WKU Libraries blog

	A large crowd gathered at Java City today to hear Nashville’s premier percussion group “The Love Drums” as they played a wide variety of rhythmic selections ranging from Middle Eastern, to Caribbean and traditional African sources. Joining Ed Haggard, Thomas Anderson and Marquetta Dupree were two talented Western employees Nadia De Leon and LeAnn Bledsoe who performed an equally varied series of tribal belly-dance stylings.
Marquetta even led a line-dance group in an impromptu celebration of life, music and dance.

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Professor Debbie Kreitzer from the Department of Georgraphy and Geology is the first speaker in the tenth series of talks on “Far away Places with Strange Sounding Names” sponsored by the friends of WKU Libraries and the Kentucky Museum. Debbie teaches classes on World Regional Geography, the Georgraphy of North America and Geographic Information Systems. She led a Study Abroad group to Slovenia in 2007 and made a return visit in 2008. This event was held at Barnes and Noble on Thursday September 17th at 7:00 p.m.

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David Keeling, head of WKU’s Geography and Geology Dept. spoke to a large enthusiastic crowd on Namibia at this month’s Far Away Places series at Barnes & Noble this past Thursday, October 1.  Keeling most recently visited Namibia in November, 2007 as expedition lecturer for the American Geographical Society sponsored “Casablanca to the Cape” educational expedition.  His prior visits included trips to the Skeleton Coast, Windhoek, and the Fish river canyons.  David is WKU’s most well traveled faculty member.  In 2008 alone his travels covered 133,840 miles.

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On the evening of April 16 at Barnes & Noble Booksellers, WKU Libraries’ Far Away Places Series featured Dr. Michael Trapasso from the Department of Geography and Geology at WKU. Trapasso provided a unique and fascinating look at retracing the “Viking Voyages.” Many WKU faculty and students as well as local community members attended the lecture.

Since earning a PhD in climatology Michael has taught a variety of classes at WKU, served as Director of the College Heights Weather Station and hosted “Up in the Air” Thursday mornings on WKYU-FM. He’s one of Western’s most traveled scholars having set foot on every continent and dipped his body in every ocean. His “Viking Mission’ began with a trip to Norway in 1999 where he began to research their ships and their voyages. He continued in 2003 with a visit to Iceland which was originally settled and populated by Vikings. In 2004 he returned for a second visit and traveled to Greenland. Late that summer, Trapasso visited Newfoundland where the Vikings established their first village on North American soil. Mission accomplished!

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WKU Libraries presented Joseph Trafton, Distinguished Professor of Religious Studies at WKU, who spoke on “The Dead Sea Scrolls” as part of the “Far Away Places Series” at Barnes & Noble Bookstore (1680 Campbell Lane) on the evening of March 19th, 2009.

The Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered in eleven caves along the northwest shore of the Dead Sea between the years 1947 and 1956. The area is 13 miles east of Jerusalem and is 1300 feet below sea level. The mostly fragmented texts, are numbered according to the cave that they came out of. They have been called the greatest manuscript discovery of modern times.

Trafton, who has a M.T.S. and Th.M. from the Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and a PhD from Duke, was first introduced to the Dead Sea Scrolls during his masters work in a course on the Jewish setting of the New Testament. He continued studying about the scrolls at Duke. When his adviser moved to the Princeton Theological Seminary, Joe was invited to be part of an international team of scholars assembled to edit and translate the scrolls called the Princeton Theological Seminary Dead Sea Scrolls Project. He was assigned five fragmentary scrolls, the first of which was published in 2002. As part of his research he has traveled to Israel and visited Qumran, the archaeological site connected with the scrolls. At WKU he teaches an undergraduate course on the Dead Sea Scrolls.

In addition to this work on the “scrolls” Joe is the author of two books, The Syriac Version of the Psalms of Solomon published by the Society of Biblical Literature, and Reading Revelation: A Literary and Theological Commentary published in the “Reading the New Testament Series” by Smyth & Helwys in 2005. One reviewer called it “a balanced approach to Revelation that makes good use of contemporary scholarship.”

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On February 19, 2009, WKU Libraries’ Far Away Places Series featured Doug McElroy , a Professor of Biology at WKU, who talked about the Galapagos Island.

His articles have appeared in the Journal of Wildlife Management, the Encyclopedia of Genetics and many others. He’s taken students to E. Africa to study African Game Species. Most recently in June of 2007 he led a combined student/alumni study abroad group to the Galapagos for a course entitled “Biology in a Social Context: Galapagos and Ecuador.” In addition to examining biodiversity “hotspots” they discussed “ecotourism, bioprospecting and the property rights of indigenous peoples.”

It’s very timely presentation since this year is the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin, who became one of the island’s most celebrated visitors when he reached there on the HMS Beagle on September 15, 1835.

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Dr. Roger D. Launius, Curator of the National Air and Space Museum at the Smithsonian, spoke for Western Kentucky University Libraries’ Far Away Places series, on Thursday, November 20th at Barnes & Noble.

Dr. Launius is considered one of the nation’s most prominent space historians and has authored or edited more than 25 books. His latest book, Robots in Space: Technology, Evolution and Interplanetary Travel, published by Johns Hopkins University Press, was the topic of discussion. In the book, Lanius and co-author Howard McCurdy of American University address the issue of how to best explore space: with humans or robots.

This event had more than eighty attendees, mostly WKU faculty and students, with some coming from the Bowling Green community.

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On the morning of November 19, WKU Libraries’ “Faraway Places” program presented Dr. David Keeling, Head of Department of Geology and Geography, WKU, in Helm Library 100. He talked about the geoethnic and geopolitical issues of Russia to an audience of faculty, staff and students. This is part of the International Education Week events sponsored by the WKU Office of International Programs.

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This Thursday, October 16, 2008, Dr. David Keeling, Head of Geography and Geology, talked about Cambodia in our Faraway Places series at Barnes and Noble.

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Aristófanes Cedeño, Associate Professor of Spanish, Director of the Panamanian Studies Program and Academic Dean of the Kentucky Governor’s Scholars Program at the University of Louisville, talked about Panama in the Faraway Places Series on Thursday, September 18th at Barnes & Noble.

Born and raised in Panama, Dr. Cedeño earned a law degree at the University of Panama before moving to the U.S. and obtaining his Ph.D. in Spanish Literature from Michigan State University. Recently he was appointed to the Board of Directors of the Kentucky Humanities Council, and was named one of the twenty-five most influential Hispanics in Louisville because of his contributions to education in Kentucky and to the Latino Legal Clinics organized by the Louisville Bar Association.

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