This is a beautifully researched and realized work of scholarship, which unveils a remarkable archive of urban images that connect occultism, modernism, globality, and architecture. It will be of great value to historians, architects, planners, and scholars of cultural modernity due to its powerful argument for the cosmological underpinnings of modern urban thought.
~Arjun Appadurai, New York University, author of The Future as Cultural Fact: Essays on the Global Condition
In the contemporary era of climate crisis, growing concerns about the exploitation of nature, resurgent nationalism, and what is looking to be a new global political and economic order that will impact not just nations but also cities, this provocative book will spark considerable debate about what kinds of urban habitats we want to build and whether historical models relegated to the dustbin of twentieth-century architectural history can indeed offer new food for thought in these turbulent times.
~Diane E. Davis, Harvard Graduate School of Design; CIFAR Fellow and Project Co-Director, Humanity’s Urban Future
As UC Berkeley’s new academic year gets underway, the Library’s Scholarly Communication & Information Policy office stands ready to guide faculty, students, and staff through the complexities of copyright law and academic publishing. Through digital resources, virtual workshops, and one-on-one consultations, we’re excited to share what this semester has in store.
Workshops
Copyright and Your Dissertation
Date/Time: Tuesday, September 16, 2025, 11:00am–12:00pm RSVP to get the Zoom link
This workshop will provide you with practical guidance for navigating copyright questions and other legal considerations for your dissertation or thesis. Whether you’re just starting to write or you’re getting ready to file, you can use our tips and workflow to figure out what you can use, what rights you have as an author, and what it means to share your dissertation online.
Managing and Maximizing Your Scholarly Impact
Date/Time: Tuesday, October 14, 2025, 11:00am–12:00pm RSVP to get the Zoom link
This workshop will provide you with practical strategies and tips for promoting your scholarship, increasing your citations, and monitoring your success. You’ll also learn how to understand metrics, use scholarly networking tools, and evaluate journals and publishing options.
From Dissertation to Book: Navigating the Publication Process
Date/Time: Tuesday, November 18, 2025 (11:00am–12:30pm) RSVP to get the Zoom link
Hear from a panel of experts—an acquisitions editor, a first-time book author, and an author rights expert—about the process of turning your dissertation into a book. You’ll come away from this panel discussion with practical advice about revising your dissertation, writing a book proposal, approaching editors, signing your first contract, and navigating the peer review and publication process.
Other ways we can help you
In addition to the workshops, we’re here to help answer a variety of questions you might have on intellectual property, digital publishing, and information policy.
Have a question about copyright and artificial intelligence (AI) in relation to research and scholarship? Or your rights and responsibilities in using library-licensed materials for AI use? View the AI page on our website for guidance.
Interested in publishing your research open access? UCB Library can help defray the costs of an article processing charge (up to $2,500) or book processing charge (up to $10,000). See the Berkeley Research Impact Initiative (BRII) for more information. And explore the various UC-wide open access agreements and discounts that can help UC corresponding authors publish their scholarship open access.
Do you want to create an open digital textbook? Take a look at UC Berkeley’s Open Book Publishing platform (anyone with a @berkeley.edu email can sign up for a free account).
Keep an eye on the Library’s events calendar for more workshops and trainings.
Want help or more information? Send us an email at schol-comm@berkeley.edu. We can provide individualized support and personal consultations, online class instruction, presentations and workshops for small or large groups & classes, and customized support and training for departments and disciplines.
A variety of UC Berkeley-authored books published open access.
UC Berkeley supports a variety of ways our authors can participate in open access publishing. At its heart, open access literature is “digital, online, free of charge, and free of most copyright and licensing restrictions” (Suber, 2019). Open access materials can be read and used by anyone.
But you might be wondering, why is UC Berkeley concerned about trying to make research more openly available and accessible? Well, one fundamental reason is that the research and teaching mission of the UC includes the aim of “transmitting advanced knowledge,” and as part of doing that, our faculty, researchers, and students create and share their scholarship.
