Winner’s Curse Effect: Biomedical Research in the Deep Web
October 12, 2008
Economic principles applied to publication systems for biomedical research reveal a publication bias, a winner’s curse. Elite high-impact scholarly journals continue to raise artificial publication barriers by underusing open access, neglecting negative data and publishing unrepresentative results of repeated samplings of real world. Access to our communal knowledge and memory through archives is essential to the democratic process.
read more Young, Ioannidis, Al-Ubaydli (2008), | digg story
Currently publicly-funded peer-reviewed academic research published in exclusive journals largely informs public policies on biomedicine, the economy, environment, education, justice, housing, etc. These journals now make articles available on-line at exorbitant prices. Contributors to these journals earn tremendous academic capital crucial to professional advancement. Password protection and high costs prevent the public from accessing the most recent relevant and accurate research. The number of publicly accessible sites are growing as search engines dig deeper in the Deep Web and the open access movement grows among some academics and scientists [2, 3].
In this concise, fact-filled, informative article published by the Association of Research Libraries (ARL)[1] (2003-05-04) the authors described how even five years ago librarians were concerned by the mergers in scholarly publishing which reduced the number of players and by rising journal subscription rates that severely eroded the purchasing power[6] of libraries, universities, and scholars requiring crucial publications for teaching, learning and research.
In February 2009 Jennifer McLennan, SPARC’s[5] Director of Communications encouraged all supporters of public access to taxpayer-funded research – researchers, libraries, campus administrators, patient advocates, publishers, and others to oppose H.R. 801: the “Fair Copyright in Research Works Act which was re-introduced in February 11, 2009 by Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee (Rep. John Conyers, D-MI). This bill would reverse the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Public Access Policy and make it impossible for other federal agencies to put similar policies into place.”The bill goes further than prohibiting open access requirements, however, as the bill also prohibits government agencies from obtaining a license to publicly distribute, perform, or display such work by, for example, placing it on the Internet, and would repeal the longstanding ‘federal purpose’ doctrine, under which all federal agencies that fund the creation of a copyrighted work reserve the ‘royalty-free, nonexclusive right to reproduce, publish, or otherwise use the work’ for any federal purpose. The National Institutes of Health require NIH-funded research to be published in open-access repositories (Doctorwo 2009).” HR801 would benefit for-profit science publishers and increase challenges for making the Deep Web more accessible. See also Doctorwo, Cory. 2009-02-16. “Scientific publishers get a law introduced to end free publication of govt-funded research.”
In 2000 The Open Archives Initiative (OAI) [4] focused on increased access to scientific research (Van de Sompel & Lagoze, 2000). Since then it has reached deeper into the Deep Web with is OAI-Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI-PMH). See Cole et al (2002).
Notes
1. In early 2002, Association of Research Libraries (ARL) Office of Scholarly Communication task force recommended that the Association promote “open access to quality information in support of learning and scholarship.” Society benefits from the open exchange of ideas. Access to information is essential in a democratic society. Public health, the economy, public policy all depend on access to and use of information, including copyrighted works.
2. UC-Berkeley Biologist Michael Eisen, Nobel Laureate Harold Varmus and Stanford biochemist Patrick Brown helped start the Public Library of Science, PLoS in 2000, a “nonprofit organization of scientists and physicians committed to making the world’s scientific and medical literature a freely available public resource” by encouraging scientists to insist on open-access publishing models rather than being forced to sign over their (often publicly-funded research) to expensive scientific journals. Wright (2004) cited Eisen, Varmus and Brown as examples of scientists who are making making some areas of the Deep Web more accessible to the public.
3. Alex Steffen (2003 [2008-09-04]) open source (OS) movement
4. The Open Archives Initiative (OAI) “develops and promotes interoperability standards that aim to facilitate the efficient dissemination of content. The OAI Metadata Harvesting Protocol allows third-party services to gather standardized metadata from distributed repositories and conduct searches against the assembled metadata to identify and ultimately retrieve documents. While many proponents of OAI advocate open access, i.e., the free availability of works on the Internet, the fundamental technological framework and standards of the OAI are independent of the both the type of content offered and the economic models surrounding that content (ARL).”
5. The Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition, (SPARC) launched in June 1998, is an international alliance of academic and research libraries working to correct imbalances in the scholarly publishing system.
