Lost in the Stacks: the Research Library Rock'n'Roll Radio Show

Catalogers discuss rejecting neutrality in the creation and management of subject headings, taking special notice of the Library of Congress's insistence on (some version of) "neutrality."

Guests: Deborah Tomaras, Metadata and Resource Management Librarian at Marist University; Tina Gross, Metadata Analyst at University of Minnesota.

First broadcast July 24 2026. Transcript at https://hdl.handle.net/1853/81968

Playlist

"We asked Deborah to explain why this quite common term, which has been around since the 1950s, and has literary warrant, was not accepted as a subject heading in 2024."

The show team, with the help of cataloger Sofia Slutskaya, discusses the Library of Congress and tries to answer the question, "We don't have a National Library... or do we?"

Guest: Sofia Slutskaya, Head of Resource Description at Emory University Libraries. Transcript at: https://hdl.handle.net/1853/81867

First broadcast July 10, 2026.

Playlist

"As a cataloger, I need a more precise definition."

A Georgia Tech faculty member describes how using AI to write MATLAB code improved a course on chemical reactor design and the benefits of discarding the analytic solution for complex, real-life problems.

Guest: Dr. Michael Filler of the Georgia Tech School of Chemical And Biomolecular Engineering.

First broadcast June 26 2026. Transcript at https://hdl.handle.net/1853/81864

Playlist

"You are expected to use AI tools in this course."

The show team discusses the 2013 blog post "The End of the Library" by M.G. Siegler, clickbait that argued that the economics of ebooks and the existence of the Internet meant that libraries had to change or disappear.

First broadcast June 12 2026. Transcript at https://hdl.handle.net/1853/81848

Playlist

"Today's episode is called 'The End of the Library.' No it's not, it's called Clickbait."

The show team has an unthemed conversation for this summer free cut. They discuss travelling to see art, Google Maps, having your assumptions tested, failure as growth, and if the phrase "get in the car, it's summer" has any significant cultural meaning.

First broadcast June 5 2026. Transcript at https://hdl.handle.net/1853/81828

Playlist

"Yeah, it's not really working for me."

Georgia Tech faculty members talk about experimenting with virtual reality tools in a composition course, students experiencing multimodal Hamlet, and assessing how best to teach the "To be or not to be" monologue. Audio from a live recording during the Georgia Tech Library's Media Arts Day, January 29 2026.

Guests: Dr. Kelly Williams, Marion L Brittain Postdoctoral Fellow at Georgia Tech; Dr. Meryem Yilmaz Soylu, research scientist at the Center for 21st Century Universities (C21U); Alison Valk, the Emerging Technologies Librarian at the Georgia Tech Library.

First broadcast May 29 2026. Transcript at https://hdl.handle.net/1853/81791

Playlist

"That's as you like it."

Members of the Georgia Tech Library's Accessibility Community of Practice get into the weeds discussing alt text for mathematics in scholarly works.

Guest: Jordan Moore, User Experience Librarian at the Georgia Tech Library.

First broadcast May 22 2026. Transcript at https://hdl.handle.net/1853/81587

Playlist

"We're getting down in the weeds."

A Georgia Tech scholar from the College of Liberal Arts discusses the place of humanities in academia and how crisis is their natural habitat.

Guest: Dr Richard Utz, Senior Associate Dean for Strategic Initiatives in Georgia Tech's Ivan Allen College of Liberal Arts.

First broadcast May 8, 2026. Transcript at https://hdl.handle.net/1853/81266

Playlist.

"The humanities, as a term, would not exist without substantial crisis in how human beings think about themselves."

A recovering academic discusses Russian dissident literature and why samizdat is not a monolithic genre.

Guest: Dr. Josephine von Zitzewitz, author of The Culture of Samizdat: Literature and Underground Networks in the Late Soviet Union

First broadcast May 1 2026. Transcript at https://hdl.handle.net/1853/81260

Playlist

"Yoga?"

For an Introduce Yourself show, a new but seasoned Georgia Tech librarian discusses his year of firsts in the profession.

Guest: Ryan Gaylor, Reference & Instruction Librarian at the Georgia Tech Library.

First broadcast April 24 2026. Transcript at https://hdl.handle.net/1853/81255

Playlist

"Right on."