This system of scholarly publishing includes traditional publications such as peer-reviewed academic articles, scholarly chapters or books, and conference proceedings. It also includes other types of publications such as digital projects, data sets and visualizations, and working papers.
In this blog post, we’ll provide an update on how the UC Berkeley Library is fostering open access book publishing. And we’ll also highlight the current progress on supporting OA publishing of scholarly articles.
Library Support for Open Access Books
We know that not all University of California authors are publishing journal articles, and many disciplines—such as arts, humanities, and social sciences—focus on the scholarly monograph as the preferred mode of publishing. Some open access book publishers charge authors (or an author’s institution) a fee in exchange for publishing the book open access, similar to the practice of academic journal publishers charging an “article processing charge” to make a scholarly article open access.
Book authors can realize a variety of benefits with open access publishing, including increasing the reach of their scholarship, building relationships within their academic discipline, garnering more citations, making their scholarly books more affordable for students, improving accessibility for print-disabled users, and more.
UC Berkeley is supporting authors who wish to publish their books open access. The library provides funding assistance and access to publishing platforms and tools for UCB authors to make their books OA.
Berkeley Research Impact Initiative books
The Berkeley Research Impact Initiative (BRII) is a program to foster broad public access to the work of UCB scholars by encouraging the Berkeley community to take advantage of open access publishing opportunities—including books and journal articles. BRII is the local open access fund that helps defray the costs associated with publishing open access books and research articles. For books, BRII can contribute up to $10,000 per book for it to be published open access. Below are recent UCB-authored books published with the assistance of BRII.
UC Berkeley Library continues to support open access book publishing via Luminos, the open access arm of the University of California Press. The Library membership with Luminos means that UC Berkeley authors who have books accepted for publication through the UC Press can publish their book open access with a heavily discounted book processing charge. When combined with additional funding support through BRII, a UC Berkeley book author could potentially publish their book open access with the costs being covered fully by the Library. Luminos books are published under Creative Commons licenses with free downloads.
Pressbooks platform & workshops
The UC Berkeley Library hosts an instance of Pressbooks (https://berkeley.pressbooks.pub/), an online platform through which the UC Berkeley community can create open access books, open educational resources (OER), and other types of digital scholarship. The Scholarly Communication & Information Policy (SCIP) office continues to offer an annual Pressbooks workshop and demo where participants can learn how to navigate the platform and create and publish their own eBooks and OERs.
UC contributing to the broader ecosystem of open access book publishing
A FY2024-25 goal of the UC Libraries is to strategically advance open scholarship by extending its support for OA book publishing. At the systemwide level, the UC is supporting several open access book publishing ventures, including Opening the Future, MIT’s Direct to Open, the University of Michigan Press’ Fund to Mission, the Open Book Collective, and more. These models secure investments from libraries and other stakeholders, and agree to publish some or all of their frontlist books open access, with limited or zero direct cost to the authors. The backlist books are made accessible to participating institutions.
The UC is also pursuing three pilot projects—with University of California Press, Duke University Press, and Oxford University Press—to enable the OA publication of UC-authored monographs. California Digital Library has also sponsored the opening of 35 UC-authored books included in the Big Ten Open Books collections.
Library Support for OA Journal Publishing
While the topic of this post focuses mainly on open access books, UC Berkeley (and the UC more generally) offers a wide range of support to help authors publish scholarly articles. The UC’s system wide Open Access Policies ensure that university-affiliated authors can deposit their final, peer-reviewed research articles into eScholarship, our institutional repository, immediately upon publication in a journal. Once they’re in eScholarship, the articles may be read by anyone for free.
As of August 2025, the University of California has 28 system-wide Open Access Publishing Agreements and Discounts with scholarly publishers. These agreements permit UC corresponding authors to publish open access in covered journals, with the publishing fees being covered in part (or in full) by the UC. In fiscal year 2024-25 UC Berkeley authors published 1,032 open access articles as a part of these system wide open access publishing agreements.
