Speaker looks at Google's effect on books

November 22, 2010

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — A six-part fall speaker series on the public’s access to books and their future continues Dec. 1 with a look at the impact of Google.

“Google and the Future of Books” will be presented by Siva Vaidhyanathan, an associate professor of media studies and law at the University of Virginia. The free program starts at 7:30 p.m. in 180 Holland Hall, Chesterfield Smith Ceremonial Classroom, Levin College of Law.

He will examine the following questions: What does the world look like through the lens of Google? How is Google’s ubiquity affecting the production and dissemination of knowledge? And, what danger does the Google Books scanning project pose for the legitimacy of the doctrine of fair use?

The series, “Imagining the Library: Books in Public Life from Late Antiquity to the Digital Age,” has drawn attention to the forces of public policy and new technologies that shape libraries and reading practices.

Vaidhyanathan will end the series at 7 p.m. Dec. 2 with a program titled “Reaching and Teaching the ‘Digital Generation’: Separating Myth from Fact” at the Millhopper Branch of the Alachua County Library in Gainesville.

The series was organized by the Center for the Humanities and the Public Sphere and co-sponsored by the center’s Rothman Endowment, the University of Florida Libraries, the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Office of the Dean, the Honors Program, the Alachua County Library District, the France-Florida Research Institute, the Department of History, the College of Design, Construction, and Planning, the Samuel Proctor Oral History Program, and the Levin College of Law.