New books by 91̽�� faculty members include a pair of children’s works profiling STEM researchers and a personal memoir of an immigrant’s journey to freedom. Also, several 91̽��faculty and staff members are featured as 91̽��Press looks back on a century of publishing — and a book on British colonialism is honored.

Work of Quintard Taylor, Bill Holm featured as 91̽�� Press looks back at 100

Marking the 100^th birthday of 91̽�� Press, its staff chose “10 pivotal titles” from its history — including three books by 91̽��faculty members — in an essay for the website LitHub titled “.”

The list represents books, the staff wrote, that helped define their fields. “Mirroring the innovative spirit of research and inquiry at the 91̽��, the press developed a reputation for publishing at the forefront of many fields … from natural and environmental history to Native and Indigenous studies, and from African American and Asian studies to literature in translation.”

The list includes “,” by , 91̽��professor emeritus of art history and curator emeritus of the Northwest Coast Indian art at the , calling it “a foundational reference work and study guide for contemporary Native carvers, painters and weavers.” 91̽��Press put out a 50^th anniversary edition of the volume in 2014.

Also featured is 91̽��history professor emeritus ‘s chronicle of “the growth of the neighborhood at the city’s heart that shaped its urban history.” “” was published in 1994.

“Seattle’s journey to world-class status has been closely tied to the vibrant culture that blossomed in this community,” the 91̽��press staff wrote, “nurturing such talents as Ray Charles, Quincy Jones and Jimi Hendrix along with the first Black Panther Party chapter outside of Oakland. The book’s call for economic justice remains as relevant and urgent as ever.”

Also noted is “,” published in 1973 with a new, updated edition in 2018. The book — called the bible of botanists and gardeners in the region — is by C. Leo Hitchcock, who was a 91̽��professor of botany; with botanist Arthur Cronquist. The new edition was revised by David Giblin and Peter Zika of the and 91̽��biology professor , with Ben Legler of the University of Idaho.

Also on the list was John Okada’s novel “No-No Boy,” with fair consideration for the author’s family by 91̽��English professor .

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Faisal Hossain of civil & environmental engineering publishes children’s books on STEM

, 91̽��professor of civil and environmental engineering, has published two books for young readers: “The Secret Lives of Scientists, Engineers, and Doctors,” volumes and , from Mascot Books.

The books will showcase “the struggle, growth and success” of 12 professionals in STEM fields, including a geneticist, a biologist, a cancer researcher and a scientist at the National Institutes of Health, among others. They will be written especially for readers from second to fifth grades.

With more volumes planned, the book series is a spin-off from a National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine effort called aiming to widen access to science education. Read an on the Civil & Environmental Engineering website.

Published in September, the book is available for order and will be in stores soon. To learn more, contact Hossain at fhossain@uw.edu.

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Affiliate dentistry faculty member publishes memoir of escape from Iran

, a part-time affiliate faculty member of the 91̽��School of Dentistry, has published “,” a memoir of her solo journey from Iran to the United States as a Baha’i refugee.

The book tells of Khajavi-Harvey growing up in Tehran during the Islamic Revolution and the Iran-Iraq War, and of her escape on her own at age 15 across the Iran-Pakistan border. Khajavi-Harvey is a Seattle dentist and human rights activist.

One reviewer wrote that the story “is a vivid reminder that immigrants bring with them deeply rooted values of family, loyalty, hard work and perseverance. We are richer for their presence.”

The memoir is available through eBook platforms, online retailers and bookstores. To learn more, contact Khajavi-Harvey at zkharvey@gmail.com.

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Historian George Behlmer’s book ‘Risky Shores’ honored by conference on British studies

91̽��history professor emeritus ‘s 2018 book “Risky Shores: Savagery and Colonialism in the Western Pacific” was co-winner of the 2019 from the North American Conference on British Studies.

The prize, which comes with $500, is awarded each year to “the best book published anywhere by a North American scholar on any aspect of British studies since 1800.” Behlmer’s was published by Stanford University Press, and was this summer in the journal American Historical Review.

The other Stansky Book Prize winner was “Trust Among Strangers: Friendly Societies in Modern Britain,” by Penelope Ismay of Boston College.

Many of these online opportunities are streamed through Zoom. All 91̽��faculty, staff, and students have access to .��

Earth Day 50th Anniversary: Gaia Has a Fever

April 22, 2:00 PM���� Livestream

Join the Department of History, College of the Environment�����Ի� 91̽��Earth Day in celebrating the 50th anniversary of Earth Day.��Dr. Jennifer Thomson will give a talk untangling the history of oil corporations, climate justice, and environmental governance. Beginning with physicist James Lovelock’s Gaia hypothesis, she’ll discuss the involvement of oil corporations in climate research, and explore a truly liberatory environmental politics.

