Toronto Reference Library Blog

Free Screening: Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry

As part of its Asian Heritage Celebrations, Toronto Reference Library will be screening the documentary Ai WeiWei: Never Sorry in the Beeton Auditorium on Tuesday May 14th at 2:00 pm.

Last year he transformed his own (rather late) version of internet meme Gangnam Style into a protest for free speech.

 

Rachel Arons in the New Yorker writes:

Ai Weiwei’s version of “Gangnam Style” is as stupid-silly as any other, and more poorly made...but it’s also an ingenious response to the attitude toward creativity put forth in the Chinese media. Ai called his video “Grass Mud Horse Style,” after a made-up creature, invented in 2009, that has become a symbol of anti-censorship in China...and, by embedding it in otherwise harmless content, it has become a way for dissenters in China to give the finger to government censors.

In support, sculptor Anish Kapoor (of Chicago's "Cloud Gate" fame) answered with his own "Gangnam for Freedom"

 

From August 17 – October 27, the Art Gallery of Ontario will be hosting a major retrospective of his work Ai Weiwei: According to What?

Recent visitors to the AGO will have seen the Snake Ceiling commemorating the over 5,000 school children killed by the 2008 earthquake--and what Weiwei calls "tofu construction"--in China's Sichuan province.

   

 The library has lots of resources on this important artist and dissident, but you might want to get prepared for the AGO exhibition with one the following:

Ai Weiwei : circle of animals by Ai, Weiwei.(with Susan Delson) Prestel, c2011.	Ai Weiwei's blog : writings, interviews, and digital rants, 2006-2009 by AiWeiwei (with  Lee Ambrozy,) MIT Press, 2011.	Ai Weiwei : So Sorry by A  Weiwei. (with Mark Siemons) Prestel 2009

 

 

 

 And remember the screening this Tuesday:

Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry

Tuesday May 14, 2013

2:00 p.m. - 4:00 p.m.

Toronto Reference Library Elizabeth Beeton Auditorium

 

Gambling on a Casino

The very mention of the word "casino" seems to bring out opinions in just about everyone. Toronto is currently looking at putting a large-scale emporium somewhere in downtown Toronto to increase revenues and encourage economic development.

The Toronto Reference Library has all kinds of information on casinos (defined as a building or room used for social amusements; specifically : one used for gambling and gaming).

Take a chance! Come to the second floor and discover our Toronto Collection as well as the general Humanities and Social Sciences holdings. You will find reports, books and guides on gambling, gaming and casinos in Toronto, the United States, and elsewhere. Here's a sampling of Toronto reports:   

Considering a New Casino in Toronto (2012),  The Health Impacts of Gambling Expansion in Toronto (2012), Towards a Municipal Strategy to Regulate Permanent Charity Gaming Clubs and Video Lottery Terminals (VLTs) in the City of Toronto (1997),  Casino Gambling in Metropolitan Toronto, (1993) and Casino : a proposal for the 1984 CNE.  For more, check out the City of Toronto's Casino Consultation site.                     



Spin the wheel and throw the dice ...Take a gamble and come to the Toronto Reference Library, 789 Yonge Street. You will hit pay dirt - books, reports, DVDs, magazines, newspapers and more. Everyone's a winner!

 

Research Guide to International Courts, Tribunals and Truth & Reconciliation Commissions

Getting Started

International Courts and Tribunals are generally established by the United Nations to investigate and try war crimes and crimes against humanity. Examples include the Nuremberg Military Tribunal to try Nazi war crimes, and the International Criminal Court.

Truth and Reconciliation Commissions are established by governments to investigate wrongdoings by past governments. The commissions are part of a process of transitional justice. Truth and reconciliation commissions are not courts although they often address the issue of whether perpetrators of crimes and injustices should be brought to trial.

Areas covered by international courts and tribunals include:

• War crimes and crimes against humanity
• Human rights violations
• Trade disputes between governments
• Armed conflicts between states

Definitions of War Crimes, Laws, and Treaties

Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide:  Full text of the United Nations convention on genocide.

