Friends: This morning I stumbled upon a news story from H-Net, an organization I had not known till today. I believe a similar organization in India will be of great value to our social scientists, economists, development researchers and scholars in humanities. I give below a brief note on H-Net (from their website) and an example of what they do. Regards. Subbiah Arunachalam Member, National Mission on Libraries Distinguished Fellow, Centre for Internet and Society What is H-Net? An international consortium of scholars and teachers, H-Net creates and coordinates Internet networks with the common objective of advancing teaching and research in the arts, humanities, and social sciences. H-Net is committed to pioneering the use of new communication technology to facilitate the free exchange of academic ideas and scholarly resources. Among H-Net's most important activities is its sponsorship of over 100 free electronic, interactive newsletters ("lists") edited by scholars in North America, South America, Europe, Africa, and the Pacific. Subscribers and editors communicate through electronic mail messages sent to the group. These messages can be saved, discarded, downloaded to a local computer, copied, printed out, or relayed to someone else. Otherwise, the lists are all public, and can be quoted and cited with proper attribution. The lists are connected to their own sites on the World Wide Web, that store discussion threads, important documents, and links to related sites on the web. H-Net lists reach over 100,000 subscribers in more than 90 countries. Subscriptions are screened by the list's editors to promote a diverse readership dedicated to friendly, productive, scholarly communications. Each list publishes between 15 and 60 messages a week. Subscription applications are solicited from scholars, teachers, professors, researchers, graduate students, journalists, librarians and archivists. Each network has its own "personality," is edited by a team of scholars, and has a board of editors; most are cosponsored by a professional society. The editors control the flow of messages, commission reviews, and reject flames and items unsuitable for a scholarly discussion group. The goals of H-Net lists are to enable scholars to easily communicate current research and teaching interests; to discuss new approaches, methods and tools of analysis; to share information on electronic databases; and to test new ideas and share comments on the literature in their fields. ***** CRL Acquires Central American Archives CRL has received and processed part one of the Archivo General de Centroamérica (Central American Archives, or CAA). These materials are accessible by CRL members (and non-members with user accounts) through the CRL catalog. CRL will acquire parts two and three of the set by the end of the 2012 calendar year. The complete archive encompasses six million pages of original primary source documents—many of which are the only existing copy—that span more than three centuries from 1519 to 1898. They document Spanish rule in the New World from the founding of the city of Antigua, in Guatemala. The collection documents all aspects of commerce, politics, and development in El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and the Yucatan and Chiapas regions of Mexico. The CAA is a rich resource for Latin American, Central American, and Spanish studies. Link to CAA record: http://catalog.crl.edu/record=b2172246~S1 The CAA set was selected for purchase by CRL members through a Purchase Proposal Program ballot. Participants noted that these materials would augment CRL’s holdings for a time period and region of growing research interest, but were unlikely to be purchased by individual libraries. Nominations for the upcoming Purchase Proposal Ballot will be accepted through September 30, 2012. Additional information available at http://www.crl.edu/collections/collection-building/cooperative-resource-deve... Mary Wilke Center For Research Libraries 6050 S. Kenwood Avenue Chicago, IL 60637 Tele: 773-955-4545, ext 317 Fax: 773-955-4339 Email: wilke@crl.edu Visit the website at http://catalog.crl.edu/record=b2172246~S1 -- This message has been scanned for viruses and dangerous content by MailScanner, and is believed to be clean.