Book Review: Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know

Serhy Yekelchyk, Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know. New York: Oxford University Press, 2020. ISBN: 9780197532119.

 

Genre: nonfiction, reference

Subgenre: Ukraine, history, politics

Format: hardcover

Source: Hutchins Library, Berea College

 

This book is part of Oxford's series "What Everyone Needs To Know" (by the way, they do have the trademark on that phrase). Our library recently bought this title for our collection, in part given the timely topic at this moment. I decided to go ahead and read it to learn more as well as to write this brief review. This is a second edition of the book. The author is a professor of History and Slavic Studies at the University of Victoria and writes on modern Ukraine and Russian-Ukraine relations. 

The book follows the typical format of the "What Everyone Needs to Know" series, which is a question and answer format. The book is arranged into seven chapters: 

• Why Ukraine?
• The Land and the People.
• The Making of Modern Ukraine.
• Ukraine After Communism.
• The Orange Revolution and the EuroMaidan.
• Russia's Annexation of the Crimea and the War in the Donbas.
• The War in Ukraine as an International Issue. 

Each chapter then has a series of basic questions with answers. Some sample questions the book answers are: 

• Why did Ukraine become a key reference point of American political struggles?
• Was Ukraine always part of Russia?
• When and why did Ukraine give up its nuclear arsenal? 
• What assistance has the United States provided Ukraine since 2014?

In addition, the book also includes a chronology, a map, a set of notes documenting facts, and a list for further reading. The book covers the country from its early days up until the first year or so of Zelensky's presidency.  As the author writes, he focuses mainly on "Ukraine's complex national and civic identity" (xv). He does address that and a bit more as he also looks at Ukraine's relations with Russia as well as Ukraine's interactions with the United States and the international community. 

The book is more an academic textbook, in other words I would not label it for pleasure reading (unless you are a policy wonk, history buff, or similar reader), but it should be of interest to general readers who want to learn more about the topic. While the text can be a bit dry at times, the book is still very accessible. The question and answer format is good to allow readers to read a bit at a time here or there. Some readers may want to read the book cover to cover. Other readers may want to just find topics of interest and focus on those. If you need a basic book that covers the topic well, this book will do the job. 

For academic libraries, this can be a good book to introduce the topic to students. For students who may be writing research papers on Ukraine and the war with Russia, this can be a good text to get them started. It can provide an overview of the issues, and the references from the notes and further reading can give students additional sources to read and explore. I would also say this can be a good selection for public libraries seeking to add a book on what is a topic right out of the news at this time. If a public library does not have much on Ukraine, this book can be a good start. 

Overall, at a little under 200 pages, not including notes and reading list, this is a book anyone can read and get a basic understanding of the country and the relevant issues. I really like it, and it would be one I would hand to students and other patrons wanting to learn more about the topic. Bottom line is this is a pretty good primer on the topic. 

4 out of 5 stars.

Article Note: Caring in First Year Library One-Shot Instruction

I picked this up to read in my quest to keep up with the literature in library instruction. Here are some takeaways and notes I want to remember from the article, with a bit of comment. 

• Author's main argument: "an academic librarian providing one-shot instruction sessions to first-year students is uniquely positioned to enact a feminist ethic of care in the classroom" (96). A key is to think of the session as the start on an open librarian and student relationship.
  
• The author further argues that the instruction session is a first impression for first year students and a way to inspire a relationship with the librarian and the library. This is a big reason why here in our library we promote our other services during instruction sessions, especially availability of appointments for research consultations with a librarian. 
• I'd give this article some bonus points for mentioning bell hooks and her work. To be honest, if you are writing about feminism and education, odds are good you have to bring up bell hooks.
• Author making reference to O'Keefe: "Studies have shown that a sense of connectedness and feeling cared for can have dramatic impact on student retention rates and ensuring that students perform to the best of their abilities; that sense of connectedness can come from a caring relationship with just one key person in the student's institution" (qtd. in 97). This is also why our librarians strive to demystify academia, make transparent assumptions that professors often take for granted and fail or neglect to explain to students. On a side note, I may need to check the literature for anything on this demystifying process; I am sure there is something out there, yet for us here seems like just something we do. 
  
