November 12-14, 2015
Picking Up the Pieces
In partnership with the Rare Book Department of the Free Library of Philadelphia, the Schoenberg Institute of Manuscript Studies (SIMS) at the University of Pennsylvania Libraries is pleased to announce the 8th Annual Lawrence J. Schoenberg Symposium on Manuscript Studies in the Digital Age. This year's theme, "Picking up the Pieces," considers the notions and consequences of fragmentation and reconstitution. When books are broken up, collections dispersed, or a society's intellectual heritage is fragmented by time, nature, and human interventions, the act of piecing together the remains can lead to surprising insights about how and why books--the artifacts of our intellectual heritage--were produced, collected, and saved in the first place. Our aim is to examine various facets of the fragmentation of books, collections, and cultural heritages in literal, metaphorical, and philosophical terms. The topic also allows us to consider how the processes of both physical and virtual reconstitution inform our understanding of these artifacts and our relationship to them.
The program begins Thursday evening, November 12, at the Free Library of Philadelphia, Parkway Central Library, with our keynote speaker Nicholas Pickwoad,Director of Ligatus, a research center of the University of the Arts London with projects in historical libraries and archives, and a leading authority on the conservation and history of bookbindings. The symposium continues, November 13-14, at the Kislak Center of Special Collections, Rare Books, and Manuscripts at the University of Pennsylvania Libraries, with papers and workshops that delve into various aspects of fragmentation and reconstitution. The symposium will end with a roundtable discussion led William G. Noel, Director of SIMS, and Brian C. Rose, James B. Pritchard Professor of Archaeology, Professor of Classical Studies at the University of Pennsylvania on the historical, social, and political consequences of fragmentation and reconstitution in the cultural heritage sector.
For more information and to register, go to: http://www.library.upenn.edu/exhibits/lectures/ljs_symposium8.html