The University of Tennessee, Knoxville has become the newest member of HathiTrust (www.hathitrust.org), a partnership of major academic and research libraries collaborating in an extraordinary digital library initiative to preserve and provide access to the published record in digital form.

Launched in 2008, HathiTrust has a growing membership currently comprising more than eighty partners.

Over the last five years, the partners have contributed nearly 11 million volumes to the digital library, digitized from their library collections through a number of means including Google and Internet Archive digitization and in-house initiatives. More than 3.4 million of the contributed volumes are in the public domain and freely available on the Web.

HathiTrust serves a dual role. First, as a trusted repository it guarantees the long-term preservation of the materials it holds, providing the expert curation and consistent access long associated with research libraries. Second, as a service for partners and a public good, HathiTrust offers persistent access to the digital collections. This includes viewing, downloading, and searching access to public domain volumes, and searching access to in copyright volumes. Specialized features are also available which facilitate access by persons with print disabilities, and allow users to gather subsets of the digital library into “collections” that can be searched and browsed.

“The Libraries are thrilled to be joining HathiTrust,” Holly Mercer, Associate Dean of Libraries for Scholarly Communication & Research Services, said. “The Libraries has a history of being committed to digital preservation and open access, and this partnership underscores our continued dedication to provide lasting access to scholarship.”

HathiTrust was named for the Hindi word for elephant, hathi, symbolic of the qualities of memory, wisdom, and strength evoked by elephants, as well as the huge undertaking of congregating the digital collections of libraries in the United States and beyond. HathiTrust is funded by the partner libraries and governed by members of the libraries through its Board of Governors. More information on HathiTrust is available at: http://www.hathitrust.org/.

The University of Tennessee, Knoxville is Tennessee’s land-grant institution and the flagship campus of the state university system. With holdings of three million volumes, the UT Libraries is a national leader in the creation of regionally significant digital collections; in support of open access though its digital repository, Trace; and through a rich history of designing innovative spaces and building key partnerships that enhance the teaching/learning enterprise. The UT Libraries is a member of the Association of Research Libraries, the Association of Southeastern Research Libraries, the Digital Library Federation, Lyrasis, and the Center for Research Libraries