Barnard College Library Research Guide
 

BC1174:  First Year Seminar, Spring 2005
Reinventing Literary History:  The Legacy of the Mediterranean
Professor:  Doug Goldstein
Librarian:

 Jenna Freedman

 
Reference Resources | Find Books | Find Articles | Find Web Resources | Find Help

 

REFERENCE RESOURCES
Encyclopedias, dictionaries and other reference books are useful for:
  • an overview of a topic
  • background information
  • bibliographies

The reference books in this list are available in the Barnard Library Reference Area on the second floor.

Title Call Number in Reference Area
Encyclopedia of African American Culture and History E185 .E54 1996

Encyclopedia of American Social History

HN57 .E58 1993

Encyclopedia of European Social History

HN373 .E63 2001

Dictionary of Literary Themes and Motifs

PN43 .D48 1988

Literature and Its Times

PN50 .L574 1997

World Literature and Its Times

PN50 .M625 1999-2004

Encyclopedia of Literary Modernism

PN56 .M54 E53 2003

Johns Hopkins Guide to Literary Theory and Criticism

PN81 .J53 1994

CLC: Contemporary Literary Criticism

PN771 .C59   

TCLC: Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism

PN771 .G27 

British Writers    

PR85 .B688
A Mary Shelley Encyclopedia

PR5398.A2 M67 2003
The Oxford Reader's Companion to Conrad PR6005.O4 Z784777 2000g
Virginia Woolf A to Z PR6045.O72 Z729 1995

American Writers

PS129 .A55

DLB: Dictionary of Literary Biography

PS129 .D5 
Zora Neale Hurston : an Annotated Bibliography and Reference Guide PS3515.U789 Z68 1997g
Knowledge Notes from LION on To the Lighthouse
Literary Index from Gale Group


USING CLIO TO FIND BOOKS AND JOURNALS     

You can enter CLIO from the Barnard Library home page or from the Columbia University LibraryWeb.

  • CLIO (Columbia Libraries Information Online) is the catalog for the Columbia University Libraries and includes Barnard Library's holdings.
  • Title search: leave off the initial article (The, An, La, etc.)
  • Author search: put last name, then first name
  • Keyword search: use and, or or not between the terms, use quotes for a phrase, and use ? for truncation (to find variant endings of a word)
  • Limiting to books in Barnard Library: use the Pre-Select Limits or Post Limits options
  • Finding a book about a person or a subject: start with a Keyword search using the most distinctive words associated with the topic.  Then look for useful subject headings and do a Subject search.
  • Finding commentaries or criticism of an author's works: do a Subject search for the name of the author and look for the subdivision Criticism and interpretation: 
    e.g. A subject search for "woolf virginia" finds a list of subject headings which includes
        Woolf, Virginia, 1882-1941 Bibliography.
        Woolf, Virginia, 1882-1941 Chronology    
        Woolf, Virginia, 1882-1941 Correspondence
        Woolf, Virginia, 1882-1941 Criticism and interpretation
  • Call numbers for literature and literary criticism start with P (How to understand call numbers: the Library of Congress Classification System).  Books that are entirely about a particular author are shelved next to works by that author; for criticism on an author, find the correct call number for the author and look on the shelf near it.
  • You can click on "search all catalogs" on the top right of the CLIO screen and then search CLIO, EDUCAT and Pegasus simultaneously
  • The holdings of the Health Sciences Library and Union Theological Seminary libraries are listed in CLIO and students with a CUID can use these libraries
  • Note that although the Barnard Library is in Lehman Hall, CLIO location Lehman means the Social Sciences library at Columbia; Barnard books have the location Barnard.
Other Library Catalogs
Those with Columbia ID have access to the libraries of Teachers’ College and Columbia Law School, but they are not included in CLIO; use the library Catalogs list on the BC Library home page or CU LibraryWeb, or the following links:

 

USING INDEXES AND DATABASES TO FIND PERIODICAL ARTICLES                            
These indexes and databases are all on the Databases list on the Barnard Library homepage.  All are available only to those with a Columbia University ID (if being accessed from off-campus).
 
