National Library Week 2023 - There is More to the Story

Members of university communities use libraries often, whether they are downloading journal articles, borrowing physical books, or using a laptop to take an exam remotely. Now, explore the philosophy, history, and design of libraries starting with this curated list of books from the collections of the UAB Libraries. There is more to our story.

Updated July 7, 2023
U
University of Alabama Birmingham
Drag items up and down to your preferred order then select the "Save Order" button.
Bad-ass librarians of timbuktu And Their Race to Save the World's Most Precious Manuscripts
Hammer, Joshua.
Ebook
In the 1980s, a young adventurer and collector for a government library, Abdel Kader Haidara, journeyed across the Sahara Desert and along the Niger River, tracking down and salvaging tens of thousands of ancient Islamic and secular manuscripts that were crumbling in the trunks of desert farmers....
The librarian of Basra : a true story from Iraq
Winter, Jeanette.
Paper Book
*ALA Notable Children's book 2006 * Celebrated author-illustrator Jeanette Winter weaves a hopeful tale of one woman's courageous book rescue. In the Spring of 2003, Alia Muhammad Baker was the city of Basra's real-life librarian....
Dewey : the small-town library cat who touched the world
Myron, Vicki.
Paper Book
Experience the uplifting, "unforgettable" New York Times bestseller about an abandoned kitten named Dewey, whose life in a library won over a farming town and the world -- with over 2 million copies sold! (Booklist) Dewey's story starts in the worst possible way. On...
The library book
Orlean, Susan
Paper Book
A REESE WITHERSPOON x HELLO SUNSHINE BOOK CLUB PICK A WASHINGTON POST TOP 10 BOOK OF THE YEAR * A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER and NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF 2018 "A constant pleasure to read...Everybody who loves books...
Cruising the library perversities in the organization of knowledge
Adler, Melissa
Ebook
Cruising the Library offers a highly innovative analysis of the history of sexuality and categories of sexual perversion through a critical examination of the Library of Congress and its cataloging practices. Taking the publication of Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick's Epistemologies of the Closet...
Memory's library : medieval books in early modern England
Summit, Jennifer.
Ebook
In Jennifer Summit's account, libraries are more than inert storehouses of written tradition; they are volatile spaces that actively shape the meanings and uses of books, reading, and the past. Considering the two-hundred-year period between 1431, which saw the foundation of Duke Humfrey's famous...
Barbarians at the gates of the public library : how postmodern consumer capitalism threatens democracy, civil education and the public good
D'Angelo, Ed.
Paper Book
Barbarians at the Gates of the Public Library is a philosophical and historical analysis of how the rise of consumerism has led to the decline of the original mission of public libraries to sustain and promote democracy through civic education. Through a reading of historical figures such as Plato,...
Libraries in the ancient world
Casson, Lionel
Paper Book
This delightful book tells the story of ancient libraries from their very beginnings, when 'books' were clay tablets and writing was a new phenomenon. Renowned classicist Lionel Casson takes us on a lively tour, from the royal libraries of the most ancient Near East, through the private and public...
Sacred stacks
Maxwell, Nancy Kalikow
Paper Book
"Librarians serve a higher purpose that no amount of digitization or computerization can ever replace...Libraries have survived and will continue to thrive in the future, because they fulfill eternal needs for people."--Nancy Kalikow Maxwell from the Preface Librarianship as a calling is a...

Library staff! You can create and contribute to lists. Contact your catalog administrator or log in here.