5. SciDev.Net (Science and Development Network) “is a not-for-profit organisation dedicated to providing reliable and authoritative information about science and technology for the developing world. Through our website www.scidev.net we give policymakers, researchers, the media and civil society information and a platform to explore how science and technology can reduce poverty, improve health and raise standards of living around the world. We also build developing countries’ capacity for communicating science and technology through our regional networks of committed individuals and organisations, practical guidance and specialist workshops.” SciDev.Net “originated from a project set up by news staff at the journal Nature (with financial assistance from the Wellcome Trust, United Kingdom) to report on the World Conference on Science, held in Budapest in 1999. This was warmly received, leading to discussions about creating a permanent website devoted to reporting on, and analysing the role of, science and technology in development. The initiative was endorsed at a meeting held at the Academy of Sciences for the Developing World (TWAS) in Trieste, Italy, in October 2000. Immediately following the Trieste meeting, the UK Department for International Development (DFID) agreed to finance a six-month planning stage, starting in November 2000. At the end of this planning stage, sufficient funding had been raised from international aid agencies and foundations for a full-time staff and an independent office in London. The SciDev.Net website was officially launched on 3 December 2001. The website has expanded continuously since its launch. We regularly add dossiers, spotlights, ‘quick guides’ and ‘news focuses’ on specific subjects, in addition to a growing amount of regular news coverage. An enhanced and redesigned version of the website was launched in January 2008. Regional networks were launched in Sub-Saharan Africa (2002), in Latin America (2003), in South Asia (2004) and in China (2005), each bringing together individuals and organisations that share our goals and objectives. There are plans for future networks in the Middle East and North Africa, West Africa and South-East Asia. SciDev.Net held its first workshop, in collaboration with the InterAcademy Panel, on science in the media in Tobago in February 2001. Since then we have collaborated with partners to deliver numerous specialist science communication workshops for journalists and other professional communicators across the world (SciDev.Net History).”
6. “Expenditures for serials by research libraries increased 210% between 1986-2001 while the CPI increased 62%. The typical library spent 3 times as much but purchased 5% fewer titles. Book purchases declined by 9% between 1986-2001 as libraries sought to sustain journals collections. Based on 1986 purchasing levels, the typical research library has foregone purchasing 90,000 monographs over the past 15 years. In the electronic environment, the model has changed from the purchase of physical copies to the licensing of access. In general, libraries do not own copies of electronic resources and must negotiate licenses (rather than depend on copyright law) to determine access and use. Large bundles of electronic journals offered by major commercial publishers will force smaller publishers out of business. Multiple-year licenses to large bundles of content that preclude cancellations will force libraries to cancel titles from smaller publishers to cover price increases of the bundles. This diminishes competition and increases the market control of the large publishers. Lack of corrective market forces has permitted large companies to reap high profits from publishing science journals. In 2001 Reed Elsevier’s STM division’s operating profit was 34% while its legal division’s operating profit was 20%, its business division’s 15%, and education 23%. Mergers and acquisitions increase prices and eliminate competition. Research has shown that mergers exacerbate the already significant price increases of journals owned by the merging companies. While there were 13 major STM (Science, Technology and Medicine) publishers in 1998, only seven remained by the end of 2002 (ARL 2003-05-04:2).”
Webliography and Bibliography
Cole, Timothy W.; Kaczmarek, Joanne; Marty, Paul F.; Prom, Christopher J.; Sandore, Beth; Shreeves, Sarah. 2002-04-18. “Now That We’ve Found the ‘Hidden Web,’ What Can We Do With It?” The Illinois Open Archives Initiative Metadata Harvesting Experience. Museums and the Web (MW) Conference. Archives and Museums Informatics. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA. April 18-20.
Smith, Richard. 2008-10-07. “More evidence on why we need radical reform of science publishing.”
Steffen, Alex. 2008-09-04 [2003]. “The Open Source Movement.” WorldChanging Team.
Young, N.S,; Ioannidis, J.P.A; Al-Ubaydli, O. 2008. “Why Current Publication Practices May Distort Science.” PLoS Medicine. 5:10.
ARL. 2003-05-04. “Framing the Issue.” Association of Research Libraries (ARL).