Free, please register for access ����

COURSE: Introduction to Basic Plant Morphology – Learning the Parts of the Plant

April 22 and April 23, 6:00 – 7:00 PM | Online Classroom

Celebrate Earth Day by expanding your plant vocabulary! David Giblin, Collections Manager of the 91̽��Herbarium, teaches this two-part class. Learning the basic vegetative and reproductive parts of vascular plants that we know from our gardens, kitchens, and walks in nature, provides an opportunity to improve plant identification skills.

This class is offered online. Viewing instructions will be sent before the start of the class.

Cost is $20 ����Register & More Info

After the Blast The Ecological Recovery of Mount St. Helens: Webinar with Dr. Eric Wagner

April 22, 10:00 – 11:30 AM | Zoom Webinar

In anticipation of the 40th Anniversary of the major Mount St. Helens eruption, 91̽��Libraries and 91̽��Press are proud to host a zoom webinar featuring Eric Wagner, Ph.D., author of After the Blast: The Ecological Recovery of Mount St. Helens.

Since it’s eruption in 1980, Mount St. Helens has been surprising ecologists and in After the Blast, Wagner takes readers on a fascinating journey through the blast area and beyond. From fireweed to elk, the plants and animals forest scientists saw would not just change how ecologists approached the eruption and its landscape, but also prompt them to think in new ways about how life responds in the face of seemingly total devastation.

Free, please register for access ����Register & More Info

Ask Your Farmer!

April 23, 11:00 AM |

The 91̽��Farm is still producing food, but under restricted operations and without the usual dedicated crew of student volunteers. Farm manager Perry Acworth will host this Instagram Live session, showing the work that’s happening on the 91̽��Farm and answering questions about the Farm and our food systems. If anyone has questions on how they can grow food for themselves, this is your moment!

Livestream takes place on and will begin at 11 AM.

������������More Info

Virtual Poetry Café for Poetry Month

Month of April | Online engagement

Since launching in April 1996, National Poetry Month has given people an annual occasion to celebrate the importance of poets and poetry in our culture. This April feels like an especially great time to explore the power of poetry and how it can be used to craft connection and celebrate the things that mean most to us!

Join Whole U this April for a virtual  91̽��Poetry Café to share the poems we love, write some of our own, and connect with our wider community over the written word.��To help get your creativity flowing, The Whole U devised UW-themed poetry prompts to try on your own or with colleagues and friends.

Pick the prompt that resonates most with you then share your favorite poems or original compositions with us by sending them to wholeu@uw.edu or by tagging them #UWPoetryMonth on social media.

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Crossing North Podcast

Ongoing | Online

Crossing North is a podcast about Nordic and Baltic society and culture. Episodes feature interviews with authors, performers, and leaders from Scandinavia and the Baltic, as well as discussions with faculty in the Scandinavian Studies Department and Baltic Studies Program.

In the most recent episode, released April 15, Colin Gioia Connors interviews author Nora Ikstena and assistant professor Liina-Ly Roos. Learn why Ikstena’s novel Soviet Milk about Soviet-occupied Latvia was so popular that libraries had to create a special loan policy for the book.

Missing the Henry? View the online collection!

Ongoing ����

From photography to textiles, the Henry Art Gallery’s permanent collection contains more than 27,00 objects from around the world.�� The collection originated with the gift of nineteenth- and twentieth-century paintings donated to the 91̽�� by Horace C. Henry in 1926. It has grown over the years through acquisitions from exhibitions and through the generosity of art collectors, artists, and donors.

Luckily for those looking to reconnect with art while working remote, the Henry has an extensive the online collection database. Learn more and .

Looking for more ways to engage? The Henry is also sharing content across their social media platforms daily!

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#BurkeFromHome Trivia Night

Every Friday, 8:00 PM ����Virtual Event

Join the Burke Museum online on Fridays at 8 PM for #BurkeFromHome Trivia. The popular Burke Trivia Night is back—this time online to practice social distancing while having loads of fun! Get your nerd on with natural history and culture-themed trivia.

BYOB, snacks, and slippers! Check out for a preview!

Free, please register for access����

Staying home? Here’s what to watch

Ongoing | Your favorite streaming service

Looking for ways to stay entertained while staying at home? If you’ve already binged all the shows in your Netflix queue, fear not. Faculty in the Department of Cinema & Media Studies have gathered television and film recommendations to fit every mood.

Looking for more?

Check out UWAA’s Stronger Together web page for more digital engagement opportunities.

