reviews Book Reviews 469 ing staff—in the reorganization of the school’s computing and library services. One of Meachen’s findings is that the merger usually is a top-down process and the people at the top are more positive about mergers than the frontline staff. A special piece is Robin Wagner’s “The Gettysburg Experience.” Wagner dis cusses the painful experience of the radi cal integration of computing and librar ies at Gettysburg College. She analyzes the failure of the merger from three per spectives: planning mistakes, faulty structure, and lack of awareness of cul tural differences between the library staff and the computing staff. The bad merger inevitably resulted in a negative working climate of demoralized librarians and staff, inferior delivery of services, and, finally, the discontent of college students and faculty. Wagner shows us just how damaging such a bad merger can be. Books, Bytes and Bridges explores the important topic of reforming the relation ship between computing services and li braries in academic institutions. It does not attempt to offer a single solution to this complicated issue. Instead, the book provides different perspectives on the topic, from those of librarians to those of computing center employees, working at institutions of various sizes, and who have experienced everything from mod erate coordination to fanatic integration. It includes an adequate index and help ful information on contributors. Despite some weaknesses, such as the discrep ancy in quality among the collected pa pers, the book as a whole offers a unique and significant contribution to this still- evolving field. It should be on the pur chasing list of all college and research li braries and on the required reading list of academic administrators.—Xiaochang Yu, Virginia Commonwealth University. Disaster and After: The Practicalities of In formation Service in Times of War and Other Catastrophes. Ed. Paul Sturges and Diana Rosenberg. London: Taylor Graham Publishing, 1999. 174p. $46 (ISBN: 0-947568-77-8). We are all familiar with the cliché about not judging books by their covers; it may be wise to extend the warning to titles now, too, for lurking behind this volume’s rather prosaic title is something far more exciting and thought-provoking than the words would suggest. This stimulating collection of essays deals not only with disasters such as flood and fire but also concentrates on war and ethnic cleansing. But even that (and the work’s more de scriptive subtitle) fails to tell all because the book is really about the larger picture of the threats to, and triumphs of, infor mation service in a very hostile world. It is certainly not the book’s aim to serve as a recruitment tool for library, archival, and records management programs, but well it might be. Rather, it offers an antidote to the meek and mild image of information specialists and, indeed, puts our profes sion in the front ranks of the many battles being fought in an era blithely referred to as the Information Age. The tales in these pages are often dark, despite the “enlight ened” times we live in. The book begins innocently enough. The introduction by Derek Law uses the standard approach, suggesting that to avoid disasters one, impossibly, must ex pect the unexpected. And then, aptly enough, that is what is delivered. Al though there are some straightforward descriptions of library disasters and re sponses, one finds oneself, as in a disas ter itself, in a very different realm in which a whole new way of thought is needed. The editors apparently knew ex actly what they were doing, as their ex planation in the back of the book proves. The essays are from the proceedings of an international conference sponsored by the IGLA (International Group of the Library Association) held on September 4—6, 1998, at the University of Bristol. There, in the “charmed setting of an En glish provincial town,” informational pro fessionals gathered to report on occur rences in far-flung, violent, and often dan gerous settings. In the opening essay, Linda Stoddart provides some of the ba sic vocabulary for disaster preparedness 470 College & Research Libraries and response but takes us out of a library setting into the information management needs of organizations such as the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies of Af rica. She discusses information needs in responding to crises, the role of technol ogy, what can be achieved, and what needs to be done. John F. Dean then shifts to a panoramic view of the appalling ar chival and library destruction in Burma, Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam, giving a bit of information on the preservation of palm leaf manuscripts and focusing on the extent of the destruction and the na ture of the response. In the next essay, Maj Klasson takes a look at another type of damage—the psychological toll the Linkoping library fire had on the Swed ish town and staff. Many electronic list subscribers may remember graphic re ports of this fire when it happened in 1996. Similarly, the role of the Internet and other advanced technologies (such as mobile telephones) in responding to the floods in southwest Poland in 1997 is mentioned in two companion articles by Bozena Bednarek-Michalksa and Andrzej Nowakowski. The authors relate how one library responded and how another was helped. (Again, many on library and ar chival electronic lists around the world had better information than what the mass media provided.) Disorders from civil di sasters get their share of attention, too. In an arresting turnabout on the relationship between disasters and information, Index to advertisers ACRL 464 AIAA cover 3, 391, 395, 399 Archival products 398 Assoc. of Christian Librarians 450 CHOICE 440, 464 East View Publications 419 EBSCO cover 2 Institute for Scientific Info. 392 Library Technologies 420 OCLC 409 Primary Source Microfilm cover 4 Salem Press 474 Univ. of Illinois Press 451 September 2000 Vladimir S. Lazarev writes on how solu tions were found in Belarus to remedy the lack of available information to deal with literal fallout from Chernobyl; and