the scope of the exceptions. The interference of rights and interests in this field is and will be topical, being solved in principle on the field of the courts of law. The issues raised and presented in this study only show the top of the iceberg of issues related to the protection of copyright and related rights. This is because only a very small part of the problems of interpretation and application of the specific legislation raised by the holders of these rights before national courts come to the Court. Better knowledge of copyright-related legislation and related rights by institutions involved in acts involving the existence of these rights, combined with dissemination to the general public, may be a way of preventing the various forms of attainment of these rights.
References
Dima, Lorena, Angela Repanovici, Daniel Purcaru et al. “Informed Consent and E- Communication in Medicine.” Revista Română de Bioetică 12 (2) (2014): 37-46.
International and European Union reglementation
WIPO Copyright Treaty (WCT), adopted in Geneva on December 20, 1996, http://www.wipo.int/wipolex/en/treaties/text.jsp?file_id=295157 (accessed September 29, 2017). Council Resolution of 14 May 1992 on increased protection for copyright and neighbouring rights, published in J.O. C 138, 28.05.1992, p. 01, http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/EN/TXT/?uri=uriserv:OJ.C_.1992.138.01.0001.01.ENG&toc=OJ:C:1992:138:T OC, (accessed September 29, 2017). Directive 83 of 1993 on the coordination of certain rules concerning copyright and rights related to copyright applicable to satellite broadcasting and cable retransmission; http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/TXT/?qid=1512251288974&uri=CELEX:31993L0083 (accessed October 7, 2017). Directive 9 of 1996 on the legal protection of databases; Published in JO L 77, 27.3.1996, p. 20-28, http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/TXT/?qid=1512251438967&uri=CELEX:31996L0009 (accessed October 6, 2017). Directive 84 of 1998 on the legal protection of services based on, or consisting of, conditional access; http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/TXT/?qid=1512251513127&uri=CELEX:31998L0084 (accessed October 7, 2017).
Cristina Mihaela Salcă Rotaru 46 Aspects on the Harmonization of Copyright…
Directive 29 of 2001 on the harmonisation of certain aspects of copyright and related rights in the information society Published in JO L 167, 22.6.2001, p. 10-19, http://eur- lex.europa.eu/legal-content/RO/TXT/?qid=1511787691474&uri=CELEX:02001L0029- 20010622 (accessed September 30, 2017). Directive 31 din 2000 on certain legal aspects of information society services, in particular electronic commerce, in the Internal Market, Published in JO L 178, 17.7.2000, p. 1- 16 http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/TXT/?qid=1512251756365&uri=CELEX:32000L0031 (accessed October 8, 2017). Directive 84 of 2001 on the resale right for the benefit of the author of an original work of art; http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/TXT/?qid=1512251988603&uri=CELEX:32001L0084 (accessed October 8, 2017). Directive 48 of 2004 on the enforcement of intellectual property rights; Published in JO L 157, 30.4.2004, p. 45-86 http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/TXT/?qid=1512252065009&uri=CELEX:32004L0048 (accessed September 29, 2017). Directive 115 of 2006 on rental right and lending right and on certain rights related to copyright in the field of intellectual property; Published in JO L 376, 27.12.2006, p. 28-35 http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/TXT/?qid=1512252493990&uri=CELEX:32006L0115 (accessed September 30, 2017). Directive 116 of 2006 on the Term of Protection of Copyright and Certain Related Rights; Published in JO L 372, 27.12.2006, p. 12-18 http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/TXT/?qid=1512252631741&uri=CELEX:32006L0116 (accessed September 30, 2017). Directive 24 of 2009 on the legal protection of computer programs; Published in JO L 111, 5.5.2009, p. 16-22, http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/TXT/?qid=1512253135931&uri=CELEX:32009L0024 (accessed October 12, 2017). Directive 28 of 2012 on certain permitted uses of orphan works; Published in JO L 299, 27.10.2012, p. 5-12, http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/TXT/?qid=1512253195898&uri=CELEX:32012L0028 (accessed October 10, 2017). Directive 26 of 2014 on collective management of copyright and related rights and multi- territorial licensing of rights in musical works for online use in the internal market, Published in JO L 84, 20.3.2014, p. 72-98, http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/TXT/?qid=1512253297852&uri=CELEX:32014L0026 (accessed October 12, 2017). Presidency Conclusions, White Paper, European Council at Corfu 24 - 25 June 1994, , http://www2.consilium.europa.eu/media/21207/corfu-european-council.pdf., p.5 (accessed September 29, 2017).
Case studies
Case C-275/06, Productores de Música de España (Promusicae)/Telefónica de España SAU, studied at http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/SUM/?uri=CELEX:62006CJ0275&qid=1511811389802 (accessed October 13, 2017).
47 Cristina Mihaela Salcă Rotaru Aspects on the Harmonization of Copyright…
Case C-5/08, Infopaq International A/S v. Danske Dagblades Forening, studied at http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/TXT/?qid=1511811389802&uri=CELEX:62008CJ0005 (accessed October 14, 2017). Case C-467/08, Padawan SL against Sociedad General de Autores y Editores de España (SGAE)., studied on http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/TXT/?qid=1511811389802&uri=CELEX:62008CJ0467 (accessed October 14, 2017). Cauza C-301/15, Marc Soulier and Sara Doke v. Premier ministre and Ministre de la Culture et de la Communication, http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal- content/RO/TXT/?qid=1511817016817&uri=CELEX:62015CJ0301 (accessed October 13, 2017).
The Role and Importance of Information Sources Case Study: The European Union’s Diplomacy and the Middle East Crisis at the Beginning of the 21st Century
Ana-Maria Bolborici
Transilvania University of Braşov, Romania
Introduction
This paper is based on presenting a case study the analysis of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the regional and international context by emphasising the role and importance of information sources in a doctoral thesis in the field of International Relations. This analysis was the main subject of my PhD thesis and was successfully defended in 2011, at the Babes- Bolyai University, Faculty of History, in the field of International Relations. In March 2016, Institutul European, Iași (Romania) the book titled European Union Diplomacy and the Middle East Crisis at the Beginning of 21st Century, which is based on my doctoral thesis. I have chosen to focus my study on this subject for two main reasons: on the first hand, today's social-political reality of the present that generates multiple dilemmas and controversies which await relevant answers; on the second hand, it is remarkable that this theme is so fresh and generates such interest that it has caught the eye of the most important states of the world. Taking into account the degree of investigation of the current topic, we can begin by estimating that, at an international level, the Middle East conflict is a rather discussed and analyzed subject, the great number of conferences dealing with this idea (but also others relevant to the area) abundantly prove this. The interest for this region has been reflected by the multiple analysis perspectives of the specific area conflicts, which have been studied by numerous researchers. At the Summit of the Book 2017, I decided to present a few aspects from “background” works, focusing on the fact that in the field of International Relations it is a real challenge to find and use valid, factual and objective information sources. The theme of my book is based on the analysis of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the regional and international context and on the effort of the international community especially which is focused on solving the Middle East conflict. I have chosen to focus on this subject, due to the current social-political realities of the present, which are generating multiple dilemmas and controversies, all which await relevant answers. Furthermore, this theme is remarkably fresh and of interest considering that the Middle East is already established as a classical power vacuum model, which has caught the eye of the most important states of the world (geopolitical and geostrategic). Taking into consideration the degree of investigation of the current theme, and considering that on an international level, the Middle East conflict is a much debated and analyzed subject, a fact proven by the large number of conferences dedicated to this issue.
49 Ana-Maria Bolborici The Role and Importance of Information Sources
The interest for this region has been reflected by the multiple analysis perspectives of the conflicts specific to the area, which have been studied by numerous researchers.1 In the last few years, we have come to the conclusion that even on the Romanian territory the problems specific to the Middle East have stirred to some extent the interest of the researchers. As far as the implication of Romanian authors or researchers in the debate is concerned, the conclusion is that although the crisis in the Middle East is an intensely addressed issue, managing to identify Romanian authors2 who have addressed the issue from the perspective of European diplomacy is difficult. Trying to clarify to what extent this theme was treated on the national level, the PhD theses presented in the last few years in Romanian universities have led to the conclusion that even in Romania the specific problems of the Middle East interest in researchers.3 Every author starts their book by building their own chronology. Even though the title of the paper The European Union diplomacy and the Middle East Crisis at the Beginning of
1 In order to argue this, I mention only a few recent papers which have been used in documenting my book and which constitute of dissertations or PhD projects: Rouba Al-Fattal, The Foreign Policy of the EU in the Palestinian Territory, Centre for European Policy Studies, CEPS Working Document No. 328/May 2010; Levi, Idan, The EU Policy in the Middle East. Problematic Nature and Potential Role”, Dissertation zur Erlangung des Grades des Doktors der Philosophie im Fachbereich Sozialwissenschaften der Universität Hamburg, 2005; Hamntan, Michail, The EU’s External Relations deficit towards the Middle East, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Faculty of Social Sciences, Department of Political Science, Academic Year 2004-2005. 2 I will mention some titles who reflect and analyse in some way the issues of the zone, in this respect: Gavrilă Carmen, Revolta Orientului (Bucharest: Polirom, 2013); Raluca Popa, Secretele Orientului Mijlociu [The Secrets of the Middle East] (Niculescu Publishing, 2011); Dumitru Chican, România şi Orientul Mijlociu în oglinzi paralele [Romania and the Middle East in parallel mirrors] (Baia Mare: Proema Publishing, 2010); Raluca Rus, Între mit şi realitate. Lupta pentru Ţara Sfântă [Between myth and reality. The fight for the Holy Land] (Iasi: Lumen Publishing, 2009); Traian Stambert, Faţa ascunsă a conflictului din Orientul Mijlociu [The hidden face of the Middle East conflict] (Bucharest: PACO Publishing, 2009); Raluca Rus, România şi conflictul israliano-palestinian [Romania and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict] (Iasi: Lumen Publishing, 2008); Valentina Tania Secheşan, Problema kurdă în contextul crizelor irakiene [The Kurdish problem in the context of the Iraqi crisis] (Iasi: Lumen Publishing, 2008); Constantin Moştoflei, Vasile Popa, Rolul UE în asigurarea securităţii globale [The role of the EU in guaranteeing global security] (Bucharest: National Defence University „Carol I” Publishing, 2008); Raluca Rus, Conflictul din Orientul Apropiat în perioada 1948-2000 [The Near East conflict during 1948-2000] (Iasi: Lumen Publishing, 2006). 3 Some relevant papers which support this idea are: Sandovici Dănuț-Florin, Dinamica arhitecturii de securitate a Orientului Mijlociu în contextul transformărilor regionale începute în 2011 [The dynamics of the Middle East security architecture in the context of regional transformations which started in 2011] (Bucharest: National Defence University „Carol I”, 2015); Lucian Sanda, Dimensiunile internaţionale ale conflictului israeliano-palestinian [The international dimensions of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict] (Bucharest: University of Bucharest, 2010); Yehuda Meir Roth, Leadership sub asediu, impactul 'proceselor Intifadei' asupra ofiţerilor de comandă ai unităţilor de teren Tzahal şi asupra ofiţerilor în general [Leadership under siege, the impact of the “Intifada trials” on officers on the ground control units zahal and the on officers in general] (Cluj Napoca: Babeş-Bolyai University, 2010); Hanna Kovel, Examinarea funcţionării leadership-ului local la autorităţile locale, în vremuri de pericol, în timpul celui de-al doilea război din Liban (iulie- august 2006 [Examination of local leadership for local authorities during time of danger, the 2nd Lebanon war (July – August 2006)] (Cluj Napoca: Babeş-Bolyai University, 20100; Essam Abou Salem, Conflictele contemporane şi modalităţi de reglementare a acestora (în baza conflictelor transnistrean şi palestino- israelian) [Contemporary conflicts and ways of handling them (the Transnistrian and Israeli-Palestinian conflicts] (Chişinău: The Moldovian State University, 2006).
Ana-Maria Bolborici 50 The Role and Importance of Information Sources the 21st century” places our timeline at the beginning of the present century, I decided to approach the Israeli-Palestinian conflict from a historical perspective, having regard for the evolution of the Jewish people in relation to Palestine through the historical period between 2000-1000 B.C. In this way, what are presented are the most important steps which the two entities (Israeli and Palestinian) had to go through. Therefore, I think the present theme of the paper was better designed for starting from the historical perspective, which I consider to be fundamental for understanding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict today and the way the European Union understands intervention in this region. Looking back this work appears as a sum of information covering both the theoretical and practical issues concerning the European Union’s organizational architecture, specifically instruments and policies, particular elements of the Israeli-Palestinian crisis. I consider these issues to be essential, but for a better understanding of the reasons for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict we need a careful and thorough analysis of the causes that have led to the conflict between the two sides in what is generally known as the Middle East crisis and also an analysis of the evolution of the peace process during history. The theme of my research requires not only to identify the causes and factors that have caused delays in the peace process but also have imposed, at the same time, a recognition of present realities when we intend to highlight and analyse the effort of European diplomacy in management of the Israeli-Palestinian crisis, starting with the European community.
Methodology and information sources
The methodology used for this book is based primarily on a diversified bibliography which we believe justifies the final conclusions, thus focusing on the study of primary sources such as: treaties, laws, official reports from various international organizations, interviews, press statements of Heads of State and Government on the occasion of high level meetings, press releases and press releases of officials, secondary sources: specialty books, manuals, dictionaries, studies and articles published in national or international journals, on historical reality, on the points of view of International Relations specialists, whose work is based on a thorough scientific documentation. For the secondary information sources, I have used: speciality books, manuals, dictionaries, studies and articles published in national or international magazines: regarding the historical reality based on the points of view of International Relations specialists, researchers whose papers are based on a scientific documentation. Among the strategies adopted to synthesize this book, I must mention that the summary of events that mark the context of Israeli-Palestinian crisis are highlighted in their importance to the further development of the peace process; by presenting the existing realities, which describe the evolution of the relationships developed by European Union with Israel and the Palestinian Authority in the context of the crisis this will be done in a fair and pragmatic report to put together realistic predictions and scenarios for the evaluation of proposed solutions over time, but also those of recent date, in order to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. In the second part, my research is based on a content analysis of the answers given by 25 specialists in the field of International Relation. In the collection of the answers I have been using the Delphi method, whose specificity is to apply the successive questionnaires to
51 Ana-Maria Bolborici The Role and Importance of Information Sources
the respondents. Regarding the sociological approach, and in collecting responses, I have used The Delphi4 method. I consider that the main merit of my approach derives from the research which was conducted with the aid specialists in the Middle Eastern, especially on the Israeli-Palestinian crisis; they have encouraged my initiative and have offered me specialized answers about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, as well as assessments regarding the role of the European Union’s diplomacy in managing and resolving the conflict. To my knowledge, this type of investigation has not been done until now in Romania and especially not as a doctoral thesis to be presented to the public. Initially, the questionnaire was sent over the course of a year to a total number of 195 respondents: specialists, professors, diplomats and politicians from different countries (including Romania), which are interested and have researched the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the Middle East region, in general. I mention that a number of institutions and persons kindly provided a number of bibliographic materials without which I would not have been able to complete the doctoral thesis. In preparing my concluding analysis, found in the last chapter of the book, I used as a study material the received answers to a questionnaire, from a twenty-five specially trained respondents who come from different socio-geographic areas mainly focused on the Middle East’s regional problems. In this context, I want again to give thanks to the twenty-five respondents of whom are researchers and practitioners from around the world, who responded to this questionnaire, in spite of distance and anonymity. Considering the hypothesis from which I started to develop the present paper, I have proposed to analyse: if deliberation about a real and effective diplomacy at the European Union level is active and working in parallel in the Middle East region in order to solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and whether it can have a decisive contribution considering the general effort of the international communities in this direction. In the subchapter “Final conclusions”, as I already underlined, starting from the question “Is peace really wanted in the Near and Middle East? And if so, who can have a decisive contribution in this respect?”, I concluded by starting from the analysis of the role of the European Union’s diplomacy in solving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Surely, these answers are important when thinking about the future of the Middle and Near East.
Conclusions
Coming back to the role and the importance of the sources, one of the historians' important rules is the bias rule and in this regard, thinking every source is biased in some way. Documents usually offer only what the author of the document thought happened, or perhaps only what they want us to think happened. As a result, historians follow these bias rule guidelines when they review evidence from the past: every piece of evidence and source must be read or analyse critically and each piece of evidence and source must be cross- checked and compared with related sources and pieces of evidence. But not only do historians have to respect this rule, also the journalists, publishers, and authors, for real and concrete information for the people who pay for finding and reading well-documented and truthful quality analysis.
4 In my research I applied only half of the Delphi method, because of the status of the parties involved and; secondly, the slow the evolution of the situation in the region does not permit me to repeat the analysis of using the questionnaire on these people.
Ana-Maria Bolborici 52 The Role and Importance of Information Sources
Nowadays, the internet is the main source of information, but there is a very clear dividing line between the young and the old with the middle aged; the statistics show that for those younger than or 45 years old, the internet is the dominant source of information while the internet plays only a modest role for older generations.5 Among students, 98 percent use the internet for schoolwork, 79 percent once a week and 35 percent daily. The internet thus plays a large role and this applies especially to adult students; half (59%) of older students (26-35) use the internet daily to retrieve information about papers school work, 43% of the ages between 16-25 and 23% of school children between the ages of 12 to 15.6 Almost two out of three people (69%) use the internet for cultural, scientific and literary; there is a difference among the young that is based on education but it increases for those over 45 years old. Among the middle-aged and the elderly, it is three times more likely than those with a higher education, compared to those who have not graduated, who use the internet for culture, science and literature.7 Primary sources are the original documents of an event or discovery, that is, results of research, experiments or surveys, interviews, letters, diaries, legal documents, and scientific journal articles. Primary sources are also records of events as they are first described; this may include videotapes, audio recordings or eyewitness news reports.8 Also important for the architecture of the book are the secondary sources which offer an analysis or a restatement of an event or discovery described in primary sources; these often interpret, explain or summarize primary sources. Some secondary sources are used to persuade the reader and that is why secondary sources may be considered less objective than the primary sources. Examples of secondary sources include: dictionaries, encyclopaedias, textbooks, articles and editorials that interpret or review research works.9 “The study of historical sources and artefacts play an important role in the field of history, as well, anthropology and urban sociology are useful fields to consider. These sources and resources offer sound arguments in favour of examining aspects of mundane or private life.”10 From personal experience, I recognize that is easier to find final sources primarily on the internet. It also is very hard to compose a rigorous selection of well documented and valid sources. Otherwise, the researcher is risking to enter into a world of speculation. It’s clear that now fewer people use libraries than in the past, but they’re still visited by over a third of the adult population.11 And although more students are using digital libraries than paper-based libraries, the library building as a place to study, is still important to them. Similarly, while open access content, digitization program and e-book subscriptions may
5 The Swedes and the internet 2014. An annual study of the Swedish people's internet habits, http://en.soi2014.se/information-and-facts/internet-is-the-most-important-source-of-information/. Accessed: 09.10.2017. 6 Idem. 7 Idem. 8 University of Michigan-Flint, Identifying Information Sources, https://www.umflint.edu/library/identifying-information-sources. Accessed: 09.10.2017. 9 Idem. 10 Mariana Borcoman, “Techniques and tools used in archive work applicable to teaching process,” in Advanced Educational Technologies International Conference (2010), 6th WSEAS /Iasme (Edute´10), Katouni, Sousse, Tunisia, p. 102. 11 Frankie Wilson, Hard Evidence: How Many People Actually Use Libraries? March 14, 2016, http://theconversation.com/hard-evidence-how-many-people-actually-use-libraries-55671. Accessed: 16.10.2017.
53 Ana-Maria Bolborici The Role and Importance of Information Sources
mean that a public library is not the only place to read books and newspapers, people still enjoy the experience of physical books and value the space to escape, study and learn. Every academician, researcher or author, no matter the field of study, must pay more attention to those every source, documents and be used with precaution. As Sorea considers, orientation in the vast and overwhelming field of available information requires connotations of initiation.12 Will the printed-book or the e-book will be most used in the next decade? The e-books became in popularity once they became as easy and enjoyable to read as printed books. Although printed books remain the most popular means of reading, over the past decade e- books have made a valiant effort at catching up. Are threatened the traditional books with extinction or will coexist with the ebooks? Answers to these questions do not come easily, regarding the possible future for the paper book in the age of digital proliferation.
References
Bolborici, Ana-Maria. European Union Diplomacy and the Middle East Crises at the Beginning of 21st Century. Iasi: European Institute, 2016. Borcoman, Mariana. “Techniques and tools used in archive work applicable to teaching process.” In the Proceedings of the Advanced Educational Technologies, 6th WSEAS /Iasme (Edute´10), Katouni, Sousse, Tunisia. Sorea, D. “Communicational Tools of Self-Knowledge.” In Bulletin of the Transilvania University of Braşov, Series VII: Social Sciences and Law, 5 (54) No. 1 (2012): 77-82. Wilson, Frankie. Hard Evidence: How Many People Actually Use Libraries? March 14, 2016, http://theconversation.com/hard-evidence-how-many-people-actually-use-libraries- 55671. Accessed: 16.10.2017.
Online sources: The Swedes and the internet 2014. An annual study of the Swedish people's internet habits. http://en.soi2014.se/information-and-facts/internet-is-the-most-important-source-of- information/. Accessed: 09.10.2017. University of Michigan-Flint, Identifying Information Sources, https://www.umflint.edu/library/identifying-information-sources. Accessed: 09.10.2017.
12 Sorea, D., “Communicational Tools of Self-Knowledge,” in Bulletin of the Transilvania University of Braşov, Series VII: Social Sciences and Law, 5 (54) No. 1 (2012): 77-82.
PART III
Books in Education
The Level of Awareness on Scientometrics in Higher Education
Angela Repanovici,1 Manolis Koukourakis,2 Mihai Bogdan Alexandrescu,3 D. Cotoros,1 Liliana Rogozea,1 Daniela Popa1
1 Transilvania University of Brasov, Romania 2 University Library of Crete, Greece 3 Cultural Center for Social Welfare Brasov, Romania
Introduction
Measuring information quality is an old and significant issue. The term statistical bibliographyseems to have been first used by E. Wyndham Hulme in 1922 when he delivered two lectures at the Sandars Reader in Bibliography at the University of Cambridge. Therefore, it is suggested that a better name forthis subject (as previously defined) is BIBLIOMETRICS, i.e. the application of mathematics and statistical methods to books and other media of communication. Nalimo and Mulkenko defined Scientometrics as “the application of those quantitative methods which are dealing with the analysis of science viewed as an information process.”1 Scientometrics is defined as "the application of those quantitative methods which are dealing with the analysis of science viewed as an information process.” Nalimov’s profound scientific works showed the world that our society needs to see far beyond our time dimension to change the situation of collapse and the disordered state of moral values. Nalimov’s concepts of meaning and consciousness expand on a great variety of issues such as mathematics, philosophy, language, and psychology. Important contributions in bibliometrics development were Lodka,2 Bradford,3 Gros & Gros,4 Zipf,5 Derek de Solla (1963-64)6, Eugene Grafield.7 Bibliometrics developed as a science being one of the analysis branch used in libraries for research and prediction. By the statistical analysis of the accepted number of papers, the development of a certain scientific domain could be proven. Maine sources of bibliometric data are WOS, SCOPUS and GOOGLE SCHOLAR.
1 Vasily Vasilevich Nalimov, Z. M. Mul'chenko, Наукометрия, Изучение развития науки как информационного процесса [Naukometriya, the study of the development of science as an information process] (in Russian) (Moscow: Nauka, 1969), 191. 2 A. J. Lotka, “The frequency distribution of scientific productivity” Journal of the Washington Academy of Sciences 16(12) (1926): 317–324. 3 Samuel C. Bradford, “Sources of Information on Specific Subjects,” Engineering: An Illustrated Weekly Journal (London) 137 (26 January) (1934): 85–86 4 P.L.K. Gross, F.M. Gross, “College libraries and chemical education” Science 66 (1927): 386-389. 5 G.K. Zipf, Human behaviour and the principles of least effort (Cambridge, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1949). 6 Derek J. de Solla, Little science, big science (New York: Columbia University Press, 1963). 7 E. Garfield, “Citation indexes for science: A new dimension in documentation through association of ideas” Science 122 (1955): 108–111.
Angela Repanovici et al. 56 The Level of Awareness on Scientometrics in Higher Education
Citation and publication counts are derived from bibliometric databases (Web of Science – WOS, Scopus and to some extent from Google Scholar). More recently, bibliographic databases have also started to display citation counts of publications.8 The large part of the objectives and contexts where evaluation of research performance is conducted, productivity is either the most important or the only indicator that should inform policy, strategy and operational decisions.9 In research community authors form a social network, which is called Research Professionals’ Collaboration Network.10 There are certain reactions in the academic community regarding the abusive use of scientometric indicators in academic evaluation and especially in the distribution of research funds. Thus, The Leiden manifesto for research metrics, and DORA- San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment, occurred and promote academic attitudes leading to a single conclusion: these evaluations must be performed by experts, mainly by experts in information sciences. All these information within the introduction were presented at the international prestigious conference QQML- Qualitative and Quantitative Methods in Libraries, during the 9th edition that took place in Limerick, Ireland.
Materials and methods
Following the plenary lecture presentation “Vision and Reality Regarding the Role of Bibliometrics in Scientific Research Evaluation” at the QQML conference, a new scientific research was initiated in order to identify the importance of bibliometrics in research evaluation and also the representative bibliometric indicators in quantifying scientific production. The proposed questionnaire for gathering data was created in SurveyMonkey and was sent to all participants at QQML conference. The link to the questionnaire is: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/92X28TG
Analysis of survey results
Fig. 1. Results regarding level of awareness in bibliometrics
8 James Wilsdon, Judit Bar-Ilan, Robert Frodeman, Elisabeth Lex, Isabella Peters, Paul Wouters, “Next-Generation Metrics” 26 (2017). doi: 10.12777/337729. 9 Giovanni Abramo and Ciriaco Andrea D’Angelo, “How Do You Define and Measure Research Productivity?” Scientometrics 101 (2) (2014): 1129–44. doi:10.1007/s11192-014-1269-8. 10 Anand Bihari, Manoj Kumar Pandia, “‘Key Author Analysis in Research Professionals’ Relationship Network Using Citation Indices and Centrality.” Procedia Computer Science 57 (2015). Elsevier Masson SAS: 606–13. doi:10.1016/j.procs.2015.07.414.
57 Angela Repanovici et al. The Level of Awareness on Scientometrics in Higher Education
The level of awareness regarding bibliometrics and the fact that this level is the highest represents the opinion of 34,78% of the respondents, while 28% are aware of bibliometrics but not at the highest level and 30,43% have an average level of awareness.2,75% of the respondents consider that bibliometrics has no level of awareness while 4,35% consider an average level of awareness regarding bibliometrics. (Fig. 1) 56,72% of the respondents record a strong agreement regarding the fact that bibliometrics is very important for libraries and 32,61% agree to that. A strong disagreement was expressed by 4,35% of the respondents while 6,53% neither agree nor disagree to the question. (Fig. 2)
Fig. 2. Responses regarding the importance of bibliometrics for libraries
52,17% of the respondents expressed a strong agreement regarding to the fact that bibliometrics is crucial and important in scientific research evaluation and 34,78% simply agree to that. 8,7% do not agree, while 4,35% neither agree, nor disagree. (Fig. 3) Concerning the question whom is more important bibliometrics, 32,61% of the respondents consider that bibliometrics is important for research evaluation, 2,71% consider important for library and 65,22% for both. (Fig. 4) 88,37% of the respondents consider that bibliometrics indicators are the most appropriate for appreciating scientific production. Only 6,98% do not agree and 4,65% do not know which indicators are more appropriate. (Fig. 5)
Angela Repanovici et al. 58 The Level of Awareness on Scientometrics in Higher Education
Fig. 3. Results concerning the importance of bibliometrics in research evaluation
Fig. 4. Evaluation of importance given to bibliometric indicators
59 Angela Repanovici et al. The Level of Awareness on Scientometrics in Higher Education
Fig. 5. Responses regarding the appropriateness of bibliometric indicators
There are various opinions in academic communities regarding the abusive use of bibliometric indicators in scientific production evaluation. This issue is highlighted also by the 55/33%, result expressing the pro/against opinion that these indicators are adequate or not. (Fig. 6)
Fig. 6. Responses concerning the use of bibliometrics in scientific production evaluation
95,65% of the respondents consider that Bibliometrics should be included as a subject in the LIS-Library and Information Science curricula. Only 2,17% consider there is no need for that while 2,17% do not know. (Fig. 7)
Angela Repanovici et al. 60 The Level of Awareness on Scientometrics in Higher Education
Fig. 7. Results regarding the inclusion of bibliometrics in LIS curricula
Bibliometrics services are offered by 50% of the institutions while in 50% of them, there are no such services. (Fig. 8)
Fig.8. Responses regarding the bibliometrics services in institutions
73,08% of the bibliometrics services are located in libraries and 26,92% are outside the libraries.(Fig. 9)
61 Angela Repanovici et al. The Level of Awareness on Scientometrics in Higher Education
Fig. 9. Results regarding the location of the bibliometric services
Q10: If it is not part of the library which is its place in your institutional structure? The fact that 73% of the bibliometrics services of the institutions are within the libraries shows a clear recognition of the fact that the experts in information science should be the ones offering these services. Q11: Where do you think bibliometrics service should be appropriately affiliated? The answer to the open question regarding the position of the bibliometrics services outside the library showed us that the departments responsible with the university projects or the department of scientific production or the science department or the research department or group of librarians are involved in bibliometrics research. Q12: Your institution The selected sample has a large geographic representation; all the continents are represented as shown in table 1. (Table 1, Fig. 10)
Table 1 . Geographic spread of the respondents Geographical Institution region University of Crete Library, Greece EU Limerick Institute of Technology, Ireland EU University of Piraeus, Greece EU Scientific Library of Balti Alecu Russo State University, Moldova Eurasia South Federal University of Minas Gerais, Brazil America Transilvania University of Brasov, Romania EU Academy of Public Administration, Yerevan, Armenia Eurasia Academy of Economic Studies of Moldova Eurasia Govt. Post graduate college for women satellite town Rawalo, USA USA European University Institute – Florence, Italy EU
Angela Repanovici et al. 62 The Level of Awareness on Scientometrics in Higher Education
Federal University of Technology Owerri Imo State Nigeria Africa University of Minho, Portugal EU South Espirito Santo Federal University, Brazil America Zayed University, United Arab Emirates, Arabia Netherlands Cancer Institute, Holland EU University of Santo Tomas, Philippines Asia Alexander Technological Educational Institute of Thessaloniki-Greece EU CIDEHUS - University of Évora, Portugal EU Large US research institution, USA University of Rhode Island, USA USA Petra Christian University, Indonezia Asia University of Limerick, Ireland EU COMSATS Institute of Information Technology, Islamabad-Pakistan. Asia Belarusian National Technical University, Belarus Eurasia Aligarh Muslim University, India Asia South Federal University of Minas Gerais (Brazil) America Penn State University, USA USA South Fundacao Escola de Sociologia e Politica de Sao Paulo - FESPSP, Argentina America
Count of Institution by Geographical region
10
1 1 4 4 4 4
AFRICA ARABIA ASIA EU EURASIA SOUTH USA AMERICA
Fig. 10. Geographic spread of the respondents
Most of the respondents, 54,35% are librarians, academic staff is represented by 34,78%, 6,52% are Ph.D. students , 2,71% master students, and other situations 2,17%. (Fig.11) The sample is very well structured consisting mostly of librarians but academic staff is also very well represented.
