Middle East Banking in the 20th Century

Unique Ephemera from the UT Libraries' Collection

This digital exhibit draws on UTL's Middle East banking ephemera collection. Much of the collection was donated by UT Government Professor Emeritus Clement Henry. The collection includes pamphlets, bank reports, directories, handbooks, and scholarly studies of Middle East banking, in Arabic, Turkish, Persian, English, French, and German. This exhibit will interest those concerned with international banking and finance in the 20th century, Middle East or Islamic banking practices, and the political economy of the Middle East.

Elsewhere & Otherwise

Imagination & Worldmaking in the Black Queer Studies Collection

This exhibition is meant to highlight the rich holdings found within the Black Queer Studies Collection. The materials brought together in this exhibition recognizes the cultural productions by Black queer subjects from across the African diaspora.

The Field Maps of Colonel Roland T. Fenton

Situation maps from WWI and WWII, belong to one U.S. Army officer, Col. Roland T. Fenton. The maps include classic trench maps, a French long-distance (indirect fire) firing range calculator for Hotchkiss machine gun, and French shelling coordinates from 1918. Some show trench elements, tracks, telephone lines, battery positions, doubtful positions, unoccupied shoulders, underground entrances, and batteries or trenches with sniper niches. German trenches and batteries were overprinted in blue. French surveillance line overprinted in red. There are hand-written annotations.

Publicity and Propaganda: The Great Britain Ministry of Information – Daily Press Notices and Bulletins from World War II

By 1935, it was becoming apparent to the British government that war with Germany would be inevitable. To avoid public panic, the government secretly planned a new department that would control propaganda and publicity surrounding the coming war. From this work, the Ministry of Information (MOI) was born on September 4th 1939, the day after Britain's declaration of war. The MOI was tasked with the handling of news censorship, national publicity, and international publicity in the Allied and neutral countries. Not only did the Ministry produce these daily bulletins, but they were also responsible for posters, films, radio broadcasts, pamphlets, newspaper articles, and advertisements. In March 1946, the MOI was dissolved as its mission to fight “a war of ideas,” had been completed with the end of World War II. The Daily Press Notices and Bulletins were the main form of communication from the British Government to the public and press during World War II. These publications provided the information that the domestic and international press used to report on the war, from the British government’s point of view. Documents range from descriptions of rationing on the home front, to the accounts of battles, to lists of casualties amongst other information. This collection, available in Texas ScholarWorks, contains the Press Notices and Bulletins published by the MOI between 1939-1946. The Bulletins are among many publications and films issued by the agency during the war but UT Libraries is the only library in the world that owns this complete series.   This exhibition was curated by Gilbert Borrego, Digital Repository Specialist, UT Libraries, 2021.

South Asian Popular and Pulp Fiction

Pastorelas: Past and Present

Pastorelas were commonly an oral tradition, rarely being transcribed to paper. This digital exhibit highlights the rare, beautifully written, and illustrated pastorela, El triunfo de Jesús contra la lengua del diablo : pastorela en cuatro actos by Manuel Antonio Zayas from 1853. It is available at the Rare Books and Manuscripts Room of the Benson Latin American Collection.

Diverse Adaptations of Classical Literature

This exhibit showcases items from the UT Libraries collection of original classical Greek literature in translation and contemporary adaptations created by a more diverse authorship than usually discussed. In this context, diverse is defined as people of color (POC), women and/or those from LGBTQ+ communities. UT Libraries contain a depth of diverse adaptations but showcased here are works of authors from Latinx & Latin American, African & African Diaspora, Asian-American and LGBTQ+ communities. This exhibit asks us to redefine who Classics is 'for' by delving into how the ancient world has been received and recontextualized by diverse adaptations engaging with classical literature. As such, it is but one effort to illustrate a fresh and more nuanced face of a field from which many POC and LGBTQ+ communities have been excluded. The collection and themes presented in this exhibit on diverse adaptations are intended to encourage those who may not have historically felt included in conversations related to classics or classical literature.

You Are What You (Do Not) Eat: Decolonial Resistance in U.S. Latinx Zines

An exhibit highlighting the Nettie Lee Benson Latin American Collection's zines to analyze the intersectionality of Latinidad and food studies.

Socialist Pamphlets

Pamphlets from the USSR, France, and the U.K.

This exhibit is comprised of three sections, each focusing on pamphlets related to socialism and communism in, respectively, the USSR, France, and the United Kingdom.

Satire After the Young Turk Revolution

Cartoons from Kalem Magazine, 1908

“Satire After the Young Turk Revolution” highlights some of the most poignant political cartoons from the first two months’ of the bilingual Ottoman Turkish-French weekly Kalem magazine’s run. This was a particularly tumultuous time in the history of the late Ottoman Empire as it grew closer to its transition into the Turkish Republic. The cartoon images have been selected for this exhibit because of their accessible meaning, illustration of the top issues of the time period, and aesthetic value. Kalem magazine was chosen for this exhibit because it represents UT Libraries’ rare Ottoman collections that are ripe for digitization to increase access for the public. This exhibit will be of interest to those fascinated by pre-WWI Europe, the Ottoman Empire, satirical and political cartoons, and French publications in the Middle East. It will be of particular interest to researchers and students of the Middle East, early 20th century Europe, and popular art and literature across cultures. The print magazine is available at the Perry-Castañeda Library at UT Austin and through the Center for Research Libraries. An incomplete digital copy (issues 2 - 40) can be found through the HathiTrust Library. It is hoped that a full-color and complete digital copy of Kalem magazine will be available as an initiative of the Middle East Materials Project of the Center for Research Libraries. Citation: Correa, Dale, curator. (2019). Satire After the Young Turk Revolution: Cartoons from Kalem Magazine, 1908.