Resoum Kidane discusses information services during the war in Eritrea, reiterating a theme that unfortunately sounds again and again in the following essays. Al though we often have to fight great battles to persuade resource allocators that librar ies, archives, and records centers are im portant, enemies of every description seem to have no doubt of it. Libraries, informa tion centers, and cultural repositories al ways seem to be among the first targets of those seeking to destroy and demoralize a nation or a people. Diana Sayej-Naser vents her rage on the effects Israeli occu pation has had on information services, education, etc., in the Palestinian territo ries; and Sava Peic and Aisa Telalovic, in spare prose, describe the incredible turmoil and loss of human life and cultural trea sures in the debacle of Saravejo. Many li brarians and other similar specialists lost their lives for going to work and doing their jobs, which, in light of what was go ing on around them, was nothing short of heroic. As perhaps is to be expected in such charged arenas of conflict, many of the authors seem partisan in their perspectives and often use language and hurl accusa tions as inflammatory as the deeds of the destroyers they decry. “We make no apol ogy for this,” Paul Sturges says in his final thoughts, concluding the volume. “Let the academics decide on matter of credit and blame[;] we want to know how informa tion professionals work when the props of a predictable natural environment and ordered society are knocked out from un der them.” Despite the partisanship prevalent in many of the pieces, this reader found the most enthralling essay to be the one es chewing it altogether. John Gray’s essay, “Documenting Civil Conflict: The Case of the Linen Hall Library, Belfast,” is truly inspiring. These passionate and dedicated information specialists, devoted to no cause other than truth and its elusiveness, collect on all sides of the conflict, creat Book Reviews 471 ing a library that truly belongs to all. If politicians and citizens were as truly evenhanded and fair as these profession als, there would be little need for a book such as this. And because they are not, we can be grateful that the editors and the writers have shared their experiences to create a book of great value to those dedicated not just to the preservation of information and information systems, but also to culture and its legacy. “This was not an academic conference,” Sturges con cludes, but he and Rosenberg have, nev ertheless, created a work of interest to academics, information professionals, and the engaged general public.—Harlan Greene, Charleston County Public Library and the South Carolina Preservation Project. Distance Learning Technologies: Issues, Trends and Opportunities. Ed. Linda Lau. Hershey, Pa.: Idea Group Publish ing, 2000. 252p. $69.95 (ISBN 1-878-28980-2). LC 99-048171. Distance Learning Technologies is not rec ommended. The stated purpose of this compilation is “to provide both academi cians and practitioners with a body of knowledge and understanding regarding the distance learning technologies.” The editor is a financial consultant with Salomon Smith Barney, Inc.; her academic background was with the School of Busi ness and Economics at Longwood Col lege. Many chapter authors have exper tise in management information systems and business management; some have expertise in educational technology. De spite the stated purpose of the book, it contains little on technology per se. Some interesting case studies are reported; however, they do not make the book a worthwhile purchase. In the preface, it is asserted that the book is organized into three sections: theoretical, conceptual, and case studies. However, it is unclear from either the table of contents or the chapters themselves that there is any dis tinction between sections. Case studies, for example, appear throughout the book. If a misleading organizational layout were the book’s only problem, it could possibly be overlooked. But many of the chapters focus on general educational principles and theories, and contain very little on distance learning or technology. In addition, the titles of many chapters do not reflect the content. On occasion, it is difficult to determine whether the chap ter authors are actual practitioners of dis tance learning or are conducting literature reviews. Even when suggesting areas for further research, it is unclear whether the authors intend to conduct the research themselves or are recommending it for others to do. A few of the case studies do present in teresting and useful, if not innovative, in formation and represent the best the book has to offer. For example, the chapter on the Department of Defense’s electronic school presents a model case study for suc cessful implementation of distance learn ing with clearly outlined advice for the beginning distance learning practitioner. The digital video chapter also presents some interesting information, although its value is limited because the use of tech nology was tested in an on-campus envi ronment. It would have been more inter esting if the authors also had attempted to use the system in a remote situation and been able to discuss the results of using video technology across a distance with its associated issues of access, bandwidth, and download times. The Pepperdine case study also presents valuable advice on developing a sense of community in the distance learning setting. This topic is of interest to many in the field as a way to increase and maintain student motivation to complete distance learning programs. In addition, the chapter on using the Internet in Egypt presents a fascinating perspective. However, it too would have been more in teresting had it contained less general theory and more detail on the implemen tation of the project and related issues such as translation of material into Arabic or the information infrastructure of the Arabic world. These rather interesting studies are refreshing bits in a compilation that adds little value to the literature on technology and distance learning and teaching.