[{"titre":"CALL Member Article: Researching Foreign and International Current Events","url":"https://www.callacbd.ca/CALL-Blog/12894125","pubDate":"Mon, 26 Oct 2026 07:55:49 +0100","source":"Canadian Association of Law Libraries / L'Association canadienne des bibliothèques de droit CALL/ACBD Blog","description":"CALL member Marcelo Rodriguez, the Foreign, Comparative and International Law Librarian at the University of Arizona Law School in Tucson, Arizona, recently wrote an article on \" Researching Foreign and International Current Events \". It originally appeared on Slaw.ca on August 16, 2022. It is republished here with permission of the author. In my professional experience working as a law librarian in multiple types of institutions, most of the time a question about or related to a situation happening in a foreign country or at the international level comes primarily through one scenario: the researcher read about it in an online media outlet, newspaper, article, blog, tweet, etc. and wants to know more. Understanding, finding relevant sources and making sense of a rapidly (d)evolving and fast moving situation in a foreign country or internationally is an incredibly complicated and labor intensive type of research, no matter how much experience you have in the subject or country. To hopefully alleviate some of the pressure on these requests from researchers, I created a monthly series, called   Through the FCIL Lens , shared in the blog of the Foreign, Comparative and International Law (FCIL) group within the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL). In this monthly series, I strive to give readers a summary with all the known and relevant information on what’s currently happening, some analysis from experts, and most importantly for the researchers, I also include at least three academic articles which help connect the situation on the ground to larger conversations and trends. I’d like to think that my purpose and hard work behind the series were confirmed a few weeks ago when the dramatic current events in Sri Lanka made international headlines in major newspapers, magazines and social media. Given my obsession and unhealthy consumption of foreign and international news,   I featured the increasingly deteriorating situation in Sri Lanka as one of the “hotspots” to observe   back in April 2022. I’m not claiming any sort of superpower, nor advocating for others to compulsively follow international news. The point is that when you are tasked with researching and finding authoritative sources in order to understand an explosive current situation in a foreign country, 97% of the time, it is not a situation coming out of nowhere. Your job is to find the relevant resources to help you link the current situation on the ground to previously documented situations, people and trends. In this post, I will mention a few crucial steps that I take in order to come up with a successful research strategy. Similarly to what I do in my legal research classes, I’m not going to enumerate a list of websites and hope the researcher finds their way. If you do that, a lot of the time, they’re left with websites which are not updated, don’t work or with a list of broken links taking you nowhere. Therefore, I will talk briefly about the initial steps I take when building a research strategy that has worked for me and also the limitations to this type of research requests that we should all be aware of. First, your main goal should be to look for specific names of people, institutions, places, perhaps a specific case or legislation. You’re aiming to find one proper name (many, if you’re lucky!) and use it as your keyword to search for sources which will help you link the current situation to previous trends, events or any relevant information. In the case of the current crisis in Sri Lanka, one of the main characters is the recently deposed president, Gotabaya Rajapaksa. If you search for his name in both free sources and subscription-based databases, you will quickly find out lots of important information. For example, he belongs to a “political dynasty” which has taken control of the country for decades and also he was hailed as a “war hero” after his leading involvement in ending the country’s civil war in 2009. These two","id":3241471},{"source":"Canadian Association of Law Libraries / L'Association canadienne des bibliothèques de droit CALL/ACBD Blog","id":3241462,"description":"Hannah Steeves, the Instruction & Reference Librarian at the Sir James Dunn Law Library, Dalhousie University (Halifax), recently wrote an article on \"Using Vinyl & Spotify to Understand Legal Information Online\" . It originally appeared on Slaw.ca on February 15, 2022 . Most legal research is done online through a combination of open and subscription databases. Legal information is available at our fingertips through Justice Laws, LEGISinfo, CanLII, Westlaw, Lexis, ProView, SOQUIJ, [insert your preferred database here], and the list goes on. The availability of electronic resources has radically changed—and will continue to change—the way legal professionals conduct research. However, despite my enthusiasm for the improved accessibility and retrievability, I think the lack of engagement that new legal researchers have with print resources creates comprehension issues. The disconnect between a source’s print and electronic formats reduces their understanding of the process used to create the document. Understanding this process helps us understand the organization of information and makes a researcher more efficient. New legal researchers are often introduced directly to the electronic version of a source without fully understanding how it came to be. For example, a student might learn about legislation and be shown how to trace a legislative history using Justice Laws without ever interacting with the print, bound statutes. They are missing the benefits of seeing the