Locally, the UC Berkeley Library continues to offer the Berkeley Research Impact Initiative (BRII). This program helps UC Berkeley authors defray article processing charges (APCs) that are sometimes required to publish in fully open access journals (note that BRII doesn’t reimburse authors for publishing in “hybrid” journals—that is, subscription journals that simply offer a separate option to pay to make an individual article open access). This past year BRII provided funding for the publication of 44 open access articles. UC Berkeley authors can take advantage of BRII assistance where there is no other system wide open access agreement in place.
Wrapping up
In this post, we highlighted several ways that the University of California—and specifically UC Berkeley—is supporting scholarly authors to create and share open access books. In addition to providing financial assistance, platforms, and publishing guidance, the Library is committed to promoting the broader OA book publishing ecosystem. We’ll continue to explore a variety of approaches to support the UC Berkeley community (and beyond) who wish to publish books on open access terms.
If you’re interested to learn more about how you can create and publish an open access book, visit our website or send an email to schol-comm@berkeley.edu.
The Graphic Arts Loan Collection (GALC) at the Morrison Library has been checking out art to UC Berkeley students, staff, and faculty since 1958 and it is back again this year!
The purpose of the GALC since its inception has been to put art in the hands of UC Berkeley students (and the best way to appreciate art is to live with it!), so on August 25 and 26, from noon to 4 p.m., and August 27 and 28, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., UC Berkeley students can come to the Morrison Library (101 Doe Library) and check-out up to two pieces of art from the GALC’s collection to take home and hang on their walls for the academic year. The prints will be available to students on a first come, first served basis. We will also have our newest prints available, including art by Dave Eggers and Annie Owens.
If you would like to see what we have before you come to the Morrison Library, all the prints are available to browse online at the Graphic Arts Loan Collection website. Not everything in the collection will be available at the Morrison Library on these days, but much of the collection will. Please note that the Graphic Arts Loan Collection will not be available to staff and faculty members during this time, but only available to UC Berkeley students. Starting September 2nd students can reserve prints from the collection through the GALC website, and on September 15th, faculty and staff can begin reserving prints. Any questions about the GALC can be directed to graphicarts-library@berkeley.edu.
Photo by Harold Ellwood. Italians reading war news, North Beach, 1935. Fang family San Francisco Examiner Photograph Archive Negative Files. The Bancroft Library. UC Berkeley. BANC PIC 2006.029–NEG box 625, sleeve 092981_01
The UC Berkeley Library has rich collections pertaining to Italian-American communities in California. An online exhibition Italian Americans in California created in 2007 imparts little known facts about centuries of immigrants to the Golden State and is now archived on the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine. Here are just a few from this marvelously researched exhibit:
Though small in number, Italians were some of the first European explorers and settlers of California. From 1687 to 1711, Father Eusebio Chino (probably pronounced Kee–no) traveled in northern Mexico and Lower California. He was the first person to prove that Lower California was a peninsula, not an island. Other early Italian visitors to the shores of California were sailors and fishermen.
Though we often associate Italians in California with San Francisco, the initial Italian settlers established themselves in such diverse communities as Monterey, Stockton, and San Diego during the years of Spanish Rule. While the majority of Italians settled in the urban centers of the east, many, especially northern Italians came out west. As late as 1890, there were more Italian immigrants on the Pacific coast than in New England.
As early as the 1840s, settlers from Genoa began to arrive in the valleys of northern and central California after hearing their Ligurian (the region that includes Genoa) sailing relatives talk about how ideal the valleys were for vinting. Despite the fact that Liguria is not a major wine producing region in Italy, the wine industry in California was mostly built by Genoese.
The first significant wave of Italian immigrants came to California during the Gold Rush. Those who came quickly moved to buy land or work in service industries, rather than stay in the mines.
