National Museum of Natural History Unearthed

The Biodiversity Heritage Library: Free Access to Biodiversity Literature

An Entomologist writing a book on skipper butterflies needs to verify several citations and species names. The information he needs to do so is held within a natural history library not accessible to him. A team of malacologists is attempting to catalog the entire family of Pyramidellidae, but after fifty years has still barely scratched the surface as they are unable to identify and obtain the necessary literature. A botanist in an isolated African village has no access to the literature needed to complete his research project on local flora. Just ten years ago, without access to the necessary literature, the individuals in each of these scenarios would have been unable to complete their work. Today, the Biodiversity Heritage Library has changed that reality. 

The Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) is a consortium of 14 natural history and botanical libraries (including the Smithsonian Institution) that collaborate to digitize past and present biodiversity literature, all of which is made freely available to the public. On BHL, you can find over 37.8 million pages of digitized literature (representing over 53,000 titles and 102,000 volumes), going back as far as 1484 and continuing to present day. Not only can you browse millions of pages online, but you can download PDFs and high resolution images of that material. You can also search for literature about a specific species and navigate back to the Encyclopedia of Life (EOL) for more information on the organism.

You can learn more about BHL, discover fun biodiversity facts, participate in daily quizzes, and explore thousands of free biodiversity images through BHL's social media outlets, including our Blog, Twitter and Facebook. Be sure to check out BHL's Flickr account, which includes more than 23,000 natural history and botanical illustrations from the past 400 years, many of which are extremely rare and incredibly valuable. This growing collection of images from BHL books (several of which are featured in this post) is freely available for download and reuse. Finally, you can download select BHL content directly to your iPad, iPhone, or iPod Touch though the Biodiversity Heritage Library on iTunes U. Again, all content is completely free.

Today, earth's biodiversity faces many challenges, and it is vital that the critical knowledge held within legacy literature be made available to scientists, researchers, conservationists, and the public at large so that we can make intelligent decisions to save global biodiversity for generations to come. Projects like BHL, which provide free global access to digitized versions of this literature, repatriate information about the earth's species to all parts of the world, helping everyone obtain the information needed to protect and preserve life on Earth.

Start exploring today at www.biodiversitylibrary.org. 


Grace Costantino, Program Manager, Biodiversity Heritage Library


Image Captions and Credits (top to bottom): New illustration of the sexual system of Carolus von Linnaeus :and the temple of Flora, or garden of nature (1807), Nymphaea nelumbo, Sacred Egyptian Bean. http://biodiversitylibrary.org/page/307094; Bilder-Atlas zur wissenschaftlich-popul‰ren Naturgeschichte der Wirbelthiere (1867), Fig. 9. http://biodiversitylibrary.org/page/4024179; Kunstformen der Natur (1904), Taf. 85. http://biodiversitylibrary.org/page/33543656.

Volunteer Reflections on RACE: Are We So Different? (Part 2 of 2)

One of the most popular visitor destinations at Natural History in 2011 was RACE: Are We So Different? This temporary, traveling exhibition is a project of the American Anthropological Association, developed by the Science Museum of Minnesota. We spoke with some of our volunteers about their experience working with visitors in the exhibition.

Volunteers found that the wide range of topics covered in RACE: Are We So Different? made it easy to start conversations with visitors. Although much of the content focuses on the evolution of race in the history and society of the United States, the RACE: Are We So Different? exhibition is grounded in the science of human variation. For visitors and volunteers alike, this was a useful entry point. For example, Cassie Ghee met many who were very happy with the focus on science. “Most said that it was about time this information was made public to a wider audience,” because it rooted the discussion in a very profound way.

More broadly, Meg Wilder described the exhibition as “a new lens for viewing our common history and experiences,” one that moved many visitors. She noted that many conversations that she had with visitors were surprisingly intimate: “The exhibition led us beyond our unconscious biases and our initial assumptions.” David Marshall concurred, although he wasn’t surprised, for he believes that “there are many people of all backgrounds who want to discuss issues concerning race. While most of us discuss these issues in comfortable and safe environments, with friends and family, there are those who crave the opportunity to go beyond those conversations.” This opportunity crossed many lines, Lisa Walsh saw, and “every visitor took away a new piece of information or precious moment of learning.”

