Fall of 2007 | Aug |
Sep | Oct | Nov |
Dec |
Spring of 2008 |Jan | Feb |
Mar | Apr |
Dr. Martha Beck
Associate Professor of Philosophy
Lyon College
Degrees:
M.A., Ph.D., Bryn Mawr College
B.A., Hamline University
"The Rise and Fall of Athenian Democracy"
Dr. Beck presented life in Greece as Plato on August 31, at 4 p.m. at the Mabee
Simpson Library. Slides from her summer trip to Greece pointed
to the many places where Athenian Democracy was born and where it died.
She answered questions from the audience as if she were Plato and was
authentically dressed in a brilliant blue Athenian toga. The house was
packed with students from Lyon and community people from Batesville and
surrounding areas.
Dr. Beck's pod cast can be found at:
http://www.lyon.edu/lyonnet/is/medserv/avarchive.html
Lyon library to host unique joint art exhibition
Three members of the Lyon community are pooling their
talents for a unique art show designed to "burn the Buddha."
On Sept. 11 at 7 p.m., the Mabee-Simpson Library will
unveil the exhibit "Burning Buddha in Batesville." John Chiaromonte,
Gary Harris, and Kenton Adler are the joint contributors, and the
exhibit will run a month in the lobby of the library and is a form of
micro art.
Adler,
an accomplished singer and songwriter as well as visual artist, said he
created a mixed media piece that will include some collage, some found
objects and some hand-painted eggshells.
"The eggshells are the centerpiece, and tie in with the
theme of the exhibit in that they are strong symbols of life on this
plane, and the endless circle of life in this universe, but are also
fragile, and easily destroyed in their corporeal form," he said. "I
think the viewer will also find a bit of whimsy and humor in the
presentation, which draws some inspiration from comparative mythology,
placing the Buddha into some distinctly non-Buddhist tradition."
"Chiaromonte said the inspiration for doing this in a
"micro" gallery goes back to an exhibition he was involved in back in
1979. Many artists, including myself at that time, were looking for ways
to exhibit work outside of the mainstream ‘art as consumer item’ gallery
mentality," he said. "During the late 1960s and 1970s, alternative art
spaces opened up everywhere and the micro gallery was one expression of
this movement."
For this exhibit Chiaromonte has created Buddhas out of
large seedpods, each stuffed with an assortment of found and natural
objects.
"Each Buddha is sitting on a small woolen pad with a
wooden begging bowl, and there are also some drawings of a burning
Buddha that I have digitally enhanced," he said. "And last, there are
some ‘spirit’ houses/monastic cells made from wooden birdhouses."
Chiaromonte said the initial idea for this exhibition
was twofold: to bring the Buddhist Dharma to Batesville in a unique way;
and, to use small art works as the vehicle for expressing this dharma.
"I approached Ken Adler and Gary Harris about
participating in the show because both of them are deeply spiritual and
creative individuals, and I believe each has approached the theme in an
open ended way," he said.
Harris said his contributions to the exhibit deal with
matters of scale, themes of caring, giving, and invitation, and the
reinterpretation of religious iconography.
"It is said in theatrical design, ‘it works in small
scale, it will work in full scale,’ so I regard the mini-gallery as both
a challenge and an opportunity," he said. "I ask the viewers to pose
themselves imaginatively in the gallery in front of my works as if they
were in full-scale."
Many of the works spring from the Scriptural quote
attributed to the pen of Saint Matthew: "Come unto me all ye who travail
and I will refresh you," Harris said.
"My own spiritual journey has been guided by Holy
Scripture, the Native American oral tradition, the Vedas, and readings
on Buddhism and Taoism," he explained. "The central piece dominating the
exhibit hall is an overblown fusion of Christian and Buddhist imagery."
The title for the exhibition, "Burning Buddha in
Batesville," initially brings to mind the 1963 photograph of the
self-immolation of the Vietnamese Buddhist monk Thich Quang Duc,
Chiaromonte added.
