oct07c.indd


George M. Eberhart N e w  P u b l i c a t i o n s  

College Libraries and the Teaching/Learning 
Process: Selections from the Writings of Evan 
Ira Farber, edited by David Gansz (247 pages, 

August 2007), brings 
together some of the 
seminal writings and 
talks of Evan Farber, 
the elder statesman 
of information­literacy 
instruction, which he 
pioneered in the 1960s 
at Earlham College. 
As Earlham’s chief 
librarian from 1962 
until his retirement 

in 1994, Farber was also one of the foremost 
proponents of the college library as an “instru­
ment of education” potentially more capable 
of innovation in teaching and learning than 
its unwieldy university counterpart. Farber 
has penned brief introductions to each of 
the 29 contributions, written between 1974 
and 2004. Richard Werking provides a short 
introductory tribute, and Farber offers up some 
personal reminiscences in a 2003 interview 
transcribed for an appendix. $29.00 (plus $6.95 
s/h). Earlham College Bookstore, Drawer 7, 
Earlham College, Richmond, IN 47374. 978­
1­879117­18­1. 

Film Preservation: Competing Defi nitions of 
Value, Use, and Practice, by Karen F. Gracy 
(287 pages, March 2007), considers the so­
cial, institutional, and cultural aspects of fi lm 
archiving in both commercial and nonprofi t 
settings, as well as the varying defi nitions 
among practitioners of what constitutes fi lm 
preservation. Gracy maps the eight stages in 
the path of preserving a film and identifi es 
the persons who are responsible for making 
decisions and maintaining quality control. 
$56.00. Society of American Archivists. 978­
1­931666­24­4. 

George M. Eberhart is senior editor of American Libraries, 
e-mail: geberhart@ala.org 

Intoxication in Mythology, by Ernest L. Abel 
(212 pages, November 2006), is a comprehen­
sive dictionary of myths, rituals, heroes, gods 
and goddesses, intoxicants, containers, places, 
and concepts associated with substance abuse, 
from tobacco to mead and peyote. Mind­al­
tering substances enjoyed a revered status in 
ancient times, and this work explains how the 
drugs were tied to possession by the gods, lib­
eration of the soul, and communion with the 
spirit world. In Hellenic culture, the mysteries of 
Eleusis, Dionysus, and Orpheus are given star 
treatment; the tobacco myths of the Americas 
are also showcased. $35.00. McFarland, 978­0­
7964­2477­1. 

Other good recent dictionaries are Carnal 
Knowledge: A Navel Gazer’s Dictionary of 
Anatomy, Etymology, and Trivia, by Charles 
Hodgson (260 pages, August 2007), which will 
satisfy any undergraduate curiosity about the 
definition and etymology of dimples, crotches, 
bosoms, and hangnails. $14.95. St. Martin’s 
Griffin. 978­0­312­37121­0. And Historical Dic­
tionary of Epistemology, by Ralph Baergen (255 
pages, June 2006), which offers defi nitions for 
the nature, methods, limitations, and validity of 
knowledge and belief, from Plato’s knowledge 
of forms to Wilfred Sellars’s critical realism and 
Bishop and Trout’s strategic reliabilism. $75.00. 
Scarecrow. 978­0­8108­5518­2. 

Jim Lane: Scoundrel, Statesman, and Kansan, 
by Robert Collins (320 pages, May 2007), is a 
thorough reexamination of the life of James H. 
Lane, an ardent Free State leader in 1856 and 
U.S. Senator from Kansas during the Civil War. 
Dismissed by critics on both sides as vulgar and 
unscrupulous, Lane was blamed for inciting the 
Confederate guerilla Quantrill to burn Lawrence 
in retaliation for a similar exploit in Missouri two 
years earlier; but in retrospect he seems more to 
have been a flawed but effective orator, organizer, 
and politician who had Lincoln’s ear and was an 
early and persuasive advocate for emancipation 
and the enlistment of freedmen in the Union 
Army. $29.95. Pelican. 978­1­58980­445­6. 

C&RL News October 2007  600 

mailto:geberhart@ala.org