For many visitors, Natural History provided an ideal space for discussion. Jane Hammel was certain that the Smithsonian’s choice to host RACE spoke volumes to visitors. “Many wished it would remain here in some capacity, as do I,” she said. The two comments that Patricia McNally heard most frequently were “Why don’t we have more exhibits like this?” and “This exhibit is so important to starting a conversation about race.” She saw that people were excited by the richness and depth of the information in the exhibition, and many people spent more time in the exhibition than they anticipated. “The RACE exhibition has the potential of being the new ‘Galileo moment’ of our times,” thinks E. David Garcia, who wrote about his experiences for this blog in August. “It has the power to create a fundamental shift in our perception of how we see the world” and the people with whom we share it.

The potential for that fundamental shift lies in the exhibition’s capacity to enable and inform learning and discussion. Silas Otieno equates the exhibition with this outcome: “The RACE exhibition means conversation, the ability to bring people together in a neutral and conducive environment and just lay bare our thoughts and ideas on the issue of race.” To Enid J. LaGesse, “the RACE exhibition means we can more clearly understand and reframe our story as a united people, discuss openly our pain and healing, and dream of new solutions to age-old problems.”

If there was one feeling that all our volunteers shared, it was the sense that RACE: Are We So Different? tells a coherent and timely story in a way that opened a place for everyone to participate. “Everyone’s story is valid and worth being told,” said David Marshall. “If only we had the time and space to hear more of our stories, we might be able to better wrap our arms around the very complex notion of race.” Greg Jenkins found it “healthy, frustrating, bewildering, enlightening, learning, unbelievable, true, thought-provoking, heart-string pulling, angering, anxious, and necessary to our collective hearts and souls.” He paused for breath, and then continued: “It’s an American community story.” It is, finally, a story to which Natural History has been pleased to contribute.

We thank all our volunteers for their hard work and generosity in 2011. Over thirty of them plan to continue volunteering at Natural History and elsewhere in the Smithsonian. We’re very happy that they’ve decided to stay with us, and look forward to the many ways in which they will carry the energy and experience of RACE: Are We So Different? forward.

David D. LaCroix, Office of Education and Outreach

Image captions and credits (top to bottom): RACE Exhibition volunteers Samantha Ferm, Enid LaGesse, and Jane Hammel. Credit: David D. LaCroix, Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History; Visitors study Kip Fulbeck’s “Hapa Project,” one of the most popular parts of RACE: Are We So Different? Credit: Charles Chen, Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History.

Volunteer Reflections on RACE: Are We So Different? (Part 1 of 2)

In 2011, RACE: Are We So Different? was one of the most popular visitor destinations at Natural History. This temporary traveling exhibition is a project of the American Anthropological Association, and was developed by the Science Museum of Minnesota. Several months before it opened, NMNH launched a campaign to recruit a new corps of volunteers to work in it.

When RACE opened on June 18, we had a diverse, motivated, and highly-trained group of seventy-five, ready to act as partners and sounding boards for visitors. Their role was to facilitate visitors’ experience of RACE, helping them to find entry points into the many conversations about science, history, and culture that the exhibition enabled.

For many of the seventy-five, this was their first experience volunteering in a museum. Over the nearly seven months that followed, the volunteers worked and talked with nearly 20,000 visitors––just a fraction, in fact, of the many from around the United States and the world who viewed the exhibition.

Now that RACE has left the Museum for its next destination (COSI in Columbus, Ohio), we asked our volunteers to reflect on their experience. What did it mean to them to serve as volunteers for this exhibition? How did it affect our visitors? And what is the larger meaning and significance of RACE: Are We So Different?

Many, like Ginger Morrison, felt that their experience had enhanced their ability to talk about race and other charged topics. “The exhibition,” Morrison said, “presented a new vocabulary that I use to talk about race. It also encouraged me to more openly initiate discussions about race outside of the exhibit itself.” Other volunteers found new understanding of the ways in which race, privilege, and difference were relevant to their lives. “I think more about the roots of our social and geographical divisions,” said Lina Khan, “and the psychological impact from events that happened in the past.” Still others, including Patricia McNally and Greg Jenkins, saw the exhibition as an opportunity to learn or learn more about the role played by perception in the creation and sustaining of stereotypes and assumptions about race.

