How a Cambridge mathematician’s protest has led to demands for open access to scientific knowledge: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2012/apr/09/frustrated-blogpost-boycott-scientific-journals

Wellcome backs campaign to break stranglehold of academic journals and allow all research papers to be shared free online.

Link to article: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2012/apr/09/wellcome-trust-academic-spring

Wow. Just…wow. Some interesting discussions on the RRN Facebook page –  www.facebook.com/groups/30614536012/

 www.kony2012.com

Matt Galloway spoke with Robin Roth, she is a professor of geography at York University, and with Ei Phyu Han, she is a PhD student and a teaching assistant at York. They were speaking about a geography course taught at the university, that is also offered to refugees living on the Thai-Burma border.

The podcast can be found here: http://www.cbc.ca/metromorning/episodes/2012/02/22/course-for-refugees/

The Fourth Annual Howard Adelman Lecture was recently held in Toronto, Canada on November 1, 2011 with guest speaker Robert Rubinstein, author of  An Italian Renaissance: Choosing Life in Canada, Winner of the 2011 Canadian Jewish Book Award, in the category of Holocaust Literature.

A beautifully delivered talk on being a Jewish refugee in an Italian camp after the Second World War. As you listen, you realise that not much has changed over the last 60+ years in how camps are run, camp inhabitants treated, and how people try to cope in bureaucratic and sometimes unwelcoming administrations.

View the video HERE

Today the European Parliament formally adopted a new set of asylum rules for the European Union. The binding rules now include gender identity as a ground of persecution, which EU Member States must take into account. Governments have already agreed to the changes, which are final.

For more information, visit: http://www.lgbt-ep.eu/press-releases/historic-vote-extends-eu-asylum-standards-to-transgender-people/

http://www.ted.com/talks/sarah_kaminsky.html

Received this blog about Dadaab from the refugee perspective: A Voice from the Voiceless – Dadaab Refugee Camps Kenya

James M. Donovan
University of Kentucky College of Law Library

Carol A. Watson
University of Georgia Law School

March 4, 2011

Abstract:
To date, there have been no studies focusing exclusively on the impact of open access on legal scholarship. We examine open access articles from three journals at the University of Georgia School of Law and confirm that legal scholarship freely available via open access improves an article’s research impact. Open access legal scholarship – which today appears to account for almost half of the output of law faculties – can expect to receive 50% more citations than non-open access writings of similar age from the same venue.

To access the research paper, go here: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1777090

Interesting posting on Boing Boing about Mac software tools for researchers: http://www.boingboing.net/2011/03/21/my-essential-mac-res.html