Collaborative LCRM Bibliography

How can we develop our incipient Long Civil Rights Movement bibliography collaboratively online?

The LCRM project team is experimenting with some ways to make the list more interactive.  First, we hope to make each entry a link to a library record and to full text where available online.  We are trying both WorldCat and OpenURL, and each has drawbacks:  WorldCat has a limit of 250 entries in saved lists; OpenURL is dependent upon a fully functioning OpenURL resolver at the user’s home institution.  (It just so happens that at UNC Chapel Hill, the OpenURL resolver seems to work better for articles than for books.)

Second, we are very interested in including notes in the bibliography on who nominated the entry and why.  Recently we started a new LCRM group in Zotero).   Zotero 2.0 (in beta at this time; download available at http://www.zotero.org/) allows some exciting group functionality. If you upgrade to Zotero 2.0 and register, you can join a group and share lists; you can also share annotations.  After you register, if you go to the LCRM bibliography group page, buttons inviting you to join the group will appear (they do not show up if you are not registered).

To include the LCRM bibliography in your own Zotero database (”Group Libraries” will appear below the “My Libraries” category), click the little gear icon at the top of your own Zotero database (the one that pops up from the bottom of your screen when you click “Zotero” in the lower right corner) and select “Preferences.”  Sych your database by entering your username and password.

Third, we would like to include online sources and primary sources in the list.  Another advantage of Zotero 2.0 is that you can categorize an array of entry types, including primary sources such as “letter,” “map,” or “document”; you can also include gray literature such as a “conference paper.”

We have not yet addressed the idea of collaborative tagging and building a taxonomy of the long civil rights movement.  A taxonomy can be especially useful in an area of study that crosses disciplinary boundaries.

Recent analysis of LCRM Project Survey for Scholars results show that the first wave of survey-takers, consisting of UNC Press authors, fans of the Press, and participants at the April 2009 Long Civil Rights Movement Conference, tend to rank a comprehensive LCRM annotated bibliography high on their collective wish list.  (The second wave of survey-takers will come from H-Net listservs, and we look forward to finding out whether this group will be similar.)  To take the survey (and receive a free book as a thank you), please click “Survey for Scholars” on the left side of this page, under “Links.”