The opportunity to speak with visitors from all walks of life was very meaningful to our volunteers. It was challenging, immediate, and fruitful: “It has allowed me to feel the impact of race on people, instead of just hearing or reading about it,” Darius Salimi explained. “Being able to interact with all kinds of people about the topic in a dedicated space was a needed release of thoughts, emotions and energy for me.” “The exhibit itself and the people I have met made me realize how great of an impact a single word can have on one’s life,” said Lizzie Ehrreich.

In the next part of this two-part posting, learn more about how our volunteers felt about the science in the exhibition, how many visitors reacted, and what volunteers feel the RACE exhibition means.

David D. LaCroix, Office of Education and Outreach

Image captions and credits (top to bottom):

Volunteer Lisa Walsh talks with a visitor about a popular interactive station. Credit: Charles Chen, Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History;

Caption: Programming coordinator David D. LaCroix and volunteer David Marshall (rear, dark jackets) discuss the RACE exhibition with a group of visitors. Credit: Reginald Galloway, Princeton Club of Washington

 

The Beautiful Time: Photography by Sammy Baloji

The Beautiful Time opened on January 7^th, in the Focus Gallery of the permanent exhibit, African Voices.  It will be on view through 2012. This post is the first in series exploring the content and themes of The Beautiful Time.

I first saw the Baloji exhibition, which was organized by the Museum for African Art, when it opened in New York over a year ago.  I was immediately struck by the beauty and the visual power of the work and by the stories Baloji’s works tell of history and memory, home and landscape, and work and wealth in the Congo.  These are all important themes in Africa today and they are themes of so many of the stories from around the continent that are told in African Voices.  I was delighted that we were able to bring the exhibit here to NMNH.  

Baloji’s haunting photographs evoke the memory of the generations of Congolese whose labor built the vibrant copper mining industry—now lost—in the Katanga province of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.  Throughout the first half of the twentieth century these mines were the second largest producers of copper in the world.   

Baloji’s photographic collages juxtapose black and white archival photographs of Congolese mine workers against the background of color photographs of panoramic landscapes of the contemporary ruins of factories and copper mines.  Although the early workers—who wear prison garb and in chains in some of these photographs—came to the mines as forced labor for the colonial state, they had within a few decades become highly skilled and valued mine workers.  Their labor created Congo’s modern industrial era and in his artwork, Baloji’s celebrates these mine workers’ essential role in Congo’s prosperity.  At the same time that they celebrate this history, these photographs convey the dramatic power of tragedy—the loss of the hard earned prosperity that has been squandered over the past decades through mismanagement and corruption.

Baloji is part of a generation of young Congolese who were born nearly two decades after the end of the colonial era in 1960.  His work aims to understand and reconnect for contemporary Congolese and for us two strikingly different time periods –the colonial and the post colonial era.  His photographs give voice to those forgotten African workers who built Congo’s mining industry in the early part of the 20^th century, and they cry out against the recent deindustrialization in the Congo and elsewhere in Africa.

Last year, I had the opportunity to meet Sammy and his colleague Patrick Mudekereza, in Brussels. Patrick is a writer and a long time artistic collaborator with Baloji in the Congo.  I asked Patrick to share his thoughts on these photographs and we have included his commentary in the exhibit.  Asked about the meaning of the phrase, The Beautiful Time, Patrick explained, “Sammy’s photographs are not nostalgic celebrations of The Beautiful Time, a phrase we often hear the older generation use when referring to the golden age of the colonial mining industry.  Rather, Sammy’s pictures speak to today and imply a failure by our leaders to provide our people with a means to create a more beautiful time than before.”

Mary Jo Arnoldi, Curator, African ethnology and arts, Department of Anthropology, NMNH

 

Image caption and credit: The archival photographs in this montage were probably taken in the early twentieth century. Porters, carrying loadsof firewood, are dressed in prioson uniforms and are attached to one another by rope. Baloji has placed the prisoners along the tracks of a now useless railway, signaling a loss of potential. Untitled, Sammy Baloji, 2006, Digital C print

You Asked...They Answered! Q&A with the Human Origins Program

Question: How do they celebrate an important discovery?

