Wits Library

Permanent URI for this community

https://wiredspace.wits.ac.za/handle/10539/3906

IR Policy

IR Policy

Browse

Now showing 1 - 20 of 51

The 3rd International Conference on African Digital Libraries and Archives Digital Libraries and Archives in Africa: Changing Lives and Building Communities
(Al Akhawayn University in Ifrane, Morocco, 2016-06-21) Al Akhawayn University
The corpus of Moroccan manuscripts is estimated at more than 80,000 titles and 200,000 volumes held at a number of public and private libraries—mostly religious institutions and zawāyā. These collections are invaluable both as repositories of human knowledge and memory and for their aesthetic value in terms of calligraphy, illumination, iconography and craftsmanship. Several medieval authors position Morocco as an important center in the Muslim West (al-Gharb al-Islami) for manuscript production, illumination, binding and exchange. However, except for a few scattered publications, a history of North African Arabic calligraphy (al-khatt al-maghribi) remains to be written. By providing the tools for making these collections readily accessible to the scholarly community in the Maghrib and beyond, ICT will make possible the study of North African scripts within the broader context of Arabic calligraphy and the Islamic arts of the book in general. The two main manuscript collections in Morocco are hosted at the National Library of Morocco (Bibliothèque nationale du royaume du Maroc, or BNRM, formerly General Library and Archive) in Rabat (12,140 titles), and the Qarawiyyin Library in Fez (5,600 titles, 3,157 of which in several volumes). Theses collections originated mostly from waqf (pious endowments) and state appropriation of private collections (e.g., 1,311 and 3,371 titles from the al-Glawi and al-Kattani collections respectively). They are written almost entirely in Arabic and in various scripts; Amazigh (Berber) manuscripts in Arabic script and Hebrew manuscripts constitute less than one percent of the total collections.
The biodiversity heritage library and African digital libraries in the global context.
(Smithsonian Institution Washington, DC, United States, 2015-05-29) Kalfatovic, Martin R.; Fourie, Anne-Lise
The Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) was created in 2006 as a direct response to the needs of the taxonomic community for access to early literature. Designed with meeting these needs, the BHL was grant-funded and quickly proved its value to its target users. The original BHL organizational model, based on US and UK partners, provided a template for, first, BHL Europe, and then a series of global nodes, most recently, BHL Africa and BHL Singapore. As the BHL moved from project to a cornerstone of biodiversity infrastructure, sustainability, appropriate expansion, collaboration with national and pan-national digital libraries (Europeana, the Digital Public Library of America) became more important. Working within the unique and often challenging environments of Sub-Saharan Africa, BHL assisted in the creation of BHL Africa is an inclusive network of African libraries and institutions in Western, Eastern, Central and Southern Africa. The short term goals of BHL/BHL Africa are surveying the biodiversity content of Sub-Saharan partners, defining digitization and aggregation capacity, and delivering African content to the BHL portal. This presentation will cover principles of pan-institutional digital library development, working across multiple African institutions, address areas of growth, and formulate lessons learned through global BHL growth.
Building an online indigeous knowledge Library on culture, Environment and History: Case Study of Elimu Asilia
(National Museums of Kenya, 2016-06-21) Owano, Ashah
Kenyan libraries and information centres are inadequately equipped with local indigenous knowledge (IK) content to contribute to global digital knowledge economy. Scarcity of community stories and information on the web undermines the role of librarians and other information workers, denying local communities opportunity to participate in the development of local content about their communities and encourage them to use and appreciate local library services. All over the world, indigenous knowledge has been recognized as distinct, legitimate, valuable and vulnerable system of knowledge that requires appropriate skills to handle and manage. In Kenya, like most African countries, events and accounts were transmitted orally from one generation to another. The data/information was hardly documented. This paper presents a case study of ‘Elimu Asilia’, a participatory platform for developing local content where National Museums of Kenya librarians working with researchers and volunteers interact with local communities including children in the collection, preparation, preservation, sharing, exchange and dissemination of IK on culture, environment and history for memory, national sustainability and eco-social development using information communication technologies. It is envisaged that this platform will contribute towards the reduction of digital divide, sharing of community IK and promote global online communities for indigenous knowledge.
