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Showing posts from January, 2013

Films on Demand - Captioning and Transcript feature

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Films on Demand now offers a feature for  captioning and interactive transcripts.  TIPS ON USING CAPTIONING To toggle captions on and off : Click the  CC is on / CC is off  button in the upper right corner of the video player. To set captioning as the default view format : Once you're signed in to your user account, click  User Options  at the top right of the screen and then click  My User Preferences  on the User Options pop-up menu. Select the  Show by Default  checkbox under Closed Captioning, and then click  Save Changes. TIPS ON USING INTERACTIVE TRANSCRIPTS To use interactive transcripts : Click on the  Transcript  tab to the right of the video player to view the interactive transcript. To jump to a different section of the video, simply click on a word within the transcript and the video will skip to that point. You can also jump back/ahead using the status bar on top of the transcr...

Book of the Week (January 28, 2013) The World Until Yesterday by Jared Diamond

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The world until yesterday : what can we learn from traditional societies? By Jared Diamond Call Number:  DU 744.35 .D32 D53 2012 Review from the NY Times Sunday Book Review Publisher's Description:  Most of us take for granted the features of our modern society, from air travel and telecommunications to literacy and obesity. Yet for nearly all of its six million years of existence, human society had none of these things. While the gulf that divides us from our primitive ancestors may seem unbridgeably wide, we can glimpse much of our former lifestyle in those largely traditional societies still or recently in existence. Societies like those of the New Guinea Highlanders remind us that it was only yesterday—in evolutionary time—when everything changed and that we moderns still possess bodies and social practices often better adapted to traditional than to modern conditions. The World Until Yesterday provides a mesmerizing firsthand picture of the human past as it ha...

Book of the Week (January 10, 2013) Aquanomics

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Aquanomics: Water Markets and the Environment Edited by B. Delworth Gardner, Randy T. Simmons. Call Number:  HD 1691 .A68 2012 Publisher's Description :  Water is becoming increasingly scarce. If recent usage trends continue, shortages are inevitable. Aquanomics discusses some of the instruments and policies that may be implemented to postpone, or even avoid, the onset of “water crises.” These policies include establishing secure and transferable private water rights and extending these rights to uses that traditionally have not been allowed, including altering in-stream flows and ecosystem functions. The editors argue that such policies will help maximize water quantity and quality as water becomes scarcer and more valuable. Aquanomics contains many examples of how this is being accomplished, particularly in the formation of water markets and market-like exchanges of water rights. Many observers see calamity ahead unless water supplies are harnessed and effective...

Book of the Week (December 31, 2012) The Round House by Louise Erdrich

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Winner of the National Book Award The Round House By Louise Erdrich Call Number:  PS 3555 .R42 R68 2012 Publisher's Description:   One Sunday in the spring of 1988, a woman living on a reservation in North Dakota is attacked. The details of the crime are slow to surface as Geraldine Coutts is traumatized and reluctant to relive or reveal what happened, either to the police or to her husband, Bazil, and thirteen-year-old son, Joe. In one day, Joe's life is irrevocably transformed. He tries to heal his mother, but she will not leave her bed and slips into an abyss of solitude. Increasingly alone, Joe finds himself thrust prematurely into an adult world for which he is ill prepared. While his father, who is a tribal judge, endeavors to wrest justice from a situation that defies his efforts, Joe becomes frustrated with the official investigation and sets out with his trusted friends, Cappy, Zack, and Angus, to get some answers of his own. Their quest takes the...