Response: It’s exciting to make new discoveries in the field! Yet each new discovery brings with it a new batch of hard work. For some discoveries, we recognize there may be years of work ahead of us, in fact, and that might include cleaning and preparing specimens, collecting and analyzing data and then preparing publications of our findings. So, though new discoveries do call for celebration, those celebrations may involve getting back into the field or the lab to see what additional information we might uncover!

Question: What’s one important thing about their recent field experiences that they’d like the Smithsonian’s visitors to understand?

Response: There’s a lot of information that can be learned from field studies. One important thing to know is that field work is a collaborative effort and requires the contributions of many types of scientists. Our team comprises members with varied specialties and this is what allows us to draw conclusions about the lives and environments of our extinct hominin ancestors. To learn more about our field work, please visit our field blog.

Question: How many shots did you have to get for your trip?

Response: That’s a great question! The number and type of vaccinations depend on the countries where we travel. For fieldwork in Kenya, we typically receive vaccinations for diseases including, but not limited to, yellow fever, hepatitis (A and B), and typhoid. Many fieldworkers also take preventative medication for malaria.

Question: Has the lost link between human and ape [been] found and understood?

Response:  The term “lost link” or “missing link” is often used to imply that there is one single species that links the great apes (e.g., chimpanzees) and humans. What decades of paleoanthropological research now show is that there are many branches on the human family tree, and no one extinct species or fossil is the link between chimpanzees and modern humans.  In fact, paleoanthropologists have made so many field discoveries that they have uncovered the remains of as many as 20 different fossil hominin species so far. Clearly, a lot has happened since the base of the human family tree split from that of the chimpanzee family tree between 6 and 8 million years ago. And there are many important fossils yet to discover.

 

Human Origins Program Staff, Smithsonian Institution

Image Captions and Credits (top to bottom): Photo of the extended Smithsonian's Human Origins Program team in Kenya, image courtesy of the Smithsonian Institution; Our human family tree, image courtesy of the Smithsonian Institution.

The Hip-Hop/Kung Fu Connection

Back in August (approximately a century ago in blog-years) the Freer and Sackler Galleries, in cooperation with the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Program presented a weekend of events exploring the connection between hip hop music and martial arts movies. Hip hop culture’s formative years in New York in the 1970s happened at a time when cheap Times Square movie houses played kung fu movies day and night, and found avid fans in the rappers and break dancers who founded the movement, turning stars like Bruce Lee into icons and inspiring groups like the Wu Tang Clan to adopt an entire philosophy based on the codes of honor and brotherhood at the root of martial arts movies. Twice during our weekend of events we showed the classic Jackie Chan film Drunken Master, which includes the kind of kung fu moves that break dancers incorporated into their routines.

The multimedia collective Hop Fu, who returned to the Freer after a three year absence for another raucous performance, make the hip hop/kung fu connection explicit in their performances, which involve live DJ scratching synced to classic kung fu movies. Their Saturday afternoon performance brought down the house and drew the kind of young, diverse audience museums crave.

We concluded things on Sunday with a panel discussion moderated by SI APA Program Director Dr. Konrad Ng entitled “The Hip Hop/Kung Fu/Afro-Asian Connection.” The panel  - which was live-Tweeted on the web site Racialicious included Hop Fu founder Barry Cole, author Nelson George (who was one of the first to write about hip hop and kung fu), and Kelly Zen-Yie Tsai, a performance artist inspired by hip hop aesthetics. The wide ranging discussion took in everything from the history of Chinese restaurants in African-American neighborhoods to Hop Fu’s triumphant performances in Hong Kong, the birthplace of the movies that inspired them, to the difficulties and pleasure of being an Asian, female performer working in a field traditionally stereotyped as misogynistic. The discussion could have gone all night, and only came to an end then our security staff stepped in to remind us that the museum had to close.

Tom Vick, Public Programs Coordinator, Freer & Sackler Galleries

Image caption and credit: Jackie Chan in Drunken Master, image courtesy of Photofest.