International Humanitarian Law—Treaties & Documents: The Geneva Conventions and other treaties from the International Committee of the Red Cross. The conventions and treaties focus on the protection of victims of war, including civilians and prisoners of war, methods and means of war, etc.

Rule of Law in Armed Conflicts Project (RULAC):  Full-text documents on international humanitarian, human rights, criminal, and refugee law.  Full-text articles address various aspects of international law in armed conflicts. Database allows researchers to pick a country and find out what armed conflicts it is now involved in and what aspects of domestic and international law are applicable.

Searching the Library Website

    Suggested Subject Headings and Keywords

Many terms in this list can also be combined with geographic locations e.g. Human rights--Rwanda.You can use the filters that appear on the left of the results screen to further limit your search results by Type (e.g. Books, Movies and Videos), Language, Age Level, Library Branch, and Subject.

• International courts
• International criminal courts
• Military tribunals
• Transitional justice
• Truth commissions
• Crimes against humanity
• War crimes
• War crime trials

Suggested Titles

                

 

 

 

 

 

All the missing souls: a personal history of the war crimes tribunals

Atrocities and international accountability: beyond transitional justice

Court of remorse : inside the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda

Human rights in international relations, 3rd ed.

The international judge : an introduction to the men and women who decide the world's cases

International judicial institutions : the architecture of international justice at home and abroad

International law : contemporary issues and future developments

Judging war, judging history: behind truth and reconciliation

Peace and justice at the International Criminal Court: a court of last resort

Peace versus justice? : the dilemma of transitional justice in Africa

           

 

 

 

 

 

 

Additional Online Sources

Present International Courts for War Crimes:

International Criminal Court:   Established by the United Nations to examine cases of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. Site contains full-text procedural rules, cases from the Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya, Central African Republic, Darfur (Sudan), and Libya.

International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda

International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia

Special Court for Sierra Leone  

Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia

The first three courts above have been established by the United Nations to try cases of war crimes, while the fourth court was established by the Cambodian government, with United Nations assistance, to try those accused of committing atrocities under the Khmer Rouge government. All sites contain case transcripts, historical investigations, procedural rules, reports, and newsletters.

    Truth and Reconciliation Commissions & Transitional Justice: 

African Transitional Justice Network

International Center for Transitional Justice: Investigates legacies of mass abuse of human rights in many countries. Included are news and research articles, links to truth and reconciliation commissions, annual reports.

International Crisis Group: Includes materials on transitional justice along with links to truth and reconciliation commissions.

Transitional Justice in Africa: the experience with Truth Commissions: Provides overview of transitional justice issues in Africa, full-text articles, links to government and non-government resources.

    War Crimes & Mass Violence:

Armenian National Institute: Reports by diplomats, survivors, journalists, and photographs, maps and other full-text materials on the Armenien genocide during World War One.

Frederick K. Cox International Law Center: War Crimes Research Portal: Annotated lists for topics such as the Armenian genocide of 1915, the Jewish Holocaust, war crimes in the Vietnam and Iraq wars, protection of civilians, war crimes tribunals and trials.

Institute for Research of Expelled Germans: Full-text articles about 10 million ethnic Germans deported from Eastern European countries after World War Two.

Online Encyclopedia of Mass Violence: Scholarly work in progress featuring chronologies, case studies, country reports, theoretical papers, reviews of the history of different mass killings.

Rutgers University—Center for the Study of Genocide, Conflict Resolution & Human Rights—Forgotten Genocides Project: Case studies of several lesser known genocides—the Assyrians of Iraq and Turkey; Circassians in the Russian Empire; Greeks in the Ottoman Empire; Kurds in Iraq.  

Yale University—Genocide Study Program: Several genocide research projects, including colonial genocides committed against indigenous peoples along with genocides committed since World War II. 

Nazi War Crimes and the Nuremberg Military Tribunal

Library of Congress—Military Legal Resources—Nuremberg Trials: Complete American records of the trials of Nazi war criminals including the trial of the major criminals (Hermann Goering and 21 other defendants). 

Library of Congress—Military Legal Resources—Law Reports of trials of War Criminals: Records for trials of war criminals in Germany and Japan during the late 1940s as compiled by the United Nations War Crimes Commission. 