"While this act was appalling to and often misunderstood
by the American people the protest was an act of compassion by Thich for
the Vietnamese Buddhists who were oppressed by the American backed South
Vietnam’s Ngo Dinh Diem government," he said. "This act of compassion
was also extended to the oppressors."
Another important element underlining this exhibition is
the Zen Koan by Zen Master Lin Chi, "If you meet the Buddha, Kill the
Buddha. If you meet a Patriarch, Kill the Patriarch." His intention is
not to condone murder but to help us see beyond external influences and
find the Buddha within.
"To burn the Buddha is to trust and listen to the
silence within," Chiaromonte said.
Buddhas
-
John Chiaromonte
Prince of Peace, Lion of Judah-
Gary Harris
Kenton Adler's Dharma Eggs and Buddha Bunnies
The library site of "100
Casts/Shooting the Line"
100 Casts/Shooting the Line was performed this Thursday,
September 20, 12:30 pm at the field in front of the pond in front
of the Mabee-Simpson Library.
Ken Adler provided the music (bagpipes) in full Scottish
regalia and Brooke Hollis, Ronica Williamson, and Colleen Rose provided
a Scottish jig dressed in black and silver as a school of trout.
John Chiromonte cast his fly rod 100 times trying to catch the trout.
He never did, but the picture of three Scottish lasses in the field
doing a delicate jig around a fisherman while pipes were playing will be
quite memorable.
Library Displays for September
Displays for the month of September include 24 posters
of our Founding Fathers of the Constitution and some of their famous
quotes in the lobby.
The Dahlquist shelf is also loaded with books about the
U. S. Constitution.
"Reachable Stars" (University of Alabama Press 2007) Book talk and
signing for Dr. George Lankford's latest book.
Dr. George Lankford
Emeritus professor of folklore at Lyon College and past Pauline M. and Brooks
Bradley Professor in the Social Sciences and Chair of the Social Sciences
Division when he served as a full-time faculty member.
October 16, 11 a.m., Tuesday morning
@ the library
A new book authored by a Lyon College emeritus professor
of folklore explores the ways ancient North Americans used the stars to
create and inspire their stories and traditions.
Folklorist Dr. George Lankford’s most recent
book, "Reachable Stars" (University of Alabama Press 2007),
compares the stories Indian groups told about the constellations and
which told the same stories – and which did not.
Subtitled "Patterns in the
Ethno astronomy of Eastern
North America," Lankford’s book contends that modern Westerners say
the lights in the sky are stars, but culturally they are whatever humans
say they are.
Many Native American tribes saw them as reminders of a
gloried past by which elders can teach and guide the young. Lankford’s
volume focuses on the ancient North Americans and the ways they
identified, patterned, ordered and used the stars to light their culture
and illuminate their traditions.
They knew them as regions that could be visited by human
spirits, so to them the lights weren’t distant points of light, but
"reachable stars." Guided by the night sky and its constellations, they
created oral traditions, or myths, that contained their wisdom and which
they used to pass on to succeeding generations their particular
worldview.
However, not all Native American groups told the same
stories. This study uses that fact to discover prehistoric relationships
between Indian groups, asking which groups saw a constellation in the
same way and told the same story.
Although these preliterate societies left no written
records, the mythic patterns across generations and cultures enable
contemporary researchers to examine the differences in how they
understood the universe—not as early scientists, but as creators of
cosmic order.
In the process of doing that, the myth-tellers left the
footprints of their international cultural relationships behind them. "Reachable
Stars" is the story of their stories.
Library Displays for
October
Early October- The Dahlquist bookshelf has a number of books that have
been challenged or banned through the years in schools and libraries.
Some of them include: "To Kill a Mockingbird, Daddy's
Roommate, Lord of the Flies, Slaughterhouse-Five, Carrie, and Bridge to
Terabithia."
Late October- The Dahlquist bookshelf has a number of
books about the history of Baseball.