Burning issue: How does copyright affect you as librarians, researchers, teachers?
(Library and Information Association of South Africa (LIASA), 2008-07) Nicholson, Denise Rosemary
This article defines copyright and provides guidelines to librarians, researchers and teachers on how to apply the Copyright law to reproduction for educational and non-commercial purposes
Challenges of building digital repositories in Africa: A case study of best practise
(Dakar, Senegal, 2016-06-22) Bakhoum, Nafissatou
Libraries are known to promote change through individual and institutional capacity leading to quality, effectiveness and then to development. Information and knowledge, as a vehicle of power and wealth, are then likely to root out economic marginalization, inequalities, unemployment and other shortages the African continent is suffering. But, in spite of its outstanding scholarly and cultural heritage and huge progress made in ICT, it is striking that Africa is still lagging behind in the international scheme of knowledge production, which is conducting the world. Deficiencies in education, lack of innovation, of a wide professional militantism and of a strong political commitment are the main causes. African libraries, therefore become conscious that such weaknesses, instead of being experienced as an additional source of frustration can be turned into an impulse for innovative change. Even if federating exhaustively valuable African contents in a unique virtual space, has not already become a reality, some African scientific institutions step boldly forward in implementing programs to meet the huge challenge of digitizing scholarly contents and providing online access to them. They are struggling to break with a long period of gathering rich scientific materials, formerly shelved in libraries as treasures, in order to safeguard and valorize them. Then, building digital repositories and promoting open access in a context with limited resources has never been so relevant. They have proven efficient in providing technical infrastructure, quality-based and value-added solutions to the management of collections, especially in heritage libraries. The objective of this paper is to reinforce, through demonstration, the optimistic view consisting of believing that all is not bleak in Africa, and overcoming challenges depends on how being strategic in addressing core issues. It focuses on two points: 1. Challenges attached to the preservation and valorization of African scholarly contents; After presenting briefly the context of accumulation of scientific materials in Africa, namely in Afrique occidentale française (AOF), we focus on the benefit effects of digitizing African scholarly contents and how it can impact on the dissemination of research outputs and sustainable development. 2. Promoting access through a digital repository: a case study of best practice. This part is demonstrative and illustrates that some African academic institutions adapt to innovative change and develop capacities to build worth institutional repositories. This case study is from Institut fondamental d’Afrique noire Cheikh Anta Diop (FAN Ch A Diop).
Civil society, popular culture and the crisis of democratic transitions in Nigeria, 1960-1993
(1994-07-13T10:45:05Z) Afolayan, Funso
On the 12th of June 1993, Nigerians trooped to the polls to once again and for the third time since the country's independence, inaugurate yet another republic through the ballot box. In spite of mounting acrimonies, the election held and it was judged by virtually all domestic and international observers as the freest and the fairest Nigeria has ever had. As the results of the election began to trickle in. the military President. General Ibrahim Babaneida. suddenly announced the susoension of the announcement of the election results, eventuallv canceling the result outriuhl and susDcndinu the whole transition oroeram. This abortion of the transition of oaf am threw the countrv into a oeriod of urofbund crisis from which it is vet to recover. Usinu the 1993 election as a case sludv. this DaDer examines the crisis of democratic transition in Nigeria. The relevance of oooular culture, its deveiooment. ils use and abuse as well as its inmacl on ihe inlra-dite slniuttle and comoetition for oower and for dominance are enunciated and analyzed.
Collaborrative Approcahes to Building Digital Repositories in Africa
(Third International Conference on African Digital Libraries and Archives (ICADLA-3), 2016-06-21) Bwamkuu, Africa J
