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Barnard College Library Research GuideBC3998:
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This guide is intended as a starting point in your
research; the databases and reference tools listed here are a
selective list. Always remember that you can ask for assistance at the Barnard Reference Desk at any
point in
your research, and you can always request a consultation.
Primary Sources | Request a Consultation
SECONDARY SOURCES
Secondary sources can give you background information to help you choose your topic and to give an overview of the subject. They can also provide useful bibliographies.
REFERENCE BOOKS:
Encyclopedia of American Social History
BARNARD REF. HN57 .E58 1993
Excellent overview essays with bibliographies to secondary resources. Use to gain a quick
understanding of your topic and some background of the time period you are researching.
The AHA’s Guide
to Historical Literature
BARNARD REF. D20 .A55 1995g
The American Historical Association's list of books and sources. Use if you want one or two
historical overviews about your topic or time period.
Encyclopedia of
American Cultural and Intellectual History
BARNARD REF. E169.1 .E624 2001
Three volume compendium of articles on aspects of American thought and expression from early America
to the present. Agrarianism, manhood and science and religion are sample article topics included in
this set.
Encyclopedia of the
United States in the Nineteenth Century
BARNARD REF. E169.1 .E626 2001
This work includes numerous articles on events, trends, movements, inventions, cultural &
social changes, and intellectual changes relevant to 19th century America.
Encyclopedia of African
American Culture & History
BARNARD REF. E185 .E54 1996
A comprehensive 5 volume set of articles devoted to African Americans and the African American
experience.
American Decades
BARNARD REF. E169.12 .A4192
This is a series going back to 1900. The Barnard Reference Department has it from the 1910-1920
edition up to current editions. Each title in American Decades is devoted to a 10-year
period. A fun way to find out about political, social, cultural and scientific events that happened
during the time period you are investigating.
American Decades: Primary
Sources 10 vol.
BARNARD REF. E169.1 .A47 1977 2004
Handbook of American Popular Culture 3 vol.
BARNARD REF.E169.1 .H2643 1989
Chronology of
World History
BARNARD REF. D11 .M39 1999
What else was happening in the world?
The Reader's
Companion to American History
BARNARD REF. E174 .R43 1991
Use for quick facts. Answers the who, what, when, where questions that may crop up as you read
primary source material.
INDEXES AND DATABASES:
Use periodical indexes to identify journal articles about specific
topics; secondary articles' footnotes and bibliographies may point you to primary resources.
For example:
America: History and Life
A major periodical index to scholarly journals containing articles on all aspects of American
history. This index is useful for finding articles about topics and it can also lead to primary
material. Check the Documentation Field (available by viewing the full citation) to see if the
article has footnotes, is based on primary material, etc.
INDEXES:
These indexes (some are online and some are in print) cite
articles and essays written during the time period relevant to this course.
Essay and
General Literature Index
BARNARD REF. AI3 .E752 (Library has: 1900 - 1994)
Use to find essays published in anthologies (books). Remember that terminology has changed. For
example, if you look under "African American" you won’t find anything, nor under "Afro-American" or
"Blacks." You have to use "Negroes." E-link enabled but try CLIO directly if e-link does not find
the item. If the title does not appear in CLIO, check the card catalog at Butler Library.
International
Index; a Guide to Periodical Literature in the Social Sciences and Humanities
BARNARD REF. AI3 .R49 (1907 - 1974)
Covers early 20th Century scholarly journals that are not in the Readers Guide,
which covers more popular magazines. When you find a citation for an article, the title of the
journal is abbreviated. Look at the front to find out what the abbreviations stand for. Use CLIO to
find which library owns the periodical. If the title does not appear in CLIO, check the Union
List of Serials to see whether Columbia used to subscribe to the journal. If Columbia stopped
subscribing many years ago, it would not show up in CLIO.
The New York Times Index
BARNARD REF. Index Table (1933 - present) and BUTLER REF. R070 N481
(1851 - present)
The New York Times Index for 1851- is also available online, see below
Historical
Newspapers Online
This is an electronic form of the print index to the New York Times as well as the
Times of London (not the full-text of the newspaper); some people may find the paper copy of the
index easier to use.
Nineteenth
Century Readers' Guide to Periodical Literature
BARNARD REF. AI3 .R496 (1890 - 1899, 2 volumes)
Index to about 60 periodicals including Atlantic Monthly, Edinburgh Review, Political Science
Quarterly, Popular Science Monthly, Quarterly Journal of Economics, Scientific American, etc.
These are primarily magazines written for the general public, but some are more scholarly. Use CLIO
to find which library owns the periodical; if the title does not appear in CLIO, check the Union
List of Serials.
Index to Nineteenth
Century American Art Periodicals
Citations with some abstracts for articles, poems, and illustrations from over 40 19th century
American art journals.
PCI
Periodicals Contents Index
An international, interdisciplinary index especially useful for finding articles published in the
18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries. Use CLIO first to find which library owns the periodical; if
the title does not appear in CLIO, check the serials catalog in Butler Reference or the Union
List of Serials.
Poole's Index
To Periodical Literature
BARNARD REF. AI3 .P7 1938g(1802 - 1881)
An index to general interest periodicals published in the U.S. and the U.K. Use CLIO to find which
library owns the periodical; if the title does not appear in CLIO, check the serials catalog in
Butler reference or the Union List of Serials.