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum: Government documents, personal testimonies, photos, and other resources about the Jewish Holocaust. Also much primary and secondary material about Roma (Gypsies), gays, the disabled, and other victims of Nazism. 

Yad Vashem: the Holocaust Martyrs’ and Heroes’ Remembrance Authority: Based in Israel, the Yad Vashem site on the Jewish Holocaust contains full-text documents, diaries, eyewitness accounts, registers of names, academic studies. 

    Investigation of crimes committed in the Former Soviet Union & Eastern European countries

With the exception of the former Yugoslavia, there have been no war crimes trials in the former Soviet Union and former Eastern European Communist countries. Nor have truth and reconciliation commissions been established. However, there are government and non-government groups that are investigating crimes of the Communist period.

Memorial: Full-text documents (almost entirely in Russian) include lists of executed people (with Joseph Stalin’s signature), lists & biographies of arrested political opponents & religious leaders, police reports & minutes of meetings of leaders of the Communist Party.

Against their will: the history and geography of forced migrations in the USSR by Pavel Polian: Full text in Russian of Polian’s monograph about the mass deportations of peasants, ethnic minorities, and other groups by the Soviet government. 

Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation: Related Links: Many of these sites are online museums, while others are run by government commissions investigating both Nazi and Communist crimes. Sites contain full-text documents and photographs along with links to the former security services. Much material is available in English.

 

For further assistance contact:

Humanities & Social Science Department, Toronto Reference Library
416-393-7175
trlhss @ torontopubliclibrary.ca 

 

International Criminal Court (ICC) logo Wikimedia Commons

 

 

 

 

The return of slavery in the chaos of northern Mali: the hidden victims / Le retour de l'esclavage dans le chaos du nord du Mali: les victimes invisibles

The Toronto Reference Library invites you to attend a French language Thought Exchange Program with Ibrahim Ag Idbaltanat, President of Temedt. For the program description in French, please click here.

Temedt and its president, Ibrahim Ag Idbaltanat, were the winners of the 2012 Anti-Slavery International Anti-Slavery Award for their outstanding dedication and groundbreaking work towards ending slavery in Mali.  Anti-Slavery International instituted the Anti-Slavery Award in 1991 to draw attention to the continuing problem of slavery in the world today and to recognise courageous campaigning by organisations or individuals in the countries most affected.

Even though it was formally abolished, slavery in Mali still exists, especially in the northern regions of the country. People descended from slaves remain as ‘property’ of their ‘masters’, either living with them and serving them directly or living separately but remaining under their control.   The organisation Temedt was created in 2006 to redress this injustice.

In the past six years, Temedt has held awareness-raising campaigns reaching hundreds of thousands of people; directly helped liberate and support dozens of enslaved individuals; provided legal support to victims of slavery; trained magistrates on anti-slavery legislation; and lobbied for legal reform to criminalize slavery practices.

However, as northern Mali falls under the control of Islamist and separatist rebels, traditional forms of discrimination and slavery are making a disturbing return, leaving thousands of people under the renewed domination of former slave masters.  Join Ibrahim to discuss these issues, and how the gains made by Temedt to eradicate slavery in Mali are being eroded in the current situation.

This Thought Exchange Program in French is at:

The Toronto Reference Library, 789 Yonge Street
Beeton Auditorium,  Yonge & Bloor
On Wednesday, December 12, 2012: 7:00-8:20 pm

For recent articles see: Globe and Mail and Guardian.
You can also check CBCnews / World

 

Biography: Ibrahim Ag Idbaltanat is a passionate, determined human rights defender who has dedicated his life to ending slavery in Mali. His ceaseless efforts to expose and denounce slavery practices have broken the silence that surrounded slavery practices. Under his leadership, thousands of people of slave descent have joined the anti-slavery movement.

Himself a descendent of slaves, Ibrahim’s engagement in the anti-slavery movement began in 1979 after he became aware of injustices against Tamacheq families of slave descent (in particular the confiscation of their land, cattle and inheritance by their traditional masters). In 1987 he helped establish the organization GARI (of which he is currently serving as President) to empower vulnerable and marginalized groups, principally through micro-credit projects and other socio-economic support.

