Events
Bookfest!
Posted November 4, 2014 by Gemma Doyle
Edgar Allen Poe is famous for spewing vitriol about Boston and the literary habits of its inhabitants, pretty much from the moment he left Boston to the day of his death. (The thing that makes it funny, of course, is that today the only Bostonian monument to Poe is a plaque on the side of a Boloco two blocks from his long-demolished childhood home. They are, grudgingly, going to install a statue of him eventually. Lesson: do not crap on a city, because it will always outlive you and have the last laugh.) It’s true that Boston isn’t a literary city on par with New York or San Francisco, but it’s not a book wasteland, either. I mean, we have to have something to do in the winter when the internet’s out. So: the Boston Book Festival, or BookFest, is a huge one day celebration of all things bookish. It takes place in Copley Square and is, get this, entirely free. You have to have tickets to some of the more popular author readings or…
Want to spend more time writing this November?
Posted October 23, 2014 by Hayley Botnen
Many people who like to read also like to write. I definitely belong in this group. In fact, every November, I am one of those crazy people who participate in NaNoWriMo. What is NaNoWriMo you might be asking? NaNoWriMo is National Novel Writing Month. It takes place every November, and it is when people decide to tackle their writing projects. Typically, NaNoWriMoers write 50,000 words in the 30 days of November. That’s 1,667 words a day. Okay, so maybe I shouldn’t say typically. That’s usually what the goal word count is, but I, for one, have only met it once in the five years I’ve done it. 1,667 words a day doesn’t seem overly hard until you get behind a couple days. I’ll let you know how I do this year. Until then, if you’re interested in trying the challenge, head on over to Nanowrimo.org and get started. Let me know in the comments if you’re participating! I always love to have friends to spur me on towards the goal. All the Best – Hayley
BAHFest
Posted October 22, 2014 by Jill Silverberg
What do you think when you read the words, ‘Bad Ad Hoc Hypothesis Festival?’ If you think that the event is going to be as ridiculously fun as it sounds, then you are correct. Sponsored by the online comic strip “Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal” BAHFest is a celebration of science and how amazingly awesome it can be. The rules of the contest are simple: come up with an outlandish theory and then prove it with science. What makes BAHFest amazing is that even the most ridiculous theory is backed up with absolute science. All the data and formulas are real even if they are being applied to something crazy like trying to prove that smugness is hereditary. As someone who isn’t exactly amazing at science, I was worried that I would not be able to enjoy the presentations. However, all six presentations were hilarious, and different. The winner (I won’t spoil who) 100% deserved the 3D printed statue of Darwin looking doubtful. Although this is only the second year that BAHFest has been held, it was…
Head of the Charles
Posted October 21, 2014 by Gemma Doyle
I love fall here in New England. We’ve covered that topic pretty well, I think, but I don’t think I can really stress it enough, now that the foliage is changing in earnest and color is everywhere. I think I love it so much, and I appreciate it so much, because it’s nothing that I’m used to and it seems like a minor miracle to me every single year. So it was with actual, real shock that I heard someone on the radio talking about watching the boats on the Charles and how it was the only part of autumn in New England that she liked. Well. First of all I had no idea what she was even talking about, so I had to do some research. You know every movie that has ever been set in Boston, how there is at least one scene with crews doing their crew boat thing on the Charles? Apparently it’s a huge deal – and I never even expected that, because in all the time I’ve lived in…
John Singer Sargent is my jam, but so are weekend SLIS events!