While there is exponential growth of local generated intellectual output from Africa, remains are challenges to make the local content visible and available at the global level. By 29th January, 2013, out of 2256 repositories listed in the Directory of Open Access Repositories (DOAR) at www.opendoar.org, only 60 repositories are in Africa, which is 2.66% of total repositories in DOAR. This statistics is consistent with many available studies which indicates that Africa’s’ contribution to the global knowledge is limited. The report released by Thomson Reuters on April 2010 also confirms that Africa's contribution to the global body of scientific research is very small and does little to benefit its own populations. With over 30 academic institutions that award bachelors, masters and PhD each year, Ethiopia faces the same challenges, make intellectual output accessible at the global level. Recognizing this fact, Ethiopian major actors in the educational field, in particular, the Consortium of Ethiopian Academic and Research Libraries (CEARL) and the National Education and Research Network of Ethiopia (EthERNet), have been actively exploring ways to address the challenge using the modern technology. CEARL, as content provider and EthERNet, as infrastructure operator, has been collaborating to unlock Ethiopian academic institutions’ knowledge using common digital repository. The collaboration is guided by Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) that harmonizes individual institutional policy framework. The paper explores the collaborative approaches whereby individual institutions pooled together resources and at the same time, jointly engage international partners specifically the International Network for the Availability of Scientific Publications (INASP), the Royal Tropical Institute (KIT), the African Digital Library Support Network (ADLSN) and the Institute of Development Studies (IDS) to bring about the national repository.
Continuing education: libraries and the Internet (CELI) project: narrowing the skills gap in Southern African university libraries
(D-Lib, 2004-04) Muswazi, Paiki
This is a description and evaluation of a SIDA funded continuing education initiative to enhance Internet skills and applications in university libraries in nine Southern African countries. The article describes the origins, objectives, methodology, coverage, challenges and gives an assessment of the project. It concludes that effective harnessing of the Internet depends on management support for continuous application of new skills and upgrading of ICT infrastructure, indigenous e-publishing, etc.
Copyright: how to use your photocopier & computer lawfully
(South Africa. Department of Sport, Arts & Culture: Librsary and Archive Services Directorate. Free State Provincial Library and Information Service, 2008) Nicholson, Denise Rosemary
This article gives practical tips when making reproductions for educational purposes.
The Developing Countries and Electronic Filing: Case Burundi, Rwanda and the DRC
(Archivist at the National Radio and Television of Burundi, 2016-06-22) Eustache, Sirtaki
Archival heritage is essential to facilitate reforms and modernization in different areas of the state and society in Burundi, DRC and Rwanda and other countries also the archives of former colonial powers are often capitals including material heritage, proof, migration, borders, resource management or data for international research. It is important to respond to societal demands in the field; be it the academic sector, the associative fabric of civil society or state structures. Models in terms of good governance / facilitating access to archives may be proposed by some European countries. Countries like the DRC, Burundi and Rwanda are among the countries that are behind in terms of looking, access and archive management, mutual capacity building.
Digital library readiness in Africa: A strategic human resource perspective
(University of Education Winneba, Ghana, 2015-05-29) Owusu-Ansah, Christopher M.
The success of any digital library endeavour significantly depends on the human capital of the implementing organisation. Many African institutions and academic libraries in developing countries are focusing and channeling significant resources into planning and setting up digital libraries. However, the main hurdle for many of these efforts is the human resource capacity of staff expected to implement these projects as several studies show a considerable skills gap in many digital library projects leading to sustainability challenges. The aim of this paper is to propose the application of the Balanced Scorecard (BSC) in evaluating digital library resources and services in Ghana to determine the readiness of academic libraries in implementing sustainable digital library services. As a result, the study examines the strategic plan of a multi-campus public university in Ghana with a view to aligning it to the same university’s library digital strategy using the BSC. The study proposes to academic libraries involved in digital initiatives to be mindful of the digital, financial and societal contexts in which they operate. The study is expected to contribute to efforts at finding strategic measures to drive the vision of the digital library African institutions.
Digital preservation in the context of institutional repositories in public universities' libraries in Ghana.
(The Balme Library, University of Ghana, 2015-05-29) Mensah, Monica