In 2006, the organization Temedt was created specifically to address descent-based slavery following the murder of a man of slave descent by a traditional master. Ibrahim served as the Vice-President of Temedt for five years and was elected its President in 2011.

In the past six years, Temedt has held awareness-raising campaigns reaching hundreds of thousands of people (it currently has over 30,000 members); directly helped liberate and support dozens of enslaved people; provided legal support to victims of slavery; trained magistrates on anti-slavery legislation; and lobbied for legal reform to criminalize slavery practices.

Due to the nature of his work, which challenges traditional power structures that perpetuate the dominance of slave-owning groups, Ibrahim is considered a threat by many elites. His work has made him many opponents and over the years he has been subject to countless false accusations aimed at undermining his credibility. Yet despite these pressures, Ibrahim has remained a committed, high-profile advocate of justice, equality and human rights for all.

Le retour de l'esclavage dans le chaos du nord du Mali: les victimes invisibles

La Bibliothèque de référence de Toronto vous invite à assister à une conférence avec Ibrahim Ag Idbaltanat, Président de Temedt.

L’organisation Temedt et son Président, Ibrahim Ag Idbaltanat, ont gagné le Prix contre l’esclavage 2012 de l’ONG britannique Anti-Slavery International pour leur engagement et travail innovateur pour mettre fin à l'esclavage au Mali. Anti-Slavery International a institué le Prix Anti-Slavery en 1991 pour attirer l'attention du grand public sur la persistance du problème de l'esclavage dans le monde d'aujourd'hui et de reconnaître les campagnes courageuses menées par des organisations ou des individus dans les pays les plus touchés.

Même s’il a été officiellement aboli, l'esclavage au Mali existe encore, surtout dans les régions au nord du pays. Les personnes descendent des esclaves restent comme "propriété" de leurs "maîtres". Après l'assassinat d'un homme d'origine esclave par un maître traditionnel,  l'organisation Temedt ou ‘la solidarite’ a été créée en 2006 spécifiquement par Ibrahim pour s’adresser aux enjeux  de l’esclavage par descendance.

Au cours des six dernières années, Temedt a organisé des campagnes de sensibilisation qui ont réussi à atteindre des centaines de milliers de personnes.  L’organisation a libéré et a directement appuyé des dizaines d’esclaves  a fourni un soutien juridique aux victimes de l'esclavage, a formé des magistrats sur la législation anti-esclavagiste et ont fait pression pour une réforme juridique pour criminaliser les pratiques esclavagistes.

Cependant, dans la situation actuelle où le nord du Mali est tombé sous le contrôle des rebelles islamistes et séparatistes, les formes traditionnelles de discrimination et l'esclavage font un retour inquiétant, laissant des milliers de personnes sous une domination renouvelée des anciens maîtres anciens.

Pour les articles récents, voir les journaux:  Globe and Mail et Guardian.
Vous pouvez également consulter CBCnews/World.

Vous êtes invités à assister à notre programme en français: 

Toronto Reference Library, 789 rue Yonge
Beeton Auditorium, Métro Bloor/Yonge
Mercredi, 12 décembre, 2012: 19h -20h20

 

Biographie:

Ibrahim Ag Idbaltanat est un défenseur des droits humains passionné et déterminé qui a consacré sa vie à mettre fin à l'esclavage au Mali. Ses efforts incessants à exposer et à dénoncer les pratiques esclavagistes ont servi à rompre le silence qui a entouré les pratiques esclavagistes. Sous son leadership, des milliers de personnes d'origine esclave ont rejoint le mouvement anti-esclavagiste.

Lui-même un descendant d'esclaves, l'engagement d'Ibrahim dans le mouvement anti-esclavagiste a commencé en 1979 après avoir pris conscience des injustices contre les familles Tamacheq des descendants d'esclaves (en particulier la confiscation de leurs terres, le bétail et l'héritage). En 1987, il a aidé à établir l'organisation GARI (dont il est actuellement le président) pour habiliter les groupes vulnérables et marginalisés, principalement par le biais des projets de microcrédit et d'autres appuis socio-économiques.  Ibrahim a été vice-président de Temedt pendant cinq ans et a été élu président en 2011.