Poole's is also available online in Nineteenth Century Masterfile
Nineteenth Century
Masterfile
Includes several 19th-century periodical indexes as well as indexing of the New York Daily
Tribune (1875-1906) and the New York Times (1863-1005). Some full-text is included.
Readers'
Guide To Periodical Literature.
BARNARD REF. AI3 .R48 (1900 - 1997)
An index to general and popular U.S. magazine. Use CLIO to find which library owns the periodical;
if the title does not appear in CLIO, check the Union List of Serials.
Readers' Guide
Retrospective
Citations to articles in popular and general interest periodicals from 1890-1982
JOURNALS AND NEWSPAPERS - online
full-text:
Accessible Archives
Searchable collection of U.S.history resources including the Pennsylvania Gazette,
Godey's Lady Book, a group of African American and abolitionist newspapers and more. Dates
covered: 1728-1870.
HarpWeek
Page images of Harper's Weekly, the popular illustrated American magazine, covering the
years 1857 to
1876, a rich record of all aspects of life during those years. Contents may be accessed by any of
four
detailed indexes.
American Periodical Series
Over 1,000 full-text periodicals including special interest and general magazines, literature and
professional journals, children and women's journals and more. 18th and early 19th century.
Nation Digital Archive
Searchable full-text page images of a major U.S. journal of left/liberal opinion with coverage
from 1865-1999.
ProQuest
Historical Newspapers
Full-text and full image articles from the New York Times and the
Wall Street Journal back to their first issue.
JSTOR
Full-text articles from more than 60 scholarly journals, some of which go back to the 1890s.
ELECTRONIC RESOURCES WITH PRIMARY SOURCES:
Barnard College
Library Subject Guide : History – Documents and Primary Sources
Recommended web sites (from the Barnard College Library) that contain historical documents and
writings.
Other large collections:
Guide to
Microforms (Primary Sources in U.S. History)
Guide to African American Studies, Native American Studies, Women's Studies, Immigration Studies,
Western U.S. History, Southern U.S. History and more. Some items are full-text
online.
Primary Sources in
African American Studies
Provides access to the full-text of selected primary sources (including autobiographies,
speeches,
legislation, Supreme Court decisions) and secondary sources (articles from reference books and
scholarly
journals). Includes prints and photographs. Contains material from colonial times up to the recent
past.
Black Thought and Culture:
African Americans to 1975
Full text of non-fiction written by African American leaders and others.
American Memory
From the Library of Congress, with over 80 collections online (texts, music, photographs,
films).
The Gerritsen Collection:
Women's History Online, 1543-1945
Full-text collection of books and periodicals, the bulk of the collection dates from 1880-1920.
Making of America
http://moa.umdl.umich.edu/
A digital library currently containing approximately 1,600 books and 50,000 journal articles with
19th century imprints.
North American Women's
Letters and Diaries
Diaries, journals, and letters written by women visiting or living in North America. Release I,
February 2001
includes the letters and diaries of 69 women.
OTHER:
American Newspapers
in the Columbia University Libraries
A checklist of U.S. newspapers owned by the Columbia University Libraries, dating from 1704 to the
present, arranged by state and city of publication.
Union List of
Serials in Libraries of the United States and Canada (ULS)
Printed guide. BARNARD REF. Z6945 .U45 1965
This multi-volume set is arranged alphabetically by the title of the publication and indicates which
periodicals major libraries subscribed to up until 1965. The code for Columbia is NNC;
the code for the New York Public Research Libraries is NN. If ULS
indicates that Columbia had a subscription to a title, you must still check Butler Reference's
Serials Catalog to find the call number and whether Columbia has the volume you need. Using ULS
will give you a good idea of what's available at Columbia before trying to use the Serials Catalog.
Women's Journals in the Columbia and Barnard Libraries
A checklist of women's magazines and journals held by the Columbia/Barnard Libraries. You can
display the titles alphabetically by title, or by date.
Women's Studies :
Microform Collections
Guide to some of the microform sets available at Columbia University, for example:
Americans for Democratic Action Papers, 1932-1965
Black workers in the era of the great migration,
1916-1929
Committee of Fifteen Records, 1900-1901
Japanese Camp Papers, 1942-1945
DIARIES:
American diaries : an annotated
bibliography of published American diaries and journals. (1983)
BARNARD REFERENCE Z5305.U5 A74 1983
The published diaries and
letters of American women : an annotated bibliography. (1987)
BARNARD REFERENCE Z5305.U5 G66 1987
CLIO AND THE CARD CATALOG:
Columbia is a major research library and you
may find some primary sources in CLIO.
For example if you do a keyword search: maine and travel
you will find some items about traveling in Maine in the 19th century.
Also when doing a subject search in CLIO or the card catalog look for the subdivision "sources".
For example:
s=women--united states--social conditions--sources
s=united states--history--1865 1921--sources
Looking for books published during a
specific span of years:
REMEMBER that CLIO does not list everything owned by the Columbia University Libraries. Use the card
catalogs in Butler Reference by finding an appropriate subject heading (use the Library of
Congress Subject Headings books located in the Barnard or Butler Reference Departments); once
you've found a useful subject heading look through the card catalog for items published in the years
you are interested in. Subject headings have changed over time, so you may need to check earlier
editions of the Library of Congress Subject Headings; check in Butler Reference for the
LCSH books that cover your time period.
Updated
March 03, 2004
Karen Dobrusky
Adapted from web page developed by Cynthia A. Johnson