Lauris Olson
Librarian & Coordinator, Social Sciences Collections
As the Penn Libraries' social sciences bibliographer - now coordinator for social sciences collections - since 1998, Lauris is responsible for selecting books, journals, electronic resources, and other media supporting Penn research and instruction in sociology, economics, linguistics, criminology, communication, and related fields. Lauris is Penn's Official Representative to the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research and the contact person for the Penn Libraries' Pennsylvania State Data Center affiliate membership. Lauris coordinates collection development and management activities of subject librarians for anthropology & archaeology, business, education, gender, women's studies & sexuality, political science & international relations, psychology, and social policy & practice/social work. Lauris is also the Penn Libraries' African studies bibliographer. Lauris started at the Penn Libraries in 1991 as a Van Pelt Library reference librarian, but Lauris's presence at Penn began in 1975 as an undergraduate, earning BA and MA degrees in Anthropology here, alongside a Drexel library degree.
The Mass Observation Project continues to compile the "Anthropology of Us" for Great Britain, starting in 1981 and building upon the original Mass Observation program that ran from 1937 to 1967.
The Mass Observation Project issues survey directives that solicit narrative responses from approximately 1,300 informants on specific topics of current interest - during the 1980s and 1990s, directive responses explored popular attitudes about the events in the Royal family's marriage and divorce - as well as on everyday life, family, the home, leisure, and food.
Mass Obs Project Module I, 1980s provides responses to directives on Thatcherism, Britain's participation in the European Economic Commission, the Falklands War, Chernobyl, the Pan Am Flight 103 bombing over Lockerbie, the Hillsborough Stadium disaster, and concerns over a new plague called AIDS.
Mass Obs Project Module II, 1990s covers mine closures, the end of Conservative rule and the rise of Tony Blair, the Good Friday Agreement, the Soviet Union's break-up, Stephen Lawrence's murder and the Macpherson Report, Mad Cow Disease, and the approach of Y2K.
The Adam Matthew Digital database presents documents held by the Mass Observation Archive, University of Sussex Special Collections. The database provides page images with searchable fulltext for Mass Obs Project directives and for typed and handwritten responses. The manuscript responses are searchable through Adam Matthew's Handwritten Text Recognition technology. Mass Obs Project Module III, the 2000s will be released in 2022, perhaps to coincide with the next season of The Crown.
