Jisc and ProQuest Team to Host Key Early Modern Studies Symposium
CAMBRIDGE, UK, September 24, 2014 – Early European studies will be the theme of a special one-day event being held by Jisc, a charity that provides digital solutions for UK education and research, and ProQuest. Taking place on the 13th October at Senate House in London, this key symposium is set to highlight the unique scholarly research potential from ProQuest’s Early European Books, which is now available on national license from Jisc for the Higher Education community in the UK.
To register to attend this free event visit http://bit.ly/1pocieI
The Jisc agreement enables early modernist scholars, researchers and librarians unprecedented access to a unique corpus of 26,000 rare and highly valuable early modern volumes from major European libraries covering the period 1450-1700.
The ‘Improving research outcomes with Early European Books’ event next month will see renowned speakers sharing their research experiences using this invaluable body of work. Andrew Pettegree, Professor of Modern History at the University of St Andrews, and Director of the Universal Short Title Catalogue will be a key speaker at the event along with Matthew Brack, Project Manager at the Wellcome Library, and Ben Meunier of University College London.
Providing perspectives from researchers alongside those of one of ProQuest’s library partners, discussions will focus on the creation of works such as Early European Books and how valuable such digitised works are for today’s scholars. In addition to three speaking sessions during the morning, there will be a panel discussion during the afternoon that will include Dr Sjoerd Levelt from Exeter University and Dr Kathleen Crowther from Oklahoma University.
Paul Ayris, Director of UCL Library Services at University College London, who has provided a paper for the event with Ben Meunier has said, “Early European Books allows research into European civilization and scholarship to be undertaken with access to the original texts, regardless of national boundaries. Once complete, the corpus will be a monument for European Studies”.
Liam Earney, Head of Library Support Service at Jisc, said, “This will be a valuable day for all librarians and researchers in the area of Early Modern studies. Jisc now being able to provide Early European Books to the UK Higher Education community means we are enabling access to important historical collections that would previously have been unavailable to the majority of academic institutions.”
About Jisc (http://www.jisc.ac.uk/)
Jisc offers digital services and solutions for UK education and research. The charity does this to achieve its vision for the UK to be the most digitally advanced education and research nation in the world.
Working together across the higher education, further education and skills sectors, Jisc provides trusted advice and support, reduces sector costs across shared network, digital content, IT services and procurement negotiations, ensuring the sector stays ahead of the game with research and development for the future.
Find out more at www.jisc.ac.uk or contact the press team on press@jisc.ac.uk
About ProQuest (www.proquest.com)
ProQuest connects people with vetted, reliable information. Key to serious research, the company’s products are a gateway to the world’s knowledge including dissertations, governmental and cultural archives, news, historical collections and ebooks. ProQuest technologies serve users across the critical points in research, helping them discover, access, share, create and manage information.
The company’s cloud-based technologies offer flexible solutions for librarians, students and researchers through the ProQuest®, Bowker®, Dialog®, ebrary®, EBL® and Serials Solutions® businesses – and notable research tools such as the Summon® discovery service, the RefWorks® Flow™ collaboration platform, the Pivot™ research development tool and the Intota™ library services platform. The company is headquartered in Ann Arbor, Michigan, with offices around the world.