63 Angela Repanovici et al. The Level of Awareness on Scientometrics in Higher Education
Fig. 11. Respondents profession
The sample structure is well balanced from the point of view of the activity type, 45,65% are persons involved in libraries management, 43,48% are not involved in management and 10,87% are involved in the university management.(Fig. 12)
Fig. 12. Respondents involvement in management
71,74 % are female respondents and only 28,26% are male respondents. (Fig. 13)
Angela Repanovici et al. 64 The Level of Awareness on Scientometrics in Higher Education
Fig. 13. Respondents gender distribution
Q16: If you have any other comments, suggestions or requests please provide details below:
The comments provided were highly objective and a selection is presented below: I believe that bibliometrics can be ONE of the appropriate ways to measure scientific production, if practiced by experts and with respect to the peculiarities of each scientific field; Researchers and librarians need knowledge of bibliometry and scientometry; The elements of bibliometrics are already being implemented in our institution. However, I think it will have to become a strategic objective of the university; Bibliometrics not understood by many in the academic community and there is little awareness within Librarianship; Apart from quantitative analysis qualitative aspect also need to focus; This is a coming hot topic for library research services. We live in an increasingly assessment -driven that academics understand and until a viable alternative presents itself, it is the best system we have. I think the library profession needs to develop greater expertise in bibliometrics, data management and research skills; Bibliometrics is undervalued and because there is lack of international standardized guidance, the level of analysis may vary a lot in different libraries. Including bibliometric work should be included in the statistics of scientific libraries because it may take a lion part of an information specialists; Relative to question number 5, I do not think that bibliometrics are appropriate for measuring production but instead impact, so my issue with the question is more semantic than substantive. Culture. This need to use evidence for impact of faculty and of universities will not likely go away; Combining bibliometrics with newer metrics (Altmetrics, etc.) will be very interesting; While I am aware that there are many flaws to the journal ranking system and corresponding bibliometrics, I am also aware that it is the language.
65 Angela Repanovici et al. The Level of Awareness on Scientometrics in Higher Education
Discussions and conclusions
The awareness regarding bibliometrics and the importance of this branch of information science is at an acceptable level in the education and research institutions and also in libraries. Most of the respondents, that is 92% have a certain awareness level regarding bibliometrics. 90% of the respondents agree that bibliometrics is important for libraries. This result indicates the fact that libraries should be involved in the decision-making process regarding the collections development, in scientific research by research activity or as support institutions. A slightly smaller number of respondents consider bibliometrics is important in scientific research evaluation with respect to those considering bibliometrics important for libraries. Scientific production is one of the most used indicators in scientific research evaluation. In case of countries evaluation and classification, most classification systems take into consideration the scientific production of countries, universities, researchers. Most of them agree that Bibliometrics is an important subject and should be included in every curriculum of LIS schools. The fact that there is a 50% share of institutions where the bibliometrics service is offered and in 50% of the institutions there is no such service shows that bibliometric researches are still not a priority of the institutions and these indicators are used even without a specialized service.
References
Lotka, A. J. “The frequency distribution of scientific productivity.” Journal of the Washington Academy of Sciences 16(12) (1926): 317–324. Hulme, E. W. Statistical bibliography in relation to the growth of modern civilization. London, 1923. Pritchard, A. “North-Western Polytechnic, London, Now at National Computing Centre.” Manchester, Journal of Documentation 25(4) (1969): 348–349. Abramo, Giovanni, and Ciriaco Andrea D’Angelo. 2014. “How Do You Define and Measure Research Productivity?” Scientometrics 101 (2): 1129–44. doi:10.1007/s11192- 014-1269-8. Bihari, Anand, and Manoj Kumar Pandia. 2015. “Key Author Analysis in Research Professionals’ Relationship Network Using Citation Indices and Centrality.” Procedia Computer Science 57. Elsevier Masson SAS: 606–13. doi:10.1016/j.procs.2015.07.414. Nalimov, V. V., and G. Colodny. n.d. Life and the Probabilistic, Edited by Robert, Reality, New, Svetlana Maltseva, and Svetlana Maltseva. 2013. “Professor V . V . Nalimov: A Man Who Surpassed His Time,” 3–6. Wilsdon, James, Judit Bar-Ilan, Robert Frodeman, Elisabeth Lex, Isabella Peters, and Paul Wouters. “Next-Generation Metrics,” 26 (2017). doi:10.2777/337729.
Romanian Students’ Perceptions of Bibliotherapy in the Educational Process
Daniela Popa,1 Ane Landoy,2 Angela Repanovici3
1 The Faculty of Psychology and Education Sciences, Transilvania University of Brasov, Roman 2 Bergen University Library, Bergen University, Norway 3 Product Design and Environment Faculty, Transilvania University of Brasov, Romania
Introduction
Bibliotherapy has a long history. Its first records were found in 300 BC in the library of Alexandria, where the following description of reading was discovered: "the nourishment of the soul."1 There are also reports on the use of reading for therapeutic purposes in Ancient Greece (Aristotle), in the Roman Empire, in the Middle Ages (religious texts), and up to the present. Along with other environmental factors, such as family and community, school has an important role in the development of the individual, not only from a cognitive point of view, but especially from the psycho-moral and social perspective. Typical questions and age-specific dilemmas can find solutions and answers in carefully chosen readings. Likewise, strategies for coping with contemporary problems faced by today's students can be discovered through bibliotherapy, through a discreet pedagogy of the relevant facts. Apart from the the well-known, general objective of bibliotherapy, some other objectives are the following: “1) guiding through reading; 2) using books to help solve personal problems; 3) developing life skills; 4) improving self-concept and personality, a dynamic interaction between readers' personality and literature.”2 In a broad sense, bibliotherapy is defined as “the guided reading of written materials in gaining understanding or solving problems relevant to a person’s therapeutic needs”3 Bibliotherapy is part of the activities related to wellness promotion, prevention and early intervention, as well as crisis intervention. Bibliotherapy, as a practice has two directions of frequent use. One of them is the clinic approach, and the second is the educational one. Both types of therapy use different communication environments, from the direct one, in the form of individual and group
1 Cardenas, M. E. “Bibliotherapy: Good book or media selection plus a definite goal.” ERIC Document Reproduction Service ED, no. 191484 (April 1980): 193 2 Afolayan, J. A. “Documentary perspective of bibliotherapy in education.” Reading Horizons 33, no. 2 (1992): 138. 3 Riordan, R. J., and Wilson, L. S. “Bibliotherapy: Does it work?.” Journal of Counseling & Development 67, no. 9 (1989): 506.
67 Daniela Popa et al. Romanian Students’ Perceptions of Bibliotherapy
counseling to online websites, included in the term e-health.4. In a narrow perspective, it delimitate “psycho-educational material, i.e., self-help manuals, which is a typical part of the adjunctive interventions” in clinical or educational treatment.5 Although there are opinions that consider that bibliotherapy should only be used by psychologists and counselors, a different perspective of developmental bibliotherapy “put forth the idea that bibliotherapy can be used in classrooms by teachers.”6 Teachers can use bibliotherapy in preventive counseling activities, for problem solving and developing socio- emotional skills.7 The criteria for choosing the readings are closely related to students' needs. The reading process facilitates the appearance of “opportunities for the imaginative projection of a subjective state into an object or person, a kind of self-identification and catharsis.”8 The next step allows the examination and generalization of new strategies for learning new behavior.9 The great advantage of bibliotherapy is the transfer of personal identities to the area of the characters discussed, namely outsourcing the problems, leading to conversations being less blocked and difficult.10 11 For the purpose of this research project, bibliotherapy is defined as: “the utilization of young-adult literature as an instructional strategy implemented by a classroom teacher to help adolescents better understand unknown concepts, cope with difficult situations, and address sensitive topics.”12 Current researches show that the use of bibliotherapy in the educational process improves students’ skills using reading process in a very efficient way to transfer knowledge and enjoy the process.13 14 15 16 17
4 Gunn, J., Cameron, J., Densley, K., Davidson, S., Fletcher, S., Palmer, V., Pirkis, J. et. All. “Uptake of mental health websites in primary care: Insights from an Australian longitudinal cohort study of depression.” Patient Education and Counseling 101, no. 1. (2017): 105. 5 Rus-Makovec, M., Furlan, M., and Smolej, T. “Experts on comparative literature and addiction specialists in cooperation: A bibliotherapy session in aftercare group therapy for alcohol dependence.” The Arts in Psychotherapy 44, (2015): 26. 6 Leana-Taşcılar, M. Z. “The Use of Bibliotherapy in Classrooms for Gifted Students & 58; A Bibliotherapy Model (Üstün Zekâlı ve Yetenekli Öğrencilerin de Bulunduğu Sınıflarda Bibliyoterapi Kullanımı&58; Model Önerisi).” Turkish Journal of Giftedness and Education 2, no. 2 (2012): 118. 7 Sullivan, Amie K., and Harold R. Strang. "Bibliotherapy in the classroom using literature to promote the development of emotional intelligence." Childhood Education 79, no.2 (2002): 74-80. 8 Leana-Taşcılar, M. Z. “The Use of Bibliotherapy in Classrooms for Gifted Students & 58; A Bibliotherapy Model (Üstün Zekâlı ve Yetenekli Öğrencilerin de Bulunduğu Sınıflarda Bibliyoterapi Kullanımı&58; Model Önerisi).” Turkish Journal of Giftedness and Education 2, no. 2 (2012): 119. 9 Marchant, M., & Womack, S. “Book in a bag: Blending social skills and academics.” Teaching Exceptional Children 42, no.4 (2010): 6-12. 10 Heath, M.A., Sheen, D., Leavy, D., Young, E. & Money, K. “Biliotherapy: A resource to facilitate emotional healing and growth.” School Psychology 26 (2005): 563-580. 11 Zambo, D. “What can you learn from Bombaloo? Using picture books to help young students with special needs regulate their emotions.” Teaching Exceptional Children 39, (2007): 32-39. 12 Camp, R. D., “Perceptions of bibliotherapy: a survey of undergraduate students.” (Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Iowa State University 14645, 2015). 13 Russell, D. H., and Shrodes, C. “Contributions of Research in Bibliotherapy to the Language-Arts Program. I.” The School Review 58, no.6 (1950): 335-342. 14 Haeseler, L. A. “Biblio-therapeutic book creations by pre-service student teachers: Helping elementary school children cope.” Journal of Instructional Psychology 36, no. 2 (2009): 113-119. 15 McCulliss, D., & Chamberlain, D. “Bibliotherapy for youth and adolescents—School-based application and research.” Journal of Poetry Therapy 26, no.1 (2013): 13-40.
Daniela Popa et al. 68 Romanian Students’ Perceptions of Bibliotherapy
Methods
Aims and review questions
This paper’s aim is to identify the level of familiarity of first year students with bibliotherapy as well as the benefits discovered by digital born generation of students.
Design
A survey research design was employed to assess the perceptions of bibliotherapy quantitatively. This research design was selected to describe the perceived attitudes and behaviors of the undergraduate students in the Transilvania University. We adopted the Camp R. D. questionnaire (2015) to the Romanian language and population. The survey consist of demographics information section and three other sections, with predominately closed response questions that asked participants to rate items using a predetermined summative scale. The questionnaire has 29 items, of which 5 are socio- demographic, 5 are open questions, and 19 items are quoted on a psychometric rating scale from 1 to 4 (1=Very uncomfortable, 2=Uncomfortable, 3=Comfortable, 4=Very comfortable). We were interested in: Student’s experiences and current understandings of bibliotherapy; How acceptable the participants perceived bibliotherapy;
Participants’ perceived comfort using bibliotherapy in a classroom setting.
Procedure
The survey was administered online using social media networks such as Facebook, Google and Yahoo. Students were asked to answer as honestly as possible Informed consent was done before completing the survey. The rights and potential risks to which they were exposed through participation in this research has been explained. As well, subjects have been assured of the privacy of their personal data.
Population
We surveyed 111 students from Transilvania University of Brașov. The data collection period was from the 1st to the 12th of October, 2017. The group of participants consist of 99 female 89,2% and 12 male 10,8%. The participants were first year students in the following faculties: Medicine 66,7%, Psychology and Sciences of Education 4,5%, Economical Sciences 14,4%, Law 1,2%, Sociology 6,3%, Product Design and Environment 6,3%. The participants age ranged from 18 and 41 years old, with the following percentages: 57,6% between 18-20 years old, 33,3 % between 21-23 years old, 2,7% between 24-26 years old, and 6,3% between 28-41 years old.
16 Gerlach, H., and Subramanian, A. “Qualitative analysis of bibliotherapy as a tool for adults who stutter and graduate students.” Journal of fluency disorders 47, (2016): 1-12. 17 Papi, A., Mosharraf, Z., Farashbandi, F. Z., Samouei, R., & Hassanzadeh, A. “The effect of bibliotherapy on the psychological capital of the staff of the School of Management and Medical Informatics of Isfahan University of Medical Science.” Journal of Education and Health Promotion (2017): 6:31.
69 Daniela Popa et al. Romanian Students’ Perceptions of Bibliotherapy
Results
The level of familiarity of first year students with bibliotherapy
The statistical analysis shows that 25,2% of students received information about bibliotherapy before completing the survey. A large sub-group (74,8%) had no contact with any form of bibliotherapy. Due to the questionnaire being administered online, immediately upon receiving access to the subjects were given the following definition: “Bibliography is not an specialization of psychology, it is a set of techniques that involve the recommendation of certain reading (fiction, non-fiction, comics, articles, poetry, etc.) and the viewing of audiovisual materials, writing texts, performing artistic activities, to treat certain life problems and / or to help deal with certain disorders”. This was done with regard to familiarity with specific techniques. After reading this explanation, the subjects were able to further complete the questionnaire. The following question, "What is bibliotherapy for you?" implied free answers. These were the subject of a qualitative analysis. Synthesizing their answers, most student representations of bibliotherapy were described as: "A way to relax, to get out of the daily routine, to disconnect me from everything that is routine"; "Opening new horizons, another point of view"; "At first glance, bibliotherapy seems to be a method that can be used to deal with some of the inner issues of the being. By being into contact with certain situations, or certain experiences, through books, film, or any other form of art, individuals can internalize those experiences and especially can empathize with them, reaching a deeper understanding of one's own being."; "Bibliotherapy is a creative way to help treat an emotional state of an individual and also an opportunity for these people to interact with specialists to improve them". The next item, "How would you define bibliotherapy according to your knowledge, your experience?", also requested open answers. Students define bibliotherapy as: "For me, this is a way to develop, both intellectually and emotionally"; "In my opinion, bibliotherapy helps us be more optimistic and have the courage to dare to do things we fear"; "I would define bibliotherapy as a way to understand the world as well as the inner world through other people. You can understand the world through the eyes of others, without living yourself through flesh and bones that experience."; "Bibliotherapy is a noninvasive, beautiful and relaxing method for treating the soul, mind and body."
Perception of the acceptability level in approaching educational goals through bibliotherapy
After knowing the meaning given to the term “bibliotherapy,” students were asked to project in the pedagogical situation where the teacher would use the specific literature for children and young people in the course. They were asked to establish the level of acceptability/ comfort in addressing certain themes. Thus, the researchers selected goals and received the scores highlighted in Table 1. Students' perception of the goals. As we can see, the main educational goals with a very strong impact on students are: to develop the vocabulary, to give students hope and inspiration, to develop fluency in reading and to promote healthy self-esteem.
Daniela Popa et al. 70 Romanian Students’ Perceptions of Bibliotherapy
Table 1. Students' perception of the goals
No Items Average SD CI 1. To discuss the phenomenon of harassment 3,09 0,848 2,94-3,25 To help the class of students understand a 3,47 0,724 3,34-3,59
2. colleague with dyslexia 3. To develop the vocabulary 3,71 0,529 3,61-3,81 To connect a student with a character 3,39 0,822 3,23-3,54
4. experiencing a similar situation or feelings 5. To develop empathy 3,38 0,832 3,21-3,53 6. To discuss a student's illness 2,84 0,977 2,66-3,03 7. To entertain students 3,02 0,981 2,82-3,20 To help a student overcome the death of 3,02 0,914 2,85-3,19
8. someone dear 9. To overcome the death of an animal 2,86 0,962 2,68-3,05 10. To introduce a scientific concept 3,32 0,811 3,17-3,49 11. To give students hope and inspiration 3,68 0,556 3,58-3,78 12. To practice problem solving skills 3,48 0,819 3,32-3,63 13. To promote healthy self-esteem 3,57 0,696 3,43-3,70 To provide students with information on a new 3,50 0,712 3,36-3,63
14. / unknown subject 15. To show students quality illustrations 3,23 0,904 3,05-3,41 16. To promote the development of social skills 3,43 0,746 3,30-3,58 17. For a student with behavioral disorders 3,11 0,898 2,94-3,28 18. To develop fluency in reading 3,62 0,661 3,49-3,73 SD=standard deviation CI = confidence interval
The benefits discovered by digital born generation of students
The participants in this study discover the following advantages in using bibliotherapy in educational settings: enriching the vocabulary, enthusiasm to read, student integration in society, information and training in various cases, "drawing students' attention to feelings and how important it is to treat painful situations, because they influence their behavior and attitude in adolescence," relaxation, tranquility, development of social skills, communication, development of imagination, development of self-confidence, positive thinking, emotional development, cognitive development, promoting values and qualities (e.g., gentleness, honesty, empathy), self-esteem, respect for oneself and others, self-knowledge.
Factors that influence the implementation in educational settings
The purpose of Part Three of the survey was to address the following research questions: What factors influence the level of comfort in implementing bibliotherapy as an instructional tool in the classroom?; and, What concerns do student’s hold in regards to bibliotherapy implementation? The answers received to the first question refer to the teachers’ competences to introduce bibliotherapy in educational context, the timeliness and adequacy of the reading and the facility of introducing it into the school curriculum. There are very few concerns student’s hold in regards to bibliotherapy implementation. The main concerns are: “some materials could not solve pupils'/teen's disturbances and they could still be disappointed”; “Sometimes you need to understand the figurative meanings in the book (at least in the case of science fiction books, because we do not have supernatural
71 Daniela Popa et al. Romanian Students’ Perceptions of Bibliotherapy
powers), but most readers do not try to understand the mystery of the story, so they cannot be found in characters”; “The only thing that can be unclear is the students' openness to reading the books. Sometimes people do not want to be helped.”
Discussion. Conclusions
This paper highlights that bibliotherapy is still in its nascent period in Romania. The study shows that students are enthusiastic about receiving such an initiative in an educational context. The differences between the two main directions are: clinical and developmental bibliotherapy are not very clear to students. One reason can be the fact that they did not experience the developmental bibliotherapy, another can be the teachers’ needs to solve difficult situations and behavior problems in classroom settings. But it is necessary to understand that “developmental bibliotherapy seeks to guide individuals in coping with life’s challenges in a manner that aids personal development” (Camp, 2015, p. 92). In line with the literature, these conclusions support the importance for teachers to communicate with all involved parts about their teaching, about including developmental bibliotherapy in the educational process and to increase awareness about the advantages it has. One of the weaknesses of this study is the limited number of male students. Because of this, we couldn’t make comparisons between genders. The research tool is self-responding, and therefore may be biased by social desirability. These findings provide useful information for the librarians and top management in libraries to help bring potential readers closer to this institution. Future studies will include comparing the perceptions of those who did not have the chance to explore bibliotherapy with those who did. Future research should focus on the efficacy of developmental bibliotherapy in educational context, teacher action research in this area and follow-up studies.
References
Afolayan, Johnson. A. “Documentary perspective of bibliotherapy in education.” Reading Horizons 33, no. 2 (1992): 137-148. Camp, R. D., “Perceptions of bibliotherapy: a survey of undergraduate students.” (Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Iowa State University 14645, 2015). http://lib.dr.iastate.edu/etd/14645 Cardenas, M. E.. “Bibliotherapy: Good book or media selection plus a definite goal.” ERIC Document Reproduction Service ED, no. 191484 (April 1980): 191-484. Gerlach, H., and Subramanian, A. “Qualitative analysis of bibliotherapy as a tool for adults who stutter and graduate students.” Journal of fluency disorders 47, (2016): 1-12. Gunn, J., Cameron, J., Densley, K., Davidson, S., Fletcher, S., Palmer, V., Pirkis, J. et. all. “Uptake of mental health websites in primary care: Insights from an Australian longitudinal cohort study of depression.” Patient Education and Counseling 101, no. 1 (2017): 105-112. Haeseler, L. A. “Biblio-therapeutic book creations by pre-service student teachers: Helping elementary school children cope.” Journal of Instructional Psychology 36, no. 2 (2009): 113- 119. Heath, M.A., Sheen, D., Leavy, D., Young, E. & Money, K. “Biliotherapy: A resource to facilitate emotional healing and growth.” School Psychology 26 (2005): 563-580. Leana-Taşcılar, M. Z. “The Use of Bibliotherapy in Classrooms for Gifted Students & 58; A Bibliotherapy Model (Üstün Zekâlı ve Yetenekli Öğrencilerin de Bulunduğu Sınıflarda
Daniela Popa et al. 72 Romanian Students’ Perceptions of Bibliotherapy
Bibliyoterapi Kullanımı&58; Model Önerisi).” Turkish Journal of Giftedness and Education 2 no. 2 (2012): 118-136. Marchant, M., & Womack, S. “Book in a bag: Blending social skills and academics.” Teaching Exceptional Children 42, no.4 (2010): 6-12. McCulliss, D., & Chamberlain, D. “Bibliotherapy for youth and adolescents—School-based application and research.” Journal of Poetry Therapy 26, no.1 (2013): 13-40. Papi, A., Mosharraf, Z., Farashbandi, F. Z., Samouei, R., & Hassanzadeh, A. “The effect of bibliotherapy on the psychological capital of the staff of the School of Management and Medical Informatics of Isfahan University of Medical Science.” Journal of Education and Health Promotion (2017): 6:31. Riordan, R. J., & Wilson, L. S. “Bibliotherapy: Does it work?” Journal of Counseling & Development 67, no. 9 (1989): 506-508. Rus-Makovec, M., Furlan, M., & Smolej, T. “Experts on comparative literature and addiction specialists in cooperation: A bibliotherapy session in aftercare group therapy for alcohol dependence.” The Arts in Psychotherapy 44, (2015): 25-34. Russell, D. H., & Shrodes, C. “Contributions of Research in Bibliotherapy to the Language- Arts Program. I.” The School Review 58, no.6 (1950): 335-342. Sullivan, Amie K., and Harold R. Strang. "Bibliotherapy in the classroom using literature to promote the development of emotional intelligence." Childhood Education 79 no.2 (2002): 74-80. Zambo, D. “What can you learn from Bombaloo? Using picture books to help young students with special needs regulate their emotions.” Teaching Exceptional Children 39, (2007): 32-39.
PART IV
Reading for Life
Reading for Life: Biblio/Poetry Therapy with Different Target Groups
Judit Béres
University of Pécs (Faculty of Arts & Humanities, Department of Culture, Library & Social Sciences), Hungary
Introduction
In his book titled A History of Reading, Alberto Manguel emphasizes how deeply reading (as a practice of understanding and interpretation of any – not just literally written – signs) is essentially embedded in human culture and everyday life. “We all read ourselves and the world around us in order to glimpse what and where we are. We read to understand, or to begin to understand. Reading, almost as much as breathing, is our essential function.”1 Reading ourselves, reading as self-exploration and self-understanding strongly links to the process of self-cognition, identification, evaluation and self-assessment. How we develop this metaphorical self-reading is one of the most complex and mysterious aspects of biblio/poetry therapy, when reading and writing ourselves, Others and the world supports self-understanding and helps the person to gain insight and motivation for change. In her impressing autobiographical novel, Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal?, Jeannette Winterson highlights this relationship based on the expressive and healing power of words: “I believe in fiction and the power of stories because that way we speak in tongues. We are not silenced. All of us, when in deep trauma, find we hesitate, we stammer; there are long pauses in our speech. The thing is stuck. We get our language back through the language of others. We can turn to the poem. We can open the book. Somebody has been there for us and deep-dived the words.”2 Reading and writing can help us to express difficult emotional experiences when turning the emotional content into language.3 The act of turning or transforming emotional experiences into words allows us to give structure to something unstructured (and many times unconscious) that helps to get more control over it. From this new perspective, and in the mirror of others, we can start to understand and re-evaluate our experiences in a new light. “Materials [that we read and write] create new perceptions in relationship to the readers’ selves, others, and the world. The creative focus is within self, creating new feelings, new attitudes and new motivations for action.”4 This is the starting point of our work in biblio/poetry therapy.
1 Alberto Manguel, A History of Reading (New York: Penguin Books, 1997), 7. 2 Jeanette Winterson, Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? (Toronto: Vintage Canada, 2012), 9. 3 James W. Pennebaker, J. F. Evans, Expressive Writing: Words that Heal (New York: Idyll Arbor, 2014). 4 Arleen M. Hynes, “Some Observations on Process in Biblio/poetry Therapy“, The Arts in Psychotherapy 8 (1981): 237.
75 Judit Béres Reading for Life: Bblio/Poetry Therapy with Different Target Groups
Reading and writing in biblio/poetry therapy
Biblio/poetry therapy is the interactive, facilitated use of (self)reflective reading and writing that helps people tackle their own subject matter, promotes personal growth, and supports mental health and wellbeing.
(Self)reflective reading in biblio/poetry therapy
Bibliotherapy is based on classical psychotherapy principles of identification, inspiration and insight which leads to motivation for positive change. This can help readers gain insight into themselves by connecting with characters and values appearing in poems, short stories, novels or in other textual materials. Their reading is followed up with group discussion and facilitated by the bibliotherapist’s and group mates’ questions and reflections. Group members can share their ideas and feelings with the help of the expression of their own subjective response to the text shaped by their identity and life-experience. The aim of the therapy is to elicite change in the attitudes and behaviour of the readers to enhance their problem-solving skills, and hence increase their resourcefulness. It aims to show readers that they are not alone because the others have the same concerns or problems. The main goal of the therapeutic process is positive life-change and personal development.5 “Bibliotherapy is the use of reading creatively; books, stories and poems to make people feel better, in themselves, about themselves and about others. (…) We all know how reading can take us out of ourselves and into another world. Conversely it can show us our own life mirrored in that of another person. If we are feeling miserable or alone sharing our experience in this way can help us to feel less isolated. Our empathy with others is extended as is our imagination and understanding.”6 As Julie Walker, a brilliant British psychiatric nurse-bibliotherapist-adult educator argues, “bibliotherapy supports people to take control of their own health and emotional wellbeing, and helps building resilience. It fits with secondary level preventions/interventions by promoting opportunities for increasing coping skills and helps to alleviate symptoms of depression and anxiety, increase self-esteem, improve social skills and concentration, combat isolation, and provide access to deeper thoughts and feelings and the words to express these to others.”7 A wide range of fiction and non-fiction materials are appropriate for biblio/poetry therapy purposes that meet the users’ needs and the focus of the therapy. Textual materials serve as motivating, affirming and empowering mental health tools. The following types of texts or other materials (that can be interpreted as texts or stories) are among them: • fiction books and texts – classic and contemporary imaginative literature: poetry, short stories, novels, drama, fairy tales • other imaginative or semi-imaginative genres: song lyrics, chick lit, theme-appropriate movies, dreams, traditional folk tales, Hasidic tales, therapeutic and developmental stories (e.g. written by Nancy Davis or Annamária Kádár)
5Judit Béres, “Bibliotherapy and Creative Writing”, in Horizontok II. A pedagógusképzés reformjának folytatása, ed. Ferenc Arató (Pécs: PTE BTK Neveléstudományi Intézet, 2015), 190. 6 John Duffy, Jo Haslam, Lesley Holl & Julie Walker, Bibliotherapy Toolkit (Huddersfield: Kirklees Council – NHS, 2012), 3. 7 Julie Walker, Does Bibliotherapy Work? Posted on 17 December 2014. http://www.cilip.org.uk/blog/does-bibliotherapy-work
Judit Béres 76 Reading for Life: Bblio/Poetry Therapy with Different Target Groups
• non-fiction: documentaries, letters, diaries, philosophy, case histories, autobiographies, personal recovery stories (e.g. AA, NA), self-help books, personal Facebook posts and blogs.8
(Self)reflective writing in biblio/poetry therapy
As “reading ourselves” is of key importance in biblio/poetry therapy, self-writing also belongs to the bibliotherapist’s basic toolkit. Nowadays there are some national practices of biblio/poetry therapy (e.g. in Finland, Lithuania, United Kingdom and the USA) where creative, poetic methods and the different types of personal writing are often more important tools than reading and reception of books. The dialogue of two professionals, Gillie Bolton, the British creative writing trainer and Juhani Ihanus, a Finnish poet- psychologist-poetry therapist highlights why the application of writing is important in therapy: “Insight and support are gained by writing that help us find out more about ourselves and the way we relate to home and work, significant others, and wider society and culture. It offers relatively safe and confidential ways to express areas of experience otherwise difficult to communicate. In its initial expressive and explorative stages, writing is private, and is both physical and creative, as is art, music, and dance.”9 Besides receptive/prescriptive biblio/poetry therapy when working with personal readings/meanings of already existing texts (e.g. poems, lyrics, novels written by other authors), poetic methods are often applied in bibliotherapeutic work. Poetic methods such as poetry, letter or journal writing foster participants’ self-assessment, encourage self- expression, provide a sense of order and control, and promote group process variables such as cohesion.10 Explorative, expressive writing is a proper way of self-writing applied in biblio/poetry therapy. Expressive writing is a powerful and deeply personal, mostly free style and fluent text (many times with no grammar, syntax or much sense) that helps people to confront deep, personal issues, promoting physical health and subjective wellbeing. This writing is a tool to ‘translate’ into language traumatic, disturbing emotional experiences that people suffer from.11 Self-writing applied in biblio/poetry therapy is a kind of personally developing, deeply self-reflective therapeutic writing. Gillie Bolton mentions poetry, journal and autobiographical writing that can reduce self-consciousness, allowing writers to tap into their strong wise creative sides “Whatever you write will be right for you at that time. Although possibly initially unclear or lacking in understanding, we are the world’s best authorities on our own experience and so cannot write wrongly about it.”12 This writing enhances self-understanding, enables the person to express experiences, thoughts and feelings difficult or impossible to share directly with others. Therapeutic writing improves
8 Categories and genres of materials applied in biblio/poetry therapy are based on Nicholas Mazza, Poetry Therapy: Theory and practice (New York: Brunner-Routledge, 2003); John C. Norcross et al., Self- Help That Works. Resources to Improve Mental Health and Strenghten Relationships. 4th ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013); Judit Béres, “Azért olvasok, hogy éljek” Az olvasásnépszerűsítéstől az irodalomterápiáig [“I read for my life” From reading promotion to biblio/poetry therapy](Pécs: Kronosz, 2017) 9 Gillie Bolton, Juhani Ihanus, “Conversation about poetry/writing therapy: Two European perspectives”, Journal of Poetry Therapy 24, (2011): 3. 169. See more about reflective writing applied in counselling and psychotherapy: Jeannie Wright, Gillie Bolton, Reflective Writing in Counselling and Psychotherapy (London: SAGE Publications, 2012) 10 Nicholas Mazza, Poetry Therapy 11 James W. Pennebaker, J. F. Evans, Expressive Writing 12 Gillie Bolton, Juhani Ihanus, “Conversation”, 170.