Botanists at the 91̽��’s have created a much-needed second edition of the “Flora of the Pacific Northwest.” Published by the 91̽��Press, took five years to complete and is the first update on Pacific Northwest vascular plant diversity and distributions since the book was first published in 1973. In the past 45 years, much has changed: The second edition documents the doubling of nonnative species in the Pacific Northwest, the addition of 1,000 taxa — including species, subspecies and varieties — to the region’s flora, and the reclassification or renaming of 40 percent of the taxa in the first edition.

The original “Flora of the Pacific Northwest” became an instant classic for its innovative style providing species descriptions in the identification keys and for its comprehensive illustrations of nearly all treated taxa. Students rely on it as an essential primer, while veteran botanists and natural resource managers use it as the definitive reference for the region’s flora.

“This book enables us to be better stewards, we know what’s here, whether it’s common or rare, or invasive,” said , collection manager for the at the Burke Museum. “It enhances our ability to preserve plant diversity in our region for future generations.”

This completely revised and updated edition captures the advances in vascular plant systematics since the first edition. These advances, together with significant changes in plant nomenclature, the description of taxa new to science from the region, and the recent documentation of new native and nonnative species in the Pacific Northwest, required a thorough revision of this authoritative work.

“Flora of the Pacific Northwest” covers all of Washington, the northern half of Oregon, Idaho north of the Snake River Plain, the mountainous portion of western Montana, and the southern portion of British Columbia. It accounts for wild-growing native and introduced vascular plants falling within those boundaries and includes:

• Treatment of 5,545 taxa, with more than 1,100 taxa added to this edition
• Illustrations for 4,716 taxa, including 1,382 new for this edition
• More than 700 newly documented nonnative taxa in the Pacific Northwest
• Nomenclature changes for more than 40 percent of the taxa included in the first edition

These enhancements make this new edition the most comprehensive reference on Pacific Northwest vascular plants for professional and amateur botanists, ecologists, rare plant biologists, plant taxonomy instructors, land managers, nursery professionals and gardeners.

The 1,100 new taxa consist mainly of existing native and nonnative species newly documented in the region, as well as a number of taxa new to science. Many of the new regional records were collected during the herbarium’s annual forays held throughout the Pacific Northwest.

“With the recent revision of ‘,’ and the soon-to-be-completed ‘Flora of Oregon,’ up to date floristic treatments are now available for the entire West Coast of the U.S.,” said , 91̽��biology professor and curator of the 91̽��Herbarium at the Burke Museum.

The new illustrations are in the style of the 3,000 original illustrations, by illustrators Jeanne R. Janish and John Ramely, found in the 1973 edition of the “Flora.”

Crystal Shin, a scientific illustrator and the primary illustrator for the revision, worked to match the style of the original illustrations so the more than 1,300 new illustrations she created seamlessly fit.

“Before inking, I study the style and techniques that Jeanne used on a similar species,” said Shin. “I like her work very much and my ink drawing style is pretty close to hers.”

Shin started the illustration process with a plant specimen by reviewing the specimen’s characteristics with one of the Burke Museum botanists. Together they determined which parts of the plant to include in the illustration. Shin then used a microscope and magnifying glass to examine the plant’s details, specifically its length of hairs, textures, marks, veins, shapes and more. After studying the plant, she proceeded with the illustration process of pencil sketching and then inking. Project staff then scanned, edited and archived the illustrations for later placement alongside the text.

It took approximately two hours to complete each illustration before being placed on the page in the book.

The newest edition of “Flora of the Pacific Northwest” can be purchased for $75.00 at the University Bookstore, local bookstores, and book retailers across the country and .

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For high-resolution images and interviews, contact burkepr@uw.edu or uwpmktg@uw.edu.

The latest 91̽�� program powered by citizen scientists aims to washed up on beaches in terms of potential harm to seabirds and other marine animals.

It’s one of thousands of research projects around the globe in which citizens collect, verify, analyze and report data about everything from what’s on the beach to what’s in the stars.

Better integration of citizen science into professional science is a growing consideration. Earlier this year , associate dean for academic affairs and diversity in the co-authored a on citizen science in the journal Science and in August there were at the Ecological Society of America’s annual meeting in the session “Citizen Science from Sea to Sky: Investigating Ecological Responses to Global Environmental Change.”

Here at the UW, citizen science interests faculty members wanting to harness the power of many eyes and hands and to broaden the impact of their work. 91̽��graduate students initiate citizen science efforts and undergraduates work both as volunteers and coordinators of volunteers.

“We’re at a tipping point,” Parrish said. “Our need to know and be able to document environmental issues is growing far beyond the reach of academic science and resource management to keep pace.“

Despite the need for information, the practice of citizen science “is not universally accepted as a valid method of scientific investigation,” Parrish and co-authors wrote in “,” in Science. “Scientific papers presenting volunteer-collected data sometimes have trouble getting reviewed and are often placed in outreach sections of journals or education tracks of scientific meetings,” they wrote.