En raison de la nature de son travail, qui remet en question les structures de pouvoir traditionnelles qui perpétuent la domination par des groupes esclavagistes, Ibrahim est considéré comme une menace par de nombreuses élites. Son travail a fait de lui de nombreux opposants et au cours des années, il a fait l'objet d'innombrables fausses accusations visant à porter atteinte à sa crédibilité. Pourtant, malgré ces pressions, Ibrahim est resté engagé, un défenseur avéré des droits humains, de la justice, et de l'égalité pour tous.

 

Mo Yan, 2012 Nobel Prize Winner, Was Here

It happened in early 1997, as I recall, when I was running Author Series here at the Metropolitan Toronto Reference Library, as it was then known.

I received a call from Greg Gatenby, a friend, yes, but more importantly, a pioneer in the area of literary programming. For it was Greg who invented the Harbourfront Reading Series, and its sibling the International Festival of Authors, the first ever of its kind in Canada. Greg Gatenby brought to his festival and his series a kind of elan, a flair, that is unmatched today. There was vision there.

Greg needed a venue to feature the Chinese writer Mo Yan, completely unknown to Canadian readers at the time, even though his work had already been published in English translation, and his novel Red Sorghum, adapted to film, was widely distributed in North America.

Gatenby had the generosity of spirit to think of his beloved Metro Library (he gave it much grist in his Toronto: A Literary Guide) as the perfect spot for a writer who he, even then, spoke about as slated to win the Nobel Prize for Literature.

"Okay, Greg," I said, "let me ask and I'll get back to you within the hour." It didn't take much convincing my Manager at the time, who lent her full support to the event. It was a classy gig, "exclusive" (read: there were very few of us in the audience). Pre internet, pre social networking, it was not easy to get the word out on such short short notice and convince the mainstream media that the library's featuring of a Chinese writer was worth their while covering.

So the Toronto Reference Library holds within its walls the lovely echoes of Mo Yan's voice reading in Chinese, with an actor reading in English for him. How lucky for us.

As we mark the occasion of Mo Yan's Nobel Prize, it is important to celebrate those who, like Greg Gatenby, have a knack for seeing beyond the hype and recognize the value of good writing, those who work to  build  community locally, in order to open our hearts and minds to the larger world of international literature in translation.

 

United Nations Connections

Almost all international stories nowadays seem to involve the United Nations at one level or another. Yet the United Nations website includes such a vast amount of information that trying to get a sense of its size, contents, and activities, is like trying to sip water from an open fire hydrant.

A sampling of a dozen examples, pointing to the huge range of areas covered - all related to their large and ambitious mandates of promoting world peace and security, development, human rights, humanitarian affairs and international law - should illustrate this point:

1. UN Databases
2. Resolution 2040 and an announcement that the Security Council Extends Support Mission in Libya for additional 12 Months
3. The International Court of Justice
4. Treaties . . .  Agreement between the United States of America and Canada on Great Lakes Water Quality, 1978
5. Current Peacekeeping Operations
6. Statements and Speeches of Ban Ki-moon
7. Oceans and Law of the Sea
8. Report of the Security Council Mission to Afghanistan
9. The Kyoto Protocol - UN Framework Convention on Climate Change
10. A current story on Syria from the UN News Centre
11. International Merchandise Trade Statistics
12. The Status of Food Security in Africa by the Economic Commision for Africa

* * *

The UN website can be challenging to navigate due to its large size, complexity of resouces, and multiple access points. If you are feeling daunted, you may want to come down to the library to get help consulting print and other resources.

These resources will give you an added perspective and understanding of the United Nations: following are five suggestions for getting started:

1. Of the many reference works on the United Nations, three stand out for special mention:
   

   Encyclopedia of the United Nations, 2nd ed.	United Nations Handbook, 2011	Encyclopedia of the United Nations and International Agreements, 3rd. ed.

