North/South Book Project

This project aims to promote exchanges between students of STS in the North and South. The initial idea came from a request for books for a library system being set up in Columbia , Venezuela and Peru .

Our goal is to gather surplus STS books and journals from scholars and academic institutions in the U.S. , Canada and Europe and ship these to interested libraries in the global South which do not have ready access to such literature. A core group of graduate students is in the process of identifying potential recipient libraries and developing a protocol for receiving and shipping donations.

Grad Student Book Exchange Project In response to a plea made by Alexis De Greiff (of the Universidad Nacional de Colombia) at last year's 4S conference plenary session, several graduate students have been discussing ways of obtaining STS books for the departments of society members who work in poorly funded institutions.

Our first concrete effort will be to sponsor a book drive at the upcoming 4S meeting in Atlanta , for donation to Alexis and his colleagues. Please bring any "surplus" volumes in the STS field that you own to 4S. These books can be donated during the 6S business meeting on Friday at lunchtime ( 12:15-1:30 ), at the graduate student party that evening ( 9 pm on), or by depositing them in a marked box near the registration area.

It would be helpful if the titles of books to be donated were emailed in advance to Shobita Parthasarathy , at: sp73@cornell.edu. We will accept voluntary donations ($3-5 suggested) from those who attend the grad student party at 4S. These will help subsidize the cost of shipping books, which is the project's most significant challenge.

If you would like more information about this book exchange project and its participants, please go to www.6s.cc and click on North/South Book Project. We will post a wish list of books from Alexis's department on our site, once we receive it.

We have developed several other ideas about ways to contribute books to faculty in the global South and are eager to have more participants in this conversation. If you are interesting in assisting with the book exchange effort, please contact Rick Duque (rickduque@yahoo.com ), Aryn Martin (am285@cornell.edu), or Eve Buckley (ebuckley@sas.upenn.edu). Thanks!

For further information, or to offer suggestions (especially regarding funds for shipping, donatable materials, or interested Southern institutions), please contact Eve Buckley at the University of Pennsylvania [ebuckley@sas.upenn.edu]. Other participants in the project

include:

Shobita Parthasarathy sp73@cornell.edu Northwestern University

Aryn Martin am285@cornell.edu Cornell University

Sara Shostak snshos@itsa.ucsf.edu U. California --San Francisco

Rick Duque rickduque@yahoo.com Louisiana State University

Maya Ponte mponte@itsa.ucsf.edu U. California --San Francisco

Mary Leinhos maryl@uarizona.edu University of Arizona

Last Updated

9.26.03