Science: the State, Market and Civil Society
March 11, 2008
Thanks to Corey Beaman for his stunning photography and video clip shown above which he made available via the Creative Commons license in Flickr. He also recommends the www.audi.com/ironman on his blog http://oneighturbo.com/. Billionaire technophile, Tony Stark is Iron Man, who directs a major industrial complex, wearing either his indestructible, hi-tech suit of armor or driving in his invincible Audi R8 which is oddly similar to his armour right down to details like Stark’s artificial heart which resembles the Audi’s mid-engine (http://oneighturbo.com/).The Audi R-8 was chosen by the Automobile Journalists Association of Canada as the “2008 Canadian Car of the Year, ” a 420 horsepower, 250 km/hr, two-seat sports car.As Quirks & Quarks’ Bob McDonald wrote in his blog, “Now there’s a clean, efficient car for you, perfect for a country with speed limits of 100km/hr and snow deep enough to ground this low rider on the first turn.” McDonald used the Audi R-8 as an example of what might happen when publicly funded science is limited to one kind of science: applied science driven by building, nurturing and protecting investment climate and the economic environment See Mobilizing Science and Technology to Canada’s Advantage . He argued,“Take clean cars for example. Scientists have been working for decades on emission controls, fuel efficiency, fuel cells and alternative ways of making wheels go around. But until regulations are in place that force automakers to use these technologies, they often don’t make it to the road. [. . .] It seems the automakers and the journalists who write about them still think it’s 1969. So if the government is going to invest in new technologies, then regulations, penalties and tax incentives must also be in place to help those technologies get out of the laboratories and really make a difference. Here’s the other danger of focusing on applied science: it doesn’t really develop anything new; it just improves on what’s already out there.”
Webliography
Bernier, Maxime. 2007. Mobilizing Science and Technology to Canada’s Advantage Corporate Publications. Industry Canada. (May 2007) http://www.ic.gc.ca/cmb/welcomeic.nsf/vRTF/PublicationST/$file/S&Tstrategy.pdf
McDonald, Bob. 2008-03 http://www.cbc.ca/technology/quirks-blog/2008/03/new_government_adds_insult_to.html
McDonald, Bob. 2008-01-25 http://www.cbc.ca/technology/quirks-blog/2008/01/no_science_in_the_pms_ear.html
McDonald, Bob. 2008-02 “Budget for science, or at least one kind of science.” http://www.cbc.ca/technology/quirks-blog/2008/02/budget_for_science_or_at_least.html
McDonald, Bob. 2008. Budget for science, or at least one kind of science quirks Friday, February 29, 2008.
Ripple Effect: Flickr, Creative Commons and Connectivity
February 29, 2008
A revised improved version of “Creative Commons” Adobe Photoshop layered image combining elements from M.C. Escher’s print, Davidhazy’s photo of ripples and a Google generated circumpolar globe. The previous version on Flickr was viewed 22,033 times by 2008-02 (uploaded 2006-10).
Modernity: Risks and Realities Reviewing Beck and Potter
January 1, 2007
Flynn-Burhoe, Maureen. 1997. “Modernity: Risks and Realities: Reviewing Beck
and Potter. Ottawa: Carleton University.
Tools Jonathan Potter offers in his book Representing Reality Discourse, Rhetoric and Social Construction “Introduction” and Chapters 1 and 2, which could enhance Beck’s discussion of myths of modernity as described in Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity “Preface.”
The image of Ulrich Beck writing by a sparkling lake provides a powerful backdrop to this highly influential catalytic work, Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity. Beck, a sociology professor at the University of Munich wrote the original German text, Risikogesellschaft, in 1986 in the aftermath of the Chernobyl catastrophe. It became ‘one of the most influential European works of social analysis in the late twentieth century.’ (Lash and Wynne, Introduction Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity, 1992: 1) Global hazards threaten the health of plants, animals and people in urban environments and pristine havens. The ecological crisis is central to this thought-provoking social analysis of the contemporary period. Beck places us as eye-witnesses to a transformation in society in which environmental risks have become the predominant product, not just an unpleasant, manageable side-effect, of industrial society.
Beck’s vision of a new era calls for a macro-sociology of change in which science as modernism’s secular religion is dethroned. Potter’s investigation in Representing Reality Discourse, Rhetoric and Social Construction is at the micro level, examining how scientific facts are constructed. This brief comparison looks at tools Potter offers in his book (Introduction and Chapters 1 and 2) which could enhance Beck’s discussion of myths of modernity as described in the Preface of Risk Society.
