reviews.indd 196 College & Research Libraries March 2009 generic manuscript types for which he provides historical context. One feature of the Dictionary that is both a strength and a weakness is the relentless focus on things British. Carter’s ABC was obviously written for English- speaking book collectors, but he compiled definitions applicable to early books across Europe and elsewhere, including citations to non-English bibliographic tools. Beal’s somewhat more insular ap- proach allows him to focus admirably on the contexts for, and collection of, British manuscripts. Thus, the Dictionary includes helpful entries to orient the reader to more specialized topics such as a PHILLIPS MANUSCRIPT or the BAGA DE SECRE- TIS (Kew Archives manuscripts dealing with cases of treason and other highly sen- sitive documents). Yet this focus can also lead to the omission of similarly important Continental institutions and manuscript genres. The BRITISH LIBRARY gets an entry, but not the Bibliothèque nationale de France or the Vatican; perhaps the only other library mentioned is the Amsterdam home of a large collection of HERMETIC MANUSCRIPTS. Peter Beal’s Dictionary of English Manu- script Terminology, nonetheless, belongs on the shelf of any English-speaking bibliophile. It would be welcome in many libraries’ and special collections’ reference shelves. It does not claim to be an encyclopedia, nor a comprehensive guide to manuscript terminology in English; the field must still wait for one to emerge. What the Dictionary off ers in- stead is a helpful, interesting, and highly readable guide to the contents, contexts, and physical makeup of a wide variety of fascinating, and important, English historical documents.—Timothy J. Dickey, OCLC Offi ce of Research. The Portable MLIS: Insights from the Experts. Eds. Ken Haycock and Brooke E. Sheldon. Westport, Conn.: Librar- ies Unlimited, 2008. 296p. alk. paper, $50 (ISBN 9781591585473). LC 2008- 010351. The Portable MLIS was compiled to fill what editors, LIS educators Haycock and Sheldon, have identified as a gap in the literature of foundational librarian- ship. The primary goal of this work is to provide a single-volume overview of foundation, practice, and future of librarianship. This collection of 18 essays written by 11 LIS faculty, 7 Academic Li- brary administrators, and a single Public Library administrator, however, does not fulfill this purpose. What the reader does find is a compilation of highly respect- able, valuable, but incomplete perspec- tives and opinions that, while of value to any information professional, also leave unrepresented the other disciplines, such as management and computer science, that contribute substantially to the solu- tion of many contemporary information management challenges. The Portable MLIS is organized as a series of three thematic “parts,” the first of which, “Foundations, Values and Context,” is composed of fi ve chapters. The first of these, by Richard E. Rubin, takes the reader through various histori- cal perspectives on the importance of the library to society. Disappointingly for a chapter positioned to set the tone for the book, a key opportunity is missed to generate much appreciation for cur- rent and future Web-based information management challenges. The increase of user reliance on the Web for information is described unenthusiastically, for example, as among the “clouds on the [profession’s] horizon.” Subsequent chapters in the first section do better to rouse excitement for new professional possibilities. Michael Gorman’s offering on professional ethics and values in a changing world is certainly worthwhile, informed by his long engage- ment with the philosophy of librarianship, but its very particular political formula- tion becomes repetitive and strikes an occasional demagogic chord. Students will be challenged by Kathleen de la Pena McCook and Katharine Phenix’s chapter 3, which traces a progression of the shift from librarianship’s connection to democ- racy to a newer bond with human rights activism. The conclusions in this chapter are energizing though vague, but the bibliography concluding this essay point to excellent additional resources on this subject. Donald O. Case’s chapter, “Infor- mation Seeking,” is nuanced and appre- ciative of the complexities of the digital environment. And Laura Kane’s chapter on “Careers and Environments” is an up- beat excursion through many traditional and emerging streams of librarianship. On the whole, Part One, while interesting and varied in scope, is uneven in depth and falls short of providing the LIS student with the full outline of the profession’s new foundational challenges. The chapters that comprise “Part II: Functions and Competencies” provide the most substantive content in the book. The first two of these chapters, by Brooke Sheldon and Barbara Moran respectively, offer well-constructed approaches to library leadership skills. Moran’s brief section on the acquisition of management proficiencies to navigate the “permanent white water” of library management is among the more valuable prescriptions in the text. Chapter 8 by Christie Koontz and chapter 9 by G. Edward Evans deal ably with all aspects of library market- ing and creating service collections and offer some very good advice for both new and seasoned practitioners about how to build partnerships and sustain relationships. Judith Weedman, David A. Tyckoson, Linda Main, and Mary K. Chelton, authors respectively of Chap- ters 11–15, share excellent philosophical perspectives on information retrieval, reference service, the notion of “librarian as Googler,” and reader advisory. As a public service professional, this reviewer found these chapters valuable but, at the same time, wished that the authors had made use of graphics such as interface design templates, screenshots, and inter- view samples to facilitate understanding of the many intangible aspects of library service theory. In fact, the unbroken use of straight text throughout the entire