tangible organization of annual, revised, and consolidated statutes. Another example is having a student use ProView without ever flipping through a physical binder and understanding how loose-leaf releases work. Although they know each source is unique, they all present approximately the same online. Unfortunately, limited class time and COVID-19 have made it nearly impossible to get students into the library to conduct research with print sources. I try to grab print copies of case reporters, volumes of statutes, and loose-leafs to show students in person or on Zoom, but the effect is not the same as engaging with the print source directly. Instead, when I meet with students, I often see ~18 tabs open in their browsers with sites ranging from course materials, Google, CanLII, and their preferred subscription platform. They ask me, “ Why does this have to be so complicated?” And they’re right! It does seem complicated, at first glance. If we had created these resources using our modern digital environment, they would be organized differently. Print established the rules, and the digital versions have been bound by them. When I try to explain why the digital versions might seem unnecessarily complex, but that understanding how to use the print sources will improve their navigation of the digital versions, I use the following analogy. First, assuming Spotify is the most common music app, I ask students whether they’re more likely to download/stream full albums or singles. Once they’ve answered, I explain that the point of this question is to determine that they understand that a single song is situated within an album—the album is a collection of songs. Next, I ask if they know why artists produce albums. This one takes a bit of waiting, and in a classroom setting a music aficionado may bring up the concept album (and rightly so!), but usually there’s someone who knows that the standard album is a result of the time limitations set by vinyl, specifically the 33 rpm LP record . (Or maybe they Google it as I’m waiting for an answer—who am I to judge?) With a brief explanation, it becomes clear that vinyl restricted artists to around 44 minutes of playing time, and this explains the standard album format still used today. The next step is to connect the persistence of the album through various eras of music. The album has survived the evolution of music distribution. Historically, it started with vinyl, but remained through transitions between audio cassette, the CD, through to","pubDate":"Mon, 26 Oct 2026 07:55:48 +0100","titre":"Using Vinyl & Spotify to Understand Legal Information Online","url":"https://www.callacbd.ca/CALL-Blog/12614092"},{"pubDate":"Mon, 26 Oct 2026 07:55:47 +0100","titre":"Canadian Association of Law Libraries Intervention in Upcoming Supreme Court of Canada Copyright Case","url":"https://www.callacbd.ca/CALL-Blog/12242053","source":"Canadian Association of Law Libraries / L'Association canadienne des bibliothèques de droit CALL/ACBD Blog","id":3241460,"description":"By: Susannah Tredwell , Manager of Library Services at DLA Piper (Canada) LLP and James Bachmann , Instructional Librarian, Law Library, University of British Columbia Since 1988, when CALL/ACBD’s Copyright Committee was first set up, CALL/ACBD has advocated for its members' interests in the area of copyright. While the primary focus of CALL/ACBD’s copyright advocacy over the last few years has been on Crown copyright and primary law, CALL/ACBD has also made submissions about such areas as fair dealing and licencing. CALL/ACBD sees this work as not only supporting the needs of its members but also as serving the interests of access to justice as a whole. Continuing this work, on January 18, 2022 CALL/ACBD, along with Library Futures Institute, will act as an intervener in the Supreme Court of Canada case Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada, et al. v. Entertainment Software Association, et al.   Kim Nayyer, CALL/ACBD’s President, and Robert Janes of JFK Law   will be representing CALL/ACBD and Library Futures. This case addresses the question of how the concepts of “communication to the public by telecommunication” and “making available on demand” as used in the Copyright Act should be understood. The outcome of this case has the potential to significantly impact various library activities, including controlled digital lending and possibly even the simple use of hyperlinks, particularly in light of the limited scope of current library and education exceptions in the Copyright Act . CALL/ACBD's submitted that the court refrain from broadly construing the terms “making available” and “Communication to the Public by Telecommunication” and that s. 2.4(1.1) of the act (\"Communication to the public by telecommunication\")   does not need to be understood as creating a new right.   You can find CALL/ACBD’s intervener's factum at https://www.scc-csc.ca/WebDocuments-DocumentsWeb/39418/FM050_Intervener_Canadian-Association-Law-Libraries-et-al.pdf . The other factums in this case are available at https://www.scc-csc.ca/case-dossier/info/af-ma-eng.aspx?cas=39418 .  CALL/ACBD has acted as an intervener at the Supreme Court of Canada on two other occasions. In Keatley Surveying Ltd. v. Teranet Inc. , which looked at Crown copyright, CALL/ACBD submitted   that “s. 12 Crown copyright does not extend to primary sources of law”. In York University v. Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency  (\"Access Copyright\"), CALL/ACBD submitted   that the SCC “should resist the temptation to modify or clarify the existing fair dealing test” stating that the existing test “is a flexible multifactorial test that allows libraries (and other institutions) to tailor access and appropriate copying policies that consider all relevant circumstances.” CALL/ACBD also made submissions to the 2018 review of the Copyright Act , R.S.C. 1985, c. C-42: one general submission   and