Let's Talk about Race at the Smithsonian - Family Day at the Anacostia Community Museum

On October 22, 2011, the Anacostia Community Museum (ACM) presented “Who AM I” and “I’ve Got To Be Me” as part of the Let’s Talk about Race at the Smithsonian family day programs. ACM’s offerings—centering around race, family, and self—joined similar ones provided by other Smithsonian organizations at the National Museum of Natural History.  

The day began at the museum with “Who AM I,” a presentation on family history research for children and their families. Historian Maria Goodwin led the group in a discussion on how easy it is to obtain and record important events in a person’s life. With assistance from their parents, children began to construct their family trees. Children, guided by a free Precious Memories workbook, also began to document their own lives. It was suggested that a good place to start is with family fun times. A sentiment shared by most was reflected in the comment, “I was very informed and plan to give [all of] my children this important information.”

Later, as part of the “I’ve Got To Be Me“ program, master storyteller and griot Baba-C offered a variety of tales about race, some from his own experience. Topics of discussion included the richness of diversity and attitudes on race and cultural differences. The afternoon session resulted in a lively exchange of storytelling and self-awareness.  

 

Robert L. Hall, Associate Director of Education, Anacostia Community Museum

Image caption and credit: Brian Carson and son Khaliq learn about family history at the Anacostia Community Museum.  Photograph by Robert L. Hall

Dispatches from Olorgesailie

(Note: This post originally appeared on the Smithsonian's Human Origins Program website as an introduction to their 2011 field season. Thank you to Dr. Rick Potts for allowing it to be reposted here!)

The study of human evolution is full of exploration, digging, and discovery. This blog tells of our Smithsonian team’s field experiences over the next several weeks as we explore, dig, and discover ancient tools and fossil bones.

This summer we’ll pick up from previous years to tell you about our research and discoveries at the field site in southern Kenya where we’ve worked for many years. Olorgesailie is the name of the site. Pronounced ‘Oh-LORG-eh-SIGH-lee, it’s a Maasai name for an ancient and inactive volcanic mountain on the floor of the East African Rift Valley in southern Kenya. It’s also the name of the surrounding countryside, much of which is a beautiful land of sharp cliffs, eroded hills, and dusty gullies.

Over many, many thousands of years, erosion by wind and rain has cut the ancient layers of sediment that piled up over hundreds of thousands of years. Those layers of dirt preserve lots of stone tools and fossilized remains, which were buried and became embedded in those layers, or strata (as geologists refer to them). From these hardened clues of stones and fossils buried in dirt, our team seeks to piece together an understanding of the lives of early human species and how their lives changed over time. You can think of the clues as an echo of an ancient time. They’re the only things left in the present about who these earlier precursors of our species were, how they lived, and what their surroundings were like.

During the course of this blog, I hope you’ll listen in about how we do this work, and why we think the stone tools and fossils we find are part of a growing understanding of the origin of our species. In fact, I’ll try my best to introduce you to a wide range of topics about our team’s study of human evolution.

As I write this diary from the field, you’ll get a picture of our digs and the people who are part of our research. For now, let me mention Dr. Briana Pobiner, who works with me in the Human Origins Program at the Smithsonian. While Briana has her own research in Kenya, she also works with our team back home as our expert in public outreach and education. Briana kindly came over a few weeks ago, before I was able to leave the U.S., to help prepare for the Olorgesailie field season. That involved organizing the Kenya crew and making sure our field vehicles were getting serviced and repaired.

Life outdoors in the dust and sun of the Rift Valley is fun – and also very challenging. It takes us away from our lives back home in the office and classroom, into a world of early ancestors and relatives of our species. It’s no exaggeration to say, I can’t think of anything more rewarding or exciting to do. I hope you enjoy this adventure.  

Click here to read about day one.

- Rick Potts, Director of the Smithsonian's Human Origins Program

Image caption and credit: Dr. Rick Potts, image courtesy of the Smithsonian's Human Origins Program.

Visitors React to the RACE: Are We So Different? Exhibit

Thousands of visitors have experienced the RACE: Are We So Different? exhibition since it opened at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History. They walk through, linger here and there, talk with our volunteers and with each other.

Several hundred visitors have also shared their reactions, thoughts, and comments with us in writing. Their response has been overwhelmingly positive.