Book Reviews 197 volume undermines the wide variety of topics within. For example, in the follow- ing pages, even the novice might wonder why there would be no illustrations of a data sample or a focus group transcript within the chapter on research. And why, one may ask, are there no survey samples or assessment prototypes illustrating the otherwise valuable chapter on learning and using evaluation? The two chapters that comprise the final “Part III: Moving Beyond the Bound- aries” fail even to approach some of the boundaries encountered in the routine work of this midcareer reviewer. In fact, very little in these two chapters challenge the perceived boundaries of anyone who reads the daily news. While Barbara J. Ford’s “LIS Professionals in a Global Society” is a good summation of where the profession is today vis a vis global outreach, the fact remains that librarians have been regular participants—if not leaders—in such activity for well over a decade. In fact, global outreach is a mainstream enterprise in most academic libraries. Ken Haycock’s “Issues and Trends” similarly treads very well-worn territory. The issues of “library as busi- ness” and friction “between and among educators of librarians and members of the profession,” for example, while well articulated in this volume, were familiar LIS discussion points by the late 1980s. No distinctly 21st-century issue or trend is to be found in either chapter. Perhaps in a later edition of this book, some dis- cussion of the more urgent challenge to move beyond internal boundaries within library specializations may be included. The 21st-century library, particularly the academic library, bumps up against leg- acy departmental boundaries to engage in special project management, digital preservation, cyber infrastructure, and other activities. Some perspective from the experts as how such internal boundar- ies may be moved with less awkwardness would, in this reviewer’s opinion, be a more contemporary and valuable topic for this section. 198 College & Research Libraries Minor difficulties readers will en- counter include the sharp variety of per- spective and tone throughout this book. While offering a diversity of professional perspectives, the Portable MLIS occasion- ally produces a jarring reader experience. For example, the lighthearted brio evi- dent in Laura Kane’s chapter, sustained by recurring exclamation points and peppy exhortations, is at odds with some of Ken Haycock’s much more somber admonitions about professional trends. Another distraction for both novice and veteran readers is that surely the authors are aware that there is much excellent, even superior literature and clarifying research on the topics covered in their essays (particularly in Part I): the extreme brevity of the reading lists at the end of each chapter is therefore puzzling. The layout is inappropriate for pedagogical purposes and the contributors’ neglect to place their offerings within a reasonably contemporary universe of LIS scholarship is not helpful to readers. To entitle a volume published in 2008 with such shortcomings “The Portable MLIS” is an irritant that increases with reflection: while this book is a useful collection of writings by a selection of distinguished members of the library profession, some of the volume’s contri- butions could easily have been written several years ago. The Portable MLIS does not provide a single volume over- view of foundation, practice, and future of 21st-century librarianship. It must be supplemented by a great deal more contemporary theory as well as current testimony to fulfill this promise.—Jane Duffy, Dalhousie University. Dorothy Anne Warner. A Disciplinary Blueprint for the Assessment of Informa- tion Literacy. Westport, Conn.: Librar- ies Unlimited, 2008. 116p. alk. paper, $35 (ISBN 9781591585930). LC 2008- 03775. Written as a practical guide for librarians, A Disciplinary Blueprint for the Assessment of Information Literacy provides curricular March 2009 models for teaching and assessing infor- mation literacy skills in eight academic disciplines. Dorothy Anne Warner, Li- brary Instruction Coordinator at Rider University, creates a framework for in- tegrating bibliographic and information literacy instruction into courses for majors in Film Studies, Integrated Sciences and Mathematics, Teacher Preparation, Com- munication and Journalism, Business Ad- ministration, Economics, Entrepreneurial Studies, and Sociology. Drawing on her teaching experience, Warner suggests that library instruction is most eff ective when students are taught the research process using standard sources from primary, secondary, and tertiary literature for their major. The author has designed a series of models that integrates these sources and information literacy skills into required courses for the majors listed above. While some of the models are developed in more detail than others, and only two had been piloted at the time this work was pub- lished, Warner maintains that each model can be adapted at other institutions. The design of each model began with the examination of a major. Warner cre- ated a curriculum map that lists factors such as core courses, required courses, course sequences, and information lit- eracy components found in the syllabi or course descriptions. The map also in- cludes assessments of those components, the professors scheduled to teach the courses, the numbers of sections taught, and notes on whether library instruction had been provided within the major. This map was used by librarians to iden- tify courses in which library instruction would be appropriate and to determine a potential sequence of information literacy units within those courses. As a second step in the design of her models, Warner wrote information lit- eracy objectives and linked them to spe- cific courses in the major. To design these objectives, she used the ACRL Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education (2000), Bloom’s Taxonomy of Cognitive Objectives, bibliographic