At the UW, the natural sciences is just one area in which citizen scientists have gathered information that has become the basis of published research and resources reports used by managers, legislators and fellow scientists.

Some examples:

• 

  Data gathered by beach walkers who tally dead seabirds that wash ashore as part of the program, known as COASST, have been published in journals such as Marine Ornithology, Marine Pollution Bulletin and Journal of Archaeological Science.

• Annual five-day collecting trips, where volunteers gather as many as 1,000 specimens, enrich the and contribute to the of choice for regional land managers and professional botanists around the world interested in Pacific Northwest plants. The “Washington Wildflower” and “Idaho Wildflower” likewise capitalize on the herbarium holdings, as do efforts now under way to revise the 1973 plant “bible” for the region, the “Flora of the Pacific Northwest.”
• Monitoring by volunteers with the UW’s about the plant Erigeron basalticus – native to Washington and commonly known as daisy fleabane – was used by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to determine that the plant, while rare, did not need listing under the Endangered Species Act.

With the right training and oversight, volunteers can collect data of quality equal to that collected by experts, according to findings cited in the Science article. To ensure that critiques of citizen science efforts are based on merits of research, rather than unfounded assumptions about the practice, the co-authors wrote that developers must employ sound research or monitoring design, and reviewers should look for evidence of such practices.

Parrish didn’t have publications particularly in mind when she spearheaded the Coastal Observation and Seabird Survey Team program 16 years ago. A professor of , she was after an even higher standard: data that could stand up in court if need be. Baselines of how many birds die naturally would be needed in the event of major oil spills or other human-caused events that might wind up in court.

For faculty and graduate students interested in tapping into citizen science, Parrish said she’d like there to be easier ways to take advantage of existing programs.

“Imagine all the people doing terrestrial climate work, plant work, plant science, agronomy – are they each going to each create a citizen-science program and train people to identify plants?” she asked. “One way is to create a kind of plug-and-play kind of situation. If at the end of the day, they’re all interested in phenology – when things in the natural world reoccur – couldn’t we create a single program that everyone could use?”

The 91̽��should capitalize on its expertise in natural sciences, education and information technology to become a center for citizen science on the West Coast, Parrish said.

“I would love to see the 91̽��leap into the lead on the West Coast on that,” she said.

“We’re knee-deep in environmental scientists. We also have a wonderful College of Education and a great education program at Bothell. We can learn why people join things and what they get out of it, because you want those volunteer data collectors to stay with you until they get good. The last thing you want is for them to breeze in and breeze out.”

“The 91̽��has a kick-butt computer science program, Information School and digital arts and graphic design programs,” Parrish said.

For example Jeff Heer, an associate professor of computer science and engineering, just received a Gordon and Betty Moore Investigator Award and he’s committed, among other things, to connect his visualization lab to “big data” produced by citizen science, and especially visualizations targeting non-scientists.

“If we’re collecting broad-scale information – big space, long time – we need different tools to bring these data together, to check them out, to visualize them – like a map or a movie – that can go out to people in near real time, not three years later in a publication. Scientists are not necessarily going to do that and neither are education people. IT people are going to do that.”

The app for iOS, Android and Kindle mobile devices – complete with images, species names , range maps, bloom period and technical descriptions – was produced by the 91̽�� at the Burke Museum and the two authors of “Wildflowers of the Pacific Northwest” with High Country Apps, a Montana-based company that creates mobile wilderness guides.

Designed for both budding wildflower enthusiasts and experienced experts, the app is for individuals who travel to wildflower areas and are interested in knowing the names and natural history of the plants they encounter. It’s primarily meant to be a plant identification tool, but it also provides educational information about ecological regions, plant communities and botanical terms.

The majority of species included are native, but introduced species common to the region are covered as well in order to expand the usefulness of the resource. Once downloaded, the app does not need an internet or network connection to run so you can use it no matter how remote your wanderings.

A free introductory version of the app that features 32 Washington wildflowers is available at selling the full, 870-plant app for $7.99. A portion of revenues from the app supports conservation and botanical exploration in the region.

“The number of species covered and wealth of information included sets a new standard for wildflower identification apps,” said collections manager of the herbarium.

Users can browse the species list by common or scientific name, or by family, to locate a plant and access the related information. However, most users will likely use the identification key that is the core of the app. Giblin and herbarium informatics specialist Ben Legler provided the technical data for the key including the scientific names, species distribution, whether each plant is native or an introduced, time of bloom and more.

The tool was inspired by the Burke Museum’s , a comprehensive online image collection of the state’s plants and lichens.