Long-term preservation of digital collections is an integral task for institutional repositories. It ensures that the digital intellectual output of the library is preserved for future access. Digital preservation has been recognized as a complex process, and there are still many unsolved issues which makes it a challenging task for institutional repositories. As such, this paper is aimed at identifying and discussing the issues and challenges of digital preservation facing institutional repositories in public university libraries in Ghana. The study was qualitative. Data used for analysis were drawn from respondents from public universities who had developed institutional repositories to capture, maintain and disseminate their information in the digital form. The key finding of the study was that, although the universities had established institutional repositories to capture and maintain digital collections, existing digital preservation methods and systems were inadequate and could lead to consequences such as denial of access to their digital collections or total loss of information. Recommendations based on findings included the development of comprehensive digital preservation policies to provide mandate and direction to preservation of the libraries digital collections.
Digital Preservation: Handling Large Collections Case Study: Digitizing Egyptian Press Archive at Centre for Economic, Judicial, and Social Study and Documentation(CEDEJ)
(Alexandria University, Alexandria, Egypt, 2015-09-14) Samir, Ahmed; Sharkas, Ahmed; Adly, Noha; Nagi, Magdy
Managing the digitization of large collections is quite a challenge not only in terms of quantity, but also in terms of text and material quality, designing the workflow system which organizes the operations, and handling metadata. This has been the focus of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina during its partnership with the Centre for Economic, Judicial, and Social Study and Documentation (CEDEJ), to digitize more than 800,000 pages of press articles dating back to 1976. This triggered a need to design a workflow to manage such a massive collection proficiently. This required simultaneous intervention of four main aspects; data analysis, developing a digitization workflow , implementing and installing the necessary software tools for metadata entry, and publishing the digital archive. This paper demonstrates the workflow system implemented to manage this massive press collection, yielding more than 400,000 items to date. It illustrates the BA’s Digital Assets Factory (DAF); the nucleus of the digitization process ,and the tools and stages implemented for ingesting data into the system. The outflow is also discussed in terms of organizing and grouping multipart press clips, in addition to reviewing and validating the output. The paper also discusses the challenges of associating the accessible online archive with a powerful search engine supporting multidimensional search.
Digital Rights Management and Access to Information: a developing country’s perspective
(Volume 19, Issue 1, March 2009, 2009-03) Nicholson, Denise Rosemary
Digital rights management systems (DRMs) together with technological protection measures (TPMs) have become a controversial topic of discussion around copyrighted works, particularly since the controversial Sony BMG case. This paper addresses some of the concerns around TPM-enabled digital rights management systems as they apply to and impact on developing countries. It highlights issues such as digital censorship, international support for digital rights management and the current legislation in South Africa relating to digital rights management. It also discusses types of digital rights management systems and how they affect access to information and knowledge, as well as their impact on the public domain and privacy. The paper provides some recommendations and challenges to librarians and educators in South Africa and for librarians in other developing countries, on how to address digital rights management issues in relation to their obligations and mandates to provide users and learners with unrestricted access to information.
Digitization Capacity and Skills of Academic Librarian in Nigeria
(Redeemer’s University, Nigeria, 2016-06-21) Adeleke, Akinniyi A
Increasing number of Nigerian universities is devising creative means of increasing their digital contents in the public domain by digitizing intellectual outputs of their faculty members. Digitization accords academic institutions the opportunity of making their institutional resources available thereby increasing their visibility and better performance in ongoing web ranking of world universities. However, certain skill sets and competencies are required by librarians who are responsible to establish and maintain digital collections in their respective institutions. This study therefore to investigated the level of librarians ’possession of these skills. A survey was conducted on librarians in eleven selected private and public universities in Nigeria that have minimum ICT infrastructure required for digitization. Eighty six librarians responded and data analysis revealed that digitization was still at its infancy in the libraries and few librarians were involved in the process. The study also found librarians score themselves below average in many of the specific digitization skills even though they considered them important. Also, majority of the librarians had no formal professional training in digitization and only a few spent time for personal skills development in the process.
