The City as American History
| Professor: Matt Klingle (
) Librarian: Ginny Hopcroft ( ) Fall 2008 |
||
The purpose of this guide is to help you locate and use the library information resources most useful for research in this class. The library's reference librarians will be glad to assist with specific questions. You may also consult Ginny Hopcroft by phone x3298 or via email at ghopcrof@bowdoin.edu.
Library Catalogs
Bowdoin College Library Catalog
Search this catalog for books, videos, microfilm, web sites, etc. owned or subscribed to here at Bowdoin.
MaineCat
Search the combined holdings of most Maine Libraries; users make loan requests online; materials arrive from Colby and Bates in two days.
NExpress
Locate books and articles within the combined collections of Colby, Bates, Bowdoin, Williams, Northeastern and Wellesley; users make loan requests online.
WorldCat
A union catalog for book/monograph holdings for academic libraries nationwide.
In these catalogs, you can search either by keyword or by subject heading. Some useful headings are:
Architecture--United States
Urban Geography
Cities and Towns
City Planning-United States
Reference Books
- Encyclopedia of American Facts and Dates
Main Ref E174.5 .C3 1993
- Encyclopedia of American Social History
Main Ref HN57 .E58 1993
- Encyclopedia of American Urban History
HT123 .E49 2007
- Encyclopedia of the great Black migration
E185.6 .E54 2006
- Harvard Guide to American History
Main Ref Z1236 .F77 1974
- The Reader's Companion to American History
Main Ref E174 .R43 1991
- Encyclopedia of urban America : the cities and suburbs
Online version
Print, HT123 .E5 1998
- Encyclopedia of homelessness
HV4493 .E53 2004
- World Encyclopedia of Cities
HT108.5 .K87 1994
- County and City Databook, published every five years. (Statistics)
Gov Doc; latest, Gov Ref C 3.134/2:C 83/2/
Indexes and Databases
Some of these databases contain the full text of the journal articles they index. Others provide citation only. Use the "Check Availability" link in the database record to determine journal availability at Bowdoin, when full text is not present. If the journal is not available in print or online, you may obtain articles through interlibrary loan.
- Academic Search Premier
- Academic Search Premier indexes over 1800 peer reviewed journals in the social sciences, humanities and science, as well as general interest magazines and several important American newspapers. Date coverage varies between periodicals some as far back as 1980; about 60% of the articles are in full text.
- America History and Life
- This scholarly bibliographic source indexes articles, books and dissertations about the history of the United States and Canada published throughout the world. It is a subject index which provides citations and abstracts for the works indexed. Coverage is 1964 to present.
- Arts and Humanities Search
- Arts and Humanities indexes the contents of scholarly periodicals and books in the arts and humanities, published from 1980 to the present. An international bibliographic index.
- Avery Index
- scholarly and popular journals, trade magazines and regional publications, domestic and international.
- Essay and General Literature Index
- This excellent, long-running index is unusual because it emphasizes the contents of books (i.e. chapters or sections), while including some periodical articles and monographs. Access points are author, title, and subject. Subject matter covered includes literature, social sciences and history.
- Catalog of Government Publications Online, 1976-
Government Index 1892-1976, print
-
To access Bowdoin's government publications, first check the Library Catalog. If you do not find your title or subject there, you should check the Catalog of Government Publications for 1976 to present. You'll obtain a citation, possibly containing a link to the full text. If there's no link, use the SUDOC (classification) number to locate the paper document in the Library's Government Documents collection.
- LexisNexis Academic
- LexisNexis Academic is a full-text web database of news and legal information. This database provides access to both current news and up to 20 years of retrospective news, both domestic and international. Under the News heading you search separate files for the most current news, World news, U.S. news, etc. Under U.S. news you can find many regional newspapers not otherwise available.
- Periodical Contents Index
- This source provides online indexing to nearly 2400 periodicals in the arts, humanities, and social sciences, published from 1770 to 1990. The index presently has 9 million entries and continues to add more. It provides bibliographic access to many of the Library's 19th and early 20th century journals.
Poole's Index
Main Per Index- Poole's Index is a subject index to British and American periodicals of the nineteenth century, created by William F. Poole, Librarian of the Newberry Library of Chicago from 1850 to 1890. This index provides excellent subject access to periodical articles of the nineteenth century, significant primary source material for this course. Bowdoin Library owns many of these nineteenth century periodicals in its collections.
- Reader's Guide Retrospective
- The Reader's Guide is an easy-to-use author/subject index to a broad range of U.S. general interest magazines and journals. It begins coverage in 1895 and continues through the present, providing indexing for many of the early twentieth century journals held in the Library's collections.
- Social Sciences Index
Main Per Index - Social Sciences Index is an easy-to-use print author/subject index to the scholarly literature of the social sciences. Social Sciences Index began in 1907, so it provides access to early twentieth century scholarship.
- Sociofile
- Sociofile is a scholarly index for books and journal articles in the field of sociology. Sociofile is international in scope and provides access to 1800 journals published worldwide, dating from 1974 to the present.
Primary Sources
For information on primary sources, please read the CBB Guide to Primary and Secondary Sources.
- U.S. Congressional Serial Set
- Fulltext legislative reports, documents and journals from the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives. Significant executive agency publications--reports of exploration, technology, finance, immigration, scientific discovery, culture, commerce and warfare included, along with all maps and illustrations. Congressional publications from 1789 to 1838, are collected in a separate database called the American State Papers.
America's Historical Newspapers, 1690-1922
- Cover-to-cover reproductions of hundreds of historic newspapers.
- American Periodicals Series Online
- "Digitized images of the pages of American magazines and journals published from colonial days to the dawn of the 20th century."
- Making of America: Digital Library of Primary Sources
http://www.umdl.umich.edu/moa -
- A collection of full-text documents from the 19th century
- U.S. Government Documents
(located on lower level of the library) - Use the Government Documents Monthly Catalog online for documents published from 1976 to present; the print Monthly Catalog located in the Documents Collection for 1890 to the present and Congressional Universe for both current and historical publications from Congress.
Academic and Government Websites
Library of Congress, American Memory Site: Historical Collections for the National Digital Library
http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/ammemhome.html
- Washington As It Was
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/horydczak
- Urban Planning, 1794-1918: An International Anthology of Articles, Conference Papers and Reports
http://www.library.cornell.edu/Reps/DOCS/homepage.htm
- The Urban Landscape: Digital Image Access Project
http://scriptorium.lib.duke.edu/diap/
Research Tips
- Consult the Basic Library Research page for a helpful summary of the research process. Additional tips for research in history:
1. Use both subject and keyword searching in any electronic database or index, including the library catalog.
2. When you find a relevant record for a book or article, always check the descriptors or subject headings for more search terms.
3. Read bibliographies and footnotes to find additional books and articles.
4. Evaluate websites carefully for accuracy, timeliness and authority.
5. Begin research EARLY.
This page last updated by Ginny Hopcroft, October 2008.