77 Judit Béres Reading for Life: Bblio/Poetry Therapy with Different Target Groups
self-respect, personal integrity and positive regard, in order to discover appropriate ways to act in the future. Even if this writing is originally for its writer to read, s/he has full authority over it, including rereading alone or possibly sharing with trusted persons. Personal writings created by participants during the sessions and after the sessions, at home, may be applied as other textual materials, if brought back and shared with trusted group members, and become subject of reflections and discussion.
Person-centred biblio/poetry therapy
In February 2014 the University of Pécs started a continuing professional training programme in biblio/poetry therapy which has become the Hungarian centre of the person- centred approach. Nowadays it is the major and most successful centre of Hungarian education in bibliotherapy. The aim of this training programme is to offer advanced knowledge and skills in the fields of biblio/poetry therapy, reading and writing for mental health and wellbeing. On completion of the qualification the trainees will be able to plan and facilitate the interactive use of imaginative literature, non-fiction materials and therapeutic writing, promoting personal growth for people from various age groups in different social contexts, living with mental health and emotional wellbeing issues. Through the whole programme students receive intensive instruction in major disciplinary fields necessary for bibliotherapist practitioners working in developmental or clinical context, such as the basics of psychotherapy and mental health, group dynamics, selection and interactive use of materials, bibliotherapy for special target groups, and supervision. 100 hours of peer experience as a participant in a supportive therapy group is an essential part of the training programme. Bibliotherapy workshops and field visits offered as further opportunities for exploring the benefits of various facilitation techniques. Biblio/poetry therapy represented by the ‘Pécs School’ is person-centered in character. However books and other textual materials are key tools and important points of reference in biblio/poetry therapy, therapy itself does not derive just from the book.13 The strongest power of bibliotherapy is based on intrapsychic and interpersonal processes. This fact fostered the notion of group process- and person-centered biblio/poetry therapy that places emphasis on participants’ therapeutic experience, examining therapeutic reading as a group process phenomenon.14 Participants’ emotional experiences and interpersonal processes between them are central, taking into consideration the wide range of therapeutic factors. Dealing with multiple emotional factors through a person-centered bibliotherapeutic process, that results an integrative model of bibliotherapy, based on the so called ’person- centred approach’ applied in the humanistic psychology. This model offers a view of people as active, autonomous agents of the improvement of their own life who, through deep encounters and intimate exchanges with the materials, the facilitator and each other, evolve an emotionally supportive environment in the bibliotherapy group, a net of interpersonal processes. A set of activities for developing EQ are involved in this process like, for instance, becoming capable to perceive, express and understand one’s emotions and ideas, capability to share personal emotional experiences, acceptance of ourselves and others, practice of giving and getting support and feedback.
13 About the distinction between the positive emotional effect of a good book and bibliotherapy, see more in Keren Dali, ”On Bibliotherapy”, Reader’s Advisory News, August 2014. https://www.ebscohost.com/novelist/novelist-special/on-bibliotherapy (accessed April 29, 2016) 14 Laura G. Cohen, ”Reading as a Group Process Phenomenon. A Theoretical Framework for Bibliotherapy”, Journal of Poetry Therapy 3 (1989): 2, 73-83.
Judit Béres 78 Reading for Life: Bblio/Poetry Therapy with Different Target Groups
Among these dynamic processes the influence of the readings or other materials is just one factor which is not enough to make an effective therapy.
Encounter
Personal Expression Growth Sharing
Support Empathy Empowerment Acceptance
Insight Understanding
Fig. 1. Emotional processes in person-centered group biblio/poetry therapy15
Given this model is person-centred it suggests to deal with some potentials hidden within and between the participant persons. The readings (or other text-like materials as I mentioned before) elicit participants’ subjective emotional response shaped by their identity and life-experience, offering a tool for their projections. One of the main questions of bibliotherapy is about why the certain person responds to literary works and other materials as s/he does, and how her/his introjections shape the personal interpretation of the materials. Thus enables the participant to stand both inside and outside that interpretation so as to observe and understand it. This act of insight, accompanied by group interactions and co-constructions of meanings might lead the person to new attitudes and new motivations for action.16
15 Judit Béres, ”Person-centered Bibliotherapy”, in Reading for Recovery poster series. ed. Judit H. Ward, J. 38th Annual Conference of the Substance Abuse Librarians & Information Specialists and Association of Mental Health Librarians (Denver, CO, May 5, 2016) 16 As I mentioned earlier, according to Hynes, 1981.
79 Judit Béres Reading for Life: Bblio/Poetry Therapy with Different Target Groups
Biblio/poetry therapy as a tool for helping professionals
Since Clara Richardson Lack’s famous article (Can Bibliotherapy Go Public?)17 has been published, it is a widespread idea that bibliotherapy can be divided in two types, developmental and clinical bibliotherapy. In Hungary there are shorter bibliotherapy trainings which try to focus just on developmental bibliotherapy education for librarians and teachers. The ‘Pécs School’ does not share this idea as it happens many times that the two modality (developmental and clinical) cannot be separated clearly during the therapeutic work. That is why we prepare trainees for the challenges of both fields, and teach them general skills needed in the facilitation of group bibliotherapy. Finally it depends from trainees original professional competences, how, with whom and where they will apply bibliotherapy.18 Biblio/poetry therapy is an effective method adaptable in many helper professions, which might be added to the toolkit of professionals who work for humans’ support. It may be offered for different target groups, both in clinical and non-clinical settings. This is why the biblio/poetry postgraduate training of the University of Pécs is available for BA or MA degree holders in arts and humanities, teacher training, mental health care, medical sciences, economy, law, and pastoration. Our students are professionals who already work with humans in different settings, and intend to learn a new method to be involved in their work. The list of their professions and typical working places is the following: • teacher in public (elementary or high) school or adult education institutions; • librarian in school, public and medical libraries; • social worker in day-care centres and care homes for people living with substance abuse issue (e.g. drugs and alcohol), working in rehab centres and relapse prevention; •social worker and mental health worker working with elderly people in care homes or in other settings (e.g. clubs for elderly, open universities for seniors); •social worker or volunteer from social welfare services, crisis intervention centres, shelter houses, or hospitals; • life and business coach who has both individual and group sessions with their clients; • HR professionals (e.g. head hunter, human resource & career manager); • prison and school psychologist; • clinical psychologist working in hospitals (e.g. with children and mothers-to-be); • assistant, counsellor or special educator working in family therapy, bereavement counselling and palliative rehabilitation; • psychiatrist working with adolescents or adults in psychiatric wards.
This list implicates the main types of the available target groups (such as students, library users, psychiatric patients, addicts etc.), but in reality there are much more types of potential clients in one setting that we could imagine for first. In schools, for instance, teachers trained in bibliotherapy or outsider bibliotherapists work mostly with students. This means the application of some elements of biblio/peotry therapy in classroom work. Teachers and school librarians sometimes offer biblio/poetry therapy groups as parents support, and there is also bibliosupervision support for teachers’ burn-out prevention. Some schools have special classes for disadvantaged and/or gifted students for whom biblio/poetry therapy sessions are among cross-curricular support programmes. Table 1 shows the details of this kind of biblio/poetry therapy provided for 3
17 Clara Richardson Lack, ”Can Bibliotherapy Go Public?”, Collection Building, 1985 Spring, 27–32. 18The ’Pécs School’ shares the integrative approach of the creative bibliotherapy programme titled ”Well into words” provided by the Kirklees Council, National Health Service, United Kingdom. https://vimeo.com/70929838
Judit Béres 80 Reading for Life: Bblio/Poetry Therapy with Different Target Groups months (1,5 hours every second week, with one facilitator) in the club of a high school in Pécs.
Table 1. Biblio/poetry therapy for disadvantaged gifted adolescents
Topics discussed Materials Creative tasks Petra Finy: Bemutatkozom [I holding and caring in human János Pilinszky: Hitünk introduce myself] (poem); write 5 relationships, love, patience, values, titkairól (Advent) [Secrets characteristics about how you see Christmas in our family (the group of our religion] (essay) yourself + 5 as Others might see started in Christmas period) you Lotilko szárnyai [The self-confidence, giftedness, emotional read Ágnes Ágai's adolescent wings of Lotilko] (Tunguz resourcefulness, resilience poems, write a similar poem folktale) about yourself Frigyes Karinthy: Találkozás egy write a letter with daydreams, desires, plans, career & fiatalemberrel [Meeting recommendations to the 8-9 years identity with a young man] (short younger yourself story) supportive/destructive relationships Ervin Lázár: A kalapba write sms letters similarly to (family, love, friendships), barriers, zárt lány [The girl closed Dániel Varró’s Szívdesszert coping in a hat] (tale) [Heart dessert] (poem) role models, youth trends, Krisztina Tóth: A lélek write an advertisement about positive/negative self-image, body megatest [The Soul is yourself similar to Virág Erdős’ image Megabody] (short story) Hazudós mese [Liar tale] (poem) Sándor Márai: Füves könyv – A boldogságról [Herbarium (About happiness)]; Sándor Weöres: A teljesség felé happiness, successful life, self- final evaluation with association (A forrás – criticism, inner resources Dixit Cards Szembefordított tükrök) [Toward completeness (The source – Mirrors facing each other)] (philosophy)
This table gives a much clearer picture of what we do and how it works. In Hungary we started bibliotherapy programs in three types of secondary schools (vocational school, technical college, grammar school for gifted children), with implications for the reduction of socio-emotional risks and distress of disadvantaged students.19 In this work particular attention is given to how bibliotherapy can facilitate readers to find solutions to personal problems, develop life skills and enhanced self-image. Bibliotherapy helps these students to learn new strategies for dealing with their social and emotional issues, and supports their empowerment, that is to break out of disadvantages and work out opportunities based on their understanding. Whilst working together in a bibliotherapy group, students learn about themselves and understand that they are not alone, but others have been sharing – and had
19See more details in Judit Béres, Ildikó Sóron, Tünde Tegzes, Borbála Zsidai, „Hátrányos helyzetű középiskolások biblioterápiája” [Bibliotherapy for disadvantaged youth], Könyvtári Figyelő, (2014): 4, 459–480.; Judit Béres, Bibliotherapy and Creative writing.
81 Judit Béres Reading for Life: Bblio/Poetry Therapy with Different Target Groups
shared – the same concerns or problems. This can expose them to new ways of thinking about and seeing the world around them, helps them gain insight by connecting to each other, to a sentence in a poem or song lyrics, or by identifying with a character in a novel or short story with similar issues to overcome. Creative writing played a very important role in this therapeutic work. We usually applied warm-up identity plays from the collections, and used humorous and ironic model texts from Hungarian poets, asking students to write similar, strong messages about themselves. This helped them to understand motivations, express feelings, externalise selfhood, reduce loneliness, frustration, and distress.20 Opportunities are usually numerous in all settings we apply biblio/poetry therapy. My second example is about libraries as traditional institutions related to the service of people, reading and books offer also numerous opportunities for general biblio/poetry groups aiming at healthy population and at people living with mild and moderate mental health and wellbeing issues. The biggest part of these groups are organised for the general support of people from various gender and age groups. There are also special, thematic groups that focus on special questions or turning points in everyday life situations (e.g. unemployment, problems in intimate partnerships and other relationships /between husband-wife, parent- child, siblings, different generations/. Thematic groups are available for vulnerable people or for those who deal with identity issues and new developmental tasks (women, young mothers and fathers, elderly, professionals in career change, immigrants). Other thematic groups focus on the support of clients with primary bonding and loss issues (e.g. divorce, bereavement, parents-to-be, parents with little children, and parents who have to let go their young adult children). Table 2 gives insight into the work of a 14-month-long (2 hours once per month in a quiet room of the county library, with one facilitator) biblio/poetry process supporting 10 adult women from different age groups (from 23 to 63), all of them facing normative life-crises and emotional wellbeing issues.
Table 2. Bibliotherapy for adult women with normative life-crises
Topics discussed Materials Creative tasks
current mood and life situations, Virág Erdős: Ma [Today] - challenges, expectations (poem) female/male role models, Lyudmila Ulitskaya: (home work) creative writing marriage/partnership crises, self- Szonyecska [Sonechka] about the therapeutic situation esteem, daydreams and desires (novel) (diary, poem, free style text) attachment, separation, loss, Eszter Szakács: Saudade; (home work) reflective writing: reflectivity, self-reflection, self- Anna T. Szabó: Elhagy the woman in the mirror who I esteem, self-confidence, primary and [She leaves me] (poems) am... secondary bondings female identity, construction of Tibor Noé Kiss: entry with association cards (Bear femininity, trans identity, sexuality, Inkognitó [Incognito] Cards); (home work) reflective body (transvestite novel) writing: my body, my femininity
Krisztina Tóth: A lélek role models, female identity, (home work) expressive writing: megatest [The Soul is femininity, self-esteem, body image milestones of my personal growth Megabody] (short story)
20 See more details in Judit Béres, Bibliotherapy and Creative writing.
Judit Béres 82 Reading for Life: Bblio/Poetry Therapy with Different Target Groups
Anna T. Szabó: Senki creativity, independence, freedom, madara [Bird of Noboby] - love, loss (short novel) abusive relationships, domestic Noémi Kiss: Sovány violence, infertility, sexual angyalok [Thin Angels] - dependence (novel) Tímea Turi: A dolgok, amikről nem beszélünk taboos, secrets, insight, trust, sharing entry with association cards [Things we never talk about] (poem) Lyudmila Ulitskaya: Médea és gyermekei women roles, touchstone members [Medea and her children] of the family, conscious and - (novel); Életművésznők unconscious, trauma [Women's Lies] (short stories) Jeanette Winterson: Miért lennél boldog, ha lehetsz reading, writing and identity work, send your favorite tale to group normális? [Why be happy mother-daughter relationship, members, guess choice when you could be mothernity, lesbian identity motivations normal] (lesbian, autobiographic novel) János Szentmártoni: Befejezhetetlen vers önmagunk állásáról creative writing: finish the poem self-assessment, personal growth, [Unterminable poem with self-reflection, share with further developmental tasks about ourselves]; Szilárd others Borbély: Ha menni kell [If it’s time to go] (poems)
This group focused on the multiple experience of female identity and personal growth, supporting participants’ coping skills when facing normative life-crises. The group worked for female empowerment (connected to feminist psychotherapy), improving women’s positive self-evaluation and resilience, helping them achieving a sense of intimacy and generativity. The group offered a lifelong perspective in character as three different generations were present supporting each other, creating a flourishing context for interpersonal learning, understanding and acceptance.21 In May 2017 a similar, but a bit longer (15-month-long, 2 hours per month) biblio/poetry therapy group for women has been started in Pécs, held in a nice community setting with garden (not in library), facilitated by two bibliotherapists in cotherapy. In this new group we try to a de more person-centred, and emphasize the benefits of poetic methods applied in identity work (e.g. poetry writing, letter writing, journal writing, tale writing). The biggest part of our sessions is based on group members’ personal writings prepared during the sessions or after sessions, at home. Receptive bibliotherapy (when we read already existing texts from poets and writers) is quite rarely applied, if yes, we use just small part units that may trigger self-reflection. Tools from fine art therapy and tale therapy (Metamorphoses) are also involved in this work. Since 2012 three other types of biblio/poetry group for women has been started in Pécs, one for elderly women at the open university for seniors held at the University of Pécs, another one
21See more details in Judit Béres, Bibliotherapy for Women from a Lifelong Learning Perspective, in Some Issues in Pedagogy and Methodology, eds. Judit Torgyik, János T. Karlowitz (Komárno: International Research Institute, 2016) 111-120.
83 Judit Béres Reading for Life: Bblio/Poetry Therapy with Different Target Groups
held in a crisis intervention care home for abused mothers with little children, and the third one started in a local prison.22 Concluding, it is worth mentioning some of the main benefits of biblio/poetry therapy. The group facilitator usually asks participants to fill out a final feedback questionnaire which helps participants’ reflection on the most important factors of their therapeutic experience. According to participants’ opinion: 1. Participants appreciated the ‘sense of universality,’ they felt they are not alone suffering from the certain problems. With the help of the (self)reflections given to each other, to the texts and the facilitator they learnt how others see their personality and behaviour, how they solve similar problems, that helped to gain new perspectives and insights. 2. The group supported the inter/intragenerational communication, helped participants to understand others’ way of thinking, motivations and reasons behind their communication and behaviour. 3. The group fostered self-reflection, the deeper understanding of experiences and personality (weaknesses, strengths) showing further developmental tasks. 4. Facilitators, group members and the self-reflective work sparked by personal writings and other theme-appropriate texts created a warm, positive and supportive emotional atmosphere, which was important experience, mostly for those who are lacking this basic ’holding’ in their everyday relationships. This atmosphere empowered participants to be more active and autonomous agents of their own life. 5. Deep encounters with each other, the facilitators and the textual materials evolve a rich net of interpersonal and intrapsychic processes such as becoming capable to perceive, express and understand one’s emotions and ideas, capability to identify and share personal contents, practice of giving and getting support and feedback, accept and tolerate others’ values. 6. It was a great experience to discover the healing power of (self)reflective writing, finding inner creative resources.
As outlined previously, the biblio/poetry therapy model and the group programmes introduced here effectively use reflective, personal reading and writing as a life support system, offering great opportunities for people’s mental health and wellbeing support, that result a number of positive emotional and cognitive changes, empowering clients through their whole life-span.
References
Béres, J., Csorba-Simon, E. ”Biblioterápia nőknek” [Bibliotherapy for Women], Könyvtári Figyelő 61, (2015): 2, 178-195. Béres, J., Sóron, I., Tegzes, T., Zsidai, B. ”Hátrányos helyzetű középiskolások biblioterápiája” [Bibliotherapy for disadvantaged youth], Könyvtári Figyelő, (2014): 4, 459– 480. Béres, J., Zoboki, R. Biblioterápia időseknek a pécsi Szenior Akadémián [Bibliotherapy for elderly at the Senior Academy of Pécs] in IX. Képzés és Gyakorlat Nemzetközi
22 See more details in Judit Béres, Bibliotherapy for Women; Judit Béres, Eszter Csorba-Simon, ”Biblioterápia nőknek” [Bibliotherapy for Women], Könyvtári Figyelő 61, (2015): 2, 178-195.; Judit Béres, Rita Zoboki, Biblioterápia időseknek a pécsi Szenior Akadémián [Bibliotherapy for elderly at the Senior Academy of Pécs] in IX. Képzés és Gyakorlat Nemzetközi Neveléstudományi Konferencia. Tanulmánykötet, ed. Bernadette Nagyházi, (Kaposvár: University of Kaposvár, Faculty of Education, 2015) 86-92.
Judit Béres 84 Reading for Life: Bblio/Poetry Therapy with Different Target Groups
Neveléstudományi Konferencia. Tanulmánykötet, ed. Bernadette Nagyházi, 86-92. Kaposvár: University of Kaposvár, Faculty of Education, 2015. Béres, Judit. “Azért olvasok, hogy éljek” Az olvasásnépszerűsítéstől az irodalomterápiáig [“I read for my life” From reading promotion to biblio/poetry therapy]. Pécs: Kronosz, 2017. _____. “Bibliotherapy and Creative Writing”, in Horizontok II. A pedagógusképzés reformjának folytatása, ed. Ferenc Arató. Pécs: PTE BTK Neveléstudományi Intézet, 2015. _____. ”Bibliotherapy for Women from a Lifelong Learning Perspective”, in Some Issues in Pedagogy and Methodology, eds. Judit Torgyik, János T. Karlowitz, 111-120. Komárno: International Research Institute, 2016. _____. “Person-centered Bibliotherapy.” In Reading for Recovery poster series. ed. Judit H. Ward, J. 38th Annual Conference of the Substance Abuse Librarians & Information Specialists and Association of Mental Health Librarians. Denver, CO, May 5, 2016. Bolton, G. and J. Ihanus. “Conversation about poetry/writing therapy: Two European perspectives.” Journal of Poetry Therapy 24 (2011): 3. 167-186. Cohen, Laura G. ”Reading as a Group Process Phenomenon. A Theoretical Framework for Bibliotherapy.” Journal of Poetry Therapy 3 (1989): 2, 73-83. Dali, Keren/ “On Bibliotherapy”, Reader’s Advisory News, August 2014. https://www.ebscohost.com/novelist/novelist-special/on-bibliotherapy (accessed April 29, 2016) Duffy, J. and J. Haslam, L. Holl, J. Walker. Bibliotherapy Toolkit. Huddersfield: Kirklees Council – NHS, 2012. Hynes, A. M. “Some Observations on Process in Biblio/poetry Therapy“, The Arts in Psychotherapy 8 (1981): 237-241. Lack, Clara Richardson. “Can Bibliotherapy Go Public?” Collection Building, 1985 Spring, 27– 32. Manguel, Alberto. A History of Reading. New York: Penguin Books, 1997. Mazza, Nicholas. Poetry Therapy: Theory and practice. New York: Brunner-Routledge, 2003. Norcross, J. C. et al. Self-Help That Works. Resources to Improve Mental Health and Strenghten Relationships. 4th ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 2013. Pennebaker, J. W. and J. F. Evans. Expressive Writing: Words that Heal. New York: Idyll Arbor, 2014. Walker, Julie. Does Bibliotherapy Work? Posted on 17 December 2014. http://www.cilip.org.uk/blog/does-bibliotherapy-work. Winterson, Jeanette. Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? Toronto: Vintage Canada, 2012. Wright, J. and G. Bolton. Reflective Writing in Counselling and Psychotherapy. London: SAGE Publications, 2012.
The Role of Fairy Tales in the Self-Realization Process
Daniela Sorea
Department of Social Sciences and Communication Transilvania University of Brașov, Romania
Introduction
In Romanian, the expression “fairy tales” is depreciative and indicates the lack of trust in the statements to which it refers. Using the expression with this meaning correctly signals the status of the fairy tale in the European culture and, by extension, in the Western culture. The phrase and its use sanction to logic of the fantastic employed by fairy tales and this logic is different from the one characteristic of common knowledge or scientific knowledge, both of which are acknowledged by the Western cultural space. In this context, fairy tales are viewed as meaningless. I believe that such an approach is reductionist and that ignoring the knowledge circulated via fairy tales is detrimental to Westerners. This paper proposes the re-evaluation of fairy tales by interpreting them from the perspective of analytical psychology. It also highlights the archetypal references of some of the main themes found in European fairy tales, their educational usefulness in this context, as well as their usefulness in managing the relations within the European community. This paper employs the analysis made by Marie-Louise von Franz to some fairy tales collected in Europe. Based on her analysis, I identified, presented and sketched the analysis of some Romanian fairy tales which correspond thematically to those she had focused on. This comparative approach has a two-fold aim: it consolidates the understanding of fairy tales as relevant from an archetypal perspective (since archetypes are generally human), and simultaneously, underlines the local differences of the archetypal contents as significant.
Individuation and archetypes in abyssal psychology
Based on Freud’s ideas, Jung develops analytical or abyssal psychology. He was both the most loved and the most hated and despised disciple of Freud, forging with the latter a relationship that renders itself to a psychological analysis. Theoretically and consciously the clash between the two is owed to Jung’s refusal to acknowledge the exclusively sexual character of the libido - the energy of the psyche. The concept of individuation is the key to C. G. Jung’s abyssal psychology. Individuation is a process by which the psyche refocuses from its conscious dimension, namely the Ego, onto the Self, that is on the whole psyche made of the conscious and unconscious. It is about refocusing since Jung believes that the Ego begins the differentiation process from the Self, that initially is its intrinsic component, ever since childhood. Thus, the mature Ego returns to its Self with all the essential experiences of an individuation process. The latter is perceived by the various cultures and
Daniela Sorea 86 The Role of Fairy Tales in the Self-Realization Process religions as integration/identification with the Universe.1 The process itself as potentiality is of instinctual origin. All people are “tailored” to follow an individuation process, but not everybody yields to the instinctual calling, especially the one manifest in the second part of the individuation process and which follows the Ego consolidation through education, career, social status, family building. This second stage consists in a dramatic confrontation2 between individuals and archetypes. Archetypes are general human schematic models to tackle the challenges of existence. They are not ready made recipes that can be applied just any time. On the contrary, they are blueprints whose contents are culturally conditioned.3 Archetypes populate the collective unconscious, namely the common to all human beings and in-depth layer of the psyche. The collective unconscious stores a lot of archetypes that activate (in a challenging manner for the individual) when life instances that correspond to them emerge. The main archetypes a person can be confronted with in the second stage of the individuation process are in the following order: the shadow, persona, anima/animus, the Self. The shadow is the archetype of every individual’s dark side of the psyche. It corresponds to the content of the personal unconscious described by Freud. Such content is located in the unconscious since consciously managing it is unpleasant and requires a lot of psychic energy. Persona is the archetype of the desirable interface, the mask that people instinctively feel the need to wear in order to agree with their community of origin It is the archetype associated with socialization- considered in the sociology of knowledge as a process of internalizing social experiences.4 .Anima and animus are counter-sexual archetypes. As previously mentioned, the Self is the archetype of the whole.5 One of its many forms under which the latter is to be found in the West is the archetype of God. Jung believes that fairy tales circulate archetypal content.6 They are the result of the endeavor of translating into symbolic images some individuation oriented unconscious processes. Moreover, they reflect elementary and fundamental psychic universal structures. Marie-Louise von Franz is a researcher from Jung’s school of thought and his collaborator. She analytically approached fairy tales and hence, most of the arguments to follow are based on her results presented in her work.
What are fairy tales?
Fairy tales are takeovers of some individual numinous experiences in the collective consciousness.7 From this perspective, they reflect the contents of the collective unconscious in consciousness and are not mere tales of some individuation based experiences. However, not all experiences of this kind become fairy tales. To become so they need to meet some psychic needs of communities. Fairy tales set, amplify, potentiate and relay significant information related to some archetypal psychic dispositions analogous to those of the individuals having had numinous experiences.8 The deep emotional intensity
1 Carl Gustav Jung, Gesammelte Werke, 8 (Düsseldorf: Walter-Verlag, 1995) 2 Michael Palmer, Freud and Jung on Religion (London: Routledge, 1997). 3 Anthony Stevens, On Jung (London: Routledge, 1990). 4 Ioana Anisa Atudorei, Emoțiile morale în contextul crizei din România [Moral emotions in the context of the crisis in Romania] (Cluj-Napoca: Presa Universitară Clujeană, 2016). 5 Carl Gustav Jung, Gesammelte Werke, 9/2 (Düsseldorf: Walter-Verlag, 1995). 6 Idem, Gesammelte Werke, 9/1 (Düsseldorf: Walter-Verlag, 1995) 7 Marie-Louise von Franz, L’interprétation des contes de fées (Paris: Dervy-Livres, 1987). 8 Idem, Les modèles archétypiques dans les contes de fées (Paris: Jacqueline Renard, 1999).
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of listeners is the result of the archetypal dimension of fairy tales which resonates with the psychic energy of the unconscious. That is also the reason for which fairy tales are so well remembered. Thus, the emotionally loaded archetypal content of fairy tales can also account for the indignation of listeners (children or adults) when the one who tells the story strays way from the classical text. What is more, the attention paid to the accuracy of the form also unveils the ritual dimension to be found in the tale’s origin.9 According to Franz, in Europe the most complex texts of fairy tales were meant for adults until the 17th century. In the rural environment, the community adults’ practice of listening to fairy tales was preserved until much later. One example in this respect is the Romanian social soirees that are recorded to unfold until the middle of the 20th century. As Franz shows, the association made by contemporary Westerners between children and fairy tales and the inherent simplification incurred by that only shows the little respect they pay to the contents and power of the unconscious.10 Concerning all of the above, I believe that the unrestricted unsupervised access of children to the complex archetypal forms of fairy tales ever since their early childhood can partially explain their unsettling rapid development. As for what fairy tales are, each one of them is associated to an archetypal behavioural type. All fairy tales make an intuitive map of the collective unconscious and its structures and processes.11 Fairy tales provide information on how the compensating function of the unconscious works. As Freud indicated,12 the psyche is oriented towards reducing the consumption of energy, namely diminishing and balancing the psychic tensions. It is exactly within the same framework that Jung refers to the compensating function of the unconscious. The latter compensates attitudes, deeds, conscious options meant to ensure efficient integration as part of the individuation process. Fairy tales signal the archetypal tension areas within the unconscious that are responsible for the compensatory outbursts. They also indicate the psychic status of peoples, nations, cultural areas and hence can be used as predictors. The analytical interpretation of fairy tales allows the recording of the undercurrents of the collective unconscious and a correct anchoring in the reality for which they act as compensators.13 Fairy tales interpretation is similar to the interpretation of dreams (viewed by Freud as the major path to the unconscious). According to Franz, the interpretation of dreams is a sequence of four stages: dividing the narrative in units of meaning (an approach similar to isolating my themes in the structuralist analysis didactically imposed by Claude Levi- Strauss); amplifying outlining of symbols in the order in which they appear in the fairy tale (the amplification refers to highlighting the relation with other cultural artefacts in which the archetypal contents is manifest in a similar/complementary/culturally adapted manner); identifying the contexts in which the symbolic images appear (namely their historical, geographical, ethnic, religious etc. anchoring); the interpretation itself, namely the translation of the fairy tale in psychological language. As the analyst underline, all interpretations are relative.14 They are tributary to the cognitive assimilation threshold employed by the interpreter. Therefore, analytical psychology requires specialists to have comprehensive humanistic training.
9 Ibidem. 10 Marie-Louise von Franz, La femme dans les contes de fées (Paris: Albin Michel, 1993). 11 Idem, L’ombre et le mal dans les contes de fées (Paris: Jacqueline Renard, 1990). 12 Sigmund Freud, Die Traumdeutung (Wien: Franz Deuticke 1950). 13 Franz, L’interprétation. 14 Ibidem.
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Whom is the fairy tale about?