The Display Case from mid-October through November
In honor of Homecoming 2007 the Mabee Simpson Library of
Lyon College will have a display of photos from 1910-1915 of Arkansas
(Lyon) College Alumnae in the display case of the front lobby. These
pictures are from the Burns Estate and capture faces of the Men’s
Erosophic Society, The Women’s L’E Toile Society, The Index staff
(yearbook), the senior class of 1914, and most interesting of all, the
1911 baseball team of Arkansas College. There are only 11 members. That
means only two on the bench, right? All the photos are labeled and we
also have the diplomas of Mabel and A. A. Conine in the case, dated
1915.
November
An Early Look at the 2008 Election
James L. (Skip) Rutherford
Dean of the University of Arkansas Clinton School of Public Service
Trustee of Lyon College
November 7, Wednesday, 7 p.m.
@ Nucor Auditorium
reception following @ the library
Skip Rutherford, a member of the Lyon College
Board of Trustees, has taught Lyon courses on the 2002, 2004 and 2006 elections.
Now he returns to campus to preview the 2008 election, the first presidential
election since 1928 where there is not a sitting president or vice president on
the ballot. With Senator Hillary Clinton, a former Arkansas first lady and
former Governor Mike Huckabee both running for President, Arkansas once again is
in the national limelight.Rutherford is Dean of the University of Arkansas Clinton School
of Public Service,
which opened in 2005. The school is located on the grounds of the
William J. Clinton Presidential Center and Park in Little Rock,
Arkansas. It is the only school in the country offering a Master’s
degree in public service.
Prior to joining the Clinton School, Rutherford
served as Executive Vice President of Cranford Johnson Robinson Woods (CJRW),
one of the region’s largest communications firms. In addition, he served
as Chairman of the Board of the William J. Clinton Foundation from
1997-2006, stepping down from the chairmanship when he accepted the UACS
position in May 2006. He remains a Clinton Foundation board member. From
1997 until it opened in 2004, Rutherford also supervised the planning
for the Clinton Presidential Library.
He is a former administrative assistant to United
States Senator David Pryor, (D-AR), past president of the Little Rock
School Board and has been active in numerous campaigns and initiatives
at the local, state and federal levels.
A 1972 journalism graduate from the University of
Arkansas at Fayetteville, he received the Journalism Department’s first
Distinguished Alumnus Award. He has served as a visiting professor at
the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville, Arkansas; Lyon College in
Batesville, Arkansas; the University of the Ozarks in Clarksville,
Arkansas; and the University of Central Arkansas in Conway, Arkansas.
He coordinated the 40th anniversary commemoration of
the 1957 crisis at Little Rock Central High School. He also coordinated
the dedication of the Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport, only the
third new commercial airport to open in the last 25 years.
He was the first president of the advisory board for
the Arkansas School for Mathematics and Science. He is a member of the
Board of Directors of Arkansas Children's Hospital, Lyon College and a
founding member of the Little Rock Central High Museum and Visitor
Center Board.
Rutherford was named the 2006 Tourism Person of the
Year at the Arkansas Governor’s Conference on Tourism. He was honored as
the 2005 Arkansan of the Year by the Arkansas Broadcasters Association,
was the recipient of the William F. Rector Memorial Award for
distinguished civic achievement in Little Rock, and received the Raymond
L. Garner Alumnus of the Year Award from the Phi Delta Theta
International Fraternity, headquartered in Oxford, Ohio. He was named
2004 Arkansan of the Year by the Arkansas Times newspaper and
2004 Headliner of the Year by the Arkansas Press Association.
Rutherford is the recipient of the Humanitarian Award
from the Arkansas Chapter of the National Conference of Community and
Justice, the Men of Volunteer Achievement from the Retired Senior
Volunteer Program, the Arkansas Community Service Award from the
Arkansas Department of Volunteerism, the Martin Luther King Award from
the Black Community Developers and the Community Service Award from the
University of Arkansas Alumni Association.
He is the founder and organizer of the Political
Animals Club, a non-partisan grassroots organization of community
leaders and activists who meet regularly to discuss politics and issues.
He and his wife, Billie, are the parents of three
children. They are members of Pulaski Heights United Methodist Church in
Little Rock where Rutherford is a past chairman of the Board of
Stewards.
