![]() ![]() ![]() How do we balance the opposing activities of preservation and use? As we discovered this semester, there are no easy answers to that question. Rare books also require similar, personal engagement. These artists’ books are works of art yet, because of their form, these works of art must be touched and manipulated. The book arts collection includes limited edition and one-of-a-kind books created by artists who use the book as their form. Book arts collections, such as the one held by Moody Library at Baylor University, are a different matter. In the public library, a popular book that falls apart after many, many readings can simply be replaced for a nominal cost. Consider how we engage with books in different settings. Yet, books are also meant to be touched, read, and consumed. Curators and librarians of book collections collect, preserve, and interpret collections for their visitors/users. Our explorations also considered the book as an object much like the objects we encounter in museum collections. Our topical explorations traveled back and forth along the long timeline of book history. Historians of the book use digital humanities tools as well as traditional academic research. Book history includes social, economic, political, and cultural history. ![]() More specifically, the history of the book touches on the histories of reading, printing, communication, authorship, editing, book arts, and technology. For fifteen weeks, we explored the history of books, which is broadly defined as the history of the creation, dissemination, and reception of script and print. Welcome to our digital publication! The Book Shelf: An Exploration of Book History is the culmination of a semester of work by the students in the course, The History and Curation of Book Collections (MST 4330/Fall 2022). Sarah chose representative samples of the articles generated for the full publication and presents them here as a preview of the content contained in “The Book Shelf: An Exploration of Book History,” which you can view in full by clicking the image below. This online exhibit was curated and edited by Sarah Stilwell, a first-year graduate student in the Department of Museum Studies. Julie Holcomb’s Fall 2022 course, The History and Curation of Book Collections (MST 4330). This exhibit represents a curated view of the full digital publication created by students in Prof. ![]()
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