Digitization capacity and skills of academic librarians in Nigeria
(University , Nigeria, 2016-06-21) Adeleke, Akinniyi A; Senior Librarian
In order to increase their global visibility and better performance in the web ranking of world universities, more Nigerian universities have been devising creative means of increasing their digital contents in the public domain resulting in more sharability of institutional resources. Digitization builds capacity for the university library system to realize its mandate of supporting learning, teaching and research activities of its parent institutions through the instrumentality of the emerging and evolving information and communications technologies (ICTs). However, certain skill sets and competencies are required by librarians in Nigerian universities to establish and maintain digital collections in their respective institutions. A questionnaire survey is conducted on this category of information professionals in ten selected private and public universities that have minimum ICT infrastructure required for digitization. The collected data are analyzed and results presented in simple descriptive statistics.
Digitizing Egyptian National Documents Archive: Challenges and Solutions
(Alexandria University, 2016-06-21) Samir, Ahmed; Elsayed, Bassem; Adly, Noha; Nagi, Magdy
The Egyptian National Documents Archive (Dar El-Mahfouzat) dates back to 1805, to Mohamed Ali’s era. This renders the archive a crucial and valuable aspect of Egyptian heritage. Dar El-Mahfouzat has partnered with the Bibliotheca Alexandrina (BA) for creating a digital archive for a collection of documents comprising more than six million pages physically pertaining to the Archive for digital preservation and access. In implementing this project, the BA has undertaken three main aspects simultaneously; building the digitization facility, developing and installing the necessary software tools and building the capacities of the staff. Each aspect represented a challenge accompanied with the notion of deploying state-of-the-art technologies for a proficient digital output. Two million pages have been digitized to date and the digital archive has been created to support multilevel authorization to secure access to classified documents. This paper will elaborately reflect the work done by the BA in creating the digitization workflow, and developing the associated tools for archiving digitally a grand historical facility in Egypt, while demonstrating the challenges encountered and their handling.
Document for Commonwealth Countries on Copyright Matters in Education
(Commonwealth of Learning, 2005-05) Hofman, Julian; Kawooya, Dick; Nicholson, Denise Rosemary; Ntuma, Augustine; Prabhala, Achal; Schad, Robert; Schoenwetter, Tobias; Tladi, Lekopanye; West, Paul
This document discusses copyright issues and provides guidelines on copyright limitations and exceptions for education in Commonwealth countries.
Free Trade Agreements and TRIPS-plus: implications for developing countries in Africa
(www.ifla.org, 2005-12-05) Nicholson, Denise Rosemary
This paper will focus mainly on issues affecting access to knowledge in African countries and implications of international intellectual property agreements. It will show that the majority of these countries are struggling to meet the very basic requirements of the TRIPS Agreement, yet they are now being pressured by developing countries to adopt even stricter intellectual property regimes through the IP Chatper or "TRIPS-Plus" in Free Trade Agreements. The paper highlights the impact of Free Trade Agreements and TRIPS-Plus on education, libraries, people with sensory-disabilities, public health and development in general.
Freedom of information: in search of a niche for the library profession in Swaziland
(Sage Publications, 1999-01) Muswazi, Paiki
The primary objective of the article is to assess the effect of censorship on collection development and librarianship as well as to ascertain future prospects in Swaziland. It is based on Swaziland legal documents. It is argued that (i) historically censorship is institutionalized through a range of legal instruments and seeks to maintain acceptable standards of morality and political stability, (ii) while the library profession's response is lukewarm, the Internet and the changed Southern African political conditions are conducive to the promotion of intellectual freedom. It concludes that awareness raising is the key to desensitizing the hitherto controversial materials and themes and giving access to all points of view without prejudice.

Browse

Browsing Wits Library by Type "Article"

Results Per Page

Sort Options