The field of Mongolian Studies in the United States is poorly served in bibliographical matters. Scholars in Chinese, Japanese, and Korean Studies have long since had several aids, such as bibliographies, union lists, and shelf lists, at their disposal. By contrast, Mongolian Studies has only one reasonably up-to-date bibliography of Western-language works (Bibliotheca Mongolica, published by this university's Center for East Asian Studies in 1978), but no union lists nor shelf lists. The absence of...

The Research Process: Strategies for Undergraduate Students is an open access textbook written by library, archives, and Learning Commons professionals at Western Libraries, and is intended for undergraduate students. In Getting Started, you will discover the stages inherent in the research process, and be introduced to the available resources at Western Libraries. In Explore, you will explore different information sources, and will learn how to develop robust search strategies for each information source. In Focus...

Poetry and History: Bengali Maṅgal-kābya and Social Change in Precolonial Bengal analyzes Bengali maṅgal-kābya, a genre of narrative literature. The first essay argues that the didactic purposes of maṅgal-kābya and the performative pleasures based upon satire make them rich sources for historians of precolonial Bengal. Three essays focus on Caṇḍimaṅgal texts, especially the version by Mukunda Cakrabartῑ, probably written before 1600 AD. They argue that Mukunda uses a ‘scale of transactions’ to describe normative roles...

Mongolian Short Stories, edited by Henry G. Schwarz: My students rightfully complain that they need an anthology of unabridged and representative samples of Mongolian literature. There is at present only one source for such materials, the magazine, Mongolia. Unfortunately, the magazine, like most other periodical publications of its kind, scatters its literary samples across scores of issues. Moreover, it is probably true that this useful magazine is still little known in the United States where...

The field of Mongolian Studies in North America has had its ups and downs over the past decade. While some universities, like Indiana and Brigham Young, have expanded their offerings and others, like Saskatchewan and Western Washington, have entered the field, there has also been some contraction. In several ways, the most regrettable casualty of the budget axe was the fine program at the University of Washington which had been founded and guided by Nicholas...

UndocuStudents: Our Untold Stories is a collection of essays, poetry, photographs, and artwork created by members of the Blue Group, an Associated Students Club at Western Washington University, whose mission is to provide undocumented students the opportunity to meet other undocumented students, find resources and services, and to build community. As the Blue Group has grown from just a few students meeting informally into an official Western Washington University Associated Students club, into an organization...

Women of Color in Speculative Fiction: An Annotated Bibliography is tertiary electronic resource which focuses upon authors who are women of color (i.e., non-Caucasian) and who write speculative fiction for adult and young adult audiences. Examples of these authors include Octavia Butler, N. K. Jemisin, Daina Chaviano, Jewelle Gomez, and Malinda Lo. For some background, “speculative fiction” is an umbrella term for science fiction, fantasy, and some horror, all of which have literary and popular...

An Uyghur-English Dictionaryby Henry G. Schwarz: As the initial foundation of my dictionary I chose the Uyg̃urçä-xänzuçä lug̃ät which, in its manuscript form and after 1982 in published form, had been my steady companion in Xinjiang. If I ever considered doing nothing more than translating it into English, I rejected this option almost from the start. For one thing, I often found the dictionary to be inaccurate in many respects, both large and small. More...

Opuscula Altaica : Essays Presented in Honor of Henry Schwarz, edited by Edward H. Kaplan and Donald W. Whisenhunt: We are pleased to present herewith a largely Mongol miscellany in honor of a most remarkable man, Henry Schwarz. I first met Henry Schwarz in the winter of 1967 at a meeting of the Inner Asia Colloquium of the then Far Eastern and Russian Institute at the University of Washington. Attending were the bright lights of...

Han River Chulmuntogi: A Study of Early Neolithic Korea by Sarah M. Nelson: Scattered throughout the Korean peninsula are about 100 known sites which contain handmade pottery decorated with parallel incised lines. First described by Japanese archaeologists in the early part of this century, the pottery was thought to resemble Central European ceramics decorated with a multiple toothed tool, and so was designated in Japanese Kushimemon Doki, a translation of Kammkeramik (comb-pattern pottery). Translated into...