2. For excellent topic overviews, mostly full text essays in encyclopedic sources, try searching the Gale Virtual Reference Library - this will require your library card for sign in.
3. Click Here for a search of over a thousand works by or about the UN at the Toronto Reference Library  - Note how the topic subdivides by subject at the bottom left hand column of the screen, eg. United Nations - Armed Forces
4. Click Here for books authord by the UN or co-authored by them within TPL
5. For articles . . . there will be a good selection to be found in the Social Sciences category of Article Search on our website - Note, this will also require your library card for sign in.

 

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Government Publications to go paperless by 2014

 

Government of Canada Publications recently announced the decision "to completely transition all publications published by the Publishing Program and publications provided by departments to the Depository Services Program from traditional print to exclusively electronic publication in two years."

This announcement marks a shift in the official position of the government with respect to their strategy for future access to publc information. The change especially affects those familiar with using libraries like the Toronto Reference Library - a full depository member for decades - with its comprehensive and rich collection of government documents in print.

The Depository Services Program (DSP) was created by an Order-in-Council in 1927 "to acquire, catalogue and distribute federal government publications in all formats to a network of depository libraries as well as parliamentarians." The DSP acts as an "information safety net, collecting current and archival government publications and making them widely available to the Canadian public." And with the advance and spread of information technology, new expectations and capabilities arise.

Government information first made an appearance on the internet through applications such as 'gophers' and 'ftp' sites. In less then 20 years, more and more information has become available on the web. Consider these "Key Statistics" for 2011-2012 from the Services for Depository Libraries page: there were 84,421 electronic publications available for download, 225,652 viewable bibliographic records, and a total of 10.2 million downloads of electronic publications.

Presently, Retention Guidelines for depository libraries recommend what sorts of government information should be held, for how long, and in what circumstances. With the transition to 'exclusively electronic publication', these guidelines will only apply to past collections since the Goverment will become the sole distributor of current publications through its website.

Publications Canada will need to develop and apply its own policies for the retention of electronic documents to ensure digital authority control and future long-term access to materials that would have otherwise been preserved in print. In other words, Publications Canada will need to provide Canadians with a new and different kind of information safety net . . . one that is digital . . .

 

 

 

End of an Era for Encyclopedia Britannica

The announcement this week that the 2010 print edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica would be its last caused a flurry of media interest. Most commentators expressed regret, but weren’t surprised by the decision. The publishers of Britannica, as well as those of many other  encyclopedias and reference guides, have been moving to digital versions for many years – a quick look at Toronto Public Library’s list of online databases reveals just how much information is at your fingertips.

 

And yet... there was something wonderful about seeing those imposing, leather bound books on a shelf. The digital version offers convenience of access to many users in many places at the same time [no longer will you go to do your research on Ecuador and find that the 'E' volume is nowhere to be found]. What will be lost is the ability to browse a set from a specific date and know that, at that point in time, these books represent the sum of man's knowledge about history, geography, science, literature and art.

 

Toronto Reference Library has a wonderful collection of older versions of the Encyclopedia Britannica in its stacks, including both editions pictured above.

 

  Our earliest set is the third edition, from 1797. I went to look up the entry on Canada and was surprised that there was none until it occurred to me that there was no Canada then. But, we are there in 1902!

 

Jump In! - The Water's Fine [no, really, it's fine]

Are you one of those Torontonians who are willing to drive for hours for the pleasure of diving into a cool, clean Canadian lake? How would you feel if you knew that you could have the same experience for the price of a token?

Yes, I'm talking about taking a trip to one of Toronto's many fine beaches. What's that you say, you'd be afraid to stick your toe in the water? Well, don't be. The City has been working diligently over the last few years to make improvements to the water quality of its beaches. The Toronto Beaches Plan, which is available at the Urban Affairs Library and North York Central Library, outlines a strategy for achieving great swimming beaches. The effort has paid off in 8 [yes, 8!] of the City's 11 beaches being awarded prestigious Blue Flag status, which indicates that they meet strict criteria for water quality.

Here are a few more pictures to make you want to get in the swim of things: