Germanists Discussion Group Minutes, Midwinter 2008 (Philadelphia)
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WESS Germanists Discussion Group
ALA 2008 Midwinter Meeting
Sunday, January 13, 10:30AM - 12:30PM
German Society of Pennsylvania (611 Spring Garden Street, Philadelphia)
- GDG Program:
- Introductions and announcements
- Present: Gordon Anderson, Judy Alspach (CRL), Claudia Alcala Iniguez, Anna Bjartmarsdottir Sveinbjornsson, Martha Brantigan-Stowell, Ulrike Engel (Saur Verlag Munchen), Frank Geniese (GSP), Rowena Griem, Richard Hacken, Sebastian Hierl, Gail Hueting, Thea Lindquist, Heidi Madden, Jon Marner, Jim Niessen, Heleni Pedersoli, Kathleen Smith (UIUC Doctoral Student - German), Anna Shparberg, Anne Oechtering, Louis John Reith, Michael Rissinger (Pew Charitable Trust), Timothy Shipe, Cason Snow, Rom Steensma (Coutts), Sem Sutter, Kizer Walker
- Kizer Walker announced a new collaboration between Cornell Library and Cornell University Press: Signale: Modern German Letters, Cultures, and Thought. Editor is Peter Hohendahl; Managing editor is Kizer Walker.
- KW received a request for information from Grant Harris, Library of Congress: he is looking for librarians with knowledge of the Dutch component of the Farmington Plan. Contact KW if you can provide any detail.
- Topics for ALA Annual – under the general topic of current trends and issues in academic publishing:
- • summary of Open Access journals in German and European Studies (revisit EZB)
- Contact KW if you want to volunteer. Gordon Anderson may be willing to do some of this…details TBA.
- Frankfurter Buchmesse: if you are planning to go, and you are interesting in coordinating activities, contact heidi.madden@duke.edu
- Discussion Group Business:
- Heidi Madden will serve as GDG Secretary/Chair-elect for 2008-2009.
- German Society of Pennsylvania
- Welcoming remarks -- Hardy von Auenmueller, President, German Society of Pennsylvania
- • The history of the German Society is available online.
- See also:
- Birte Pfleger. Ethnicity Matters: a History of the German Society of Pennsylvania. Washington, DC: German Historical Insititute, 2006.
- • Information on Scholarships
- "German American Studies: The Horner Library as a Resource" -- Professor Frank Trommler, University of Pennsylvania
- Horner Library provided literature for immigrants who wanted to learn English; Horner also provided leisure reading and literature in German – the collection includes both canonical and popular literature ("Trivialliteratur"). A complete description is at URL below – though this description cannot substitute for visiting the library itself. It is a beautiful space – see pictures.
- See also:
- Frank Trommler. "The Library of the German Society of Pennsylvania and its Consolidation under Oswald Seidensticker." Atlantic understandings: Essays on European and American history in Honor of Hermann Wellenreuther. Ed. Claudia Schnurmann and Hartmut Lehmann. Hamburg: Lit and New Brunswick: Transaction, 2006. 299-315.
- Reference Guide 20
- Kevin Ostoyich. The German Society of Pennsylvania: A Guide to its Books and Manuscript Collections. Washington, DC : German Historical Institute, 2006.
- Report: "Tracking Down an Immigrant Family with the Help of the Horner Library" -- Jim Niessen, Rutgers University Libraries
- Horner Library is not your first stop for tracing your ancestors; you are referred to the following resources for that purpose: http://www.germansociety.org/GenealogyResources.pdf. The society was founded as a charity organization for new immigrants. Aside from food, clothing and English lessons, etc., the society also provided an employment service. The records of this service are intact: the books list name, occupation and place of origin – not "Germany" but Bavaria, Rhineland, etc. Jim Niessen was able to look up a relative with records from 1894. Horner Special Collections are an unknown treasure trove of information.
- Tour of the Horner Memorial Library
- Although Dr. Friederike Baer, the Horner's Special Collections Librarian, was unable to attend the meeting, GDG members had the opportunity to view the collections, including an 18th-century edition by Francis Daniel Pastorius, founder of the first German settlement in North America.
- (minutes Heidi Madden, ed. KW)
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