Durham Research Online (DRO) is the university’s open access institutional repository, where anyone can find (and read!) lots of research articles, book chapters and conference papers by Durham authors for free. We’ve had some recent changes and we’d like to update you about these and remind you that we are here for you!
Continue reading “Durham Research Online – looking forward in 2021”Waving goodbye to REF 2021
Last week, staff in the Library waved off 12 boxes of books and other publications authored by current and former Durham staff as a final (for now) step in our university’s REF submission. This submission involved a huge commitment from staff across the university, across professional support and academic departments. Colleagues from across Durham University Library and Collections service have been involved in collecting publications, enabling open access and reviewing compliance with REF requirements, supporting Impact case studies and providing support for our poor academic colleagues tasked with drafting Research Environment statements.
Here we provide some brief figures to show some of the effort made to be able to wave off the final boxes one sunny morning last week…
Continue reading “Waving goodbye to REF 2021”Foraging for theses
Recent headlines have highlighted concerns over unscrupulous third parties attempting to make money off the back of researchers by attempting to sell (for pennies) copies of Masters and Doctoral theses online. These have been taken from universities around the UK, including Durham University, and resold without permission (and often in breach of copyright). But for many years, Durham and other universities around the world have endeavoured to provide free access to theses, moving from what was previously rows of shelves of hard bound theses in our libraries, to digital repositories sharing the knowledge and expertise of our community online.
We often get asked by students, staff and others outside of the university if we have a specific theses available, or how to access theses and dissertations more generally, so we thought we’d highlight some of the resources available to you and why we make our theses available.
Continue reading “Foraging for theses”#OpenAccessWeek2020: DRO is for book chapters too!
When we speak to colleagues about open access, often in short 5-10 minute briefings at Boards of Study, the focus is usually on ensuring open access to journal articles and conference papers. But a significant amount of research published at Durham comes in the form of long-from publications; books, monographs and chapters in edited volumes. In many cases we can make some or all of these open access as well. So let’s have a closer look…
Continue reading “#OpenAccessWeek2020: DRO is for book chapters too!”#OpenAccessWeek2020: A conversation with Professor Clare McGlynn QC (Hon)
International Open Access week is not only an opportunity to share the amazing open access research from Durham University and engaging with the wider open access community; it is also about getting to know our academics and the research process, helping us to understand a little bit more about the work that goes into the final article we download from the publisher’s site or repository. This year, we are so grateful to Professor Clare McGlynn QC (Hon) for taking the time to answer questions about her research.
Continue reading “#OpenAccessWeek2020: A conversation with Professor Clare McGlynn QC (Hon)”#OpenAccessWeek2020: Thank you – we’re in the Top 10!
Earlier this year saw the publication of the CWTS Leiden Rankings. This ranking provides indicators of citation impact, collaboration, gender diversity… and open access publishing. And we thought we’d take a moment during open access week to highlight Durham University’s achievement in the latter.
Continue reading “#OpenAccessWeek2020: Thank you – we’re in the Top 10!”#OpenAccessWeek2020: Year in review
Open Access publishing is taking the world by storm, partly thanks to initiatives such as Plan S, and this year, Durham academics have published a huge amount of articles that are gold open access – often with a Creative Commons attribution licence – which means they are free to read, download, share and adapt as long as you give appropriate credit.
Continue reading “#OpenAccessWeek2020: Year in review”#Colourourcollections (2)
This week we’re introducing you to a historic magazine for Durham University students, which we hold in our archives and special collections.
The Sphinx was a magazine produced by the students of Durham University between March 1905 and June 1922 (it did not appear between July 1914 and the end of 1918). It contained short pieces, parodies, cartoons and accounts of sports and other social events.
The image below shows a view that hasn’t perhaps changed much over the last century or so! Right-click and save the image, or download a PDF version to colour in at your leisure. Why not share your efforts with us via Twitter (@dulib or @PalaceGreenLib)?
International Women’s Day: In celebration of (Clara) Enid Robertson.
Back in December 2019, the open access team here at the library received a very special request from Jeremy Durward, a Psychology student from Deakin University in Australia. He was researching his great great aunt, (Clara) Enid Robertson, as he had discovered they had a shared interest in Psychology. We helped Jeremy locate Dr Robertson’s thesis, “The psychology of musical appreciation: an analysis of the bases and nature of the experience of listening to music” – which you can also read in our etheses repository.
Continue reading “International Women’s Day: In celebration of (Clara) Enid Robertson.”
#Throwback Thursday: Open Durham
Inviting academics to speak about their research at the library
Working in an academic library is a great privilege; a big part of any library role is providing a service which ensures students and academics have access to the resources they need to study and produce their research. The open access team at Durham get to see the final product of our researchers’ hard work when they send manuscripts that have been accepted to journals to be deposited into our repository. Open Access Week 2019 – ‘Open for Whom?’ was the perfect opportunity to share the incredible research that we help to support in the library with our colleagues.