The majority of these Italian immigrants to California came from northern Italy. They began building communities, introduced Italian Opera to California in 1851, and founded an Italian language newspaper in San Francisco as early as 1859. Amadeo Giannini founded what became the Bank of America, first known as the Bank of Italy, in 1904 as a way for Italian immigrants to save and borrow small amounts, but the genius of his bank was the first use of branches put in locations closer to his customers.
The aftermath of the Gold Rush brought even more northern Italians to California. The ostentatious wealth of those who succeeded during the Gold Rush years brought with it a demand for stone and marble cutters from Italy to work on the mansions of the newly rich. The fishing grounds and warm climate began to attract Sicilian fishermen, especially in the Bay Area and San Diego.
San Francisco’s Little Italy bounced back from the 1906 earthquake in better shape than ever. At the same time, Italian immigrants had established themselves as the primary fishermen in the San Francisco Bay, and as a major agricultural force as well. Some children of the first wave of immigrants were coming of age in the 1900s to the 1930s, and these achieved greater success than their parents in law, politics, business, and agriculture, especially wine.
The cultural contributions of generations of Italian Americans in San Francisco in particular is impressive. Writers such as Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Gregory Corso, Diane di Prima, Philip Lamantia and others fostered the Beat movement in the post-World War II years, rebelling against the conventions of mainstream American life (consumerism, racism, homophobia, etc.).
From Doe Library’s collection in the Main Stacks and NRLF, here are some noteworthy publications:
Garibaldi, C. G. (active ca. ). At the Play [Portraits of Prominent San Franciscans, California]. Robert B. Honeyman, Jr. Collection of Early Californian and Western American Pictorial Material. The Bancroft Library. UC Berkeley. BANC PIC 1963.002:0501–ESelect Finding Aids from The Bancroft Library
Early California Italian-American Newspapers in The UC Berkeley Library
ll Corriere del Popolo. San Francisco, CA: Pedretti Bros., 1914-1943, 1948-1967 (lacks issues)
L’Eco d’Italia. San Francisco, CA: Pierino Mori, 1966-1980.
L’Italo-Americano. Los Angeles, CA: Scalabrini Fathers, 1985-2016. Online archive for 2012-present available via UCB only. Former titles: Eco d’Italia and Italo-Americano di Los Angeles
Italian fisherman with no crabs at Fisherman’s Wharf. Fang family San Francisco Examiner Photograph Archive Negative Files. The Bancroft Library. UC Berkeley. BANC PIC 2006.029–NEG box 644, sleeve 093662_02
Pins, badges, and other ephemera relating to Republican National Conventions and Republican political campaigns mostly from the 1950s and 1960s from the Marjorie H. E. Benedict papers (BANC MSS 90/168 c).
Over the last year, I’ve worked on a grant project funded by Jo Freeman processing four collections relating to women in politics. These collections include the Vera Smith Schultz papers, Mary Moore papers, Marjorie H. E. Benedict papers, and Eleanor Cameron Fowle papers. Each of these collections have been important and enlightening in their own way. They are now processed and open for the public to research and explore.
Mary Moore Papers
Various campaign and political buttons, particularly related to Mary Moore. (Mary Moore papers, BANC MSS 2016/111)
Letter sent to Martin Foster, owner of the Piedmont Theatre, from a resident concerned about how screening The Empire Strikes Back will cause problems in the neighborhood. (Mary Moore papers, BANC MSS 2016/111)
Flyer for a Tom Hayden for US Senate campaign event for cocktails with Jane Fonda. (Mary Moore papers, BANC MSS 2016/111)
The first collection from this project that I processed was the Mary Moore papers (BANC MSS 2016/111). Moore served as a councilwoman for Oakland City Council for District 2 from 1977-1994. Her papers cover political issues in Oakland at this time, including local disputes over projects and businesses in the area of District 2. On the juicier side of politics, there are articles referring to the breakdown of the relationship between Moore and then Oakland Mayor, Lionel Wilson. It’s always fun to get to know more about a city’s politics during a different time period. A lot of proposals for projects and redevelopment came across Moore’s desk and it is particularly interesting to find out which projects were implemented and which ones were not.