Posted October 6, 2014 by Alexandra Bernson
As an online student working full time in the Greater Boston area, it is very difficult to participate in the multitude of SLIS social gatherings. Whether it is a lecture, a coffee meet-up, or happy hour, these events always seem to take place right in the middle of the standard work day. I understand that the majority of students at Simmons are full-time but I wish that there were more events during the weekends or week nights (I’m sure there is a trivia night somewhere in Fenway!) that might accommodate us 9-to-5-ers. Last week, as I pessimistically scanned the events “This week @ SLIS!” courtesy of LISSA, I noticed an advertisement for a free guided tour at the Art of the Americas collection of the MFA (Museum of Fine Arts) on Sunday, October 5th. The event’s description made me frantic: “ONLY 3 TICKETS LEFT!” I almost dropped my phone as I dove for my computer, opened up Eventbrite, and claimed my ticket. I spent the entire week in anticipation, and not only because I absolutely…
ThatCamp Harvard 2014
Posted September 30, 2014 by Gemma Doyle
On Saturday I attended THATCamp at Harvard University. THATCamps are popping up all over the place these days – the name stands for The Humanities and Technology Camp, and they are meant to be a collaborative day between people working in the humanities and people working in technology. As the THATCamp website describes it, “an open, inexpensive meeting where humanists and technologists of all skill levels learn and build together in sessions proposed on the spot.” THATCamps are meant to be very informal and spontaneous, not at all like a regular conference. (Much better than a regular conference for promoting productive work, which is one of the goals behind THATCamps.) Sessions on Saturday ranged from Wikipedia and conversations about how to foster more collaboration to archival tools and discussions of using social media and ways to visualize music. Sessions were informal groups chatting; no lectures or hierarchies. Professors and students spoke as equals as they tried to solve problems. Most important of all: it was fun! It really was. (And you know I am not…
A Day in the Life
Posted September 15, 2014 by Alexandra Bernson
As a first semester MLIS student, I would be the first to tell you that I don’t have much experience with archival work. Aside from volunteering in public libraries and a brief stint as a shelver in college, my only real exposure to archives was researching the Theatre and Performing Arts special collection at my undergrad’s university archives. I had the opportunity to hold a Shakespeare First Folio and other amazing artifacts, and got a little spoiled when it came to the joys of archival discovery. When I volunteered to work several hours at the Brookline Historical Society for the REPS Day of Service 2014 this past Saturday, I didn’t know what to expect. Google Maps brought me to a little old house with a white picket fence, but thankfully the curators found me lurking in the backyard before I convinced myself that I was trespassing on a private residence. In a small room in the back of what I learned was the historic Edward Devotion House, I was assigned two boxes from a new…
Ahts Festival
Posted September 9, 2014 by Gemma Doyle
One thing I love about Boston is the amazing diversity and frequency of the festivals and events that happen in the city throughout the year. This is especially good if you’re new to town and aren’t quite sure what to do with yourself – I know I spent my first fall here learning the city by going to harvest festivals in neighborhoods all over the place, and it’s how I learned the T/commuter rail routes. Fall may be the best time, the quintessential New England time, really, but summer is a busy time for festivals, too, and it’s hard to go more than a few blocks in the city without stumbling on tents and music and food trucks. This happened to me Labor Day weekend, when I went into Boston mostly to visit the Institute of Contemporary Art but also just to poke around Haymarket and enjoy my last free weekend before classes started. The Ahts Festival is proof that no matter what anyone tells you about not being able to hear the accent you’ve…
August Exploration
Posted August 11, 2014 by L. Kelly Fitzpatrick
In the areas surrounding Simmons’ Boston campus, there are countless neighborhoods to be explored. This past weekend, I took a step toward better exploring my own neighborhood of Somerville at the Somerville Flea. Every Sunday, vendors and visitors gather near Davis Square to engage in an exchange of goods from vintage scarves to bunches of carrots, peaches, and plums. Awash with Etsy-worthy ephemera, a stack of enormous volumes stopped me in my tracks. Unbeknownst to me, they weren’t books. They were boxes. And not the kind that butcher books to make them either – stunning reproductions of War and Peace, Tess of the d’Urbervilles, and other titles. Set on them lining my bookshelves within the hour, I made away with the two enormous false volumes clutched haphazardly in my arms. Arriving home, I soon placed my own copy of Tolstoy’s War and Peace into the box boasting the same title in box format; the daunting pagination of the wartime epic finally matched by a cover of suitable size. Tucked away on my bookshelves, the remainder…
A Night with Google
Posted August 7, 2014 by Jill Silverberg
Sometimes I am purely baffled at the things I’ve gotten to do since moving to Boston almost a year ago. Most recently, I found myself at Boston’s very own Children’s Museum at an event hosted by Google as a means of promoting their online program, Google City Experts. Like Yelp, Google is trying to find a niche for itself within the world of online reviews. Nowadays, if you search for something on Google Maps, a box appears on the left hand side that includes a variety of information such as the address, hours of business, phone number, and website. At the bottom of the box, are reviews for your inquiry. Like Yelp, these reviews were created by users, and can range from being brief to extremely thorough. Write enough of these reviews and Google will eventually consider you to become part of their City Experts program. So here is the big question, is it worth it? Well, the event at the museum was hands-down awesome. For the most part, me and the other attendants had…