Amnesty @ the Library
Students can bring food for "Help and Hope" of
Batesville, along with overdue books and all fines and fees will
be forgiven. Bring boxes of:
-
macaroni and cheese
-
Ramon Noodles
-
cans of vegetables
-
fruits
-
peanut butter
-
bags of beans
-
rice
"Help and Hope" of Batesville
knows we will be coming with a carload after school is out. Thank
you for contributing to "Help and Hope" of Batesville.
Displays Highlight Good Reading for the Holidays
Dean Covington, Director
of the library has assembled a collection of Christmas adult fiction on
the Dahlquist shelf. These books all have something about
Christmas in them. Nearby, is a collection of children's
fiction and non-fiction reading for the Christmas break. These
books are the best of the best, having won various awards such as the
Coretta Scott King Award, The Carnegie Award, the Kate Greenaway Award,
the Canadian Library Association's Book of the Year for Children, the
Senior Young Reader's Choice Award, the Costa Children's Book Award, the
Boston Globe's Horn Book Award for Children's nonfiction and fiction,
the Sydney Taylor Award, and of course the Caldecott and Newbery Medal
books.
Displays Highlight Diversity Week
The Japanese Wedding Kimonos
The Mabee-Simpson Library of Lyon College is displaying
vintage wedding kimonos that are on loan from First Community Bank of
Batesville, Arkansas. Mr. Dale Cole, Chairman and Chief Executive
Officer, purchased them from his friend, Harvey Bell who currently
resides in Japan. The gowns will be displayed until the end of
January and the display is open to the public. Call 307-7444 for more
information.
The gracefully embroidered white kimono–shiro-uchikake—is
the most popular gown worn during the actual Japanese wedding ceremony.
Its ‘white’ color represents the willingness of the bride to be ‘dyed’
in the color of her husband’s family. The iro-uchikake (colorful
uchikake) is worn by the bride during the wedding reception over the
shiro-uchikake. The bride will normally change her dress
several times, a tradition dating from the 14th century that signifies
that she is prepared to return to everyday life.
The uchikake kimono
originated in the Edo era and was mainly worn only by court nobles. The
kimono is made of silk and beautiful silk brocade. The kimono is rich in
fine embroidered patterns and scenes of flowers, cranes, pines, and
nature motifs embellish the kimono in rich color. The wedding day will
be the last time the bride will wear a rich highly patterned kimono, for
in Japan they are reserved only to be worn by young unmarried women. Red
is the most popular uchikake kimono color, however they are available in
many different colors from imperial purple to sea green.
“Beuys Will Be Beuys”
Link
to photos of exhibits
John Chiaromonte will be at the library on
January 22, at 11 a.m. to open the micro exhibit “Beuys will be Beuys” as
described below.
The Exhibition “Beuys will be Beuys”
(pronounced bo-eze) installed in the Ray Johnson Micro Gallery at the
Mabee-Simpson Library pays homage to the German artist Joseph Beuys.
Joseph Beuys is best known for the unusual materials (felt and animal
fat) that he used in his sculpture and his shamanistic performances. As
a professor he coined the phrase “Social Sculpture” to emphasize his
belief that each individual has creative potential and that Art could be
a vehicle for democratic social change.
The show will be on exhibition at the Library from January 21st
through June 29th. Over 120 artists from 30 countries have
contributed small works for the exhibition. These artists are part of an
international postal art network that began during the 1950’s with the
founding of the New York Correspondence School by Ray Johnson. Before
the creation of the New York Correspondence School artists used the
postal system to share and exchange art with other artists and friends.
Examples of this activity are Vincent van Gogh's letters to his brother
Theo packed with drawings for painting ideas or postcards created by the
artists Marcel Duchamp and Joseph Beuys. The unique thing about what Ray
Johnson did was to create a network of artists, poets, and musicians who
used the postal system as a reaction against the elitist attitudes of
commercial art galleries.