Beck reinterprets this period, not as the mythical ‘end of history’ but as a continuity or even a beginning of modernity. This reflexive modernity or risk society evolves beyond its classical industrial society. In ‘classical industrial society, the ‘logic’ of wealth production dominates the ‘logic of risk production, in the risk society this is reversed (Beck 1993: 12).’
In this myth of modernism faith in science and progress drives an industrial society perceived as a ‘thoroughly modern society’ (Beck, 1992: 11). Beck questions science’s claim to elitist truth and enlightenment. Scientists have made errors that have resulted in environmental disasters. He does not call for the end of science but for a change within science. He extends scientific skepticism to the foundations and consequences of science itself (Beck, 1992: 55).
This is where Potter’s more precise methods would be valuable to Beck. Beck’s analysis is far-reaching, at times vague. He describes science as becoming “self-service shops for financially well endowed customers in need of arguments’ (Beck, 1992: 173) There is no connection made here to empirical studies, no proof to substantiate his claims. Potter’s tools could provide the missing analytic glue.
Jonathan Potter, a professor of Discourse Analysis at Loughborough University recognises two important precursors in his research: John Austin in How to Do Things with Words and Berger and Luckmann’s The Social Construction of Reality. The description of the ‘skilful interweaving of theoretical, methodological and empirical material’ (Southgate, 1992: 358) used in the review of another of his publications applies equally well to Representing Reality.
Beck calls for a constant questioning of the role of science, of technological progress. Potter offers specific theories and methodologies: the sociology of scientific knowledge (SSK) a ‘radical reappraisal of the traditional view of scientific facts’ (Potter, 1996: 13). This calls for a relativist stance in which the validity of scientists’ truths should also be questioned. In constructionist theory analysts question the elite status of scientific knowledge by closely observing in their habitat (the laboratory) the culture of laboratory scientists as one would an ‘exotic’ ethnic group. Interest theories connect scientists and their social milieu, linking their findings with their ideologies and allegiances. The Quine-Duhem model of the web of belief uses the metaphor of a drum to describe the network of belief. The skin of the drum is tightened and pulled in different directions as new and opposing scientific findings are added to the network. The drum network allows room for contradictory findings. It also allows for the discarding of theories that no longer can be substantiated by new findings. Traditional social scientists use reports or descriptive accounts as if they were factual objects. Ethnomethodologists question these false assumptions by using indexicality, reflexivity (considering reports both for the event they describe and the relation of the report to the event) and the documentary method of interpretation. Conversation analysis deals with practices of description by converting theoretical or philosophical issues of fact and description into questions that can be addressed analytically through studies of records of interaction. Speakers of descriptive discourses, even in what might appear to be the most mundane conversation are designing their talk-in-interaction for certain affects. By investigating fact-construction at the micro level, through discourse analysis of what appear at times to be mundane conversations, Potter reveals the rich potential of this tool for questioning fundamentals of truth.
As risks spread around the globe so does public awareness. The consequences of classical industrial society are questioned. The modernist view, based an assumption of realism in science created a system in which scientists working in an exclusive, inaccessible environment disallowed public skepticism. Lay people often those most directly affected by the pollution of modern technology search for ways to protect themselves. No longer confident in technical experts they become experts in compiling their own dossiers.
Potter’s subtle, intriguing arguments might convince policy makers and scientists where Beck might fail. There is a risk however that the tools of fact construction he describes could be better used by those who are already in power, the risk producers. Informed readers, the general public might be aware they are being manipulated by the presentation of ‘facts’ but it would take a skilful professional to be able to consciously construct facts for their own purposes.
This brief comparison of one aspect of these two social analyses was also written by a sparkling lake. On the surface the clear water mirrors the stunning autumn colours of the Gatineau Hills. However, like any seemingly pristine lake, closer examination reveals an over-abundance of algae growth in some areas, a reflection of a potential threat of pollution. Only through a professional laboratory’s water analysis can concerned residents of the lake arm themselves with factual information, to enhance their input into municipal policies. With good rhetorical skills and a solid dossier lake residents too can be agents of change. Beck’s essay style may well be dense, vague prose but it is well worth the effort. At his best he is inspirational. He pulls all of us into his sphere of action, the public and scientists giving hope that a democratic reciprocal discourse is possible.