The central characters of fairy tales are heroes. Analytically speaking, the fairy tale hero symbolizes the formative factor of the Ego, namely that part of the Self archetype that is a model and structural foundation for the Ego and which, as such, builds and guarantees the latter’s stability.15 The fairy tale heroes go on initiation trips at the end of which they come back home wise, rich and triumphant. The trip is an individuation process by which the Ego harmonizes with the Self. Fairy tales do not perfectly overlay known, conscious, and desirable representations of self accomplishment. This imperfection is due to the resistance raised by the Ego of the listeners/ readers to refocus on the Self, and hence causes dissatisfaction to the listeners or the readers of the fairy tales. The end of classical fairy tales is not always a happy one. Somebody dies (justly punished even though that person could be somebody close to the hero), is mutilated and destined to live like that, etc. Such endings signal the integrative dimension of the Self (which encompasses both the good and the evil) and, more importantly, the continuous endless character of the individuation process in which new, even subtler stages emerge. The fairy tale heroes are schematic, have no interior substance, and they are not real human persons. The way they are represented unveils their status of archetypal representations. An Elderly Wise Man is always around many fairy tale heroes. He symbolizes the active power of the collective unconscious that configures, arranges and organizes archetypal images. His role is to intelligently guide heroes to adequately use their available resources. The formative factor of the Ego is guided by the unconscious to use its allocated psychic energy. The presence of the Elderly Wise Man in fairy tales has a correspondent in the prestige given to the elderly in the past: the third age was a test of wisdom and quality, a divine blessing and a criterion to gain extremely important positions in social organization.16 The hero is also surrounded and helped by various magic, talking animals. According to Marie-Louise von Franz, there are two categories of animals: real ones and people who are temporarily trapped in an animal’s skin. Real animals symbolize instinctual pulsions in fairy tale. Pseudo- animals represent spiritual pulsions retained in the unconscious since they do not match the dominant vision of the world (and which is consciously assumed) when the fairy tale emerged. The dominant features of the animal species in whose skin a person is entrapped indicate, by similitude, the type of human behaviour corresponding to the psychic content that is retained in the unconscious. For example, the male fox in the Saxon fairy tale The Wehmus Bird (I will get back to this tale a little bit later in the text) hides the spirit of nature under his skin, is clairvoyant and cunning, and acts efficiently when it comes to surviving and overcoming the most unusual trials. Such a spiritual pulsion is pushed by the West into the unconscious and therefore, the refusal to marry her is a mistake and bears consequences on the individuation process. It is actually the case with many fairy tales in which the advice of the magic animals is not taken and thus heroes miss to apply solutions supplied by instincts and unconscious. In fairy tales, heroes interact with various representations of the anima. This aspect is to be detailed further in this text. Moreover, divine children (that is kids who are miraculously born) are present in the fairy tales, as well as marked ones like the brothers with a star on their forehead or children who are made completely out of gold. These are symbols of
15 Marie-Louise von Franz, La délivrance dans les contes de fées (Paris: Jacqueline Renard, 1998). 16 Diana-Cristina Bódi, Persoanele vârstnice. Resursă importantă în familie şi în societate [Older people. An important resource in family and society], (Iaşi: Institutul European. 2017).
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renewal, of the Self that is about to emerge and manifest itself. The surfacing from the unconscious of content that is already assumed by the conscious is uplifting and related to the individuation process. There are also negative characters around heroes and any reference to them thrusts the question on the narrative dimension of the fairy tale in the limelight.
What do fairy tale characters do?
I will present several types of fairy tales by their archetypal contents. This is just for supporting the arguments related to the educational and diagnostic role of fairy tales and hence is not an exhaustive endeavour.
Two people travelling through the world
Some fairy tales provide information on the shadow and the management of assuming it. There are two components of the shadow, as Franz17 highlights: a personal one and a collective one, that is related to the group of origin. Even cultural areas have their own shadows. The shadow of contemporary West is focused on some sort of metaphysical ignorance, the result of a long rationalistic education process. it is responsible for the Westerners’ appetite for wars, nationalist hat, consumerism, programmatic destruction of nature, indicates Franz. Fairy tales operate with the collective dimension of the shadow. Not integrating the personal dimension of this archetype favours its inclusion in the collective dimension. The conflict with the shadow can be overcome but not solved. Ethically speaking, archetypes are neutral at the unconscious level. It is only their activation in the consciousness via representations that polarizes them as good - evil in the Western culture. The correct efficient attitude on behalf of the Ego is to acknowledge the existence of the shadow that accompanies the individuation process. As Franz shows, the issue of the shadow is paradigmatically outlined in the fairy tale by the trip that two persons take around the world and, when they reach the king’s court, one of them tries to destroy the other. Marie-Louise von Franz18 analyzes two tales from the Grimm Brothers’ collection - The Two Travelers and Ferdinand the Faithful and Ferdinand the Unfaithful - from the perspective of the relationship of the Ego with the shadow. Ion Creangă’s tale Harap-Alb19 (Romanian for The White-Negro) is centered on the same issue. The Bald Man is the shadow of the White-Negro. As a fairy tale character, the general features of the hero bear some local traits attributable to the historical experience of the Moldavians with the Tatars. Even the name given by the Bald Man to the hero when making him his slave is representative for the hero’s relation with the shadow and for the local option by which to signal it. The name Harap-Alb (contains a semantic contradiction, since the term Harap is used with the meaning of black man. Such a meaning is the result of a semantic juxtaposition of the terms Arab and Black African used in Wallachia and capturing the reality of a historical context when Arabs would trade slaves (some of which black) from the African territories.
17 Marie-Louise von Franz, La voie de l'individuation dans les contes de fées (Paris: Jacqueline Renard, 1978). Idem, La délivrance. 18 Idem, L’ombre. 19 Ion Creangă, Povești, povestiri, amintiri [Stories, narrations, memories], (Bucharest: Minerva, 1978).
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Beautiful girls, princesses, fairies, witches
Other fairy tales are centred on the relationship of the hero with various aspects of the anima. As Franz shows, the rich manifestations of this archetype in the European fairy tales are due to the need to activate the values of femininity in the unconscious in a compensating manner as a result of a Judeo-Christian culture20. In fairy tales there are princesses kidnapped by dragons and saved by heroes, good and generous fairies guarding the order of the world, and poor and very beautiful girls who make spectacular and hard to ignore promises. The relationships between heroes and them are simple and highlighting. Sometimes, the former benefit from their relations with princesses, who are temporary captive in animal skin, a symbol of spiritual pulsions equivalent to the anima that resides in the unconscious. I will address this kind of relationship later on. Besides these bright, attractive and quite aspects of the anima, the fairy tales also unveil dangerous dimensions of the feminine principle. Sometimes princesses dance and thus charm the onlookers transforming them into stones (similar to Iele - feminine mythical creatures in Romanian mythology). According to Franz,21 dancing is a way by which the Self becomes manifest as a cosmic dance. Marie-Louize von Franz22 comparatively analyzes two fairy tales on the magical and secret dance of the anima: a Danish tale called The Princess with 12 Golden Pairs of Shoes and one from the Grimm Brothers’ collection - The Shoes with Holes in the Soles. The Danish fairy tale is about a princess who dances all night and thus tears twelve golden pairs of shoes (a number similar to the number of night hours - the interval of darkness and secrets). Her companions are a troll, who cast a spell on her and the marriage candidates who had already tried to save her. The hero needs to kill the troll before marrying the princess and his intervention is soteriological. He unveils and brings proof of the princess’s night trips and thus manages to break the spell and bring back to life the forests of the charmed empire by killing the troll. The atmosphere of the tale is bleak; the tensions among characters are spectacular, and emotionally loaded. As Franz shows, the Danish tale unveils a people’s collective psyche that has not developed a culture of the anima. The weak representation of the feminine is due to the direct overlay of Christianity with the beliefs in the spirits of the Danish areas. The psychic energies of the North European peoples are channelled on trolls - personifications of the amazing powers of the mountains, forests, torrents that are in the middle of a primitive religious experience. The trolls’ powers lead to possessions and those who are spiritually possesses are dehumanized. By lowering and including ideals into the material world, the dialectic materialism managed to impose such an empire of trolls, suggests Franz. The princess is the archetype of the anima in its nubile dimension that steps into the depths of the unconscious. In the fairy tale there is a ladder to the lower parts of the Earth where the troll rules. The latter’s presence indicates that the conscious and unconscious used to be related. Nonetheless, their relationship has been compromised by the early adoption of Christianity in Northern Europe, believes Franz. The other fairy tale analyzed by Marie-Louise von Franz, The Shoes with Holes in the Soles is pretty similar to Ispirescu’s tale The Twelve Emperor’s Daughters and their Charmed Palace23.
20 Franz, La femme. 21 Idem, Les modèles. 22 Ibidem. 23 Petre Ispirescu, Legendele sau basmenle românilor [Legends or Fairy Tales of Romanians] (Bucharest: Editura pentru Literatură, 1968).
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Contrary to the version of the Danish tale, the princesses in these fairy tales are the ones who are willing to dance and their performance bewitches their pretenders in the ball room of the palace. The twelve princesses symbolically exhaust the nubile stages of the anima. The hero’s intervention is not a saving act by itself since they are not in suffering. By unveiling the secret of their nocturnal trip the hero manages to naturally assign them with normal dance partners and thus resets that natural order of the world. These fairy tales reveal a much better relationship between the conscious psyche and the feminine principle compared to the Danish one. This good relationship with the feminine principle has a correspondent in the rituals that the nubile girls in the Romanian villages still perform in order to rush their marriage. Traditionally, marriage and birth of children while the woman is young are considered natural and good practices in rural areas.24 There are also evil fairies who willingly trouble the good course of the world. There are also witches even more evil than the princesses who bewitch through their dance. The witch in the fairy tale symbolizes the terrifying dimension of the Great Mother archetype. Christianity pushed this archetype into the unconscious by valuing it in a unilateral and positive manner in the representations of the Virgin Mary. It is thus the fairy tales that compensate for ignoring this dimension. The gypsy woman (sometimes accompanied by her mother who is good at enchantments) sneaks in the bedroom of rich man in order to work her evil intentions and thus symbolizes another dark aspect of the anima. In Ispirescu’s tale Înşir-te mărgăritari (Romanian for Pearls, Thread Yourselves) the gypsy servant buries the new born golden babies of her mistress in manure and replaces them with two puppies. Thus, she takes over the role of wife and kids’ mother. As such she subjects the children to a number of individuation processes that clearly hint at alchemist transformations (into golden apple trees, blades of basil, pieces of the golden wool lamb of the master, two children playing with golden apples). In the end, the gypsy’s deceit is unveiled and she is punished to be torn to pieces that are scattered around the world. The negative and yet catalyzing aspect of the anima is no longer in a projection state and its energy is redistributed. The dragon from fairy tales whom the hero needs to dare signifies, as Franz25 shows, the maternal instinct that lies undifferentiated in the unconscious. The emergence of the individual consciousness involves getting away from the mother, that is killing the dragon. Returning to the issue of the anima captive in an animal’s skin, Marie-Louise von Franz (2016) analyzes a fairy tale called The Cat which was collected in Romania.26 This is included in the collection Die Märchen der Weltliteratur, chapter Zigeuner Märchen. Von Franz does not explicitly indicate the Roma origin of the fairy tale. On the contrary, in her analysis she refers to the historical and cultural roots of the Romanian peasants to whom she attributes its circulation. The latter, the authors states, are under the influence of the Habsburg Empire and hence their fairy tales refer to emperors and not kings. Considering the impressive pagan component of the gypsy culture and as a result of her attribution of this fairy tale to the Romanian peasants, Marie-Louise von Franz fails to explore the special relation that the Roma people have with Virgin Mary, and hence the border line that defines it. Thus, if the text would be attributed to gypsies, and not Romanians, whose majority is made of Orthodox worshippers or Greek Catholic in
24 Mariana Borcoman, “The significance of Saint Andrew´s day in Romanian Folklore,” in microCad 2008, International Scientific Conference March 20-21 2008, ed. László Lehoczky (Miskolc: University of Miskolc, 2008), 13-17. 25 Franz, La voie. 26 Idem, The Cat: A Tale of Feminine Redemption (Toronto: Inner City Books, 2001).
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Transylvania, the references made to Virgin Mary could be analyzed from a different perspective. What is more, even the theme of the cat woman would be easier to relate to the gypsy folklore, considering the latter’s Oriental roots. In this respect, it is worth reminding that sometimes Romanians pejoratively call the Roma people “pharaohs.” All these observations only contribute to a more refined analysis of fairy tale about men and their erotic and potent anima and become relevant in terms of the relationship between fairy tales and the psychological configuration of peoples. According to Marie-Louise von Franz, fairy tales compensate for the dominant psychological attitude to be found with the collective consciousness of a people. Their analysis unveils the layers of the collective unconscious, namely activated archetypes, their prevalent dimensions, the relationship among these and, additionally, the factors in the peoples’ psyche that need to acquire balance through fairy tales. The tale named The Cat is about a princess cursed by Virgin Mary while still unborn to transform into a cat when she turns 17. The curse is triggered by the offense brought by princess’ mother, who could not have any children, to Virgin Mary. Thus, while travelling at sea, the empress steals (actually her servants steal) a golden apple from Virgin Mary’s garden. When biting into the apple, she learns that she is six months pregnant. However, her child is not a divine one but a cursed one. The princess grows up into a beautiful and normal girl. When she turns 17, during a family meal, she and her servants turn into cats and leave to the forest. It is a peaceful, non-dramatic departure. The prince who saves her comes from an empire ruled by a widow drunkard emperor. He is the youngest boy of the three the emperor has and meets the cat in her castle in the forest and falls in love. The prince undergoes a number of initiatic trials like physical suffering, nakedness and confronts his father in armed conflict. In the end, the cat, his wife by now, convinces him to cut off her tail and then her head in order to undo the curse and help her regain her human aspect. This is a fairy tale about the wisdom of anima that helps man evolve and discover it. Moreover, it outlines men’s need for the feminine as inspiration, support and facilitator in accomplishing their highest goals. Last but not the least, the tale shows that the feminine easily cooperates with the masculine when it is acknowledged and (at archetypal level) appreciated as such. The cat princess from the fairy tale collected in Romania symbolizes the potentiality of the anima which, when correctly acknowledged and approached can become an ally of men helping them to develop spiritually.
Temporary captivities in an animal's skin
The fairy tales in which the hero and the heroine, in animal skins, are in love (or establish an erotic relation) are therapeutic, according to Marie-Louise von Franz.27 As she shows, these texts supply recipes by which psychic disorders can be overcome. According to popular beliefs, the neuroses and psychoses are consequences of spells and curses. The dramatic emergence from under the skin of an animal signifies the intensely emotional confrontation of consciousness with the unconscious contents that generate the psychological disorder. Psychic issues that facilitate the access to highly emotional unconscious contents are useful for the individuation process. Their efficient management hurries the end of the latter. Human characters are transformed into animals as a result of spells or curses and their freedom lies at the end of a number of trials and adventures, which analytically speaking, equates their healing.
27 Franz, La délivrance.
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Fairy tales present extricating instinctive processes that unfold in the human psyche. The liberation process is individual but it overlays the representations of typical healing processes associated with certain diseases that are manifest in the collective unconscious. Skin burning (symbolizing the confrontation between consciousness and the unconscious content that triggers psychic distress) proves a liberating solution only when it is preceded by efforts that are perceived as embarrassing. Premature burning prolongs the spell or the curse. In the absence of perseverance and consented effort, diseases take new forms and the infantilism of conscious attitudes runs into the risk of recreating the neurotic situation. Marie-Louise von Franz analyzes as an example of a therapeutic fairy tale a Russian one: The Frog, the Czar’s Daughter, and an Italian tale: The Pig Prince. In the Russian story the prince marries to a frog that proves her household related skills and, what is more, performs a number of miracles in front of their wedding guests ending by temporarily abandoning her frog skin and thus unveiling her human face of great beauty. The prince burns his wife’s skin but the latter becomes a prisoner in a palace located at the far end of the world. What the husband needs to do is to find the palace and free her. In the Italian fairy tale one of the fairies predicting people’s destiny casts a spell on the prince to live in a pig’s skin. When he marries, his first two brides, daughters of a poor perfume maker successively think of killing the groom during the night of the wedding. However, they do not manage to do that and are punished. The third bride, the youngest sister of the two accepts to live with her pig husband who, at night, took human form. After a while the prince’s parents come to visit them, find the prince’s skin, burn it and thus break the spell. A similar fairy tale of Ion Creangă, The Story of the Pig,28 can be considered a combination of the therapeutic liberating ways.29 In this story, the ill advised wife burns the skin before the time for doing that and thus needs to go on the liberating trip. However, Creanga’s story is about a double liberation. The archetypal fairy tale scenario refers to the constructive meeting between an individual’s anima and the animus of his partner. Creangă’s story therapeutically approaches one stage from a two-fold individuation process.
The magic healing song
Some fairy tales are focused on the blockages to the Self that appear during the individuation process. These are similar to those in which the king is sick and the hero needs to find a cure for him. The similarity between these texts and the theme focused on the search of the Grail is obvious. The king symbolizes the dominant representation (accepted at conscious level) of divinity in the cultural area where the fairy tale originated. The king’s disease shows that such a representation fails to meet the psychic needs of the individuals from that specific cultural area and from that particular age when the fairy tale is dated. In many tales of this kind, the king feels better if a magic bird sings for him and such a song signifies the healing emergence at conscious level of some messages from the unconscious. Von Franz30 analyzes a Transylvanian Saxon fairy tale of this type called the The Wehmus Bird. “Wehmus” is a phonetic alteration of the word “Phoenix.” The story is about a sick
28 Creangă, Povești. 29 Daniela Sorea, “Complexitatea individuatoarea a vieţii de cuplu.” [The individuation complexity of the couple's life], in Familia creştină. Fundamente antropologice, iubire şi sexualitate în celibate şi căsătorie [The Christian Family. Anthropological foundations, love and sexuality in celibacy and marriage], eds. Alexandru Buzalic and Călin Ioan Duşe (Cluj-Napoca: Presa Universitară Clujeană, 2016), 249-66. 30 Franz, La voie.
Daniela Sorea 94 The Role of Fairy Tales in the Self-Realization Process pastor whose pains calm down when a bird sings to him. From the latter’s beak pour down pearls. His sons leave to search for this bird that only spent little time with the sick man. While travelling, the elder sons refuse to share their food with a male fox and without the latter’s advice they fail in their search. The youngest son does share his food with the fox and with his help he borrows the bird from the emperor, marries to his youngest daughter and enables the transformation of the fox (who was actually a bewitched prince) into a human being. The pastor’s sickness suggests the problems created by the unilateral development of consciousness of middle aged men. An intellectual rationalistic attitude suffocates emotions and spontaneity, reducing the appetite for life. The fairy tale suggests the solution to such a disease by invigoratingly reiterating some vital experiences. The presence of the pastor signals the religious dimension of the blockage within the individuation process. In this respect, Ispirescu’s The Magic Bird,31 is structured pretty similarly to the one analyzed by Franz. Instead of a sick shepherd, Ispirescu’s story is about a God fearing emperor. He was trying to build a monastery but it kept collapsing. The motive of the collapsing monastery corresponds in the Romanian folklore to the ballad of Manole, the Craftsman and exemplifies the local particularization of archetypal motives. The emperor’s sons leave one by one to look for the magic bird that lives in far away land in order to place it in the tower of the monastery and thus enforce the construction. The youngest of them offers the fox food and drink, manages to break the spell cast on the latter and thus acquires a wise and loyal companion for his trip. On the way back home his brothers cut off his feet, take the bird and the girl saved from the dragons’ palaces and present themselves to the emperor. The youngest brother reaches back home much later. He is helped by the fox to regain his health and asks for justice. He marries to the saved girl and takes his father’s place on the throne. The bird who had been sitting mute in the tower starts singing only when the youngest son comes back home, that is just for the one who had the merit of having truly acquired her. Even Ispirescu’s tale suggests a religious blockage by characterizing the emperor as God fearing, as well as via the nature of the building that needs reinforcement. A muted bird signals the formal dimension of the religious and is but a form without content. However, the tale suggests that forms require struggle to be filled with content.
The two couples
Other fairy tales are centered on quaternary activating the Self archetype. According to Jung,32 one of the symbolic representations of the archetype of the whole is quaternity. This is a balanced relation among four elements built on the ancestrally significant structure of the cross. It is the scheme by which order is achieved without fail, a system of coordinates instinctively used to divide the land, the year, traditional communities, moon phases or temperaments. The idea of quaternity in fairy tales is frequently related to the establishment of two couples: a profane one and a magic one. Children (in pairs - a brother and a sister) marked with a star on their forehead make along with their parents (and as with any patriarchal society the mother needs to first undergo a series of persecutions) a quaternity. Up until the moment this quaternity is whole (namely at the end of the fairy tale when equilibrium is reached) one of the brothers, and usually it is the sister, assumes the role of savour. Thus, the feminine principle, which in the European culture is more closely related to the shadow and the evil than the masculine principle, can, for exactly this reason,
31 Ispirescu, Legendele. 32 Jung, G.W, 9/2.
95 Daniela Sorea The Role of Fairy Tales in the Self-Realization Process
reconcile the divine with the humane, the spiritual with the terrestrial, the good with the evil, as Franz indicates.33 The fairy tale analyzed by Marie-Louise von Franz34 about the quaternary activation of the Self is a Spanish one. Its name is The White Parrot. The story joins a lot of themes anchored in archetypes: a woman gives birth to some extraordinary children in the absence of her husband; the parrot, who is considered as the holder of the truth and knowledgeable about future; the spring with silver water and the oak tree with silver and golden fruits - all of which signals the alchemic origin; the old witch; the placement of the unwanted children in a basket and their abandon into the waters of the river. The interpretation proposed by Franz is a complex one and values all these different themes in a differentiated manner. As the analyst shows, from the perspective of Self activation, the children with a star on their forehead seem to favour the shaping of a quaternity where symbols of wholeness are present: the parents, the old fisherman and his wife and finally, the parents again in the presence of the parrot. The latter’s presence is a sign of stability of the quaternary structure. The parrot, the fifth element, the quintessence, is in this case a representation of the spirit of knowledge. Ispirescu’s fairy tale Pearls, Thread Yourselves, already approached from the perspective of the dark dimensions of the anima, is focused on the quaternary activity of the Self. However, the Romanian tale does not have several characters like the administrator who is in love with the master’s wife, and the witch. These roles are both attributed to the gypsy who causes the metamorphosis of the children. Initially stifled by the warm and germinating manure they rise as golden apple trees and undergo all the traumatic transformations characteristic of the vegetal world. Then, they are subjected to the trials of the animal register and only after they are cut to be served as food they regain their human form. The innovative spiritual pulsions initially manifest themselves at pre-human level and then become operational through awareness. The emergence of an authentic quaternary representation is the result of exposing the gipsy who, as wife of the master, is sitting next to him and his children - a boy and a girl- in a very active pseudo-quaternity. The Story of the Pig can be considered a fairy tale centred on the activation of the Self as well. It is more complex than the therapeutic tales like The Frog, the Czar’s Daughter and The Pig Prince with which is thematically close. In the case of the Romanian fairy tale the initiation is a two-fold one and overlays the confrontation between consciousness and the unsettling content of the unconscious. The result of these trials is also related to quaternity: the latter consisting of Him - Her- Animus- Anima is formed at the end of the initiation processes of the hero and his wife through the withdrawal of the animus and anima projection. This is also a fairy tale that provides suggestions as to the individuation process incurred by a couple’s relation.35 Is a type of relationship that Westerners can benefit from: in the couple identity work, femininity and masculinity, although socially constructed as opposite gender identities, could change places or melt into one another in a continuous process, transgressing differences and being united by partners’ orientation towards domesticity and intimacy, Rezeanu36 highlights.
33 Franz, La voie. 34 Ibidem. 35 Daniela Sorea, “Complexitatea”, 249-66. 36 Cătălina- Ioana Rezeanu, “The relationship between domestic space and gender identity: Some signs of emergence of alternative domestic femininity and masculinity,” Journal of Comparative Research in Anthropology and Sociology 6 (2) (2015): 9-29.
Daniela Sorea 96 The Role of Fairy Tales in the Self-Realization Process
The marriage between the emperor’s daughter and the pig son of the poor old man takes place in a land that lies beyond the borders of the known world. The couple undergoes a double conversion. The pig proves to be Prince Charming, while the slightly imprudent princess becomes a poor woman undergoing a lot of sorrows; it is only in this moment that the couple can manifest itself in a creative manner. The unfolding of the individuation process is marked by a quaternity based, balanced structuring of couple relations. The motive of the double marriage also belongs to quaternity. However, when analyzing the Transylvanian fairy tale, The Wehmus Bird, Franz considers it rarely employed. The same motive is to be also found in Ispirescu’s story The Magic Bird where the male fox who had been married before the spell was cast on him returns home when the hero marries to the girl he saves from the dragons’ palaces.
The educational role of fairy tales
The enumeration of the types of fairy tales is not exhaustive, and fairy tales operate with groups of archetypal motives. The same story fits from a typological perspective many categories. Such an example already provided in this paper is The Story of the Pig. Nonetheless, different archetypal motives shape individuation processes in the case of all fairy tales. From an educational perspective, fairy tales unveil their usefulness at least from two perspectives. The hero who undergoes an initiation process returns home victorious, with a thorough knowledge of how the world works, represents an attractive model. The educational approach can explicitly value the heroic dimension of successful schooling. The heroic dimension is enhanced by the use of information technology, which involves “interaction techniques, search reformulation, relevance judgement,” as Repanovici points out.37 From another perspective, fairy tales are useful as models/suggestions as to how life situations with archetypal resonance can be managed. An adequate luggage of known (available) fairy tales helps individuals find, recognize and trust when in need the efficient archetypal solution. This is not about explicitly looking for solutions to crisis situations in the fairy tale volumes from libraries, but about identifying a known archetypal context from the fairy tale with which the psyche of an individual resonates. Acknowledging an archetypal context, assuming that it involves opening channels to the depth of the psyche, is similar to the diagnosis that the leader of the călușari from Oltenia makes based on the melodic line with which the patient resonates.38 The two-fold usefulness of fairy tales already described above highlights the importance of accessing them in a differentiated manner by age and progressively by their content. Fairy tales are not mere stories to put children asleep. Whether told or read when wide awake or already asleep they manage to connect listeners’ psyche to the archetypal reservoir from the collective unconscious. I believe that the traditional choice of the moment when the lesson of the fairy tale is to be conveyed is not at random and proves a thorough knowledge of the psychic works. However, fairy tales do not have the role of putting children at sleep. On the
37 Angela Repanovici, “Information Technology Implication in Student Behaviour for Information Literacy Skills,” in Education and New Educational Technologies. Proceedings of the 4th WSEAS/IASME International Conference on Educational Technologies (EDUTE'08). Book Series: Recent Advances in Computer Engineering, ed. Nikos E. Mastorakis et al. (WSEAS Press, 2008): 81. 38 Gail Kligman, Calus. Symbolic Transfomation in Romanian Ritual (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981).
97 Daniela Sorea The Role of Fairy Tales in the Self-Realization Process
contrary, I would argue. Exposure to models is one of the forms that social learning process, which has effects on the formation of attitudes and opinions of social actors, can take. Modeling is exercised, in the first instance, by the family of origin, one of the most important and constant sources of social influence, Gotea says.39 The social role undergoes changes according to the context (characterized by affectivity or affective neutrality - from Parsons) in which it is exercised.40 Fairy tales fulfil their educational role if they reach the consciousness of individuals by successive and increasingly complex reiterations and starting since childhood. These reiterations outline different dimensions of the archetypal content that can be accessed gradually while growing and being confronted with specific life related situations. The ability of (good) books to seduce readers and to clarify their point of view about life41 is related to the archetypal content they convey. Fairy tales do this in the easiest way.
The European role of fairy tales
As local particularizations of some general human contents (namely archetypes), fairy tales supply the analyst with information on the psychic status of the population from the area where they are collected and age they are dated. This information is useful in the context of globalization of education, which requires cultural sensitivity, the ability to manage differences in customs, values, and traditions from different countries.42 It is not only useful in an educational context. The differences between the Danish story and the Romanian one concerning the dance of the anima indicate different manners of establishing relations with the anima in the case of Romanians and Danish people. It is the difference between the princess who is bewitched by the troll and hence under his power (a tell tale sign of how women from the North are like: rather trolls or fairies than human beings who can establish normal human relations, as Franz43 shows and, on the other hand, the twelve dancing princesses who do not really want to be saved and who cast their spells through their dance. It is the difference between people of the North and those of Latin origin. In The White Parrot tale the Spanish earl is horrified to find that his wife has given birth to two black children. In The White-Negro, the names of the hero and of his shadow (the Bald Man) indicate Romanians’ ethnic sensitivities historically anchored. The Wehmus bird from the Saxon tale from Transylvania is a reminder of the Phoenix motif. The magic bird from the Romanian fairy tale is a reference to the bird of the soul who acts as a messenger from the other world and as psychopomp instrument. By attributing a tale to the gypsies simply because it was collected in Romania changes its interpretation and somewhat alters the amplifying stages by which its symbols are highlighted, as well as the delineation of the context in which the symbolic images appear in the interpretation algorithm. The detailed analysis of the particularities of this kind provides useful information for managing multicultural contexts and inter-ethnic relations. In the second decade of the 21st
39 Mihaela Gotea, Reţeaua socială şi conflictul marital: constrângeri şi oportunităţi [Social network and marital conflict: constraints and opportunities] (Cluj-Napoca: Presa Universitară Clujeană, 2014). 40 Atudorei, Emoțiile. 41 Carmen Adriana Gheorghe, “Books and the Room of One’s Own,” Book of Abstracts, 6th Summit of the Book, http://www.unitbv.ro/Portals/9/Summit- Angela/summit/BOOK%20OF%20ABSTRACTS.pdf, (accessed November 8, 2017). 42 Laura Saunders et al., “Culture and Competencies: A Multi-Country Examination of Reference Service Competencies,” Libri 63, no.1 (2013): 33-46, https://doi.org/10.1515/libri-2013-0003. 43 Franz, Les modèles.
Daniela Sorea 98 The Role of Fairy Tales in the Self-Realization Process century Europe is marked by the Brexit, the referendum for Catalonia’s independence, the success of a nasty right wing campaign in Austria, the fences raised by Hungary to stop immigrants, a high even though not explicitly formulated concern for altering the European comfort with the coming of the refugees from the Arab world. As Bolborici44 highlights, the European Union is not faced with individual requests for refugee placement which would impose a normal flow rate of processing without pressure on European Union borders, or with a transparent refugee process that could be administratively controlled by Member States, the European institutions face a massive exodus of populations from different areas, for different reasons, a phenomenon that happens suddenly in the crushing waves of immigrants and which has no estimate of ending soon. All of the above shows a disregard for the programmatic values underpinning the generous European project and could be explained by the increased focus on the conscious dimension of European’s psyche that has been rationally educated. The European Union is a rational project. Programmatically, public reason prevails in making decisions and resolving conflicts in its area45 and “preventing and settling conflictual aspects is based on the coordinating, not subordinating character of international law.”46 Ignoring the unconscious pulsions has led, in this case, to compensatory outbursts. In such a context, the analytical interpretation of Europeans’ fairy tales, the inventory of their common themes and local and ethnic variations must be reconsidered. A detailed map of the local projections of the archetype of the shadow in Europe would ease the management of the complicated European neighbourhood relations, as well as of the non- traumatic acceptance of the refugee influx. A collective identity seems easier to set up nowadays on the basis of problems to be solved than on the basis of a common principle.47 The thorough knowledge disseminated via fairy tales can be retrieved in order to support, defend, and balance the common European project.
Conclusions
The previously mentioned fairy tales belong to different peoples from the European area. Besides the cultural and ethnic differences that are analytically outlined, fairy tales unveil the common archetypal core of the psyche in highly accessible language. The fairy tale relays information on the individuation process from the collective unconscious. It is therefore a simple and efficient “training” means for undergoing individuation. Fairy tales provide models of individuation based evolution and information on the correct management, from an archetypal perspective, of the significant trials raised to self- accomplishment. The fairy tale hero is the best of the exemplary models by which the Ego functions in harmony with the psyche since he originates in the fundamental structures of the psyche.