Today there are postal or small works exhibitions in museums, galleries,
artist’s homes all around the world. What is different about the
exhibition at the Mabee-Simpson Library is that the work is being shown
in a “micro-gallery” or scaled down version of an average gallery space.
There will be a rotation of three to five artists each week in the micro
gallery throughout the spring semester. You are invited to visit each
week to get a feel for what artists around the world are doing.
February 2008
"The 'Arkansas Ghost' Trial: The Strange Story of
the Murder of Connie Franklin."
Dr. Blevins summarizes his lecture with the following:
"In December 1929, the nation turned its attention to a sensational
murder mystery and trial in rural Stone County, Arkansas. For the
people of one community, things would never be the same again."
The lecture is on February 27, Wednesday, at noon and is free and open
to the public.
Dr. Brooks Blevins
Assistant Professor of History
Lyon College
B.A. in history at Lyon College, where he graduated magna cum laude
M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in history at Auburn University.
March 2008
Dr. Elizabeth Jacoway
"Turn Away Thy Son: The Crisis That Shocked the
Nation."
Lyon College Trustee and former Lyon College
professor
March 25, Tuesday, NOON @ the Mabee Simpson
Library
When nine black children desegregated Little Rock’s Central High School in
September 1957, 13-year-old Elizabeth Jacoway paid little attention. At the
time, she had no concept of the history she had lived through.
It was years later as a doctoral student that Jacoway began to realize the
importance of the Little Rock Nine. It was then she determined she, along with
the rest of the world, needed to know the truth about what happened 50 years
ago.
Jacoway will talk about her book Turn Away Thy Son: Little Rock, the Crisis That
Shocked the Nation (Free Press, 2007) at noon March 25 in the Mabee-Simpson
Library on the Lyon College campus.
Jacoway said her lecture builds from her childhood in Little Rock where her eyes
were closed to the realities of racial inequalities, to her graduate study and
approach to the research, to the arguments and conclusions crafted in the book
and to the ways the book has been received.
“This is a story that deserves to be discussed, thought about, and understood,”
she said. “It is a story that our nation needs to understand. America’s racial
dilemmas seem intractable in large part because we have settled for the easy
answers of half-truths and feel-good solutions.
“As we enter an era of remembrance of one of the most promising moments in our
national experience – the Civil Rights Movement – we owe it to the pioneers who
made huge personal sacrifices, and to the silent, unnamed thousands before and
since who have suffered the consequences of careless thinking on the part of
their leaders and scholars, to make a rigorous examination of those hope-filled
days so that we may move toward more clear-headed insights and more just
solutions for the future,” she added. “As one of the Little Rock Nine commented
at a conference recently, only when we acknowledge the full truth about the past
will be able to get about the business of reconciliation and healing.”
Jacoway was the visiting associate professor of history at Lyon College from
1990-1991 and joined the Lyon College Board of Trustees in 2001.
A native of Little Rock, Jacoway lives in Newport with her family. She received
her doctorate in American History from the University of North Carolina, and is
the author of five books and 17 articles. A frequent speaker at community events
and professional meetings, Jacoway has served with many regional and national
professional organizations, including the Little Rock Central High Museum
Visitors Center, the Arkansas Women’s History Institute, and the Southern
Historical Association.
Jacoway was an assistant professor at the University of Florida from 1972-1975
and an associate professor at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock from
1975-1978.
Amazon.com has posted Diane Tebbett's review of the
book.
The review is below:
Those of us who grew up in
Central Arkansas during the Central High crisis formed our opinions from
what our families believed about what was happening, what they believed
about race, what we saw on television, and what we read in either the
"liberal" Arkansas Gazette or "conservative" Arkansas Democrat. The
received wisdom then and now has been that Orval Faubus exploited the
limited integration of Central High for personal political gain.
Jacoway's
extensive research into both primary and secondary sources illuminates
the truly Byzantine complexity of the situation. Given the racial
attitudes of those who accepted integration at the time as an
undesirable, but legally necessary, step, it may be true that, as one
source quoted in the book states, sending 9 children into Central was
doomed from the beginning--sending 300 would have been the only strategy
that might have worked.