Bibliography
Beck, Ulrich. 1992. Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity. Translated by Mark Ritter. London: Sage.
Draper, E. 1993. ‘Risk, Society and Social Theory,’ Contemporary Sociology. 22:5:641-644.
Dryzek, J. S. 1995. ‘Toward an ecological modernity,’ Policy Sciences. 28:1:231-242.
Hall, J. R. 1994. ‘Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity.’ The Sociological Review. 42:2.
Lidskog, R. 1993. ‘Ulrich Beck: The Risk Society. Toward a New Modernity,’ acta sociologica 36:4:400-403.
Potter, Jonathan. 1996. Representing Reality Discourse, Rhetoric and Social Construction. London: Sage Publications.
Rustin, M. 1994. ‘Incomplete Modernity: Ulrich Beck’s “Risk Society,’ Dissent 41:3 394-400
Satterwhite, J. H. 1994. ‘Ulrich Beck: Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity.’ Social Science Quarterly. 75:1 236.
Southgate, D. 1994. ‘Mapping the Language of Racism.’ Sociology. 28:1:358-9.
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Poincaré, Perelman, Hamilton, Yau: Knowledge Collision in the Fields of Mathematics
December 30, 2006
“It’s just the way it is,” isn’t anymore. As I read the Nasar and Grubermanifold New Yorker article (2006) I was deeply moved by the life story of Gregory Perelman who can live on a $100 a month and who managed to wipe out an entire branch of pure mathematics in a few years by working alone, even isolated in the slow world. He is described as an idealist, an ascetic, a Russian Jew who lives with his mother in a gray neighbourhood of gray apartment buildings. But in this article he shines brilliantly. He may be part of the answer to my own puzzle, the ethical dilemma of being an academic in the 21st century.
Henri Poincaré created a True Knowledge Gap in mathematics, giving rise to an entire branch in his discipline when he slipped in an offhand question that became the legendary problem of the 20th century (Nasar and Grubermanifold 2006).
By the nineteen-sixties, topology had become one of the most productive areas of mathematics, and young topologists were launching regular attacks on the Poincaré. To the astonishment of most mathematicians, it turned out that manifolds of the fourth, fifth, and higher dimensions were more tractable than those of the third dimension. By 1982, Poincaré’s conjecture had been proved in all dimensions except the third. In 2000, the Clay Mathematics Institute, a private foundation that promotes mathematical research, named the Poincaré one of the seven most important outstanding problems in mathematics and offered a million dollars to anyone who could prove it.
In 1992 when Gregory Perelman (b. 1968) posted his solution to the problem on the Internet on a site used by mathematicians working with advanced concepts, he supplied enough information for the handful of minds capable of understanding to know that he had cracked it.
It took me a few days to feel I had understood enough of their article to appreciate it. I used my new Firefox add-on Gnosis.[1]
Why then did this story continue to unfold on some very messy battle Fields? Politics, power and control. To understand more fully, I worked out some of the ideas at Tim’s and in an easy chair playing with pictures. I also had to map out a brief timeline and the biographies of the main characters: Perelman, Hamilton, Yau, Tian, Zhu, Cao, Ball and Thurston. I played with the concepts of Knowledge Collisions in the Battle Fields of Mathematics but this was not about knowledge collisions on a level playing field.
Poincaré’s bagel, coffee mug handle, soccer ball and noose knot were great for starters. The table itself was easily transformed into a topology of Battle Fields. Cigars and necks protruded on the topological landscape like stalagmites. I laid a silk cloth over it all so it could drape over the edge of the table. I left a space on the table edge for a dented fender. The True Gap gaped like a crevice in an otherwise relatively level playing field. The coffee mug with its insignia of Stephen Hawkings casts a long shadow and the handle represented the branch of mathematics called topology. Since we are looking at a cross section of topological field the branch that has disappeared over the edge represents a small sorrow [2]
I didn’t know where to put Gregory Perelman my new hero, so I put a spoon in the coffee mug which he of course had stirred up. Then I balanced a swing at the top of it giving him a higher vantage point from which he can quietly survey the field. He swings slowly back and forth without those below noticing. All they can see is the spoon and the bottom of his swing. I turned him into a pearl and remembered a quote, “Not every sea has pearls . . .”
