Kalimat — Moderated discussions related to Baha'i bibliographic research

Description

Kalimat is a moderated and curated list concerned with bibliographic research, bibliographic methods, manuscript studies, digital humanities, and library science as it pertains to the Babi-Baha'i religion or its precursor Abrahamic, Islamic Shaykhi contexts. Postings can also include announcements of any print or digital materials, including grey literature for any audience, with an emphasis on novel, scholarly, biographical or historical research.

Kalimat is also the home for continuing discussions of the Reference Desk series on archives, libraries, bibliographies, and online resources.

The list transacts in English but discussions are not limited to bibliographical materials in English. The remit is broad and postings can include conference announcements, requests for information, book reviews, manuscripts for peer review, bibliographic reports, bibliographic files, software and software service reviews. Internet resources, relevant blogs, twitter postings, discussion and opinion threads are all acceptable if relevant to the list. We are especially interested in engaging with students, practitioners and scholars from Latin America, the Asia-Pacific and Africa and building networks of cooperation and collaboration on and off the list.

List rules

No forwarding

By default posts can not be forwarded outside of the list without the original poster's consent. There are many reasons for our firm no-forwarding rule: information may be sensitive, confidential, inaccurate, private, or be awaiting publication or review. Do not quote from Kalimat messages in order to share them in the world beyond this list, without the permission from the sender/author (and whether they want their name associated with the quote). Sometimes a message seems to have publicly-available information such as a quote from a newspaper or website, in which case you need to paste a sentence from it into Google or find the article on the web before sharing it, because links shared here may be private links made specially for current issues that are not visible to others on the web. If in doubt, err on the side of caution and ask the sender for advice. Ask for permission off list to avoid noise and clutter on the list and you are advised to retain the consent. To save time or ambiguity a poster should indicate explicitly when the post can be forwarded. When forwarding do not transmit any list related email addresses.

Keep it relevant

To keep our inboxes uncluttered, the moderators may place temporary email limits (e.g., 3 posts per member per day) if/when discussions become too boisterous. Other topics can be discussed on Tarikh, Hikmat, Issues, Tech, and Tarjuman.

List Values

Commitment. Commitment to the task of capacity building, knowledge sharing, advancing bibliographic culture. Courage. To speak truthfully, to create psychological safety and to promote wellbeing and to encourage diversity of views and voices. Focus is staying on task, staying the course and continuously improving the list's effectiveness. Openness is about seeking knowledge, being open to new ideas, creating a culture of learning including the wisdom that can be gleaned from failure. Respect comes from valuing the list purpose, encouraging list members strengths and abilities, serving the list and its members, breaking new paths into uncharted territories.

Civility

Not unlike a graduate-school class, email discussion can sometimes become heated or argumentative. This list has steps in place to prevent that from happening here. Please be polite, so that the moderators will not need to intervene. Ad-hominem attacks (On the poster or a person living or dead) will result in removal.

Reporting issues

Any and all issues that a list member may have related to the speech of another list member should be directed in private to the administrator, and not to other members of the list or to the list itself. The administrator will make every effort to resolve issues quickly.

Keep personal replies off-list

The purpose of the list is to facilitate the exchange of information between practitioners and scholars. If your contribution is limited to something like "I agree," "congratulations," or "send me a copy too," please reply privately and not to the group as a whole.

No cross-posting

If you're on multiple Bahai Library lists, please don't post to more than one. All "bcc" posts — where the list is a hidden recipient — will be rejected. Postings to attract new members or advertising or promoting the list is encouraged as long as it is reasonable

Real names

For the sake of list management, the administrator needs to know the real identity of every account holder. It would be appreciated if each list member were to provide the administrator with a brief introduction when applying for membership.

Lurking and passive participation

New members take a while to learn the rules and norms of a list. Members are expected to be fully engaged in contributing to the list's work and output. Prolonged lurking may lead to loss of membership.

Administration

Moderating

This list is run by Steve Cooney, softwaremage@gmail.com, with server admin by Jonah Winters, jonahwinters@gmail.com.

Membership

There are no restrictions on membership. Membership is open to anyone. Loss of membership is at the discretion of the list owner or the administrator but may be appealed to the "board." In the future list owners may limit list size.

To join the Kalimat List send mail request to: softwaremage@gmail.com