44 Ana-Maria Bolborici, “The immigration crisis – reflections concerning the crisis of European identity,” Bulletin of the Transilvania University of Brasov, Series VII: Social Sciences and Law 9 (58), no. 1(2016): 39-46. 45 Gabriela Răţulea, “Introducere.” [Indroduction], in Justiţie şi coeziune socială [Justice and Social Cohesion], ed. Gabriela Răţulea (Iaşi: Institutul European, 2015), 7-33. 46 Carmen Adriana Gheorghe, “The Banking Surveillance of N.B.R.- A component of International Regulations,” Bulletin of the Transilvania University of Brasov, Series VII Social Sciences, Law 8 (57) no.1 (2015): 161. 47 Ionuț Mihai Popescu, “Credința și coeziunea socială în contextul destrămării identităților colective.” [Faith and social cohesion in the context of the breakdown of collective identities]. In Justiție și coeziune socială [Justice and Social Cohesion] , ed. Gabriela Răţulea (Iași: Institutul European, 2015), 227-58.
99 Daniela Sorea The Role of Fairy Tales in the Self-Realization Process
Fairy tales also supply instruments to defuse tensions among neighbourhoods and harmonize the relations among Europeans and between the latter and their guests. Fairy tales are a resource. To ignore it is counter-productive since its responsible, professional and undistorted use is less costly.
References
Bódi, Diana- Cristina. Persoanele vârstnice. Resursă importantă în familie şi în societate [Older people. An important resource in family and society]. Iaşi: Institutul European. 2017. Bolborici, Ana-Maria. “The immigration crisis – reflections concerning the crisis of European identity.” Bulletin of the Transilvania University of Brasov, Series VII: Social Sciences and Law 9 (58), no. 1(2016): 39-46. Borcoman, Mariana. “The significance of Saint Andrew´s day in Romanian Folklore.” In microCad 2008, International Scientific Conference March 20-21 2008, ed. László Lehoczky, 13-7. Miskolc: University of Miskolc, 2008. Creangă, Ion. Povești, povestiri, amintiri [Stories, narrations, memories]. Bucharest: Minerva, 1978. Franz, Marie-Louise von. La voie de l'individuation dans les contes de fées. Paris: Jacqueline Renard, 1978. _____. L’interprétation des contes de fées. Paris: Dervy-Livres, 1987. _____. L’ombre et le mal dans les contes de fées. Paris: Jacqueline Renard, 1990. _____. La femme dans les contes de fées. Paris: Albin Michel, 1993. _____. La délivrance dans les contes de fées. Paris: Jacqueline Renard, 1998. _____. Les modèles archétypiques dans les contes de fées, Paris: Jacqueline Renard, 1999. _____. The Cat: A Tale of Feminine Redemption. Toronto: Inner City Books, 2001. Freud, Sigmund. Die Traumdeutung. Wien: Franz Deuticke 1950. Gheorghe, Carmen Adriana. “Books and the Room of One’s Own.” Book of Abstracts, 6th Summit of the Book. http://www.unitbv.ro/Portals/9/Summit- Angela/summit/BOOK%20OF%20ABSTRACTS.pdf. (accessed November 8, 2017). Gheorghe, Carmen Adriana. “The Banking Surveillance of N.B.R.- A component of International Regulations.” Bulletin of the Transilvania University of Brasov, Series VII Social Sciences and Law 8 (57) no.1 (2015): 161. Gotea, Mihaela. Reţeaua socială şi conflictul marital: constrângeri şi oportunităţi [Social network and marital conflict: constraints and opportunities]. Cluj-Napoca: Presa Universitară Clujeană, 2014. Ispirescu, Petre. Legendele sau basmenle românilor . Bucharest: Editura pentru Literatură, 1968. Jung, Carl Gustav. Gesammelte Werke, 8. Düsseldorf: Walter-Verlag, 1995. _____. Gesammelte Werke, 9/1. Düsseldorf: Walter-Verlag, 1995. _____. Gesammelte Werke, 9/2 (Düsseldorf: Walter-Verlag, 1995). Kligman, Gail. Calus. Symbolic transfomation in Romanian ritual. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981. Palmer, Michael. Freud and Jung on Religion. London: Routledge, 1997. Popescu, Ionuț Mihai. “Credința și coeziunea socială în contextul destrămării identităților colective.” [Faith and social cohesion in the context of the breakdown of collective identities]. In Justiție și coeziune socială [Justice and Social Cohesion] , ed. Gabriela Răţulea, 227- 58. Iași: Institutul European, 2015. Rățulea, Gabriela. “Introducere. ” [Indroduction]. In Justiție și coeziune socială [Justice and Social Cohesion] , ed. Gabriela Răţulea, 7-33), Iași: Institutul European, 2015. Repanovici, Angela. “Information Technology Implication in Student Behaviour for Information Literacy Skills,”. In Education and New Educational Technologies. Proceedings of the 4th WSEAS/IASME International Conference on Educational Technologies (EDUTE'08). Book
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Series: Recent Advances in Computer Engineering, ed. Nikos E. Mastorakis et al., 81-6. WSEAS Press, 2008. Rezeanu, Cătălina- Ioana. “The relationship between domestic space and gender identity: Some signs of emergence of alternative domestic femininity and masculinity.” Journal of Comparative Research in Anthropology and Sociology 6 (2) (2015): 9-29. Saunders Laura, Serap Kurbanoglu, Mary Wilkins Jordan, Joumana Boustany, Brenda Chawner, Matylda Filas, Ivana Hebrang Grgic et al. ”Culture and Competencies: A Multi- Country Examination of Reference Service Competencies.” Libri 63, no.1 (2013): 33−46, https://doi.org/10.1515/libri-2013-0003. Sorea, Daniela. “Complexitatea individuatoarea a vieții de cuplu.” [The individuation complexity of the couple's life]. In Familia creștină. Fundamente antropologice, iubire și sexualitate în celibat și căsătorie [The Christian Family. Anthropological foundations, love and sexuality in celibacy and marriage], eds. Alexandru Buzalic and Călin Ioan Dușe, 249-66. Cluj-Napoca: Presa Universitară Clujeană, 2016. Stevens, Anthony. On Jung. London: Routledge, 1990.
The Book and the Separate Room
Carmen Adriana Gheorghe
Department of Law, Transilvania University, Romania
Introduction
Books seduce, as words distract the reader from reality, absorbing them in the imaginary of its pages and transforming them. Books offer pleasure immersed in intelligence, creativity, open-mindedness and, often times, in happiness. The experience of the book can be attained through two perspectives: that of the creator, who escapes, in a separate room, from his/her social, professional, or familial issues; and the perspective of the reader in libraries, in more complex and isolated, “separate rooms.” As each reader has a “Shakespeare’s sister” with her own identity (such as the sister with whose assistance Virginia Woolf pleaded that it is possible to sustain one’s own vision on life), reading is bound to become “the art of lecture.” Furthermore, the book has an interior life flow and forms a clear perspective on life, which can be poetic or even aesthetic. Apparently, the book, the word, and the library are unable to maintain a determined place anymore. But the future is born from the present in which the number of printed books raises constantly and the number of readers stays the same.
The book seduces
In 1927, Virginia Woolf, together with her husband Leonard, were invited to answer the following question: Are there too many written and published books?1 Launched on air by BBC London Radio Station, by nightfall, the topic led to another unspoken question: Is Europe somehow going to survive through books and through those who write them? Although the two of them were book makers (Virginia was the writer and Leonard was the publisher), or maybe particularly because of this reason, they were among the 2,300 people on the execution list to be enforced as soon as the Nazis invaded Great Britain. With such a complicated historical background, in which the ascension of the Nazi Party permitted the “black shirts” to get out on the streets of London, was this an issue of interest to the public? It seems so. 80 years later, how much has this question decreased in essence? Not at all. Today’s world, the world led by words, is also pursued by this dilemma: are we going to continue producing books or not? Apparently, too many books are produced. The reader is not able to consume them anymore, as the number of readers is constant, but there is an increasing number of books. Those who are seduced by books will try to keep up to this trend, and keep all types of books in their houses. The book is presented, launched, bought, promoted, read, borrowed, commented upon, recommended, re-found, re-read, revised, supplemented and added -- it has the seemingly
1 https://www.jstor.org/stable/25486300?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents. http://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/44b9567e384b48a8bbd31ccab2ea0093
Carmen Adriana Gheorghe 102 The Book and the Separate Room perfect life of a seducer. Fearless, even undaunted, those passionate of books abandon themselves in the written word in order to travel through times and junctures, rivers and images, feelings, emotions, and games of ideas. Should it be true that women love books more than men, a single reason can be brought up for this at a first look, public libraries seem to be especially visited by women. Would this be a type of “revenge” from the times when women were not allowed in libraries unless accompanied by a male student of the respective college or entered with a recommendation letter? Public libraries should be kept like a “separate room” for our days’ women, especially as the majority seek the book for the pleasure of holding it in their hands? Seduction pheromones should exist and are activated during the reading process, stimulating elements like intelligence, talent, literary art, the genuine or unique perspective of what is told in the story -- all of these elements being capable of creating an aesthetic vortex which will absorb the reader. Pleasure produces happiness, the kind of happiness that wraps our thoughts and, sometimes, profoundly affects us. Therefore, the book is never sufficient.
Shakespeare’s sister and the “separate room”
“In Virginia Woolf’s vision, Shakespeare’s sister is the creator who was never visible because of contextual, external reasons. She is the creator sitting in a famous man’s shadow,” noted a contemporary writer. Even since Virginia Woolf launched the idea of Judith Shakespeare in the 1900s’ London scenery as someone who might write books in the “separate room,” she noted, amused, in her journal: “I thought of that old gentleman...who declared that it was impossible for any woman, past, present or to come, to have the genius of Shakespeare. He wrote to the papers about it. Women cannot write the plays of William Shakespeare.” Judith was a fiction which created dispute. As her spiritual mother, “she had to stay at home, watch her brother go off to school, and become imprisoned in domesticity. She was as adventurous, as imaginative, as agog to see the world as he was. But she was not sent to school. Eventually, Judith is shamed into a marriage by her family. Her brother, William, makes his way in the world, while Judith is trapped at home, her genius unfulfilled.” Thus, as per the period’s opinion, Shakespeare’s sister could not have written good books, not even if she had a “separate room” used for either writing or reading books (assuming that she could have had the opportunity of solitude). From the perspective of the “separate room,” Virginia Woolf was successful, as she owned such a room, not only because of her marriage to Leonard Woolf, but also because of being recognized as part of Bloomsbury’s vanguard Set. Although she worked in a separate room, she remained connected to the family life. In the middle of perfectly- elaborated phrases and minutely-processed mornings, she had to instruct the cook on how much butter to add to the recipe, or what to be served to the nephews if they visited. Here she is, this Shakespeare’s sister, who wrote between 1907 and 1941, who although had her own room, had to uphold the foundation of the English family, and not only. Her condition was just like her life, divided between sitting in her armchair in the “separate room,” being the mistress of her writing, and being the mistress of the house. At the same time, she was in an uncommon condition, because of her permanent depression and disease. She wrote in her journal “Not having children, being far from friends, not managing to write well, makes me spend too much on food, get old, ask myself too many questions. I do not like time warning his wings around me.” The solution she found was: “Then, work!” with the following addition (author’s note): “You have a ‘separate room!.’” This contradiction grinded Virginia Wool’s life, although she had won her status as a writer. She was happy because she wrote, and she was unhappy because she wrote. “All
103 Carmen Adriana Gheorghe The Book and the Separate Room
writers are unhappy. The world’s image mirrored in books this way is too dark. People who do not have this gift are happy, the women in the garden in front of Mr. Chavasse’s house. It is not an accurate image of the world, just a canvas painted by a writer. Is their world happier than ours? Are musicians, painters, indeed happier?”
Books in the “separate room”
Should we conduct an analysis of randomly-chosen books from the first shelf of a bookcase (the one which we named the “separate room”), would it show that this concept is up-to- date, either as a way of affirming the independence of Romanian or international female authors, or as a way of keeping a safe haven for writing and reading in the universal cultural landscape? Let us remember that books written in the “separate room” are meant to be “good books,”, as amusingly suggested Virginia Woolf in 1927. Two well-known Romanian authors wrote the following books: Rodica Ojog Brasoveanu2 focused on detective books and Virginia Faur3 wrote books reflecting the professional experience of scientific research materialised in recipes for soul. Their public recognition is given by the out of print circulation of their books and by the highly topical issues faced by the characters and their mysterious actions,. Furthermore, it is given by the remedies suggested for personal defeats suffered by many, whether they are fictional characters or not. Mrs. Dalloway4 is perpetuating its authority as “good book” because of Virginia Woolf’s decisive contribution to the development of literature, while The Sacred and Profane Loving Machine5 also remains a “good book” because of Iris Murdoch’s power of analysis and observation. The intellectual novelty, the experiment, and the study of characters from these books can be seen as criteria for their classification in the category of “good books,” meaning books written in the “separate room.” Doina Rusti’s book The Ghost at the Mill6 a novel published in 2008 and recently translated in German, tells a story on the consequences of communism, in which the love for books went through fire in a literal way and was pierced by sword. This is a fragment from the book:
Ion Nicolescu slowly followed the guardians… but did not dare to tell them to let him have the books he loved, at least Eminescu’s leather-bound edition, or Memories from Childhood.7 How could this book be hostile? When they see the books from his bookcase, they will leave without destroying anything. Not to mention that he could not imagine how they would do that… (p. 416).
Finally, what can two writings such as The Pig’s Story8 by Ion Creanga and with Umberto Eco’s Confessions of a Young Novelist9? Besides the fact that they are both in the category of “good books.” Confessions... should be first of all analysed beside King’s Mistery. On Writing,10
2 Rodica Ojog-Brasoveanu, Buna seara, Melania (Bucharest: Ed. Nemira, 2013). 3 Virginia Faur, Retete pentru trup si suflet (Bucharest: Gutenberg Univers, 2011). 4 Virginia Woolf, Mrs.Dallowey (London: Hogarth Press, 1925). 5 Iris Murdoch, The Sacred and Profane Loving Machine (London: Chatto & Windus, 1974). 6 Doina Rusti, The Ghost at the Mill (Bucharest: Polirom, 2008). 7 Ion Creanga, Memories of Childood (Bucharest: Herra, 20110. 8 Ion Creanga, The Pig’s Story (Bucharest: Ager, 2011) 9 Umberto Eco, Confessions of a Young Novelist (Harvard University Press: 2011). 10 Stephen King, King’s Mystery. On Writing (New York: Scribner, 2000).
Carmen Adriana Gheorghe 104 The Book and the Separate Room by Stephen King, an essay summarizing almost his entire experience on literature, from the writer’s tool kit, up to his compulsory readings’ list and readers’ requests, in a foray through his methods of books writing. Does he remind us of the “separate room”? Yes, there is no doubt about it. Similarly, Eco pampers in the pages of his essays, among memories of his first writing attempts, his juncture from writing speciality books to novels, respectively the manner in which his master degree represented the seed that created the sentence “a monk was poisoned while reading a mysterious book” and gave birth to The Name of the Rose.11 Is this about the university becoming or being recognized as the “separate room” of academic completion? The Pig’s Story has the charm of a vintage jewellery, with a brilliance perpetuated up until today.12 Published in 1876, the love story between a princess and a domestic animal, speaks about love and faith, about determination and the satisfaction of not giving up, about patience and deprivation with a view to a higher goal, the recovery of love, family, of the golden dream released from an evil spell. However, it also speaks about parents and their children. Whether they are poor peasants, emperors or empresses, they are linked by the golden bridge blown through the charmed pig’s nostrils, former and current Prince Charming. The female character of the story had a “separate room,” but until she achieved the real one, she had to undertake o long initiating journey.
Conclusions
In the end, can one consider 100 Forbidden Books,13 a summary of 100 books with apparent issues, as a “good book”? Would books labelled as “good” still be forbidden? Or were they forbidden because they were “bad”? Good or bad, according to whom? This highlights that, at a given moment, political, religious, social, or sexual reasons were criteria for classifying books as “not good.” Mrs. Chaterley’s Lover14, Men and Mice15, Dr. Jivago16 or Oliver Twist17, would then be on the list of books not written in the “separate room.” The analysis above does not destroy potentialities. It remains open and endless. Labelling is as difficult as writing a book, as deciding upon a book’s content, or just as difficult as capturing the infinite ways in which a book is received by its readers. Nevertheless, we approach libraries as places in which books are arranged and classified. “One day I read a book and my entire life changed”. It does not matter if the book was one written in the “separate room.” It does not matter anymore if too many books are written and published. The “separate room” is perpetual, as well as the books in it.
11 Umberto Eco. The Name of the Rose (Boston: Harcourt, 1983). 12 See also: D. Sorea, “Complexitatea individuatoare a vieții de cuplu” [The Individuative Complexity of Couple Life] in Familia creștină. Fundamante antropologice, iubire și sexualitate în celibat și căsătorie [The Christian Family. Anthropological fundaments, love and sexuality in celubacy and marriage], ed. Andrei Buzalic and Ioan Dușe (Cluj-Napoca: Presa Universitară Clujeană, 2016), 249-266. D. Sorea, “Accesibilitate şi ocultare în era cunoaşterii informatizate.” Biblio 2009, Conferinţa internaţională de Bibioteconomie şi Ştiinţa Informării (2009): 65-68. 13 Nicholas Karolides, Margaret Bald, Dawn Sova. 100 Fordiden Books (Bucharest: Paralela 45, 2007). 14 D.H. Lawrence, Mrs. Chaterley’s Lover (Florence: Giuntina, 1928). 15 John Steinbeck, Of Mice and Men (New York: Covici Friede, 1937). 16 Boris Pasternak, Dr. Zhivago (Milan: Feltrinelli Editore, 1957). 17 Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist (London: Richard Bentley, 1838).
105 Carmen Adriana Gheorghe The Book and the Separate Room
References
Creanga, Ion. Amintiri din copilarie [Childhood memories]. Bucharest: Herra, 2011. _____. Povestea porcului [The story of the pig]. Bucharest: Ager, 2011. Dickens. Charles, Oliver Twist. London: Richard Bentley, 1838. Eco, Umberto. Confessions of a Young Novelist. Harvard University Press: 2011. _____. The name of the Rose. Boston: Harcourt, 1983. Faur, Virginia. Retete pentru trup si suflet [Recipes for Body and Soul]. Bucharest: 2011. Karolides, Nicholas and Margaret Bald, Dawn Sova. 100 Forbidden Books, Bucharest: Paralela 45, 2007. King, Stephen. King’s Mystery. On Writing. New York: Scribner, 2000. Lawrence, D.H. Mrs. Chaterley’s Lover. Florence: Giuntina, 1928. Murdoch, Iris. The Sacred and Profane Loving Machine. London: Chatto& Windus, 1974. Ojog-Brasoveanu, Rodica. Buna seara, Melania [Good evening, Melania]. Bucharest: Nemira, 2013. Pasternak, Boris. Dr. Zhivago. Milan: Feltrinelli Editore, 1957. Rusti, Doina. The Ghost at the Mill. Bucharest: Polirom, 2008. Sorea, D. “Complexitatea individuatoare a a vieții de cuplu” [The Individuative Complexity of Couple Life]. In Familia creştină. Fundamante antropologice, iubire şi sexualitate în celibate şi căsătorie [The Christian Family. Anthropological fundaments, love and sexuality in celubacy and marriage], ed. Andrei Buzalic and Ioan Duşe, 249-266. Cluj-Napoca: Presa Universitară Clujeană, 2016. _____. “Accesibilitate şi ocultare în era cunoaşterii informatizate.” In the Proceedings of the International Conference Biblio 2009: Conferinţa internaţională de Bibioteconomie şi Ştiinţa Informării (2009): 65-68. Steinbeck, John. Of Mice and Men. New York: Covici Friede, 1937. Woolf, Virginia. Mrs. Dalloway. London: Hogarth Press, 1925. _____. A Room of One’s Own. London: Hogarth Press, 1929. _____. Three Guineas. London: Hogarth Press, 1929.
Online resources: https://www.jstor.org/stable/25486300?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents (accessed November 23, 2017) http://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/44b9567e384b48a8bbd31ccab2ea0093 (accessed November 23, 2017) https://www.observatorcultural.ro/articol/virginia-woolf-o-camera-separata (accessed April 20, 2018) https://books.google.ro/books/about/A_Room_of_One_s_Own_Three_Guineas.html?id =JU9ODwAAQBAJ&source=kp_cover&redir_esc=y (accessed April 21, 2018) https://www.bookaholic.ro/o-camera-separata-identitati-feminine.html (accessed April 20, 2018)
PART V
Perspectives on Publications in Life Sciences
Biomechanics in Publication: Present State and Perspectives
Ileana-Constanta Rosca
Product Design, Mechatronics and Environment Department, Transylvania University of Brasov, Romania
Introduction
Biomechanics, as “the study of the movement of living things using the science of mechanics,” was recognized as a clear discipline only a short time ago1, as its beginnings can be found in the early development of natural sciences. Human scientific interest on itself concerning physiology and implicitly biomechanics was only part of a wide range of challenges faced when trying to understand the world. In time, knowledge was organized and structured in separate disciplines, leading to fragmentation that increased until the last century. But as scientific knowledge increased, the gaps between disciplines continued narrow, and now we study interdisciplinary domains as biophysics, biochemistry and, among them, biomechanics.2 3 Biomechanics provides the most important information necessary to improve the human movement from two points of view: performance improvement and the reduction of the consequences of injuries in synergy with other kinesiology domains.4 Human movement is generally accepted as being the relative movement of two segments of the human body and, viewing the high dynamic of the research in this field, the quantity of information increases rapidly. This situation led to the present state – a large number of papers in many publications mostly impossible to read not only because of their number but also because they are not systematized.
Basic knowledge in biomechanics
A good biomedical engineer is firstly a good engineer able to invent and design and, secondly is able to create new systems that have never existed before. Thus they take engineering courses to be able to create and design and, after a good knowledge accumulation, the inventive thinking can be cultivated. All curricula in medical engineering comprises a typically common subject – biomechanics. But it follows other ones that are also comprised in them. The most important is mechanics in the large sense of the term, i.e. solid rigid mechanics elasticity and plasticity, as well as the mechanics of continuum body
1 H. Hatze, “The meaning of the term "biomechanics" Journal of Biomechanics 7(2) (1974): 189-190. 2 R.B. Martin, The Early History of Biomechanics. Presidential Lecture at the 23rd Annual Conference of ASB in Pittsburgh, PA (1999). 3 R.E.D. Ferdinands, “Advanced Applications of Motion Analysis in Sports Biomechanics” in the Proceedings of the 28th Conference of the International Society of Biomechanics in Sports, Northern Michigan University Marquette (2010). 4 D. Knudson, Fundamentals of Biomechanics (New York: Springer Science+Business Media, 2007).
Ileana-Constanta Rosca 108 Biomechanics in Publications: Present State and Perspectives and fields. All these serve as base for the biomechanical studies being intimately closed to needed mathematical and measurement instruments. This is the reason that in all great biomechanics courses or books the first part is dedicated to the presentation of basic mechanics. Most of them begin with several chapters on kinematic, kinetic and static classical mechanics,5 6 7 8 presented abstractly or applied on the human movement analyze. But all this knowledge is accessible in any scholar specialized course and, it brings few new information on the specific domain of biomechanics. What is a very good contribution is the fact that some courses present many solved or proposed applications which facilitate the understanding of a quite abstract theoretical domain. There are few books9 10 11 that prolong the mechanical study in elasticity, plasticity and continuum mechanics, even most of the human body’s components are composite, non-isotropic and non-homogenous and modern studies lye on the consideration of such properties of living tissues. These are some few considerations on the general biomechanics books and courses. From another point of view, biomechanics can address different chapters of locomotor or different systems of the human body. We can briefly cite works only on gait,12 13 on spinal biomechanics14 or on computational techniques15 but, also on living tissues10 or some very known on human circulation and blood.11 Concerning the biomechanics study area, if we take into account the simple sense of human locomotion, works on other subsystems of the human body that locomotor are difficult to accept as being in the domain or they could be considered as frontier ones. But lying on the broader mean of locomotion accepting that any relative movement of a human part or organ in report to another can be considered as biomechanical movement, a lot of other works are part of biomechanics, even they address the limbs and the whole body or other organs as heart, lungs, liver, kidneys or any other living tissue. Also, we have the possibility to access the contributions of different authors in structured volumes edited by prestigious scientists and which cover a large range of sub-domains of biomechanics from the mechanics of hard and soft tissues, mechanics of microcirculation and of sanguine particles till the mechanics of senses and factors affecting the mechanical work in humans.12 15 6 Our days we can observe that the development of such works – of general interest or courses for students – began especially in the second half of the last century and touched almost the whole area of biomechanical study and are spread on all world continents, from Europe till Africa and Australia. They form a large basic knowledge on biomechanics but
5 B.S. ,Hall Basic biomechanics, Fifth edition (New York: McGraw-Hill, 2007). 6 R.D. Peterson; D.J. Bronzino, Biomechanics. Principles and Applications (Boca Raton: CRS Press, 2008). 7 I. C. Rosca, I. Serban, Fundamente de biomecanica [Fundaments of biomechanics] (Brasov: Transylvania Univ. of Brasov, 2015). 8 A. Tözeren. Human Body Dynamics: Classical Mechanics and Human Movement (New York: Springer- Verlag, 2000). 9 Y.C. Fung, Biomechanics. Motion, Flow, Stress, and Growth (New York: Springer Science+Business Media, 1990). 10 Y.C. Fung, Biomechanics. Mechanical Properties of Living Tissues, 2nd Edition (New York: Springer Science+Business Media, 1993). 11 Y.C. Fung, Biomechanics. Circulation, 2nd Edition (New York: Springer Science+Business Media, 1997). 12 C.T. Leondes, Musculoskeletal Models and Techniques (Boca Raton, Florida: CRC Press, 2000). 13 C.L. Vaughan, B.L. Davis, J.C. O’Connor, Dynamics of human gait (Cape Town: Kiboho Publishers, 1999). 14 W.R. Haid Jr., R.B. Subach, E.G. Rodts Jr. Advances in spinal stabilization (Basel: Reinhardt Druck, 2003). 15 T.C. Leondes, Computer Techniques and Computational Methods in Biomechanics (Boca Raton, Florida: CRC Press, 2001).
109 Ileana-Constanta Rosca Biomechanics in Publications: Present State and Perspectives
are not up to date of the scientific research, even very necessary in large public information and in specialist formation.
Dynamic biomechanical information publishing
After the world was concerned on the industrial development to improve the human life comfort and on military advancement, we can see that at least in parallel with these two great goals the scientific world leans more and more on the human being assistance and healing. Assisting and security devices for normal people working in dangerous environment or for handicapped subjects evolve extremely rapidly and embrace the last progress in mini and nano technologies, materials informatics and robotics. This is possible on one side because of the general technical development and, on the other side, because of the important founds allocation for research specific establishments. In this social context, it is natural that many journals arise and very early become well known due to the high scientific level of published papers and highly quoted by the great number of associated citations. In present the highest quoted journals in biomechanics are: Biomechanics and Modeling in Mechanobiology, Journal of Biomechanics, Scandinavian Journal of Medicine & Science in Sports, Computer Methods in Biomechanics and Biomedical Engineering, Journal of Biomedical Engineering-Transactions of the ASME, Clinical Biomechanics, Sports Biomechanics, Journal of Applied Biomechanics, Molecular & Cellular Biomechanics, Acta of Bioengineering and Biomechanics and, Applied Bionics and Biomechanics. Their Impact factors for 2016 are between 3.036 (the first one) and 0.703 (the last one) and this seems to be rather low in report with other journals in medicine, materials and chemistry that are closely related to biomechanics. These biomechanics journals publish a high number of volumes and issues containing many important results of last minute specific research. In parallel with periodical journals, proceeding of strong international meetings and congress are published in volumes constituting collection of weighty scientific achievements.16 17 18 In the same range of interest, we must mention the interdisciplinary character of biomedical research in which biomechanics is almost all the time the first part and, thus, a lot of results are part of publications in many other journals of connected areas. On the other hand, biomechanics being fundamentally the application of mechanics on the human body’s behavior many other journals of applied mechanics, mathematics and engineering publish results of biomechanical research.19 20 Most of journals publishing biomechanical research results are from the beginning open access or are very soon on internet sites which makes them accessible to the large interested public. But there is a problem concerning the level of conceptualization of the informed consent of authors, especially in Eastern European countries21 (Dima, 2014).
16 I. Serban, “Gait and Balance Analysis in People with Meniscal Tear” in COMEC 2015 proceedings (2015). 17 C. Druga, A. Lupu, “Simple Circuit for Monitoring Brain Activity” in COMEC 2015 proceedings (2015). 18 O.A. Florea, I.C. Rosca, “A novel approach of the Stokes second problem for the synovial fluid in knee osteoarthrosis” Osteoarthritis and Cartilage 22 (2014): 109-110. 19 O.A. Florea, I.C. Rosca, “The Mechanical Behavior and the Mathematical Modeling of an Intervertebral Disc” Acta Technica Napocensis, 58(2) (2015): 213-218. 20 R. Miclaus, A. Repanovici, N. Roman, “Biomaterials: Polylactic Acid and 3DPrinting Processes for Orthosis and Prosthesis” Materiale plastice [Plastic materials] 51(1) (2017): 98-102. 21 L. Dima, A. Repanovici, D. Purcaru, et al., “Informed consent and E-communication in medicine” Revista romana de biotică [Romanian review of bioethics] 12(2) (2014): 37-46.
Ileana-Constanta Rosca 110 Biomechanics in Publications: Present State and Perspectives
Conclusion
Publications in biomechanics are present in most scientific publications: books, student courses, journals, proceedings collections, internet and, open sources, depositories. The dynamic of the research in this domain is remarkable, the research achievements are huge and this makes the documentation of specialists in this domain very difficult. Very few times does a structured book or course present up to date researches and thus courses are always late in reporting with other types of publications. It should also be mentioned that most authors are not well informed on the conditions, facilities and their responsibility of publishing on-line. The most of important biomechanics journals are in English and they do not accept any other language from authors who are not English native speakers. This makes the acceptance of their papers in interesting specific journals more difficult. Thus they have to use onerous proofing services which, together with the high publication fees limit the authors’ contribution with interesting research results if they are not a part of a strong English language establishment.
Representative Publications for Medical Engineering
Corneliu Druga
Department DPMM, Transilvania University of Brasov, Romania
Introduction
Biomedical Engineering is an interdisciplinary domain which links many disciplines such as engineering, medicine, biology, physics, electronic, science and technology of materials, etc. A good example in this direction is a paper written by our colleagues 1. This rapidly growing field must meet the needs of industrial, clinical, and scientific research communities. It involves the application of state-of-the-art technology to the creation of methodologies and devices for human welfare and for better understanding of human biological processes 2. The Biomedical Engineering curriculum at most universities and institutes typically comprises subjects like: Biomaterials, Biomechanics, Biosensors, Medical Imaging, Prosthetic Devices, Bioinformatics, Biotechnology, etc. (Fig. 1). In this case the students are exposed to both engineering and biology subjects. Nor are students in Medical Engineering, from the Faculty of Product Design and Environmental, an exception. It is very important that the medical field is so large as to be the list of representatives of this field. The purpose of this article is to identify a number of scientific parameters contributing to a classification of a journalist in the field of medical engineering. This is useful for all user groups from researchers to teachers working in this area. For this, a series of scintillation indicators such as: Cite Score, Impact Factor (IF), 5-year Impact Factor, SNIP, Scimago Journal Rank (SJR) and h5-index.
