U.Va. Library Press Release
For Immediate Release
November 14, 2006
Download a pdf of this release
Google Book Library Project:
University of Virginia Joins Leading Research Libraries in Partnership with Google to Increase Discovery of Knowledge — and to Offer Library Books to Global Audience
(Charlottesville, VA) - The University of Virginia and Google today announced U.Va. as the ninth partner in the international Google Book Library Project, joining Harvard, Stanford, Oxford, the University of Michigan, and other leading research libraries in the collaborative effort to make their vast resources more accessible.
The Google project digitizes books from major libraries around the world and makes them searchable on Google Book Search. Hundreds of thousands of selected books from the University Library's collections will be digitized by Google and made searchable.
"This is an historic moment," said University President John T. Casteen III. "When Jefferson designed the University, he placed the library at its center — both physically and academically. Reading and the quest for knowledge were all-important to him. Reaching out into the world — what we now call Globalization — was central to his vision of what an American university must do to promote the knowledge that sustains personal freedom. To have the library that is the clearest single emblem of this vision now assume a role in a vast, international digital library has special meaning here. It puts a distinctly contemporary meaning to our founder's dream of making knowledge accessible to all people."
Google will digitize selected portions of the Library's great collections of American history, literature, and humanities works, and incorporate them into the Book Search Project
Book Search was specifically designed to comply with copyright law. Anyone will be able to freely view, browse and read U.Va.'s books in the public domain. For books protected by copyright, scholars will be able to discover relevant books via key-word searches, and they will get basic background (such as the book's title and the author's name), at most a few lines of text related to their search, and information about where they can buy or borrow a book. If publishers or authors don't want to have their books digitized, they can be excluded.
"Since 1992, the U.Va. Library has been making public domain works freely available online," said University Librarian Karin Wittenborg. "Scholars tell us that we have made it possible to ask new questions because these works are available digitally. With Google, we will be able to offer access to many more texts. For example, 18th- and 19th-century works that are rarely found can be discovered by new audiences."
About the U.Va. Library
With 13 physical locations as well as the original Rotunda, the U.Va. Library contains more than five million volumes, 17 million manuscripts, rare books and archives, and rapidly-growing digital collections. The Library is a leader in developing collections, tools, and collaborations that foster scholarship at the University and worldwide. It is known in particular for its strength in American history and literature, as well as its innovation in digital technologies.
About the Google Books Library Project
The Google project digitizes books from major libraries around the world and makes them searchable on Google Book Search. For more information on the project: http://books.google.com.
Links for more information:
- Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) about the University of Virginia - Google Book Library Project
- To explore Google Book Search: http://books.google.com
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