• Citation for the reference: O'Keefe, P. (2013). "A sense of belonging: Improving student retention." College Student Journal, 47 (4): 605-613.
• Defining feminist pedagogy, from Crabtree, et.al.: "Feminist pedagogy is marked by a desire to break down the classroom hierarchy that traditionally puts the teacher in a position of power over the students, favoring instead an egalitarian community of learners who respect individuals and differences" (97).
•  Citation for the reference: Crabtree, R.D., Sapp, D.A., and Licona, A.C. (eds.). (2009). Feminist pedagogy: Looking back to move forward. The Johns Hopkins Press. 
• Though the author argues that our classrooms may be places of radical possibilities, I do have to question that. Just how much "freedom" do we really have given certain faculty demands and other restrictions? 
• The author highlights that the one-on-one reference consultation is a good fit for a caring relationship to develop. We often find here that we are better able to care for and help our students in consultations. In addition, the feedback from post consultation surveys we do as part of our assessment process tend to be positive. 
• A tip: "It is important to show availability outside the classroom for a future encounter" (100). We certainly do this. I even keep late hours for consultations. 
• The author probably needs to work on limits and boundaries given that she "gives students her email address and cell number and asks them to email/call/text anytime" (100). I give my students my email address, but that is it. They do not get my cell, and I do not think a librarian should be giving out their personal cell number. Heck, in previous workplaces some of the female librarians had to be concerned about stalking to the point they did not even want their full names on name tags. So no, not giving out my cell. Besides, as much as my current employer loves the idea of 24/7 availability, reality is workers including me do have lives outside of work that do not include our students. Healthy boundaries need to be enforced. Besides, there is no reference question that would require an emergency call at 3am for instance. 
• A big part of the reason I choose to work in a small college: "What if our first-year students came to the library for the first time and discovered there a librarian who knew their names, was interested in their research assignment and its relation to their lives, reflected carefully and responded to their expressed needs, was knowledgeable and credible, indicated wide availability outside of the library session, and sought further and deeper relationships with them as individuals?" (101-102). That is basically a lot of what my colleagues and I do here. The small college setting does make it a bit easier. 
• To be honest, a lot of this material is not so much "feminist" caring. It is just plain caring, making an effort to know the students. The article could have left out the feminist theory at the start of the article, and this would still work. 

 

Citation for the article: Leah Morin, "The First-Year Library Instruction One-Shot: A Place for Caring." Communications in Information Literacy 15.1 (2021): 95-103. 

Some additional items from the references list I may want to look at: 

Accardi, M.T. (2013). Feminist Pedagogy for Library Instruction. Library Juice Press. 

Kumbier, A., Drabinkski, and M.T. Accardi, (2010). Critical Library Instruction: Theories and Methods. Library Juice Press.  

I already read and reviewed bell hooks book Teaching to Transgress (link to review and reading notes part one and part two).

 

 

 

 

Article Note: On trendspotting and the future in post-pandemic academic libraries

This editorial piece looks at spotting trends for academic libraries in the post-pandemic world. Personally, I do not think we are in a post-pandemic world, but as I often say, I am not a pundit nor do I play one on TV. Anyhow, the last two years have been challenging for us in academic libraries, large or small. We had to improvise, adapt, and overcome in order to serve our students. In our case, we did do quite a bit of work in order to respond and adapt our services to more online settings. Our library did have some structure in place to accomplish this. The college overall had to work at it a bit more mainly because we are a residential campus, but the college did adapt as well. The article's author suggests that these new experiences will continue to shape academia in the post-pandemic world. Do keep in mind that for the most part, as usual in many LIS articles, this one focuses more on larger institutions like ACRL members and its UK counterpart. I am more interested to see if anything can be useful to us here in our more modest and smaller setting.

 

Some key quotes, with my comments. 

 

"The pandemic has heightened the importance and significance of being able to operate in a hybrid manner and how libraries deliver services in online environments" (2). 

 

By now, an increase in online learning is a given, and it is more significant in the COVID times. COVID and online learning are here to stay, which should not surprise anyone. 

 

"Brine and Knight (2021) actually discuss the continued increasing cost of digital content, and the impact that the pandemic has had on this issue" (2). 

 

This has been and continues to be a constant, the increasing costs. As I often say these days, this is one of the things I do not need cartomancy for. 

 

On another note, as the article mentions, open access has expanded. However, the work is barely starting. It is nowhere near where it could be or should be. 

 

"By 2020, the ACRL trends around students have become more about 'student wellbeing and mental health,' illustrating that whilst the focus may have changed, the importance of understanding and supporting students has never diminished" (3).

The 2020 report would look at data before the pandemic, Even then wellbeing and mental health were emerging as issues. If anything, the pandemic has made issues of wellness and mental health worse given the higher stress students, along with faculty and staff, face during these Hard Times. As for how higher education has handled it, well, based on observation I'd say inconsistently. 

"Academic librarians will need to manage and curate data more and more, and consequently will need to become more 'data literate'" (5). 

We continue to use data and evidence to guide our decisions, but the point here is that there are and will be more additional data sources to consider. 

 

"Academic libraries continue to lead the way in decolonization and liberation work and initiatives within their institutions, but much still needs to be done to address the unbalanced nature of the academic library workforce and how this reflects on the support and services provided for the users of those libraries" (5). 

Naturally, something had to be said to diversity and inclusion. Given the climate in the U.S. as of this post, I am a bit skeptical about claiming that academic libraries lead the way in the liberation work. Some might, but others are failing at it. Even here I know we do what we can, but there is still work to do.

Citation for the article: Leo Appleton, "Trendspotting-- Looking to the Future in a Post-Pandemic Academic Library Environment." New Review of Academic Leadership, 28.1 (2022): 1-6.