1 I. Serban, I.C.Rosca, M. Baritz, “Influence of sound frequency on human body stability,” Environmental Engineering and Management Journal 15 (2016): 375-381. 2 Somesh Menon, Careers360. https://medicine.careers360.com/articles/biomedical-engineering- fusion-of-two-domains (accessed October 20, 2017).
Corneliu Druga 112 Representative Publications for Medical Engineering
Fig. 1. The world of Biomedical Engineering3
Bibliometric indicators of impact
There are a number of bibliometric indicators focusing on measuring impact of scholarly journals. Most of these measures are calculated from the pool of journals indexed in three citation indexing databases: Web of Science, Scopus and Google Scholar.
Web of Science indicators
Web of Science's core indicators are: Impact Factor, Immediacy Index, Cited/citing half-life and Eigenfactor (Table 1). These indicators are described below: The impact factor (IF) or journal impact factor (JIF) is a measure reflecting the yearly average number of citations to recent articles published in that journal 4. The impact factor (IF) is a measure of the frequency with which the average article in a journal has been cited in a particular year. It is used to measure the importance or rank of a journal by calculating the times its articles are cited. The Eigenfactor score, developed by Jevin West and Carl Bergstrom at the University of Washington, is a rating of the total importance of a scientific journal. Journals are rated according to the number of incoming citations, with citations from highly ranked journals weighted to make a larger contribution to the Eigenfactor than those from poorly ranked journals.5 The Immediacy Index is the average number of times an article is cited in the year it is published. The journal Immediacy Index indicates how quickly articles in a journal are
3 Joseph Bronzino, ed. Medical Devices and Systems (New York: CRC Press Taylor & Francisc Group, 2006), 10-12. 4 Wikipedia. Impact factor. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impact_factor (accessed October 21, 2017). 5 Wikipedia. Eigenfactor. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eigenfactor (accessed October 21, 2017).
113 Corneliu Druga Representative Publications for Medical Engineering
cited. The Immediacy Index is calculated by dividing the number of citations to articles published in a given year by the number of articles published in that year. Cited Half-Life refers to the median age of the citations received by a journal during the JCR year. A citation’s age is equal to the publication year of the citing item minus the publication year of the cited item.6
Table 1. Bibliometric indicators of impact
Based indicators Web of Science SCOPUS Google Scholar Impact Factor SNIP h5-index Immediacy Index SJR h5-core Cited/citing half-life CiteScore h5-meian Eigenfactor
SCOPUS indicators
Scopus's core indicators are: Source Normalized Impact per Paper (SNIP), SJR (SCImago Journal Rank) and CiteScore (Table 1). These indicators are described below: CiteScore is a simple way of measuring the citation impact of serial titles such as journals. CiteScore calculates the average number of citations received in a calendar year by all items published in that journal in the preceding three years. SNIP – a factor released in 2012 by Elsevier based on Scopus to estimate impact. The measure is calculated as where RIP-raw impact per paper, R - citation potential and M - median database citation potential. SJR indicator is a measure of scientific influence of scholarly journals that accounts for both the number of citations received by a journal and the importance or prestige of the journals where such citations come from. The SJR indicator is a free journal metric which uses an algorithm similar to PageRank and provides an alternative to the impact factor (IF) 6 . Scopus-based metrics can be accessed via SCOPUS platform as well as via JournalMetrics.com, CWTS Journal Indicators and Scimago (SJR indicator only) websites.
Google Scholar indicators
Google Scholar Metrics is another source of journal-level metrics. Google Scholar's core indicators are: h5-index, h5-core and h5-median.These indicators are described below: The h-index of a publication is the largest number h such that at least h articles in that publication were cited at least h times each. For example, a publication with five articles cited by, respectively, 17, 9, 6, 3, and 2, has the h-index of 3.7 The h-core of a publication is a set of top cited h articles from the publication. These are the articles that the h-index is based on. For example, the publication above has the h-core with three articles, those cited by 17, 9, and 6. The h-median of a publication is the median of the citation counts in its h-core. For example, the h-median of the publication above is 9. The h-median is a measure of the distribution of citations to the articles in the h-core.
6 https://clarivate.com/blog/a-closer-look-at-cited-and-citing-half-lives (accessed October 23, 2017). 7 https://scholar.google.com/intl/en/scholar/metrics.html#metrics (accessed October 23, 2017).
Corneliu Druga 114 Representative Publications for Medical Engineering
Finally, the h5-index, h5-core, and h5-median of a publication are, respectively, the h- index, h-core, and h-median of only those of its articles that were published in the last five complete calendar years articles.7
Search engines
Given that the Biomaterials sub-domain is present in all educational institutions active in the field of Medical Engineering, we considered that it would be necessary to identify the most representative journals in this field. This can be done in two ways: the journals are selected from a series of scientometric indicators such as those described above or from the article we want to publish. Method I: I used the platform Scimago Journal & Country Rank which provides us with a list of the most representative journals in terms of the SJR indicator. The list of journals includes 66 titles where the SJR ranges from 4,915 to 0.121 for the year 2016. Users can search for other types of publications, such as: Book series, Trade journals or Conference and Proceedings, from 1999 until 2016. In addition, it is possible to set the geographic area where the publications can come from. As shown in this list, the Advanced Functional Materials Journal has the highest SJR (4.915). Advanced Functional Materials is known for its rapid and fair peer review, quality content, and high impact (2017 Journal Citation Reports: 12.12), making it the first choice of the international materials science community. To see what the impact factor is for the same log we can use the available platform at: Journal Impact Factor List www.scijournal.org (Fig.2). According to this platform, the Impact Factor for 2016 is 12.124. The Google Scholar platform-specific indexes, h5-index and h5-median, for this journal are 133 and 186 respectively. The Relative Influence Score (RIS) for the Advanced Functional Materials Journal for 2017 is 8,719. Method II: If we have an article and want to identify a journal where we can post the article for publication, we can call Elsevier Journal Finder, Springer Journal Finer or Wiley Journal Finder. For example, I used the title and abstract of an article written by a number of colleagues from Transylvania University in Brasov in the biomaterials domain in this year within the Elsevier Journal Finder platform.8
8 R. Miclaus, A. Repanovici, N. Roman, “Biomaterials: Polylactic Acid and 3D Printing Processes for Orthosis and Prosthesis,” Materiale Plastice 54 (2017): 98-102.
115 Corneliu Druga Representative Publications for Medical Engineering
Fig. 2. Journal Impact Factor List
Fig. 3. The partial result of identifying journales using the Elsevier Journal Finder platform
Optionally, research fields can also be complemented, or open access journals can be filtered. Following the search, there were 10 suggestions of journals that show a series of information such as: Impact factor, CiteScore, Review speed, Acceptance rate or Production speed (Fig.3). The same information was also used in the Springer Journal Suggester platform, with the result of 20 journals that show a series of information such as: Impact Factor, Acceptance rate and Time to first decision (Fig.4). A real benefit to writers of less experienced articles in this direction is to find out where to publish a journal where the
Corneliu Druga 116 Representative Publications for Medical Engineering
Enago Academy platform is presented, detailing the whole procedure, from the identification of the journal to how to write the article.9
Fig. 4. The partial result of identifying journales using the Springer Journal Suggester platform
Conclusions
Since the methodologies for calculating the different indicators specific to the three platforms (Web of Science, Scopus and Google Scholar) are different, the criteria that we must consider when choosing a journal are: Impact Factor, CiteScore, Relative Influence Score, Review speed, Acceptance rate, Publishing fee and, last but not least, the indicators that are taken into account in the institution where you operate. At Transylvania University of Brasov, one of the promotion criteria is related to the publication of articles with RIS (Relative Influence Score) greater than 0.7. If there is an article, the simplest way to identify a journal is to use the Elsevier or Springer platforms described above. Acceptance rate and publication fee are also very important in choosing a journal. Generally speaking, it is preferable for young researchers to choose journals with lower Scientometric Indicators and a higher Acceptance rate.
9 Enago Academy, Elsevier Journal Finder: How to Select an Appropriate Journal for Publishing , https://www.enago.com/academy/elsevier-journal-finder-select-appropriate-journal-publishing/ (accessed October 24, 2017).
117 Corneliu Druga Representative Publications for Medical Engineering
References
Serban, I., Rosca, I. C., Baritz, M. “Influence of sound frequency on human body stability.” Environmental Engineering and Management Journal 15 (2016): 375-381. Somesh, Menon. Careers360. https://medicine.careers360.com/articles/biomedical- engineering-fusion-of-two-domains (accessed October 20, 2017). Bronzino, Joseph, ed. Medical Devices and Systems. New York: CRC Press Taylor & Francisc Group, 2006. Wikipedia. Impact factor. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impact_factor (accessed October 21, 2017). Wikipedia. Eigenfactor. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eigenfactor (accessed October 21, 2017). https://clarivate.com/blog/a-closer-look-at-cited-and-citing-half-lives (accessed October 23, 2017). https://scholar.google.com/intl/en/scholar/metrics.html#metrics (accessed October 23, 2017). Miclaus, R., Repanovici, A., Roman, N. “Biomaterials: Polylactic Acid and 3D Printing Processes for Orthosis and Prosthesis”, Materiale Plastice 54 (2017): 98-102. Enago Academy. Elsevier Journal Finder: How to Select an Appropriate Journal for Publishing . https://www.enago.com/academy/elsevier-journal-finder-select-appropriate-journal- publishing/ (accessed October 24, 2017).
PART VI
Collections: Histories and Landmarks
The Second Life of Books from Private Collections
Elena Harconiţa
USARB Scientific Library of the Republic of Moldova
“… Books are like an inheritance passed on from generation to generation for those who will be born.” M. Druc
“The personal library is the mirror of its possessor ... an unmistakable witness of the most intimate spiritual paths.” I. Stoica
A source of enrichment of the collections of the Scientific Library of „Alecu Russo” Bălţi State University (USARB) are donations from personalities from Moldova and abroad. Due to the generosity of the donors, the USARB Scientific Library benefits today of 10 private collections, comprising 35 773 titles, 38 633 volumes, at a total value of over 1 399 537 MDL (66 645 EURO) (Fig. 1), (Fig. 2).
Radu Moţoc 30.250 33.000 Mircea Druc 267 285 Iulius Popa 379 383 Ioan Călin Dimitriu 392 396 Dr. Leonid Gheorghian 268 277 Pavel Proca 457 464 Daniela Gîfu 62 96 Dan-George Dimitrescu 2.578 2.608 Nicolae Varnay 769 773 Mircea Filip 351 351
Fig. 1. The Private Collections
Elena Harconita 120 The Second Life of Books from Private Collections
Fig. 2. The Private Collections in open access
Why the Second Life of Books? Because those who gathered and loved them, decided on their fate by offering them to libraries, some of which are not properly funded today. The acquisition of information resources does not correspond to current trends and the Internet’s growing monopoly. Therefore, the upgrade of information and communication technologies cannot provide access to publications which may not even be digitized. The gaps in printed collections can be covered by donations of private libraries, thus following Shiyali Ramamrita Ranganathan's five classical laws of library science: Books are for use; Every reader has his/her book; Every book its reader; Save the time of the reader; The library is a growing organism1. These collections are important to the content and history of the owner as they are integrated in the cultural and scientific heritage of the Library. University librarians manage and carefully preserve all these books (which may be considered cultural jewellery) for future generations. Furthermore, they exploit and promote the collections through various actions: bibliographic journals, traditional thematic and informative on-line exhibitions, presentations, and book launches. Documents from personal libraries donated to the library contribute to the enrichment of the cultural and scientific heritage of the institution and diversify an informational offer which can be consulted by thousands of users of today and tomorrow. The books in these collections have special value due to their content and various titles, being produced in various prestigious publishing houses, or coming from known or less
1 R. A Leiter, “Reflections on Ranganathan`s five laws of library science.” Law Library Journal 96(3) (2003): 411-418.
121 Elena Harconita The Second Life of Books from Private Collections
known private collections. They contain the donor's autograph, stamp, or ex-libris. By each integrated editorial object in these collections, we become more familiar with the donor's preferences and reading interests. Our goal is to review some of the peculiarities and beauty of heritage books in these collections. The “Radu Moţoc” collection (Fig. 4, 5) was created thanks to the effort of engineer Radu Moţoc, a descendant of the great family of Ivanco Moţoc (1460 - 1520). The Metropolitan Varlaam (1590-1657) belonged to this family.
Fig. 3. M. Şleahtiţchi, E. Harconiţa, R. Moţoc, V. Priţcan
It should be noted that our readers owe a great deal to Mr. Radu Moţoc, the secretary of Pro Basarabia and Bucovina Association, “Costache Negri” Branch from Galati, Honorary Member of the University Senate of the Alecu Russo Bălţi State University for providing the satisfaction of meeting with the national values of the past. The relations between Balti University Library and Galaţi started in 1992, when the need for a Romanian book has become extremely urgent.. Numerous letters were sent to big libraries in Romania, to various institutions and associations. Among the first who answered to our request was Radu Moţoc, who during a period of over 20 years helped to develop the Romanian book collections in the field of Romanian history, language and literature - over 33, 630 volumes worth about 1.5 million RON (100 000 euro), 30 643 books, 2 335 magazines; 227 CDs, DVDs, and documents in the following languages: Romanian, English, French, German, Spanish .etc.
Elena Harconita 122 The Second Life of Books from Private Collections
Fig. 4. The “Radu MOTOC” Collection
Fig. 5. The “Radu MOTOC” Collection
Some examples marked by ex-libris are the following: Dicţionar invers (Reversed Dictionary) (Bucharest, 1957), 43); Sadoveanu, Mihail. Dimineţi de iulie ( July Mornings) (Bucharest, 1927); Vlădescu, G. M. Moartea fratelui meu (My brother's death) (Bucharest, 1934), etc., which have the label on the inside cover: EX LIBRIS MOŢOC RADU, Ex-libris: Donation book fund from Cultural Association Pro-Basarabia and Bucovina, Galaţi Branch, Biblioteca Moţoc (Moţoc Library), Ex-libris Pro-Basarabia and Bucovina Cultural Association Galaţi Branch, Ex- libris: „Engineer Library Radu Moţoc” etc., engineer Radu Moţoc as a sign of ownership. Also, many books in the „Radu Moţoc” collection have autographs or simple thoughts, memories, special dedications: Engineer Radu Moţoc, this son of the Romanian Urban Muşatini [dynasty], and to everyone who loves, around, this bit of the Future in the Sol key, from a piece of Romaşcan - the author. Roman, February 1, 2011 - Gh. A. M. Ciobanu; Technical School of Commerce. Arad. The students' library. No. 3169. “Mircea Druc” collection (Fig. 6) comes from Mr. Mircea Druc, Prime Minister of the Republic of Moldova during 1990-1991, who donated books from the personal collection through the “Regina Elena” Foundation. He transmitted all his love and affection to the students who will open the pages of his lifetime “fortune.” This collection comprises of 285 documents from the fields of philosophy, social sciences, politics, economics, language, literature, history and periodicals in the following
123 Elena Harconita The Second Life of Books from Private Collections
languages: Romanian, English, French, Latin and Spanish. Most of the volumes are single copies and each work has the donor's ex-libris. Among the oldest works according to the year of publication are: Gonseth, Ferdinand. Déterminisme et libre arbitre (les problemes de la philosophie des sciences). – Neuchatel, Ed. du Griffon, 1947; Bujor, I. I. Gramatica limbii latine (Grammar of Latin). – Bucharest, Ed. Ştiinţa, 1958; Hugo, Victor. Omul care rîde (The man who laughs). - in Romanian language by Gellu Naum, Bucharest, Ed. Tineretului, 1961. The latest document of the collection is published in 2014 “Sunt român şi limba mea-i română” (“I am Romanian and my language is Romanian”).2 Several documents in the collection have the autographs of the authors including: Emil Constantinescu, politician and scientist, former president of Romania; Ion Iliescu, Romanian politician, who served as President of Romania three times; Paul-Philippe de Hohenzollern, also known as Prince Paul of Romania; Leo Butnaru, poet, prose writer; Gheorghe Calamanciuc, playwriter, poet and prose writer, etc.
Fig. 6. The “Mircea DRUC” Collection
Mircea Druc is an authentic “landsman.” He is a great lover of his country, nation and language. In support of these statements come the titles of the offered papers: “I am Romanian and my language is Romanian,” “Unity for the interests of the country!,” “Démocratie et educatie.”
2 Ioan Aurel Pop, ed. Sunt român şi limba mea-i română (Chişinău: Litera, 2014).
Elena Harconita 124 The Second Life of Books from Private Collections
Without books, we would be sadder and poorer. Books are like an inheritance passed on from generation to generation for those who will be born (Mircea Druc).3
The “Iulius Popa” collection (Fig. 7) belonged to Iulius Popa, journalist and bibliophile, who donated in the summer of 2016 a part of the personal library consisting of over 500 copies, all special books that show the fine and refined taste of the collector. The donated books represent the most diverse areas of human knowledge: starting with fiction, moving to science, history, soul and health. Documents have been integrated in the open access shelves at the Loan Hall No. 1, Scientific and Fiction Documents. The purposef the collection is to provide “all readers with good books, well chosen, beautiful, interesting and well translated, collected from all the productions of the human spirit.”4
Fig. 7. The “Iulius POPA” Collection
An outstanding gift is represented by rare editions, stored and preserved in the Rare Book collection. The contribution made by bibliophile Iulius Popa is immeasurable, as he is
3 Gabriela Cazacu, “Bibliotecile sunt eterne datorită pămîntenilor cu suflet mare: [despre Colecţia Mircea Druc de la BŞ USARB] [Libraries are eternal because of big-hearted people – on the “Mircea Druc” Collection of BŞ USARB]” Sintagmele. 2014, V, aug.-sept.: 7. 4 Iulius Popa Collection, http://bs-usarb.blogspot.com/search?q=colec%C5%A3ia+iulius+popa (accessed: November 23, 2017).
125 Elena Harconita The Second Life of Books from Private Collections
sharing his wealth with us. He offered the university community books for younger generations. We note some volumes from the rare book collection: Lazar, Victor. Cluj. - Bucharest: National Culture. 1923. - 78 p., with numerous paintings, photographs, illustrations, maps. On Endpaper: Exlibris Royal Cultural Foundation. This book is given by His Majesty King Carol II, the King of Romania (1839-1914) through the Royal Cultural Foundations for youth education and for rewarding the students who are heading for culture. Chamberlain, Houston Stewart. La Genese du XIX-me siecle T. 2. – Paris: Librairie Payot et C-ie, 1913. – 1552 p., bibliophile edition in French on culture, civilization, civilization development, progress and universal history. The “Ioan Călin Dimitriu” collection (Fig. 8) was offered in 2014 by Irina Dimitriu, Ioan Călin Dimitriu’s daughter, who expressed the wish that this collection would be a special fund that bears the name of her father, a computer specialist from Bucharest, Romania. 10 appendices were attached to the donated books.
Fig. 8. The “Ioan Călin DIMITRIU” Collection
Ioan Călin Dimitriu was born in Giurgiu in 1945, in a family with great respect for the book. He had a real passion for reading all his life. His favourite reading consisted of books on homeland and universal history. The proof of this passion is represented by a vast library that he has been building over years and which he has always wanted to give away to those who are most in need and also eager to read. Therefore, at the end of Mr. Dimitriu Ioan Calin’s life, his daughter donated a part of her father's books collection to Bălţi University. The collection includes 396 documents in various fields such as law, art, history, social sciences, mathematics, medicine, linguistics, language, but mostly Romanian and universal literature in Romanian, English and French. According to the genre of documents, the collection has the following elements: fiction - 81%, scientific - 16%, educational - 3%. The most beautiful gift in the past was represented by books, thus, some dedication can be found in some books, written by loved ones (daughter, wife, relatives, friends) to Ioan Călin Dimitriu. Here are some examples: Dimitriu Cristina; Dimitriu Ana Cristian; For Ioan Călin Dimitriu, With Love, Adriana Manga Happy Birthday 07 January 2006; Cristina June 27, 1978 Ioan Călin Dimitriu 03.08.2013; Jean Saulea Balti 1967 Pedagogical Institute. On the title sheet of each volume it is written - Ioan Călin Dimitriu, 03.08.2013.
Elena Harconita 126 The Second Life of Books from Private Collections
From a chronological point of view, the collection documents cover about 75 years, starting with 20th century and ending with books published in 2013. The book fund holds books that can now be converted to bibliophile values: Coster, Charle: Legenda şi întîmplările vitejeşti, vesele şi glorioase ale lui Ulenspiegel şi Lamme Goedzak în ţinuturile Flandrei şi aiurea. (Ulenspiegel and Lamme Goedzak's legendary and glorious l stories in Flanders and other countries). – Bucharest : Ed. de Stat pentru lit. şi artă, 1955. – 571 p.; Dreiser, Theodore. Sora Carrie. – Bucureşti : Ed. de Stat pentru lit. şi artă, 1957. – 516 p.; Bacalbaşa, Anton. Schiţe şi articole (Sketches and articles). – Bucharest : Ed. pentru lit. şi artă , 1957. – 431 p.; Bart, Jean. Europolis. – Bucureşti : Ed. de Stat pentru lit. şi artă , 1956. – 303 p.: il. and many others. We find collections that differ in content and graphics, especially: Biblioteca pentru toţi (Library for All), FICTION Connection, Globus, Meridiane, Senzaţional, Columna, „AltFel” compania, Romanul istoric (Historical novel), Săptămăna Financiară (Financial Week), Thriller, Ştiinţa afacerii (Business Science), Ion Jalea, Epica magna, Romanul de dragoste (The novel of love), Romanul secolului XX (the Novel of the 20th century), Comando, Christie, Biblioteca RAO (Library RAO) and others. The thematic homogeneity as well as the value of the donated books denote the fact that they were not accidentally acquired by the owner, but went on the thread of permanence of the national historical values. This is the theme of the works that deal with subjects of Roman literature, universal literature, history and language. Elena Cristian mentions in her study „that Ioan Călin Dimitriu tried to gather any note, regardless how little about the Romanian country.”5 The “Dr. Leonid Gheorghian” collection (Fig. 9) was integrated in the library fund in 2014, thanks to Dr. Leonid Gheorghian (place of residence in Germany, Bensheim). He donated from his own library 277 very important copies collected over time. Leonid Gheorghian was born in Prajila (1929), Soroca district, Republic of Moldova, where he lived during the first years of his childhood (Leonid Gheorghian does not remember this village, considering Balti as the town of his childhood). The collection holds valuable documents in the fields of culture and civilization, philosophy, history, aesthetics, literature and art. Romanian literature and universal literature prevailed as well as documents printed in Romanian, French and Italian. The documents in the collection have a seal on the title sheet of the book with the ex-libris: “Dr. Leonid Gheorghian. Fachazt fur Radiologie.”
5 Elena Cristian, “Colectia particulara a Dlui Ion Calin Dimitriu integrata in colectia Bibliotecii Stiintifice USARB” [The private collection of Mr. Calin Dumitriu from the Scientific Library of USARB] Confluente bibliologice [on-line] 2014 (3-4) : 117-124, http://libruniv.usarb.md/confbib/articole/2014_3-4/Conf%203-4,2014%20117-124.pdf http://www.calameo.com/books/001133349bb964f950861 (accessed: November 23, 2017).
127 Elena Harconita The Second Life of Books from Private Collections
Fig. 9. The “Dr. Leonid GHEORGHIAN” Collection
The oldest document in the collection is the volume of Mihai Eminescu “Poesii,” facsimiles published in 1884 (Bucharest, Publishing House SOCECU & Comp.) The volume includes all the poems of Mihai Eminescu published in “Convorbiri literare” for twelve years, as well as poems in manuscript form. It is the second copy of this document, the first copy being located to the USARB's “Rare Book” collection. Books come to the user with different messages. As far as universal literature is concerned works of famous universal writers can be discovered: Honore de Balzac, Charles Dickens, William Faulkner, Kafka, Saint-Exupery, Stendhal, Jules Verne, Emile Zola. The Romanian literature is present by the works of Tudor Arghezi, George Coşbuc, Nicolae Dabija, Ion Druţă, Mircea Eliade, Mihai Eminescu, Paul Goma, Liviu Rebreanu, Mihail Sadoveanu, George Topârceanu and Grigore Vieru. It is worth mentioning the volumes of prose written by Paul Goma, as well as Dr. Virgil Razseu, surgeon, animator of the scientific life, writer and journalist. In “Leonid Gheorghian” collection we find 4 CDs with religious songs, located in the Mediateque and 3 documents, musical notes collections, located in the Loan Hall No. 3 Musical Documents, which denote the interest of the collcetion’s owner to religious music. “Pavel Proca” collection (Fig. 10, 11) comes from one of the most prolific theatrologist in the Republic of Moldova, who worked at the “Vasile Alecsandri” National Theater in Balti. For four decades, he watched everything that happened on the scenes and behind the scenes of the Moldavian theatre, filming chronics, making portraits, writing reviews of various performances on stage throughout the country. Ion Ungureanu, Artist of the People, ex-Minister of Culture and Cults, mentions in his book “The Theater of My Life ...”, launched on September 2, 2011, at the International Book Fair: “To Paul Proca, ....But I did not expect this „star” of critics to come from Bălţi. Another Basarabian miracle. What a nice thing we have: So it's not all lost in our culture...”6
6 Ion Ungureanu, Teatrul vietii mele… in trei acte si fara antracte (Chişinău : Cartea Moldovei, 2012), 622 p.
Elena Harconita 128 The Second Life of Books from Private Collections
Fig. 10. The “Pavel PROCA” Collection
The donation includes 464 copies in 457 titles, including 179 new titles. The collection includes general-cultural spheres of interest (philosophy, real and applied sciences), and mostly specialty areas (art, fiction, history). The themes of the works include the subjects specific to theatre and film: acting, dramaturgy, directing, scenography, criticism in Romanian, Russian, published in the publishing houses: Albatros, Moldavian Book, Romanian Book, Meridiane, Art, Fiction, etc. Most books have the donor's ex-libris: “Personal P. Proca Library”. Books are inventoried, we suppose they also had a catalogue for tracking, quick retrieval, and avoid duplicate titles. The highest inventory number we found was No. 1. 3168 on the book - Мольер, Жан Батист. Полное собрание сочинений: В 3 т. Т.3. – М. : Искусство, 1987. – 717 p. (Moliere, Jean Baptiste. Complete works: In 3 vol. T.3. – M. : Art, 1987. – 717 p.) It follows that P. Proca was the owner of over 3000 works. Collections included: “Arcade”, “Biblioteca de artă” (The Art Library), “Biblioteca pentru toţi” (The Library for All), “Cele mai frumoase poezii (The Most Beautiful Poems), „Clasicii Literaturii Universale” (The Classics of Universal Literature), “Patrimoniu”, “Rampa”, “Romanul de dragoste” (Love novel), “Teatru” (Theater), “Texte comentate” (Commented Texts), «Античная драматургия» (Antique drama), «Классики и современники» (Classics and Contemporaries), «Мастера советского театра и кино» (Classics and Contemporaries), etc.
Fig. 11. The “Pavel PROCA” Collection
129 Elena Harconita The Second Life of Books from Private Collections
The library is proud of the books of Pavel Proca ,playwright and art critic, which are included in the „Book of Autographs and dedications” catalogue, edited by the USARB Scientific Library, the authors being Lina Mihaluţa, Elena Cristian and Svetlana Cecan. The “Daniela Gifu” collection. Daniela Grifu is a graduate in Physics, master degree in Communication and PhD in Philosophy. At present she is a professor at “Alexandru Ioan Cuza” University of Iasi. “Daniela Gifu” collection includes 96 copies in 62 titles, personal works and other Romanian books. The whole content of the collection is positioned by the effect of providing users with the Romanian words. Daniela Gifu (Fig. 12) publishes prose, literary criticism, essays, portraits in numerous cultural and literature journals in the country and abroad, as well as in anthologies and collective volumes. Some documents in the collection have a special value, which is given by the dedication of their authors. Some of these dedications were personalized, addressed to Daniela Gifu: The writer and journalist George Arhip writes, To my Friend Daniela Gifu, an invitation to the Nameless Country, George Arhip Iasi, on 11 Dec. 2010; Autograph of Poet Aurel Pop - My good friend Daniela Gifu, we go in and out of the world through a fall. It all depends on us, we have stopped and kept the secret of these falls. Sincerely Aurel Pop March 2013; Mrs. Daniela Gifu, these steps to the highest Eminescu and human spirituality. Respectfully George Popa March 13, 2011.7
Fig. 12. Daniela GIFU
A number of documents have autographs by Daniela Gifu, out of which we feel her love for the Romanian country , people and language: Romanians from Bălţi live hopefully. Daniela Gifu 14.09.2014 Bălţi; A pivotal bridge over the centuries. Romania - Moldova. With the joy of dedication. Daniela Gifu 11.09.2014, Bălţi. Mrs. Daniela Gifu comes with a message to all editors in Romania “If each of them could donate to the Library of the University of Bălţi one copy of each printed book, the symbolic “Bridge with Flowers,” which was spoken about for a quarter of centuries, would turn into a concrete “Bridge of Romanian Books.” It would be an invaluable help for those we call our brothers.”8 The “Dan-George Dimitrescu” collection (Fig. 13), obtained as donation in 2014, is the Dan George Dimitrescu family library. He graduated from Bucharest University of Engineering and worked as an engineer until his departure to Sweden in 1988. The collection includes 2 608 documents in 2 578 titles, including 1 774 solo titles in various languages (Romanian, English, French, German, Latin, Italian, Spanish, Russian). A significant weight in this collection is represented by the works in Romanian, the majority
7 Mihaluţa, Lina, Cristian, Elena, Cecan, Svetlana. Colecţia Daniela Gifu. In Carte cu autograf şi dedicaţii : catalog. Bălţi, 2015, vol. II, 261-268. ISBN 978-9975-50-152-1.
8 Daniela, Gîfu. Criză de carte românească la Biblioteca Știinţifică a Universităţii de Stat “Alecu Russo” din Bălţi, http://uzp.org.ro/criza-de-carte-romaneasca-la-bibliotecastiintifica-a-universitatii-de-statalecu-russo- din-baltii (accessed: September 15, 2015).
Elena Harconita 130 The Second Life of Books from Private Collections edited at the beginning of the 20th century. The rare book is represented by 410 volumes, and they can be classified as rare Romanian books and rare foreign books. The donor's great passions were books, geography, bridge, philately, and travel. The books reflect on the one hand the style and the intellectual interests of Dan George Dimitrescu and on the other hand his life and activities.
