Law Library Wins Halloween Trick-or-Treat Tour Decorating Contest

On October 31, the Law Library staff participated in the first annual Halloween Trick-or-Treat Tour sponsored by the Law School's Office of Student Affairs. The Law Library's Rare Book Room was decorated with an abundance of creepy, spooky decor around the central theme of "A Poltergeist Trapped in the Law Library." Along with the decorations, two games were planned for the enjoyment of the tour guests.

At 4:00 p.m. on Halloween, the tour guests began to arrive. Close to 50 tour participants came through the ordeal unscathed and were awarded candy and prizes for their efforts. The tour hosts offered a "lights on" option for the less adventuresome visitors.

At the annual Law School Halloween Social, held later that evening, winners of the annual decorating and costume contests were announced. The Law Library staff was delighted to receive 1st Prize for best decorated space! Along with a fall floral arrangement and a tin of gourmet popcorn, the Law Library gets "bragging rights" until next year's event.

A big note of thanks goes to the decorating committee (Beverly Bryant, Acquisitions Senior Assistant; Maggie Ward, Senior Cataloging/Serials Assistant; Pam Mueller-Anderson, Senior Serials/Cataloging Assistant; Sandra Osborn, Supplementation Senior Assistant, and Richard Humphrey, Reference Librarian), who diligently planned the event and put up the decorations. The entire Law Library staff also deserves kudos for pitching in with lighting, props, costumes, and extra hands during the event.

Fall 2011 Exam and Winter Break Hours

November Law Library Display

In celebration of Native American Heritage Month, the Law Library’s November display spotlights the National Native American Bar Association (NNABA). Information about the NNABA, its current leadership, and its core initiatives, is featured in the display case.

Along with the NNABA information, we have included the official seals of numerous Native American tribes that reside throughout the United States.

On the adjacent counter, numerous titles from the Law Library’s collection are displayed, reflecting many of the complex legal issues which confront our Native American citizens.

For a more localized approach to Native American issues, go to the website of the American Indian Center of Indiana at: http://americanindiancenter.org/default.php

Law Library Subscribes to International Encyclopedia of Laws

The Law Library recently purchased a subscription to the Wolters Kluwer electronic product International Encyclopedia of Laws (IEL).

The IEL resources focus on specific fields of law and provide access to monographs which describe how each country’s legal system governs these legal issues. Each monograph is authored by recognized experts in the respective legal field of that country. Researchers will find these resources invaluable in discovering how different countries deal with legal issues and how the countries’ laws compare and contrast with one another.

As with most of the other electronic titles to which the Law Library subscribes, these titles can be accessed through the Electronic Resources link on the Law Library’s homepage. Researchers may click on any of the links, indicated by the blue arrow, to see a complete list of the available databases.

After clicking on the International Encyclopedia of Laws link, users will be directed to a list of the individual IEL titles.

Below is an example of what users will see when they link to an individual IEL title (in this example, IEL Civil Procedure). Notice that in the upper right-hand corner, there is an option to link to the Title Contents (Table of Contents) for each article. The “More about this title” link provides access to the author, title, and date information for each part of the monograph, and the “Update history” link will indicate how timely the information has been updated.

Moving the cursor over the “National Monographs” link and clicking on it will provide an alphabetical list of the countries whose resources are currently a part of the publication. All documents in the IEL database are provided in English regardless of the official language of each country. Individual chapters are provided in .pdf format and can be printed or bookmarked for future reference.

If researchers experience any difficulty in using the IEL resources, they may click on the Help button in the middle of the blue task bar. Doing so will link to the following screen where help options are displayed. If user’s questions cannot be answered by any of these help options, they should be sure to ask one of the Reference Librarians for assistance.

New Subscriptions to Bureau of National Affairs (BNA) Environmental Resources

Our Law Library now provides electronic access to the BNA Environment Reporter and the BNA International Environment Reporter. As in the article above, access to these databases is through the Electronic Resources tab on the Law Library’s website.

Both of these services will be useful in researching current information on environmental issues, particularly as new laws, regulations, and policies are being considered and implemented by national and international agencies. Crucial issues of environmental safety and compliance are arising daily and these resources will help researchers to find the most current information.

After accessing the resource, the researcher may simply scroll through the current newsletter and read the recent articles, if that fulfills their information need. However, if the researcher prefers to conduct a directed search, they may enter search terms in the box next to the search button or use the links below the box to customize their searching options. The “Advanced Search” option will provide more detailed search parameters, especially if specific publication dates, titles, or author’s names are known.

In order to become familiar with the functions of these BNA tools, the “Help” option near the middle at the top of the opening screen will link the user to instructional materials. Moving the cursor over the plus signs and clicking on them will guide the user to more specific topics within the instructional files. If specific help topics are desired, the user may also choose the “SEARCH the Help” option which appears just under the title on the Help screen.

Another useful feature of these resources is the “Finding Tools” link that appears just below the title of the reporter. As illustrated, this feature will allow searching or browsing of the reporter’s Index Archives or, if the searcher knows specific case names or recent topical cases, they may search the appropriate case lists indicated.

As always, please consult one of the Reference Librarians, if you have any questions or problems with using any of the reference resources in the Ruth Lilly Law Library.

Librarian and Staff News

Judith Anspach, Professor of Law and Director of the Law Library, presented a guest lecture titled "Current Issues in Animal Law" for the SPEA Animal Rights course, on Friday, October 28.

Catherine Lemmer, Head of Information Services, presented a conference session, titled “Developing an Effective Online Legal Research Course for Law Students” at the 2011 Ohio Regional Association of Law Libraries Annual Conference in Cincinnati, OH, on Thursday, October 20.

Chris Long, Cataloging Librarian, presented a conference session, titled "RDA - Coming Soon to a Catalog Near You?" at the 2011 Ohio Regional Association of Law Libraries Annual Conference in Cincinnati, OH, on Thursday, October 20. Chris also presented the program "RDA: A Cataloging Odyssey" at the 2011 Indiana Library Federation Conference in Ft. Wayne, IN, on Tuesday, November 15.

Wendell Johnting, Cataloging and Government Documents Librarian, Kiyoshi Otsu, Automated Services and Media Librarian, and Richard Humphrey, Reference Librarian, co-presented a conference session titled "The QR Code: What Is It? How do I Use It in My Library?" at the 2011 Ohio Regional Association of Law Libraries Conference in Cincinnati, OH, on Thursday, October 20. They also presented this program at the 2011 Indiana Library Federation Conference in Ft. Wayne, IN, on Tuesday, November 15.

Mahnaz Moshfegh, Serials/Acquisitions Librarian, will be retiring in December. Mahnaz joined the Ruth Lilly Law Library faculty in the spring semester of 1989. She has directed the acquisition of new resource materials and overseen the management of serials records for the library for the past 22 years. Prior to her term at the Ruth Lilly Law Library, Mahnaz held a number of library positions in the IU library system on the Bloomington campus including six years in the serials department of the Wells Library.

Ruth Lilly Law Library
 Lawrence W. Inlow Hall
 530 West New York Street
 Indianapolis, Indiana  46202-3325
Reference Desk - (317) 274-4026
Circulation Desk - (317) 274-4028

Hours are posted on the website and in the library.

Library hours - http://indylaw.indiana.edu/library/hours.htm
Reference hours - http://indylaw.indiana.edu/library/libservices.htm#RefHours