Vera Smith Schultz Papers
A page from Vera’s notebook that discusses the evolving role of women in civic activities. (Vera Smith Schultz papers, BANC MSS 96/62 c)
Article honoring the life and work of Vera Smith Schultz. (Vera Smith Schultz papers, BANC MSS 96/62 c)
Article honoring the life and work of Vera Smith Schultz. (Vera Smith Schultz papers, BANC MSS 96/62 c)
The next collection I worked on was the Vera Smith Schultz papers (BANC MSS 96/62 c). Schultz was the first woman elected to the Mill Valley City Council in 1946 as well as the first woman elected to the Marin County Board of Supervisors in 1952. After she lost her re-election in 1960, Schultz continued her involvement in local government and non-profit organizations that operated in Marin County. She was a fierce advocate of getting Frank Lloyd Wright to design the Marin County Civic Center. Her papers primarily consist of materials related to her work on the Marin County Board of Supervisors, her personal interests in local Marin County issues, and her work with the Marin Senior Coordinating Council.
Marjorie H. E. Benedict Papers
Boxes and piles of materials while in process. (Marjorie H. E. Benedict papers, BANC MSS 90/168 c)
Poster of President Dwight D. Eisenhower that says “Happy Birthday Ike” (Marjorie H. E. Benedict papers, BANC MSS 90/168 c)
RSVP card for the California Pageant of Fashion and Luncheon, an event of the 1956 Republican National Convention held in San Francisco. (Marjorie H. E. Benedict papers, BANC MSS 90/168 c)
One of the most rewarding (and most difficult to organize) collections that I worked on for this project was the Marjorie H. E. Benedict papers (BANC MSS 90/168 c). Benedict’s papers provide a unique perspective on the organizing and political tactics of the Republican Party in the 1940s-1960s. She was the Republican National Committeewoman for California representing the state for the Republican National Committee (RNC) from 1949-1960. Her work with the RNC comprises most of her papers and includes materials from when she was designated as Hostess for the 1956 Republican National Convention in San Francisco. Her collection includes correspondence and campaign materials from both state and national campaigns. State campaigns featured include politicians that also have papers in The Bancroft Library’s holdings, including Senators Thomas Kuchell and William Knowland. The wealth of correspondence and ephemera that Benedict’s collection holds can help researchers better understand the relationship between politicians and the RNC and political organizers.
Eleanor Fowle Cameron Papers
Article titled “Cuties vs. Issues: Cranston’s Wife Bets on Latter” with photograph of Cranston’s wife, Geneva Cranston. (Eleanor Fowle Cameron papers, BANC MSS 90/177 c)
Bumper sticker in support of Alan Cranston for office. (Eleanor Fowle Cameron papers, BANC MSS 90/177 c)
Poster of the cover for Eleanor Fowle Cameron’s book,
“Cranston: The Senator from California.”(Eleanor Fowle Cameron papers, BANC MSS 90/177 c)
The final collection I worked on for this project was the Eleanor Fowle Cameron papers (BANC MSS 90/177 c). Eleanor Fowle Cameron was a chairwoman of the Democratic State Women of California, a former head of the women’s division of the Democratic State Central Committee, and president of the Foothill-De Anza Community Foundation. She also was part of the Stanford University Founding Grant Society board of directors and a trustee of The Trust for Hidden Villa in Los Altos Hills. She was the sister of former California Senator Alan Cranston. She authored “Cranston, The Senator from California,” a biography of her brother, that was published in 1980 and republished in 1984. The bulk of this collection consists of materials related to the research and writing of her biography on Alan Cranston. There are also a few articles she wrote for other publications and some personal correspondence and family papers.
The Graphic Arts Loan Collection (GALC) at the Morrison Library has been checking out art to UC Berkeley students, staff, and faculty since 1958 and it is back again this year!