Fig. 13. The “Dan-George DIMITRESCU” Collection
The way the collection is presented shows the respect and special care of the owner for his books. Bonded and covered with rigid, flexible cover, they speak in their own style about the inseparable relationship between interest and passion for the bridge, the travelling, and the functions it has fulfilled. All documents bear the stamp of O. P. C. N Bucharest (Office of National Cultural Heritage). As a result, these cultural goods (books) were removed from the country. His daughter, Suzana Dimitrescu confesses about evidence of this episode of her father’s life (all books were transported to Sweden, 5 kg per person). Some of the books carry the author's notes and autographs, other simple inscriptions of the people who bought or donated them. We present some dedications given to Dan George Dimitrescu: A “modest” contribution to my competitive bridge! ... A dedication to my great maestro, to whom, with a friendly mind, I tell him that thanks to him, we have reached this level. Sincerely Andrei Varlan November 2003 or another autograph, On behalf of a friend and respect that I do not want to disappear. Andrei, May 2009; Mr. Dan Dimiterescu with all my esteem. From the father of the author M. Scarlat Sf Vasile 2007; My high school colleague and my old friend Dan Dimitrescu With all my love Dominte Timonu 1/06/2012; Mr. Dan Dimitrescu with feelings of esteem and appreciation from the author Gh. Neamu, etc. 9 The volumes are emphasized as patrimony values. We notice translations from foreign authors and works written by Romanian authors printed in the country and abroad. Passionate for culture, geography and history, Dan George Dimitrescu has gathered precious and rare books from different epochs and cultures. The state of preservation of these books is good, which means that they will last for many centuries, and the next generations will give them the attention, respect and appreciation that these written sources of Romanian history and civilization deserve.
9 Lina Mihaluţa, Elena Cristian, Svetlana Cecan, “Colecţia Dan George Dimitrescu.” [The Dan George Dumitrescu collection] in Carte cu autograf şi dedicaţii [Book with autograph and dedication]: Bălţi catalogue 2015, vol. II, 247-260. ISBN 978-9975-50-152-1.
131 Elena Harconita The Second Life of Books from Private Collections
In conclusion, we would like to quote a fragment from his daughter, Suzana Dimitrescu's evidence: “Dad was a good-hearted man who has been involved in the fate of many people trying to help them. We are glad that other literature enthusiasts will be able to enjoy the books so loved by our father.” The “Nicolae Varnay” collection was offered by his daughter. Dr. Nicolae Varnay was a lawyer, graduate of the Faculty of Law in Cluj. Besides the Hungarian mother tongue, he loved the Romanian language. He was self-taught in German and French , acquiring a pure culture in these languages. He worked as a lawyer in Arad, nicknamed „Gold mouth” for his pleadings in Romanian. He has grown up and lived in a multicultural environment - Romanians, Hungarians, Germans, Serbs, Jews, and he strongly believed in friendship among peoples. He loved music and theatre. His whole life he worshiped his family and passion for books. This donation was made by the initiative and by the care of his daughter Ileana Budişteanu, architect, associate professor, doctor from Bucharest, Romania. Documents in the collection date back to the 20th century and include books in Romanian, Hungarian, German, French, etc. (Fig. 14).
Hungarian • 366 English •243 German •95 English •24 Italian •4 Latin •2 Russian •1
Fig. 14. Collections per languages
The “Nicolae Varnay” collection (Fig. 15, 16, 17) includes 852 papers in 848 titles in various fields of knowledge: linguistics, literature, theory, literary criticism, philosophy, religion, law, real science, medicine, art, history and 4 titles in Romanian language in religion field. The charm of the “Nicolae Varnay” collection is the harmonious coexistence between languages, 43%) of them in Hungarian language being dominant. According to the genre of documents 51% are scientific documents, 46% are fiction and 3% didactic documents.
Elena Harconita 132 The Second Life of Books from Private Collections
Fig. 15. The “Nicolae VARNAY” Collection
The volumes in the collection items date from the 19th century to the present. An exceptional gift is the rare editions, the bibliophile books that are of interest not only in content but also in form, published during 1868-1955. We mention in particular the existence of bibliophile values: Almanach az 1892. evre: Egyetemes Regenytar / szerk. Kalman Mikszath. – Budapest : Singer es Wolfner, 1892. – 251 p. Ady-dokumentumok konyve. – [Bratislava]: [Eugen Prager], [1937]. – 87 componente. Ghetie, Jon. Dicţionar român-magiar : Pentru şcoală şi privaţi = Roman-magyar szotar : iscolai es maganhasznalatra / Jon Ghetie. – Budapest: Franklin-Tarsulat, 1896. – 501 p. Neuestes taschen-worterbuch deutsch und englisch. Ed.: F. E. Feller, O. Thiergen. – Leipzig: B. G. Teubner , 1898 (Kollektion Feller). – Vol.2. – 54 p. Maupassant, Guy de. Mont-Oriol; Yvette. forditotta: Frigyes Koranyi, eno Vertesy. – Budapest : Revai Testverek Irod. Int. R.-T., 1910. – 324 p. – (Klasszikus Regenytar / szerkesztik: Zoltan Ambrus, Geza Voinovich). Segur, Comtesse de. Les Bons enfants. Paris : Librairie Hachette, 1907. – 380 p.: il. – (Bibliotheque rose illustree). Tompa, Mihaly. Munkai: sajto ala rendezte es bevezetessel ellata Jozsef Levay. – Budapest : Franklin-Tarsulat, 1902. – Kot.1-2. – (Magyar remekirok ; 37-38). Kot. 1 : Dalok. Odak. – 1902. – 272 p.: portr. Kot. 2 : Dalok. Odak. Romanczok. Balladak. – 1903. – 275 p. Une Journee a Versailles: Guide illustre du chateau, du musee, du parc et des trianons. Paris : Braun & C, 1937. – 68 p.: il.
133 Elena Harconita The Second Life of Books from Private Collections
Fig. 16. The “Nicolae VARNAY” Collection
The category of valuable documents includes numbered copies, with autographs, illustrated books, as well as volumes with old manuscripts, ex libris or special binding techniques with stamps. Some include notes of the lawyer, Dr. Nicolae Varnay: Les Plus beaux tableaux du Louvre (Paris: Libr. Hachette, 1929), L` Ecole des femmes de A. Gide (Paris: Librairie Gallimard, 1929), Classe de E. Glaeser (Paris:Victor Attinger, 1929), Les Moins de vingt ans de Gyp (Paris: Calmann-Lévy, 1930). The cultural profile of the bibliophile Nicolae Varnay, is illustrated by encyclopaedic volumes. Allam - es jogtudomanyi enciklopedia / foszerkeszto: Imre Szabo. – Budapest : Akademiai Kiado, 1980. – Kot. 1-2. – ISBN 963-05-2056-7. Bainville, Jacques. Histoire de France / Jacques Bainville. – Paris : Librarie Artheme F Ayard, 1924. – 574 p.
Fig. 17. The “Nicolae VARNAY” Collection
The donation presents precious collections, some of which are unique: Biblioteca de buzunar (Pocket library), Biblioteca pentru toţi (The library for all), Biblioteca şcolarului (School Library), Bibliothèque Nationale, Bibliothèque rose illustree, Bibliotheca scriptorum graecorum et romanorum Teubneriana, Bibliothèque de philosophie scientifique, Bibliotheken der Weltlit, Cartea Vremii (The Book of Time), Classiques Larousse, Clepsidra, Cogito, Collection des écrivains illustres, Collection Europe, Columna, Deutsche Klassiker,
Elena Harconita 134 The Second Life of Books from Private Collections
Diakkönyvtar, Explication de notre temps, Fischer Bucherei, Gondolkodó magyarok, Grandes figure, Les grandes études historiques, Le Livre de poche, Lyceum, Mari Scriitori Români (Great Romanian Writers), Magyar remekirok, Meridiane, Nouvelle Bibliothèque Littéraire, Olcsó Könyvtár, Osszegyujtott muvei, Patrimoniu, Părinţi şi scriitori bisericeşti (Fathers and church writers), Remekírók Képes Könyvtára, Renaissance könyvek, Revai könyvtár, Romanul secolului XX (The Twentieth Century novel), Seria de autor „Jorge Luis Borges” (The author's series „Jorge Luis Borges”), Serie de autor Julio Cortazar (The author's series Julio Cortazar), Sinteze Lyceum,Tanulok Könyvtóra, Teatru (Theater), Teka, etc. The collection acquired by the lawyer, Dr. Nicolae Varnay is distinguished by thematic and linguistic diversity, value and originality; the documents are particularly useful for both students and teachers to be used for studies and research, and for all those interested in Hungarian language, literature and culture. The “Mircea Filip” collection (Fig. 18) was organized in the autumn of 2016. It was donated by Prof. Mircea Filip from Bucharest. The private collection “Mircea Filip” currently contains about 970 volumes in Romanian, English, French languages etc. This collection includes the documents from all fields of culture and science: philosophy, aesthetics, sociology, law, art, music, philology, works of art fiction, geography, history. Many of these books have historical notes, ex-libries, dedications and autographs. Also, they have a great graphic presentation, a generous and useful cultural approach that comes with useful information for library users, enriching the SLUSRB collection with new book titles. Analyzing the 1908-1960 editions, these include about 248 books, most of them unique, of which the oldest copies are:
Fig. 17. The “Mircea FILIP” Collection
Murnu George. Portretul Elin: Studiu iconografic din arheologia clasică cu 15 ilustraţiuni în text. Bucureşti: Inst. de Arte Grafice “Carol Gobl” (1908), îmbogăţită cu autograful “Lucreţia Zamfirescu 1914”. John Raphael Smith et les graveurs a la maniere noire du temps de Reynolds. Paris: Hachette et Cie (1914), cu 64 de gravuri engleze din secolul al XVIII-lea: Thomas Frye. La Reine Charlotte, femme de George III; James McArdell. Mary Panton, duchesse d`Ancaster (Hudson); Anne Day, devenue Lady Fenhoulet (Reynolds); Laurence Sterne (Reynolds); Emma Lyon, Lady Hamilton posant une “Nature” (Romney), etc. Cartea deţine un ex-libris ştampilă: Librăria “CARMEN SYLVA”.
135 Elena Harconita The Second Life of Books from Private Collections
Leonard de Vinci. Traite de la Peinture: traduit integralement pour la premiere fois en francais sur le Codex Vaticanus (Urbunas) 1270. Ouvrage orne de 40 fig. Demonstratives de l'edition Princeps et de 100 dess. Esthetiques d'apres les Cliches d'Alinari, Brogi et Fumagalli. Paris. Librairie Delagrave, (1919).
From the field of art, music we can mention the valuable documents that support the desire to know the miraculous world of beauty, the spiritual world: Posluşnicu, Mihai Gr. Istoria muzicii universale: Forme muzicale la popoarele occidentale şi la români: pentru clasa 6-a secundară de ambele sexe. Bucureşti: Cartea Românească, (1935). Ciomac, Em. Poeţii armoniei: I. S. Bach, Beethoven. Schumann, Chopin, Liszt, Verdi, Brahms, C. Franck, Mussorgsky, Debussy, M. Ravel, G. Enescu cu 12 portrete dupa desenele originale de Jean Al. Steriadi. Bucureşti : Fundaţia pentru lit.şi artă „Regele Carol II”, (1936). Cuclin, Dimitrie. Manual de muzică pentru clasa I-a secundară. Bucureşti: Cartea Românească, (1936).
There are over 100 volumes in the collection containing handwritten notes or autographs that specify who wrote them. Among heritage books in the collection of “Mircea Filip” we find a special one through the ennobled information on her pages. The book, Oprescu, G. Romanian countries seen by French artists (XVIII and XIX centuries). Bucharest: National Culture, (1926), holds the autograph “The 1st Prize taken in the 7th grade Gh. Maraloi 1934-35,”, ex-libris label: ROYAL CULTURAL FOUNDATIONS. This book is given by King Carol II via the Royal Cultural Foundation to youth education and to reward the students who are on the path of exploring the culture, and another ex-libris stamp Dr. Maraloi Gheorghe. The volumes of private collections „bear the traces of the time and touch of those who have browsed them before, their beauty is the beauty of the thought gathered in the miracle of the letters...” 10
The Scientific Library of the Alecu Russo Balti State University expresses its gratitude to the donors and families of Mr. Radu Moţoc, Mircea Druc, Ioan Calin Dimitriu, Leonid Gheorghian, Pavel Proca, Dan-George Dimitrescu, Daniela Gifu, Iulius Popa, Nicolae Varnay, Mircea Filip, Ioan Nicorici for the valuable collections of books that came to Balti and can be read today with as much passion as years ago.
References
Cazacu, Gabriela. “Bibliotecile sunt eterne datorită pămîntenilor cu suflet mare [despre Colecţia Mircea Druc de la BŞ USARB]” [Libraries are eternal because of big-hearted poeple – on the Mircea Druc Collection of BŞ USARB]. Sintagmele V (2014): 7. Cristian, Elena. “Colectia particulara a Dlui Ion Calin Dimitriu integrata în colectia Bibliotecii Stiintifice USARB” [The private collection of Mr. Ion Calin Dimitrtiu from the Collection of the Scientific Library of USARB]. Confluente bibliologice 3-4 (2014) : 117- 124, http://libruniv.usarb.md/confbib/articole/2014_3-4/Conf%203-4,2014%20117-
10 Stoica, Ion. Informaţie şi Cultură : sinteze, reflecţii, atitudini. Bucureşti : Editura Tehnică, 1997, 149.
Elena Harconita 136 The Second Life of Books from Private Collections
124.pdf, http://www.calameo.com/books/001133349bb964f950861 (accessed: November 23, 2017). Gîfu, Daniela. Criză de carte românească la Biblioteca Științifică a Universității de Stat „Alecu Russo” din Bălți [The Romanian book crisis at the Scientific Library of the “Alecu Russo” State University of Bălți], available online at: http://uzp.org.ro/criza-de-carte-romaneasca-la- bibliotecastiintifica-a-universitatii-de-statalecu-russo-din-baltii (accessed: September 15, 2015) Iulius Popa Collection, available online at: http://bs- usarb.blogspot.com/search?q=colec%C5%A3ia+iulius+popa (accessed: November 23, 2017). Leiter, R.A. “Reflections on Ranganathan`s Five Laws of Library Science.” Law Library Journal 96(3) (2003): 411-418. Mihaluţa, Lina and Elena Cristian, Svetlana Cecan. “Colecţia Daniela Gifu” [Daniela Gifu Collection]. 261-268. In Carte cu autograf şi dedicaţii: catalog [Book with autograph and dedications: catalogue]. vol. II. Bălţi: 2015,. ISBN 978-9975-50-152-1. Mihaluţa, Lina and Elena Cristian, Svetlana Cecan. “Colecţia Dan George Dimitrescu” [Dan George Dumitrescu Collection]. In [Book with autograph and dedications: catalogue]. vol. II. Bălţi: 2015,. ISBN 978-9975-50-152-1. Pop, Ioan Aurel (ed.). Sunt român şi limba mea-i română [I am Romanian and my Language is Romanian]. Chişinău: Litera, 2014. Ungureanu, Ion. Teatrul vietii mele… in trei acte si fara antracte [The theatre of my life… in three acts without intermission]. Chişinău: Cartea Moldovei, 2012. 622 p. ISBN 978-9975-60- 236-5. Stoica, Ion. Informaţie şi Cultură : sinteze, reflecţii, atitudini [Information and Culture. Summaries, Reflections, Attitudes]. Bucharest: Editura Tehnică, 1997. 227 p. ISBN 973- 31-1097-3.
The Progress and Development of the Digital Library of “Lucian Blaga” University of Sibiu since 2007
Rodica Volovici,1Cristina Pârvu1
1 Information and Documentation Science Department, “Lucian Blaga” University of Sibiu, Romania
Introduction
In 2007, when Sibiu (Romania) received the title of European Capital of Culture, the “Lucian Blaga” University Library got involved in its first digitization project, SCRIBe - System of Processing and Visualization of the Old Book Fund. The project aimed at exploiting and making old, rare books, of a high cultural importance available to readers, by scanning and indexing them in an electronic format. The project’s main objective was to elaborate a computerised system giving beneficiaries (citizens, Romanian and foreign researchers, representatives of libraries and museums) the possibility to access the old book fund, which was normally limited due to the scarcity of copies and the need to protect documents with a high degree of wear. Interest for these books stemmed from their old age and scarcity. The objectives of SCRIBe translated into: the creation of an experimental computerized system for purchasing, compressing, and managing the images in the respective documents, the creation of a website through which users can search the old book virtual library and express their interest in reading certain documents, the creation of an experimental system to recognize OCR characters, which can be adapted for various types of writings within these documents, the creation of a system through which users can visualize different parts of the images at various levels of detail, the design and creation of an experimental system through which users can apply methods to improve the quality of an image area and to express their satisfaction in this sense.
In 2013, the cultural project Sibiu Smart 2013 followed. Sibiu remained very interesting and attractive for tourists due to its annual promotion under an ever-renewed logo: if 2012 was the Baroque year, 2013 was the Smart year. The city's cultural agenda became richer compared to the one in the year of grace 2007, Sibiu - European Capital of Culture: new events vivifying the lively cultural atmosphere of Sibiu were added to well-established events, such as Astra Film Festival, Artmania, the Christmas Concert, Sibiu Jazz Festival, Tiff, or the “Carl Filtsch” Festival. The year 2013 was thus under the Smart sign of the college, young character of Sibiu’s university environment, a confirmation of the fact the city grew and became established as an important Romanian university centre, through its five universities and more than 20,000
Rodica Volovici, Cristina Pârvu 138 The Progress and Development of the Digital Library of “Lucian Blaga” University students. Projects initiated by the “Lucian Blaga” University of Sibiu were among the 78 approved projects: - Romanian Writers versus German Translators - “Lucian Blaga” Students' Colloquium - Gaudeamus - Students’ Fall - Sibiu Educational Festival, and the Digital Library of the LBUS - Sibiu Smart. The project aimed at creating a digital library dedicated to Sibiu in general and to cultural events, especially those that took place in 2013 under the auspices of Sibiu-Smart. It included the creation of a digital data base in which both old books about Sibiu, and images and videos of cultural events were archived. The bibliographical descriptions made in a professional manner by university library experts were available online, thus promoting the past and present multicultural richness of the city of Sibiu on the internet. By promoting this cultural resource of Sibiu in the network of Romanian university libraries, a very active Sibiu in these modern times was promoted in the Romanian and foreign academic environment. The project activities included: the design and creation of the digital library system on the library’s server, the implementation of the computerized system under its two components - a presentation and dissemination website and the DSpace digital base, archiving the scanned book pages, the bibliographical research of the collections of books or periodicals by or about the city’s representative personalities, the scanning of these bibliographical materials at the optimal format and quality - collecting digital objects (pictures, images, films, old books, news articles, etc.) - their digital processing in the optimal format and quality for the internet. The specific digital objects were processed from the viewpoint of library science in the two digital collections: Trecutul istoric Smart (Smart Historical Past) and Prezentul Smart (Smart Present), verifying and adding copyright. Then, the digital library was disseminated through various actions performed the library: news articles, organizing Nocturna Smart (Smart Night) in November 2013, participating at the Gaudeamus Book Fair in Bucharest in November 2013, and through the dedicated website: http://bcu.ulbsibiu.ro/smart. The proposed stages were: creating the digital library system - April-August 2013, selecting and scanning the bibliographical material, collecting and processing the digital metadata and archiving the digital objects - April-November 2013, disseminating the projects, promotional actions: April-November 2013. The aim was to create a digital library for Sibiu-Smart, in which to digitally archive and bibliographically describe (images, films, PDF files) old books about Sibiu and cultural events Sibiu-Smart. Then, a Sibiu-Smart digital library was made available to the online general public, where people can search and visualize both old books about Sibiu, historical and cultural personalities, and descriptions of Sibiu-Smart cultural events. Besides, a higher number of visitors and tourists were informed about the city’s cultural richness and attracted to Sibiu, as they got to know the diversity and richness of the cultural events due to their professional description and dissemination via the Sibiu-Smart Digital Library. By publishing documents and images about the cultural events in a Digital Library, they became available at any given moment, anywhere, on any device, whether a laptop, a tablet, or a smart phone. Of high importance was the truthfulness of information, coming from reliable sources, and the professional manner in which the bibliographical descriptions were made. Between 17-19 April 2013, the LBUS Library organized the 4th International Conference “Information Science and Information Literacy”, during which the Digital Library Sibiu- Smart was launched, and which became the project’s first promotional action.
139 Rodica Volovici, Cristina Pârvu The Progress and Development of the Digital Library of “Lucian Blaga” University
From June to November, we were busy selecting the books and periodicals, scanning them in the library's digitization laboratory - using a powerful BookEye4 scanner and the related professional software, installed and put into operation in the library digitization laboratory.
Europeana insight - contributions in the largest European cultural database
As a digital data contributor in the projects Europeana Libraries 2011-2012 and Europeana Cloud 2013-2015, the library proposed that one of the future collections in the Europeana digital library should be about Sibiu-Smart 2013. The LBUS Library became a digital collection contributor in Europeana in 2011, participating at the cultural projects below alongside the most important national and research libraries in Europe within The European Library (TEL): 1. Europeana Libraries: Aggregating digital content from Europe's libraries, 2011-2012 - 19 participants, 4.3 million digital objects (books, magazine articles, theses, letters), 850,000 images, 1,200 films and videos (click here for details about the project), 2. Europeana Cloud: New Spaces for Sharing Content, 2013-2016 - facilitated sending digital collections to Europeana and made available new tools to researchers for using and improving the resources available, - worked on a new cloud infrastructure, - brought a new set of digital data (2.4 million new metadata and 5 million digital objects in the cloud), 3. Europeana 1914-1918 - the project included the collection of stories, memoirs, and testimonies from the First World War (1914-1918), - contributors from all over Europe are called to bring their contribution in dedicated collections of digitized materials, available at: http://europeana1914- 1918.eu/en.
The Campaign Europeana 1914-1918 encouraged the people of Sibiu to go to the “Lucian Blaga” University Library to contribute to the European digital library with documents, memories, and stories, and to the recreation of public memory regarding the events, the people, and the institutions of World War I. The Romanian Academy Library, supported by the LBUS Library, organized a campaign to collect data in the building of the Sibiu University Library, after similar events in Bucharest and Cluj. The contributors’ documents were digitized, then recorded in the Europeana 1914-1918 database and returned to their owners, as each of them also submitted the documents’ stories. Thus, the city of Sibiu has contributed more than 150 war images from historical publications, magazines, and books, 36 pictures, 28 postcards and other personal objects (identity cards, business cards, student cards, etc.), as well as decorations. People also contributed with photos of historical monuments dedicated to the fallen heroes of the First World War. A very emotional moment was the meeting with the oldest war veteran in Sibiu, 101- year-old Mr.(r) Ioan Floca, member of the Sibiu branch of the National Association of War Veterans “Gl. Traian Moşoiu”, who received a home visit from the Coordinator of Europeana Romania, Mrs. Cristina Roiu, members of the LBUS Library staff, and col. (r) Victor Neghină, who made this meeting possible.
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The event was an opportunity to contact representatives of cultural institutions in Sibiu and find ways to collaborate in this and in future projects.
Projects on cultural local heritage
The next digitization projects in which the LBUS Library got involved were: Traditional communication and transportation means - from the preservation of heritage to its promotion: digitization between necessity and challenge and Preservation and exploitation of heritage: a history of the means of transportation from Sibiu county reflected in a “Library on wheels” - dedicated digital platform and touring exhibition; both took place in 2016. The first project was initiated by the “Lucian Blaga” University of Sibiu, unfolded through the University Library from April to November 2016, and was financed by the Local Council and the Sibiu City Hall, through the 2016 Cultural Agenda; the dedicated website is http://bcu.ulbsibiu.ro/Calatorind_prin_Sibiu/, while the digital repository in the Digital Library is http://digital-library.ulbsibiu.ro/dspace/. The two main collections are entitled Călătorind prin Sibiu - în imagini (Travelling through Sibiu - in pictures) and Istoria mijloacelor de transport reflectată în documente (The History of Transportation Means Reflected in Documents). The stories, memories, images, and exact data regarding the history of the city intertwined and outlined an ever more vivid picture of the Sibiu of the past, through the archived documents, the photographs in personal and institutional collections, into this project which aimed at highlighting the history of the city’s means of transport. Walking on the roads of Sibiu, whether you are a local, a passer-by or a traveler on the city’s streets, you may have wondered how they looked like 10, 50, or 100 years ago, how one could travel from one place to another, be it in a classic car, in the city's public or recreational transport means, or about the flying machines on the city’s sky. The beauty and the hidden stories of each street corner are waiting to be revealed by documents or histories added by each generation. What was the route of the tram, or what were the coach fees, where did people walk, or where were the fairs to which peasants came with bags, baskets, carts full of goods - these are all details conferring more charm to your city. The project “Traditional communication and transportation means - from the preservation of heritage to its promotion: digitization between necessity and challenge” developed a digital platform dedicated to the history of means of transport in the city of Sibiu. The project team completed the documentation stage and collected data about the Prehistory of the Modern Rocket. The Sibiu Manuscript (1400-1569), The Sibiu of the Past in the collection Emil Fischer, Hermann Oberth. Titan of Space Travel, Preindustrial and Industrial Heritage in Romania, the Tram Line in Sibiu, the Flight of Aurel Vlaicu. Besides, we created a collection of images (photographs, postcards) submitted by private collectors or partner institutions, representing carts, carriages, cars, train stations, platforms, bridges, trams, zeppelins, boats, bicycles, stagecoaches, horsemen parades, sledges. After evaluating the authenticity of the sources, we started processing the metadata and uploading them into distinct collections in the digital library. Starting from the idea that the library can be a cultural intersection, a meeting point, and a starting point for real or imaginary journeys, a data base containing the transport routes in Sibiu, scientific literature, as well as travel notes by those who walked the city’s streets, is a resource which can be exploited by the inhabitants, but also by the big number of tourists choosing Sibiu as their destination. On a website dedicated to the project, Călătorind_prin_Sibiu (Travelling through Sibiu), we highlighted the evolution, the history, and the diversity of means of transport, from the
141 Rodica Volovici, Cristina Pârvu The Progress and Development of the Digital Library of “Lucian Blaga” University
beginnings of Conrad Haas’ rocket in the 16th century, to the ancestor of the present trolley bus, the omnibus - equipped with an electric engine and wooden wheels - which started operating in 1904, to the electric tram, including the old locomotives in the Sibiu Depot. The second project, Preservation and exploitation of heritage: a history of the means of transportation from Sibiu county reflected in a “Library on wheels” - dedicated digital platform and touring exhibition, aimed at both developing a website dedicated to dissemination, then a repository of scanned images and documents constituting the Digital Library per se, available on the internet, and the creation of a touring exhibition with the digital materials, photographs made during the project. We also conducted a presentation study, printed in one of the project brochures, which followed the evolution, history, and diversity of the means of transport, from the prehistory of the Sibiu rocket in the 16th century, to the means of transport and of communication in Modern Europe, as reflected in publications. The presentation and dissemination website can be accessed at http://bcu.ulbsibiu.ro/Biblioteca_pe_roti/, while the digital repository is available at http://digital-library.ulbsibiu.ro/dspace/. The project structure included two sections or digital collections: I. “Biblioteca pe roți” în imagini (Library on wheels - in pictures) 1. Human-powered means of transport 2. Animal-powered means of transport 3. Mechanical means of transport 4. Craftsmen, crafts and workshops 5. Hydraulic means of transport II. Documentation resources on transport in the county of Sibiu 1. Monographies 2. Periodicals 3. Selective bibliography and online resources 4. Project publications.
During this project, we collaborated with institutions in Sibiu (History Museum, Astra Museum, Sibiu County Division of the National Archives, Teutsch House, Tursib, Sibiu CFR Depot), but also with private collectors. After ten years of transformations and evolution, 2017 brings a new challenge to the Digital Library, i.e. the project O frescă a societăţii şi un tezaur istoric în imaginile atelierelor fotografice de epocă din Sibiu (1854–1948). Valorificare şi digitizare (Images of Sibiu's Classic Photo Studios (1854–1948): Society Fresco and Historical Treasure. Exploitation and digitization),an integral part of the project Valori ale cunoaşterii tradiţionale în susţinerea regiunii gastronomice europene Sibiu 2019 (Traditional Knowledge Values to Support Sibiu European Region of Gastronomy 2019) run by the Sibiu University. Through the digital platform which will include historical photographs from most studios of Sibiu during the mentioned period, the “Lucian Blaga” University Library aims at saving, exploiting and thus offering a valuable, less known treasure to the general public. The project started with a conference on the history of photography in Sibiu, one of the first Transylvanian cities where permanent photo studios ran, where people had the opportunity to appreciate the charm of classic photos. The following collections were created: 1. Photo studios in Sibiu - Alois ZIEGLER (1838 Sibiu–?) - August Salomon MEINHARDT (1845 Töttleben, Germany-1900?) - Camilla (Kamilla) ASBOTH (1838 near Budapest–1908 Sibiu)
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- Emil FISCHER (1873-1965) - Fritz THEIL (1880 Sighişoara–1942 Agnita) - Guggenberger Mairovits - Gustav Albert SCHIVERT (Schievert, 1826 Sibiu–1881 Graz) - Heinrich BüCHNER (1821 Altenberg, Germany–1890 Sibiu) - Johann NICKLAS (1832 Sibiu–1878 Mănărade) - Julie HERTER (1838 Cârţa/Harghita–1922 Sibiu) - Theodor GLATZ (Vienna, 10 December 1818 – Sibiu, 13 April 1871) - Victor MYSZ (Alba Iulia 1875–Sibiu 1940) - Wilhelm AUERLICH (1853 Braşov–1917 Sibiu) - Wilhelm MANN (1867 Alba Iulia –1927 Salzburg) 2. Classic gastronomy - Gastronomy - Monographies - Gastronomy - Periodicals
The images showing agro-food markets in the Small Square and the Big Square, restaurants, cafes, terraces, and confectioners’ brought people in the atmosphere of the past. Of interest were both the photographs of 1854-1948, and the devices and images in the studio of Emil Moşoiu (1926–1996), which were donated to the University Library by Mrs. Silvia Coacă, the daughter of the photo artist. The collections of the Digital Library also include: science books, LBUS Library publications, periodicals in Sibiu, PhD theses (summaries), Telegraful Român newspaper (full issues of 1868-1882; 1887-1888; 1918 ), Telegraful Român newspaper (transliteration of issues from January to August 1853 ), and national science publications.
Conclusions
All the documents included in the Digital Library of “Lucian Blaga” University of Sibiu are of great importance for the local heritage, culture, development and history of this part of our country. The selection of these documents was made after the necessity of the academic and local community interests was established. The participation of Romania in the Europeana Digital Library was not significant until two years ago. Through the Europeana Libraries Project, the Library of the Romanian Academy and the “Lucian Blaga” University of Sibiu had contributed with a rich and a high quality digitized content, thus enriching the image of the Romanian culture in Europeana. For the ”Lucian Blaga” University from Sibiu, it was a challenge and an honor to take part in the project together with the most important Research Libraries in Europe. We had the opportunity to see how the big important European libraries are organized and function ( Europeana, CENL, TEL, CERL), we gathered a rich professional experience, beginning with preparing the digital material and ending with its processing and cataloging. There was also a great opportunity for us to promote our university as an institution providing knowledge; some of the local and national cultural richness ( books or cultural events) are available now in digital format in Europeana. The partnership between the University and the mayoralty of Sibiu made possible the promotion of the major cultural event of 2007: “Sibiu - European Capital of Culture.” There was a year very rich in cultural events as you can see in the pictures and videos of our digital collection. For the future, the University of Sibiu wants to continue working with the European partners, through the e-Cloud project and the future structure organization of the European Library. So, we would like to promote the cultural richness of our region, as well as its multicultural values.