The virulent racism of the
many who opposed any degree of integration, combined with the shrinking
reticence of the few who understood it was legally necessary, left no
chance of success. Jacoway shows that few, if any, of the adult players
were completely blameless. While one could perhaps argue with Jacoway's
interpretation of some individuals' motives, the lengthy bibliography
and notes prove that she has excelled in the historian's task of
considering all sources in an attempt to recreate the reality of this
tumultuous time in our history.
Those looking for a novelistic
treatment, with heroes and villains and a compressed timeline hitting
only the high spots, will find this volume overfilled with detail. Those
wishing to understand all the forces which combined to turn Little Rock
from a moderate, progressive small Southern city into an international
symbol of racism and violence will appreciate the thoroughness and
richness of detail in Dr. Jacoway's solid history.
David Sonnier
Associate Professor of Computer Science
Lyon College
M.S., Georgia Institute of Technology
B.S., United States Military Academy
April 23, Noon, Wednesday
@ the Mabee Simpson Library
Fides et Ratio
(Faith and Reason)
David Sonnier, associate
professor of computer science at Lyon College, is presenting Fides et
Ratio (Faith and Reason) at the Mabee Simpson Library on April 23,
Wednesday, at Noon. He will talk about the balance of faith and reason
as one of the central issues in the philosophy of religion, and one
which emerges as frequently today as it did 100 or 1000 years ago. The
question emerges in many different forms:
- What are the limitations of each
(faith and reason)?
- What is the right balance between
faith and reason?
- Is it necessary that there is a
conflict?
- Is faith an obstacle, or is it
something that allows our mind to reach truths that would otherwise
be beyond our reach?
- Is belief in God rational?
- Does the person who believes err
on the side of credulity? Does the non-believer make the same
mistake by being overly credulous of a negative proposition?
Is it possible to reach a
balance of Faith and Reason in a world that resents both? Explore the
nature of Faith and Reason, and visit some of the ideas presented by
Aquinas, Pascal and others.
Sonnier joined the Lyon faculty in 2001
and is currently pursuing a Ph.D. from the University of Arkansas at
Little Rock. He currently serves as faculty advisor to Catholic Campus
Ministries. He is also a member of the Batesville Symphony League and
vice president of the Batesville Swimming Association. He is a graduate
of Georgia Tech and the United States Military Academy.
Good-bye reception for
Deanna Devall
A good-bye reception was
held for Deanna Devall at the Mabee-Simpson Library
on May 1, at 4:30. Deanna is leaving the library, moving, and
getting married!
pictured left to
right are: Camille Beary, Judy Blackwell, Dean Covington, Deanna Devall,
Brenda Lindsey, Kathy Whittenton, Mary Evans
Recycling Party @ the Library
The Lyon Recyclers met at the library on April 30 for a rip
roarin' party. That is they ripped out hundreds of pages from books for
recycling. The books were old indexes and law codes that are all now
online at the library. Many students stopped by to take out their
frustrations about finals by ripping some pages out of some books. Two car
loads of paper were hauled off by maintenance after they were finished. The
library thanks the Lyon Recylers for helping with this project.
Amnesty @ the Library
April 20 to Commencement, May 3
Students can bring food
for "Help and Hope" of Batesville, along with overdue books and all
fines and fees will be forgiven. This semester we are also accepting
linens, toiletries, and shampoo for the flood victims in Independence
County. Below are some of the food items that we are accepting.
-
Macaroni and cheese
-
Ramon Noodles
-
Cans of vegetables
-
Fruits
-
Peanut butter
-
Bags of beans
-
Rice
"Help and Hope" of Batesville
feeds many families in Batesville and the surrounding area.
Archived Library News and Events for the academic year of 2006-2007
Archived Library News and Events
for the academic year of 2004-2005
Contact
The
Mabee-Simpson
Library, Lyon College
2300 Highland Road, Batesville, AR 72501
Front desk (870) 307-7205
Interlibrary Loan (870) 307-7505
Last Maintenance: May 2, 2008