Visitors find many ways to express themselves, both on the topic of race and on the many entry points that the exhibition provides. They tell us that they are very glad to have an opportunity to learn more about race though science, history, and lived experience. They tell us how much they appreciate that the Smithsonian is hosting the exhibition and giving it such a wide audience. Many visitors write a lot, sometimes even filling both sides of a blank 4" x 6" notecard.

Most of all, they express diverse insights, points of view, and ways of engaging with a complex and often controversial topic.

These 25 cards (one of which is pictured at right) were written by visitors who came to the RACE exhibition in its first two weeks, June 18 through June 30.

Learn more about RACE: Are We So Different? at NMNH: http://www.mnh.si.edu/exhibits/race/

David D. LaCroix, Programming and Volunteer Training Coordinator, Office of Education and Outreach

Will current blood quantum membership requirements make American Indians extinct?

(Note: This post originally appeared on the National Museum of the American Indian’s blog on September 15, 2011. Thank you to NMAI for allowing us to repost this as part of our blog series for RACE: Are We So Different? !)

Blood quantum is a term used to define bloodlines relating to ancestry. For example, a person with one Indian grandparent and three non-Indian grandparents has one-quarter Indian blood. For American Indians, intermarriage between tribes, however, reduces specific tribal blood quantum.

The concept of documented blood quantum began in Europe and surfaced in the Virginia Colony in 1705. However, Native blood quantum was not widely applied in federal law until the 20th century. In 1934, the Indian Reorganization Act provided a means for federally recognized tribes to form constitutions and statutes to define their own membership criteria. As a result, the majority of federally recognized tribes began using set blood quantum requirements, lineal descendancy, or roll descendancy as criteria for tribal membership. Many non-federally recognized bands and tribes adopted blood quantum requirements to determine their tribal membership as well.

Tribes that use blood quantum criteria require tribal members be at least one-half to one-sixteenth blood of their tribe. A Certificate Degree of Indian Blood (CDIB) is issued to tribal members as documentation of tribal membership. Tribes that use CDIB’s have the right to close membership or disenroll members because of lack of blood quantum. Tribes that use roll descendancy, established though treaties, may have tribal members on their rolls with no Indian blood at all—people who are tribal members, but who are not American Indian. Issues of roll descendancy, including closing membership and disenrolling tribal members, are currently being debated in the courts.

A colleague and I were discussing tribes that use blood quantum to determine their membership. She said, "Tribes that do this are setting themselves up for extinction. Eventually intermarriage will wipe fixed blood quantum out.” I totally agree with her: under the current blood quantum of my own tribal membership, my future grandchildren will not qualify to be members. As an American Indian and tribal member, this concerns me.

My colleague said her tribe recently opened up their membership for new members including new babies, people who moved out of state, etc. In order to become a new member each person seeking enrollment had to answer, historical, cultural, and family questions that pertained to the tribe's identity. For newborns, their parents had to answer these questions.

It was this tribe’s belief that if prospective members were connected to their community roots, they would know the answers to the tribe’s questions. Individuals who moved away and did not maintain any connection to their tribal community were not able to answer the questions and were refused membership, regardless of blood quantum. Perhaps this is one alternative that tribes will consider to replace blood quantum requirements.

During the NMAI Living Earth Festival this summer, I asked a Native Hawaiian woman how Native Hawaiians view blood quantum in their culture. She responded, "To the majority of Native Hawaiians, blood quantum is not an issue. We know our family bloodlines, and they are recognized by other Native Hawaiians. This is what makes us Native Hawaiian. I think blood quantum is an issue to Native Americans because of their relationship to the United States government. Native Hawaiians are not recognized by the United States the way federally recognized tribes are. Therefore, I think it is due to the government that Native Americans have to be concerned about blood quantum." To me there are many truths in my Hawaiian sister's feedback.

Do you think current tribal blood quantum requirements need to be amended or terminated? If so, or if there are other aspects of this topic that interest you, you're welcome to join  the conversation here via the comments.

—Dennis Zotigh, NMAI cultural specialist

Above: Three Nanticoke schoolboys, 1911–14. The boy in the center is from the Street family. Indian River Hundred, Delaware. Photo by Frank G. Speck. N01278