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References
Biblioteca XXI : Management si marketing [The Library XXI: Management and marketing], ed. Gheorghe Buluta et al. Targoviste: Bibliotheca, 2012. Cartea electronică [The electronic book], coord. Doina Banciu. Bucharest: AGER, 2001. The “Lucian Blaga” University Library of Sibiu web page, available at http://bcu.ulbsibiu.ro/ [accessed 29.09.2017]. Digital library of “Lucian Blaga” University Library of Sibiu, available at http://digital- library.ulbsibiu.ro/dspace/ [accessed 15.09.2017]. Capital Cultural online journal (2017), available at http://capitalcultural.ro/calatorind-prin- sibiu-cu-biblioteca-digitala-a-ulbs/ [accessed .18.09.2017].
Revista BIBLIOTECA (“The Library” Review): 1948-2018 – A Landmark in the Professional Community of Romanian Librarians
Elena Tîrziman,1 Maria Micle2
1 University of Bucharest, Romania 2 West University of Timişoara, Timişoara, Romania
Introduction
A professional and scientific field gains prestige and social recognition if it can assert its own specific identity. One can discuss a professional and scientific field whether that field generates the followings: it clearly states its subject matter; it defines its specific concepts; it develops its own methodology; it states its own laws; argues on models and theories; and it supports specialized publications which become the public space of the said field. From this point of view, one can argue that Library Science and the Science of Information is an recognized interdisciplinary field with a clearly stated status1 mentioned in the International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED) of UNESCO under the code 0322 Library, information, archive – however, Library Science does not always and everywhere enjoy an appropriate prestige. Specialized publications contribute decisively to the prestige and status of a given domain – thus, this chapter will present the journal “Biblioteca” which celebrates 70 years of uninterrupted activity in 2018. Over these 70 years, the journal has intersected with the path of Romanian libraries and librarians, the two sides aiding each other throughout each one’s development and difficulties. The information presented in this chapter was obtained through content analysis of the journal. This was, of course, a quantitative analysis which went through the entire collection and was aimed at identifying and highlighting relevant information on the history of the journal, such as: sections, subject matters, cultural and bibliological personalities, and the importance of the journal for the info-documentary field.
The history of the journal
Since July 1948, the Biblioteca Journal has been a space for publication, information, debate, and professional formation. It first appeared under the title Călăuza cetitorilor [The Readers’ Guide] (July 1948) and its aim was to record new publications. Shortly afterwards, it starts to develop as a publication dedicated to librarians and thus, in October 1948, it changes its name into Călăuza bibliotecarului [The Librarian’s Guide], keeping this name until December 1964. Between January 1965 and December 1973, it appears monthly as Revista bibliotecilor [The Journal of Librarians]. The reforms in culture affected the publication: between 1974 and December 1989, it is
1 European Commission. Education and training. ISCED 2013 code: 0322 Library, information, archive. https://ec.europa.eu/education/resources/international-standard-classification-education-fields_ro (accessed November 28, 2017).
145 Elena Tîrziman; Maria Micle Revista BIBLIOTECA (“The Library” Review)
published as Biblioteca: buletin trimestrial de biblioteconomie/bibliologie [The Library: Quarterly Bulletin of Library Sciences]. Within this period, it appeared as a supplement of the journals Îndrumătorul cultural [Cultural Guide] (December 1974 – December 1979) and Cîntarea României [The Song to Romania] (January 1980 – December 1989). The year 1990 represents a new beginning for the publication: it appears as a new series published by the Ministry of Culture with the title Biblioteca: revistă de bibliologie şi ştiinţa informării [The Library: Journal of Library and Information Sciences]; afterwards, starting with 2009, it started to be published by the Romanian National Library (which also publishes the following journals: Revista Bibliotecii Naţionale a României, Revista Română de Istorie a Cărţii, Revista Română de Conservare şi Restaurare a Cărţii)2.
Subject matters, content, sections – evolution in time
Starting its very first years of existence, the journal becomes a benchmark for professional formation, because of three main reasons: the publication of fundamental specialized literature; the creation of a section dealing with the field’s theory and practice; the active support of professional manifestations and continual formation in Library Science. The publication contains articles on the organization of courses for librarians, the professions included in the profile of the librarian, the attributions of various professions in Library Science, proposals for improving field-related activities, etc. The cultural dimension of the journal should also be highlighted. The Romanian and foreign cultural and documentary heritage present in libraries is presented to the wide public. Significant personalities of the time authored articles – some of them being the academician Virgil Cândea, mathematician Grigore C. Moisil, literary historian Şerban Cioculescu, historian Alexandru Zub. Today, “Biblioteca” (ISSN 1220-3386) is still connecting the members of the professional community of Romanian librarians, but it faces the challenges of digital communication. Still edited by the Romanian National Library, it is published monthly in printed format, as an informative bulletin addressed to all types of libraries and its articles continue to be written in Romanian with contents and abstracts in English.3 The current sections of the journal are the followings: Repere profesionale [Professional Benchmarks] – it contains Library Science theory and scientific research Viaţa bibliotecilor [The Life of Libraries] – presentations of current activities in all types of libraries (events, projects, models of successful practices) Metodologie [Methodology] – usually contains materials by the Romanian National Library which functions as methodological coordinator Patrimoniu [Heritage] – section on collections and library values Meridian bibliologic [Library Science Overview] – section on the personalities of the field and events Galaxia Gutenberg [Gutenberg Galaxy] – miscellaneous section, library calendar, reviews, documentary summaries, debates.4
2 Reviste BNR. http://www.bibnat.ro/Reviste-BNR-s223-ro.htm (accessed December 20, 2017). 3 See the journal with all its information here: http://www.bibnat.ro/Biblioteca-revista-de-bibliologie- si-stiinta-informarii-s224-ro.htm (accessed December 20, 2017). 4 http://www.bibnat.ro/Biblioteca-revista-de-bibliologie-si-stiinta-informarii-s224-ro.htm (accessed December 20, 2017).
Elena Tîrziman; Maria Micle 146 Revista BIBLIOTECA (“The Library” Review)
“Biblioteca” (“The Library” Review) - a benchmark in professional formation
During the period when there were no graduate courses on Library Science, the journal played a significant role for the formation of librarian professions. The University of Bucharest had a Library Science Department within the Literary Faculty between 1953 and 1958. The courses initiated by N. Georgescu Tistu at the University of Bucharest were continued by Mircea Tomescu (1960-1969) and Dan Simonescu (1970-1972). Between 1963 and 1970, Professor Dan Simonescu coordinated a department of Library Science where the courses had a length of three years. Starting with 1968, under the coordination of the same professor, the PhD studies in the field were inaugurated. Since 1990, after the fall of communism, Library Sciences return as a form of institutionalized education within universities such as the University of Bucharest and other universities in Romania from the cities of Cluj, Timișoara, Sibiu, Brașov, Oradea, Suceava, Târgoviște. Of these universities, the Library Science departments from București, Cluj, Sibiu, Timișoara (as a post-university programme) still function. The new programmes proposed the professional formation of individuals in the areas of Library Science, Information and Documentation, and the Science of Information, for professions in a permanent state of transformation because (due to their content represented by documents and information). University formation assures the establishment of the following professions: librarians (cataloguing, indexing, librarians in relation with the public, librarians for reference services), editors, archivists, documentary specialists, database specialists, specialized information intermediaries, and other professions in the field of Information Sciences. In the communist period, the specialized university formation was sporadic and was done through optional courses – thus, the ones who worked in libraries were gradates of other specializations, usually of humanities, who then needed initiation and continuous formation courses. This is the point where the importance of Biblioteca as a professional support becomes apparent. The journal collections of the ‘1950s, ‘60s, ‘70s, and ‘80s display articles with varied subjects on the profession, as well as articles with a theoretical and practical perspective. The subject of theory and practice in Library Science is dealt with in approximately half of the journal content. This is done in an extremely diversified way (from a thematical point of view), starting from subjects of wide general interest to particular aspects for small communities of specialists in the field. The articles and studies specifically refer to aspects and professional competences5 in Library Science and the Science of Information – furthermore, one can observe an evolution of these articles throughout time. Since the journal’s very beginning, there was a clear preoccupation with the assessment and consolidation of the Library Science professions so that any Romanian librarian (regardless of the type of library they work in and of their geographical area) could have at disposal articles of interest while being up-to-date with the field and while belonging to the community. Furthermore, the most relevant aspect of the journal’s preoccupation with the profession was that it offered information in such a way that the work quality of the Romanian librarian was not different than the work quality of librarians from representative European libraries. Should one write a textbook on Romanian Library Sciences solely with information gathered from the journal’s collections, a complex document would result which would
5 Elena Tîrziman; Maria Micle. “Adapting Librarians’Professional Competences to Current Requirements through Initial Education and Lifelong Education,” in European Journal of Social Sciences Education and Research (http://ejser.euser.org/), vol. 6, no. 2 (2016), 161-166. http://journals.euser.org/files/articles/ejser_jan_apr_16/Elena.pdf (accessed November 28, 2017).
147 Elena Tîrziman; Maria Micle Revista BIBLIOTECA (“The Library” Review)
encompass all Library Sciences sub-fields of interest as well as the historical evolution of the field. The development and the organization of the collections is a thoroughly debated subject touching on aspects of evidence (considered important in the 1950s when the society was being reorganized after the instauration of communism), acquisition, the organization and reorganization of the legal deposit, supplementing collections by “the collection of libraries” as a method of centralized acquisition from publishers (in the 1960s). National and international publication exchange becomes important for the Romanian scientific communities, especially in the 1970s, although one can notice a decrease in these activities in the 1980s because of ideological reasons such as Romania’s imposed communication limitation with the western world. Publication processing is one of the best represented themes in the journal. Thus the theory and practice of publication processing (cataloguing, indexing, the organization of catalogues) were presented with the main aim of describing its methodology, by instructing and helping the library community to work in a unitary way. The international cataloguing norms were repeatedly presented, together with the specific standards for publication processing, the instruments needed for work, guides and methodologies, and examples (this has been happening since the 1960s up until the present day). Subjects such as information and documentation in libraries are frequently found in the articles of the 1970s and ‘80s, while subjects regarding the digitalization of libraries and digital information started to be dominant in the 1990s towards the years 2000. After the 1990s, the university curriculum reintroduces courses of Library Sciences, thus the Biblioteca journal starts to collaborate and support the academia. Although the editorial production often surpasses the reading and assimilation capacity of the specialized bibliography, the Romanian journals of Library Sciences are still not frequent, thus Biblioteca remains a leader in popularity, based on its subscriptions and visibility. Alongside professional articles, scientific articles are increasingly published, thus the journal starts to be open to international authors who present their experiences in the field. Furthermore, the journal is more and more cited in the thematical bibliography offered to students.
Personalities and the journal
Several generations of specialists contributed to the consolidation of the Library Sciences field in Romania and they used the publication as a space for information and professional debates. Reading the journal issue by issue, one can notice the evolution of the field in Romania as well as matters such as: keeping the profession up-to-date and modernizing it, theorizing Library Science activities, the dissemination of good practices in the field, the collaboration between libraries, etc. This way, one the journal highlights certain methodological issues of the field, such as: how public and scientific libraries were organized; which were the principles of collection development; which norms were at the basis of publication processing; how catalogues were organized; how bibliographies were created; how information and documentation activities were done in libraries; etc. A significant number of articles were signed by representative names – thus these texts (which often also presented portraits of renowned Romanian Library Science specialists) became fundamental in the field. Furthermore, the preoccupation of research and documentation is apparent throughout the journal content. Therefore, over a century ago, Ioan Bianu, managed to create a Library Science school within the Library of the Romanian Academy, to create the basis of the field’s activity in Romania. Furthermore, he defined the function and organization rules of a library (based on unitary norms, theories, and practices), thus creating a library which then became the first national library of Romanians. Nerva Hodoş, who was schooled at Bianu’s school from the
Elena Tîrziman; Maria Micle 148 Revista BIBLIOTECA (“The Library” Review)
Library of the Romanian Academy, imposes the reorganization (based on modern scientific criteria) of Library Science activities. Most significantly, he imposed the reorganization of bibliographical articles – a domain in which he was deeply involved. Nicolae Georgescu Tistu takes the Library Science school to an institutionalized environment. As a docent in Library Sciences, he teaches specialized courses at the Higher School of Archives and at the Literature Faculty of the University of Bucharest. Ioachim Crăciun has a remarkable teaching career in Cluj and contributes fundamentally to the development of the field with significant writings. Dan Simonescu6 enriches the field with a historical, theoretical, and research dimension, thus essentially contributing to the evolution of the book-related fields. Corneliu Dima Drăgan continues the activity of Professor Simionescu and directs his teaching and research activities towards the theory and practice of Library Sciences, as well as the history of libraries. Mircea Tomescu was preoccupied by the theoretical and practical aspects of the field and published his research thus defining and presenting his concepts in an remarkable work on the history of the Romanian book. Gabriel Ştrempel7 modernizes the Library Science school of the Library of the Romanian Academy, by connecting his path with that of this library and by contributing to the realization of several monumental papers in the field. Gheorghe Buluţă was one of the most representative followers of Dan Simionescu and continued the work of the famed professor by his contribution to the theoretical and practical development of the Romanian Library Studies. Mircea Regneală8 discusses the entire contemporary problematic of Library Sciences, touching on theoretical and applied research, thus having a significant contribution to the support of today’s education in the field. Several other names were involved in the editorial activity of the journal. They supported its publication in sometimes extremely difficult situations being aware that Biblioteca is a fundamental professional benchmark for the Romanian librarians and libraries. Some of these names are the following: Grigore Botez, Getta-Elena Rally, Barbu Theodorescu, Atanase Lupu, Angela Popescu-Brădiceni, Corneliu Dima Drăgan, Ioana Lupu, Corina Costopol, Emil Vasilescu. The Biblioteca journal, through the specialists of the field with recognized realizations, assured a type of advisory environment for librarians, creating a bridge for dialogue between specialists and librarians.
6 The fundamental bibliographical work used for the identification of old Romanian patrimony books is: Ioan Bianu, Nerva Hodos, Dan Simionescu, Bibliografia românească veche. 1508-1830 [Old Romanian Bibliography. 1508-1830]. I: 1507-1716 (Bucharest: Academiei Române, 1903); II: 1716-1808 (Bucharest: Academiei Române, 1910); Ioan Bianu, Dan Simonescu, Bibliografia românească veche. 1508- 1830 [Old Romanian Bibliography. 1508-1830] III: 1817-1830 (Bucharest: Academiei Române, 1936); Ioan Bianu, Dan Simionescu, Bibliografia românească veche. 1508-1830 [Old Romanian Bibliography. 1508-1830] IV: adăogiri şi îndreptări [Additions and Corrections] (Bucharest: Academiei Române, 1944). 7 Gabriel Ștrempel also coordinated the following summary works: Bibliografia românească modernă, 1831-1918 [Modern Romanian Bibliography, 1831-1918] 4 volumes (Bucharest: Editura științifică și enciclopedică, 1984-1991); Catalogul manuscriselor românești [The Catalogue of Romanian Manuscripts] 4 volumes (Bucharest: Editura știinţifică și enciclopedică, 1978-1992). 8 M. Regneală headed the editing of the collective work: Tratat de biblioteconomie [Treatise on Library Studies] 2 volumes (3 books) (Bucharest: Asociaţia Bibliotecarilor din România, 2013-2016). The third volume is currently being published.
149 Elena Tîrziman; Maria Micle Revista BIBLIOTECA (“The Library” Review)
The importance of the journal for The National Romanian System of Libraries9 (Sistemul National de Biblioteci din România [SNBR])
Throughout its 70 years of activity, the journal was an editorial space in which all types of libraries were involved, including the SNBR as a whole. The journal helped libraries to remain united and fulfill their specific aim, even in difficult social and historical moments. Biblioteca thus became a public space for Library Sciences and a forum for professional questions and answers, while being an exhibition of library presentations, good practices, examples of representative activities. While large libraries such as the Romanian National Library, the Library of the Romanian Academy or the university libraries are usually present in the journal, also smaller school and public libraries are present. They are motivated by the will to make their presence visible in the both library space and in the Romanian cultural space of their specific interest. The Biblioteca journal was the main methodological support for SNBR thus contributing to the promotion of norms, standards, guides, and unitary work methodologies for all libraries in the system. Between the 1970s and 1980s, when the access to international information was particularly difficult, the journal compensated this phenomenon by trying to promote, on the largest professional scale, translations for the specialized literature, conferences, and other types of activities which aided the library professions. Without exaggerating, it can be asserted that the journal Biblioteca had a significant contribution to the synchronization of the Romanian Library Science reality and that of the international reality (Russian on several stages, as well as European and North American). It is important to note that SNBR regards the journal as a forum of all Romanian libraries, as a professional and editorial space of all libraries and librarians.
The perspectives of the journal in today’s digital information context
The dependence on the technological innovation is increasingly accentuated today, thus electronic resources offer specialists abounding information from all over the globe. However, because this information is preponderantly published in English (the new scientific language), the accessibility of to these resources depends on an advanced knowledge of the language and on the level of digital alphabetization. Because of the need of internationalization and integration in the “global village,” researchers are motivated to rather publish in foreign journals and in a language of international circulation in order to receive international visibility. Therefore, original productions and specialized literature in Romanian are increasingly poorer. As a consequence, one can notice the creation of a distance between the scientific (elite) environment and the professional one, which, generally, tries to integrate the innovative ideas in its own rhythm. Scientific journals, just like the entire publishing field (both characterized by the diffusion of novelty) is currently acclimatizing to the digital environment. Therefore Biblioteca has once more the opportunity to assess its role in the Romanian community, by popularizing and disseminating science to a large Romanian-speaking professional environment. Contrary to the printed publication formats, online publications allow communication in two ways and favour rapid reaction. Today, Biblioteca published its summaries and abstracts bilingually (in Romanian and English) and, since 2010, it is indexed in EBSCO and ProQuest. The next step necessary for keeping and enforcing its visibility is transforming the journal in an open access journal. This way, its content could better reach its target audience who could be involved and interested in the professional activities of librarians.
9 SNBR is formed of two main types of libraries: public libraries (county/city/local libraries) and educational libraries (academic and school libraries). The National Library has a methodological influence over libraries, especially the public ones.
Elena Tîrziman; Maria Micle 150 Revista BIBLIOTECA (“The Library” Review)
Conclusions
Being both a cultural and a specialized publication of Library Sciences, the Biblioteca journal is a channel for professional communication and opinion formation. It managed to be a constant appreciated presence in the specialized Romanian space, favouring publications from the entire SNRB network. Having reached its 70th anniversary, after an often difficult and questioned path, the journal continues to support libraries and librarians in their professional destiny. There are only a few other specialized publications in Romania with can pride with such a longevity. Biblioteca is addressed to all libraries from the SNRB network, thus its role of defining the status of Romanian Library Sciences must be highlighted. Furthermore, the journal must be supported so that it remains in the professional editorial space of Romanian libraries and librarians.
References
“Biblioteca”. Ed. Romanian National Library. http://www.bibnat.ro/Biblioteca-revista-de- bibliologie-si-stiinta-informarii-s224-ro.htm (accessed June 28, 2017). Biblioteca Collection. 1948-2017. Biblioteca, număr aniversar – 65 de ani [Biblioteca, anniversary issue – 65 years]. Bucharest: Editura Bibliotecii Naţionale a României, 2013. Buluţă, Gheorghe and Victor Petrescu. Galeria bibliologilor români. Portrete [The gallery of Romanian Library Sciences specialists. Portraits]. Târgovişte: Biblioteca, 2013. European Commission. Education and training. ISCED 2013 code: 0322 Library, information, archive. https://ec.europa.eu/education/resources/international-standard-classification-education- fields_ro (accessed November 28, 2017). Tîrziman, Elena and Maria Micle. “Adapting Librarians’Professional Competences to Current Requirements through Initial Education and Lifelong Education”. In European Journal of Social Sciences Education and Research (http://ejser.euser.org/) 6 (2016): 161-166. http://journals.euser.org/files/articles/ejser_jan_apr_16/Elena.pdf (accessed November 28, 2017).
151 Elena Tîrziman; Maria Micle Revista BIBLIOTECA (“The Library” Review)
Fig. 1. Example of one of the journal’s issues: the editorial board, the table of contents and the cover Source: http://www.bibnat.ro/Ultimul-numar-s239-ro.htm
The Journeys of Books
Robert Coravu
Department of Communication Sciences, Faculty of Letters, University of Bucharest, Romania, [email protected]
The traveller goes well with the road The traveller goes well with the book The book goes well with the road
The book - a journey per se
Each book is a journey per se: it takes us from one point of our life experience and carries us to another, where we find ourselves enriched with ideas, stories, knowledge, feelings generated by the experiences and imagination of other people. This journey can be done for leisure, can have an educational goal or can represent a form of resistance, of survival, of escape from an overwhelming reality. Reading as entertainment is the most usual interaction with the book. Here, a particular case is the book that accompanies the traveller, that is his/her companion. The traveller goes well not only with the road, as one Romanian proverb says, but also with the book. The book which accompanies the traveller is a journey inside another journey, a virtual one added to the one made in the real world. On the other pole, reading as a way of resistance is a familiar experience, not so distant in time, for Eastern Europe. Before the changes which occurred in this area in 1989, the book was, for the people of these countries, an open door to freedom, one of the few ways to break out of a prison without bars. Reading is a survival reflex activated in any totalitarian society, even in settings hard to imagine. Most of the Theresienstadt survivors named the access to written word as one of the basic reasons of their survival, reading being, in such an extreme context, “a crucial tool of comfort, learning, and escape.”1 The Ghetto Central Library, inaugurated in August 1942, whose collections included, at the end of the war, around 100,000 volumes, was part of the props of an “exemplary concentration camp” - in fact, a transit point to death camps as Treblinka or Auschwitz - used by the Nazis in order to show to the world that the Jews with a certain social and intellectual status who were “hosted” here lived a normal life. The collections of the Ghetto Central Library came from the Jewish libraries confiscated by the Nazis but also included books found in the luggage of deported Jews. The library had a reading room, some branches and a bookmobile system - boxes with books which travelled around the camp. Thus, in the midst of a tragedy without equivalent in the history of mankind, defying the omnipresent spectre of death, the book had an important contribution to survival by facilitating journeys of the imagination beyond the barbed wire fences.
1 Miriam Intrator, “People were literally starving for any kind of reading: The Theresienstadt Ghetto Central Library, 1942-1945” Library Trends 55, no. 3 (2007): 514.
153 Robert Coravu The Journeys of Books
Travelling books
Starting from the third library science law of Ranganathan - “Every book its reader” - one can say that the fate of the book is to travel, to come down from the shelf in order to be read, to be borrowed from a library or from one reader to another, to travel sometimes long and difficult roads to get to the one who needs it. The book goes well with the road: an unread book, that lays on a library shelf, does not fulfil its destiny. For a long time, until the codex imposed itself as the most ergonomic shape of the book-object, the book had a corporality that limited its circulation. The conjunction between the advantages of codex and those of the printing technology facilitated the journeys of the books. Later on, when book circulation developed in parallel with the preservation as main function of libraries, the journeys of the books were supported by lending services provided inclusively to those readers who were unable or in difficulty to reach the library building. Even before the emergence of modern public libraries, the goal to provide books to those who used to have difficulties to get them was reached through mobile libraries, also known as itinerant libraries or travelling libraries. In 1679, the English reverend Thomas Bray established the first travelling loan libraries in order to help clergymen who did not have the possibility to acquire the theological books they needed. These mobile libraries were constituted from books packed in boxes and sent to the deaneries of British colonies2. In Great Britain, the Industrial Revolution and the improved transportation facilitated the emergence, at the beginning of 19th century, of itinerant libraries in the form of collections borrowed by a central library, having as main target the rural population or the people from sparsely populated areas, where the books were transported by ships, trains or horse wagons. In USA, the person who had the idea of travelling books was the famous Melvil Dewey, in 1893. His initiative was based on the belief that reading is fundamental for progress and started from the remark that many communities did not have financial means for establishing public libraries. Shortly, nearly 30 American states provided, in one form or another, mobile library services. The first bookmobile was launched in 1905, when Washington County Free Library, Maryland sent a horse wagon carrying books to different villages whose inhabitants had limited access to library services; in this way, within the first six months of service more than 1,000 volumes were provided.3 The horses proved also useful during the Great Depression, when isolated rural people from Kentucky benefited from The Pack Horse Library initiative, a New Deal program which used horse-riding librarians to deliver books.4. The bookmobiles play even today an important role in the countries with big areas and many small, isolated communities (USA, Canada, Australia), whether under their most familiar presentation - the buses especially designed to carry lending collections - or of the planes used in Alaska as flying libraries.5 In other countries, the books are travelling using less modern, but equally efficient means. Thus, in Colombia, in 1990, at the initiative of the Ministry of Culture, mobile libraries using donkeys (biblioburro) were launched to deliver books in the remotest areas of the country.6
2 Diane Bashaw, “On the Road Again” Children & Libraries: The Journal of the Association for Library Service to Children 8, no. 1 (2010): 32. 3 Ibidem. 4 Eliza McGraw, Horse-Riding Librarians Were the Great Depression’s Bookmobiles, http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/horse-riding-librarians-were-great-depression- bookmobiles-180963786 (accessed December 17, 2017). 5 Nancy Ferrell, “Alaska's flying library” Library Journal 108, no. 6 (1983): 554-555. 6 Alberto Manguel, Biblioteca nopții [The Library at Night] (Bucharest: Nemira, 2011), 202.
Robert Coravu 154 The Journeys of Books
Outside the libraries, one can discuss about the alternative forms of the journeys of the books, as, for example, book sharing. In recent years, book sharing initiatives such as BookCrossing have become very popular. The philosophy of BookCrossing, synthesised in the saying “if you love your books, let them go,”7 encourages readers to share their books, providing them with an online platform for this. A book registered on the platform receives an unique identifier (BookCrossing ID) thanks to whom the person who put it in circulation after meeting its next reader in a public space, letting it on a park bench, in a bus station, in a café or in a “BookCrossing zone” can follow its journey: one could travel only in a certain region, while another one could cover thousands of kilometres. Currently (December, 2017), there are more than 1.8 million active users and around 12.2 million books travelling throughout 132 countries.8 In the journeys of the books, the man himself can play the role of a vehicle, whether we are talking about books that travel with or inside him. At the beginning of 19th century, the Transylvanian peasant Badea Cârțan used to cross the mountains from Romania to Transylvania carrying in his saddlebags books and other publications, many of them forbidden by the Austro-Hungarian rulers, in order to give them to Romanian pupils, students, professors and priests. In the written testimonies regarding the experience of political imprisonment during the communist age, as those included in the work Jurnalul fericirii (“The Happiness Diary”) of Nicolae Steinhardt, we find many examples of intellectuals who made the books travel to their cellmates, reproducing them from memory, even if fragmentarily and synthetically. In his dystopian novel Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury imagined a total identification of human beings with the books, in a future society where the books, being considered harmful, are condemned to be burned: in order to save the greatest written works of mankind and to preserve them for next generations, book lovers memorize them integrally, becoming bookmen.
E-books or the virtual journeys of books
In the digital age, the independence won by the content of the book from its material shape modified the relationship between book, space and time. The journeys of the books are not defined any more through the distance travelled, but through the speed with which they reach the reader, through the number of kilobits per second with which they are transferred to a reading device. The interaction with an e-book reader or with a tablet, a cell phone or a computer used as reading devices is different from many perspectives. The relationship with the corporality of the printed book is much more intimate, more personal. Each copy of a printed book has its own biography, its own journey in time which defines it, which leaves traces on its body following the wear caused by use and age or in the form of annotations and underlining made by its owner(s); each copy has been bought, has been part of one or many personal or public libraries, perhaps has been passed from one generation to another, being thus a reference for the history of a family. For e-books, the copy is not any more an operational notion, but the loss of the material body makes the reading more ergonomic and allows the storage of large number of books on an easy-to-carry medium.
7 Pamela LiCalzi O'Connell, Free Your Books, New York Times (July 18, 2002), http://www.nytimes.com/2002/07/18/technology/online-diary.html (accessed December 17, 2017). 8 About BookCrossing, http://www.bookcrossing.com/about (accessed December 17, 2017).
155 Robert Coravu The Journeys of Books
Conclusions
Beyond the changed reading habits and relationship with the book, the journeys of the books will continue to accompany the passing through time of human beings. The shape of the book changed in the digital environment, but its substance remains the same. Innovations like the hyperbooks or visual books didn't generate the expected revolution. The Promised Land of the electronic book which provides a different reading experience, based on hypermedia, still waits for its population. Printed or electronic, text-based only or enriched by multimedia, with or without a material body, the book still is the fulfilled promise of a journey.
Note A version of this paper was published in Romanian, under the title „Călătoriile cărții” [The journeys of the books], in the volume: Popescu, Cristina (ed.). Călătoria cărții: itinerar prin lumea informației [The journey of the book: itinerary within the world of information]. București: Editura Universității din București, 2016, p. 267-272.
References
Bashaw, Diane. “On the Road Again.” Children & Libraries: The Journal of the Association for Library Service to Children 8, no. 1 (2010): 32-35. Ferrell, Nancy. “Alaska's flying library.” Library Journal 108, no. 6 (1983): 554-555. Harrison, Tanja. “The Courage to Connect: Mary Kinley Ingraham and the Development of Libraries in the Maritimes.” Library & Information History 28, no. 2 (2012): 75-102. Intrator, Miriam. “People were literally starving for any kind of reading: The Theresienstadt Ghetto Central Library, 1942-1945.” Library Trends 55, no. 3 (2007): 513-522. Kirby, David. “The Traveling Library.” Michigan Quarterly Review 48, no. 4 (Fall 2009). http://hdl.handle.net/2027/spo.act2080.0048.408 (accessed December 17, 2017). LiCalzi O'Connell, Pamela. “Free Your Books.” New York Times (July 18, 2002). http://www.nytimes.com/2002/07/18/technology/online-diary.html (accessed December 17, 2017). Manguel, Alberto. Biblioteca nopții [The Library at Night]. Bucharest: Nemira, 2011.
Author Index
Alexandrescu, M. B., 55 Amaricăi, E., 19 Béres, J., 74 Bolborici, A.-M., 48 Caloian, S., 19 Coman, C., 8 Coravu, R., 152 Cotoros, D., 55 Druga, C., 111 Gheorghe, C. A., 101 Harconiţa, E., 119 Khechoyan, T., I, 31 Koukourakis, M., I, 55 Landoy, A., 66 Micle, M., 144 Pârvu, C., 137 Popa, D., 55, 74 Repanovici, A., I, 8, 55, 66 Rezeanu, C.-I., 8 Rogozea, L., 55 Roman, N., 19 Rosca, I.-C., 107 Salcă Rotaru, C. M., 39 Serageldin, I., 2 Sorea, D., 85 Şerban, I., 26 Tîrziman, E., 144 Volovici, R., 137