The purpose of the GALC since its inception has been to put art in the hands of UC Berkeley students (and the best way to appreciate art is to live with it!), so on August 25 and 26, from noon to 4 p.m., and August 27 and 28, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., UC Berkeley students can come to the Morrison Library (101 Doe Library) and check-out up to two pieces of art from the GALC’s collection to take home and hang on their walls for the academic year. The prints will be available to students on a first come, first served basis. We will also have our newest prints available, including art by Dave Eggers and Annie Owens.
If you would like to see what we have before you come to the Morrison Library, all the prints are available to browse online at the Graphic Arts Loan Collection website. Not everything in the collection will be available at the Morrison Library on these days, but much of the collection will. Please note that the Graphic Arts Loan Collection will not be available to staff and faculty members during this time, but only available to UC Berkeley students. Starting September 2nd students can reserve prints from the collection through the GALC website, and on September 15th, faculty and staff can begin reserving prints. Any questions about the GALC can be directed to graphicarts-library@berkeley.edu.
To my usual delight with speculative fiction, the Hugo awards have been announced! These controversial awards raise lots of questions about voice, audience, and the politics of publication. Nonetheless, they are usually worth a gander as awesome literature. I, for one, adore a couple of these authors.
Best Novel
The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett (Del Rey, Hodderscape UK)
Published by Europa Editions, The Passenger series offers an unconventional take on typical travel guides with new writing, original photography, art, and reportage from around the world. The series was first launched in 2018 by the independent Italian publisher Iperborea, and was brought into English by Europa in 2020. It has also been translated into Spanish, Portuguese, and Korean.
The book-magazine travels far and wide to bring back the best writing from the places it visits. It assembles not only reportage, but also long-form journalism and narrative essays with the aim of telling stories of the contemporary life of a place and its inhabitants: “It takes readers beyond the familiar stereotypes to portray the shifting culture and identity of a place, its public debates, the sensibilities of its people, its burning issues, its pleasures and its pain.”
An Author Recommends section provides cultural tips on books, films, music and more from contemporary authors such as Valeria Luisell (Mexico), Banana Yoshimoto (Japan), Enrique Vila-Matas (Barcelona), Pitchaya Sudbanthad (Thailand), Paolo Macry (Naples), Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (Nigeria) and more. Digging Deeper provides short bibliographies for further reading, and The Playlist links to curated Spotify playlists of music from the featured city, country, or region. To date there have been eighteen volumes published in English, and all are shelved in Morrison Library’s travel section, waiting for their next trip.
Exploring Research at Scale with Web of Science XML Data
The Web of Science XML dataset now available for research, teaching, and learning at UC Berkeley.
This dataset is an essential tool for anyone exploring, evaluating, or visualizing global research activity. Drawing from over 12,500 journals across 254 disciplines in the sciences, social sciences, and humanities, this rich dataset includes not only journal articles, but also conference proceedings and book metadata—spanning back to 1900.
With more than 63 million article records and over 1 billion cited references, the dataset supports large-scale analysis of scholarly communication and impact. Key metadata elements include ORCID identifiers in over 6.2 million records to help disambiguate authors, detailed funding acknowledgments with grant numbers, and full author and institutional affiliations to support accurate attribution and collaboration analysis. Web of Science also standardizes institutional names to resolve naming variations, making cross-institutional analyses more reliable.
Researchers can access this data through flexible XML, allowing them to build complex citation networks, analyze research dynamics, and model trends over time. The dataset can be combined with other datasets for additional insights or used in visualization and statistical tools.
For research offices the dataset provides an opportunity to gain meaningful insights into the ever-evolving research landscape. With consistent indexing and global coverage, it’s a foundation for informed research strategy, evaluation, and discovery.
The Graphic Arts Loan Collection (GALC) at the Morrison Library has been checking out art to UC Berkeley students, staff, and faculty since 1958 and it is back again this year!
![At the play [portraits of prominent San Franciscans, California]](https://update.lib.berkeley.edu/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/at-the-play.png)