My early experiences in academia were entirely positive. It was only when I was in my fifth year of graduate studies, my second in my PhD that I began to realize the hidden power and politics behind the scenes in the ivory towers as one professor after another sought to gain control over academic and/or grant capital at any cost. I caught myself transforming campus towers into Freudian phallic symbols as I watched with dismay my PhD slipping away from me. I was disgusted mainly with my own naïvity, my lack of campus street-smarts but by then it was too late. It seems my university students in their twenties had figured it out long before I did. No wonder we all make fun of Ph.D.s!
So here I am typing away in my living room office with my old PC perched on this great glass-topped Business Depot computer desk, reflecting Mount Tzuhalem with the fire crackling off to my left and our family sound asleep. I’m emptying my PC into a dozen or more free Web 2.0 sites.
I’m not a Perelman but he is my hero. If you can only learn to live on $100 a month, keep access to the Internet, connect one’s PC’s memory to the free Web 2.0 you can sit back in the slow world and quietly watch a lifetime of experience upload to this strange virtual space we call the Internet.
Perelman’s copyright took the risk of losing his intellectual capital. For some Yau and his students really did deserve the Fields Award he received from Ball.
But for me I would rather face the perils of a Perelman Risk, tie my intellectual capital to my Creative Commons stake and at least let people share some of the amazing experiences I was privileged to have before the Fawlty Towers crumbled around me.
Footnotes
[1] See the article on ClearForest. I had to select a chunk of the article at a time for Gnosis to do its magic but undeniable it makes digesting lengthy, complex articles less cumbersome. At the most elemental level it is similar to the Google generated highlighted key words in .pdf files found in response to a user’s Google search inquiry. Gnosis uses a number of colour codes to highlight a number of themes which I am just trying to work out now.
[2] Its a bit like the death of a meteorite in a fiery explosion would be to the person who had named and followed the passage of the meteorite for decades.
[I have even heard on academic hearsay which is as reliable as Frank I suppose, so I should not repeat this but . . . this is not a journal it is a blog . . . an archaeologist explained to his First Nations guide (who later whispered this to me) that he would not reveal their findings in the field since it would be so hotly contested by his colleagues in his branch it would consume his entire career to defend it. Academic hearsay. Fireworks, not a meteor. Take away 5 credibility, legitimacy points from this author immediately!]
For more reading on science on Web 2.0 see yanfeng.org
Selected webliography
Swaminathan, Nikhil. 2006. peer_review_is_sooooo_old_school
Scientific American Blog. December 22, 2006.
Nasar, Sylvia , Grubermanifold, David. 2006.”Manifest Destiny.” The New Yorker: Fact. Annals of Mathematics. A legendary problem and the battle over who solved it. Issue of 2006-08-28; Posted 2006-08-21; accessed December 22, 2006.
A photojournalist’s haunting report on his journey to Yugoslavia in 1991
November 20, 2006
Echoes of Geurnica: Vukovar (1991)
I created this Adobe Photoshop image in 1994 in response to the words and images of the women refugees of Vukovar. Women make up the largest percentage of refugees worldwide. Urban ethnographer and documentary videographer Ph.D. Cynthia Porter Gehrie, Ph.D. (Northwestern University) worked with the NONA Center for Multi Media, Zagreb, Croatia cgehrie@videodocument.org to produce a site where the story of these women could reach the world. (Currently under construction)
“I spent three months in the basement, and I had no idea of the extent of the destruction in the city. When they were taking us from the Hospital, where we all gathered, to the general warehouse, from the truck I saw what the city looked like. We drove through the main street all the way to Mitnica. The houses in ruins seemed to weep and moan as if in pain, and only the chimneys stood defiantly. I can still see a house devoured by flames and next to it a cow, which came from who knows where, dazed by the horror and destruction around it. When I close my eyes, I can see the ruins, the ghastly dead streets and, tormented by insomnia as I am, I can feel the eerie silence falling over the city of ghosts (Kumpf 1994)”
While looking for images in 1994 to complete this digitage, I came upon photojournalist, Ron Haviv’s site: “Blood and Honey: A Balkan War Journal.” (Which is now available through Amazon.com) This is the url of his powerful photo of a Geurnica-like cow which so perfectly resonated with the eloquent, haunting words of a owman who knew what it was to be a refugee. She wrote about “a house devoured by flames and next to it a cow, which came from who knows where, dazed by the horror and destruction around it (Kumpf1994).”
Stumble it!
papergirls 
