Library News

April 27, 2023

On Thursday, April 13, 2023, the UC Merced Library held an opening reception for the current exhibit, Building a New Future: Art and Activism in the Central Valley—Photographs by George Ballis. Maia Ballis spoke at the reception and introduced her late husband’s work. Following the reception, Agustín Lira and Patricia Wells performed and discussed songs that inspired and continue to express the struggle for workers' rights.

March 22, 2023

Building a New Future: Art and Activism in the Central Valley
Photographs by George Ballis
March 22, 2023 - July 28, 2023
Kolligian Library, Second Floor

The industrial scale agriculture that dominates the Central Valley of California has historically relied on groups of seasonal, mostly migrant farmworkers. Foreign nationals from Asia, Mexico, and the Middle East, black Americans from the rural South, and members of other marginalized groups have been attracted to the world’s most productive agricultural region by the promise of employment and economic opportunity. Instead, they have faced meager wages, substandard housing, lack of access to clean water and healthcare, not to mention harsh conditions and exploitation. Attempts to organize any action against these conditions have typically been met with retaliation, and often with violence. While California fruits and vegetables predominate in the marketplace, the plight of the farmworkers remains largely...

March 8, 2023

The 2022-2023 Abrescy-Kranich Library Award for Student Research Excellence awarded two undergraduate students - Sophia Wallace-Boyd and Brian Fernandez at a public reception on March 10, 2023.

February 2, 2023

The UC Merced Library is currently accepting ZCCM proposals that will bring course costs to zero for courses offered in summer or fall 2023. Faculty and lecturers who wish to replace commercial materials with Open Educational Resources (OER) and/or library-licensed material are encouraged to apply for a ZCCM grant by March 27, 2023.