This book, Five Seasons in Ecotopia: Rainforest Immersion and Conservation Action in Costa Rica, is an effort to share our perspectives from five years of experience studying and teaching in Costa Rica through the intersections of geography, ecology, and political science. These reflect the dominant pedigrees of more than one-hundred students who annually spent five weeks in Huxley College of the Environment’s RICA program in Costa Rica. The RICA program was designed to foster global...

Most math books for college students start out reviewing “rules” in an introductory chapter. The review usually goes like this: here are the “rules”, here are some examples of using those “rules” and here are 10 to 100 exercises where you will practice using those “rules” and then you’ll be tested on them. The problem with that approach, even if it seems familiar and comfortable to you, is that people learn, in part, by connecting...

The idea for this guide, Freshwater Algae in Northwest Washington, began in 2006 when the Institute for Watershed Studies (www.wwu.edu/iws) expanded its Northwest Lakes monitoring project to collect water quality samples from more than 70 local lakes. This volume, Cyanobacteria, is part of a series describing freshwater algae in Northwest Washington, and includes simple algal keys that can be used by students with little experience in taxonomy, as well as members of the general public....

Western Libraries at Western Washington University began collecting Mongolian materials in earnest in 1975, when the University's Center for East Asian Studies created a Mongolian Program unique in North America. Most of the books and journals have been acquired through the efforts of Professor Henry Schwarz, who made many of the purchases during his frequent trips to Mongolia. He was also instrumental in obtaining the important collection of Mongolian and related materials acquired by the...

One of the most ubiquitous terms used over the past dozen years or more has been globalization, but there is no consensus as to its precise meaning. Instead we have been witnessing an ever growing number of definitions and descriptions offered by experts in such fields as economics, politics, anthropology and sociology. If they agree on anything at all, it seems that globalization has come about largely as the result of three factors: the end...

Buddhist Art of East Asia by Dietrich Seckel, translated by Ulrich Mammitzsch: The publication of an English translation of a work which was originally published thirty years ago requires some explanation. Professor Seckel’s work has not only stood the test of time remarkably well, it has also remained the only attempt to date to provide a systematic survey of East Asian Buddhist art. This emphasis on the basic principles of this art constitutes the value...

College president Charles H. Fisher’s transformation of Bellingham State Normal School, a small state teacher’s college, into Western Washington College of Education earned him the overwhelming respect of his peers, faculty, students, and much of the local community. His reward was an abrupt firing by Washington Governor Clarence Martin in 1938. Fisher’s ousting was engineered by a cabal of “anti-communist” citizens led by Frank I. Sefrit, the conservative editor of The Bellingham Herald. The group...

The idea for this guide, Freshwater Algae in Northwest Washington, began in 2006 when the Institute for Watershed Studies (www.wwu.edu/iws) expanded its Northwest Lakes monitoring project to collect water quality samples from more than 70 local lakes. This volume, Chlorophyta and Rhodophyta, is part of a series describing freshwater algae in Northwest Washington, and includes simple algal keys that can be used by students with little experience in taxonomy, as well as members of the...

In recent years, attempts by Muslims all across the U.S. to build worship spaces have been met with opposition. Some opponents questioned whether Islam should be considered a religion afforded all the protections of the First Amendment, or whether it is a sinister ideology that posed a threat to American values and should therefore be opposed. Supporters, on the other hand, argued that protecting the rights of Muslims to worship freely is a validation of...

Studies of Mongolia, edited by Henry G. Schwarz. It is my pleasure to present to Mongolists and other interested readers the proceedings of the first North American Conference on Mongolian Studies, held in Bellingham on November 25-26, 1978. The idea for such a conference occurred to me about two years ago. As I recall, it was not some specific event that prompted my decision to organize the conference; rather, it probably was disappointment, slowly accumulating...

Western at 75, a history of the institution, was written in 1974 by Dr. Arthur C. Hicks on the Diamond Anniversary of Western Washington State College. Dr. Hicks used the opportunity to update his book, The First Fifty Years, which he had prepared for the Golden Anniversary of what is now Western Washington University. The book traces the history of a teacher training institute (state normal school) from 1899 through its transformation into a liberal...