Searching Basics:
  • Keyword searching in some databases requires the use of Boolean terms - AND or OR between the search terms, or quotes to search for a phrase 
  • Truncation in Keyword searching expands a search term to find all forms of a root word, e.g. modernis* finds modernism, modernist, and modernists 
  • Look at the Help files for a database to get more details on how to search 
  • Click on "e-link" next to a citation to find out if an article is online, or do a title search in CLIO using the title of the journal in which the article appears.

Humanities Full Text  
  • Citations and abstracts for articles, book reviews, etc. in archaeology, art, classics, film, folklore, journalism, linguistics, music, performing arts, philosophy, religion, world history and world literature, from 1984 to the present
  • To eliminate book reviews, limit Document Type to "Feature" articles
  • Use Keyword search rather rather than All-Smart Search
  • Use " " for phrases, *for truncation

JSTOR: The Scholarly Journal Archive     
  • A full text database of articles from over 1,000 scholarly journals, from the beginning of the journal but excluding the most recent 3-5 years; includes African American studies, anthropology, classical studies, education, history, language and literature, philosophy, political science, sociology and more        
  • Use the Advanced Search for more precise searching     

LION: Literature Online 
  • A library of more than 350,000 works of English and American poetry, drama, and prose, plus biographies, bibliographies, and over 145 full-text journals and other key criticism and reference sources
  • To find critical articles click on "Search: Criticism and Reference"

MLA: Modern Language Association Bibliography
  • Citations for articles, books, book chapters, dissertations etc. on literature, linguistics, language and folklore published from 1963 to the present
  • Use keywords,*for truncation, " " for phrases 
     
Project Muse: Scholarly Journals Online
  • Full-text articles from more than 250 journals in literature and criticism, history, the visual and performing arts, cultural studies, education, political science, gender studies, economics and many others
  • Usually includes last several years of the journal only
     
ProQuest Direct
  • Full text articles and citations for articles from newspapers, magazines and scholarly journals  
  • For scholarly journals, select "Interdisciplinary - Research Library" from the drop-down menu and check "Scholarly Journals" box
  • Use keywords, phrase assumed, *for truncation
     
Women's Studies International 
  • Citations for articles on women's studies, gender studies, feminist theory and criticism, published from 1972 to the present 
  • To change from split screen to full screen, and for other options, click on "Change Search & Display Level"
  • Use keywords, phrase assumed, *for truncation

 

FINDING INFORMATION ON THE WORLD WIDE WEB          

Subject Guides to the Internet on the Barnard and Columbia Libraries Homepages   

The Subject Guides page, available on the Barnard Library homepage, includes subject guides on art, history, literature, politics, ready reference, science, theater, women's studies, etc.   

The Literature Guide lists many useful resources and includes links to:
  • Online Literary Criticism Collection - contains links to over 4,000 critical and biographical websites about authors and their works      
  • Voice of the Shuttle - a huge collection of links to web pages for humanities research, including literature of all periods, history, linguistics, media studies, philosophy, etc.

The Columbia Subject Guides page, available from Columbia University LibraryWeb, includes links to African-American Studies, American Studies, Electronic Text Resources, Humanities & History, Women's Studies, and many other topics.

 

BARNARD LIBRARY REFERENCE SERVICES & OTHER SOURCES OF HELP

The Reference Department is available to assist you with your library research and teach you how to use our print and electronic resources.  Here you can find information about consultations, Instant Messenger Reference, Live Chat Reference, Library and Reference hours and more.

Consultation with a Reference Librarian: Complete a Consultation Request Form you can e-mail to the library requesting a consultation if you are having difficulty with your research.

Live Chat Reference: Monday through Friday, 1 - 5 p.m., you can chat online with a Columbia or Barnard librarian.  Click on the Ask Us Now link on the Barnard Library homepage or on Columbia LibraryWeb.

Research Skills Worksheet: helps you to test and improve your library research skills.

Evaluation Criteria for Websites - "The Good, The Bad & The Ugly: or, Why It's a Good Idea to Evaluate Web Sources," and how to do it.
 

Writing, Planning and Researching Help Available on the Web                                       

The Columbia LibraryWeb page Library Research Guides includes a link to the Bedford Handbook by Diana Hacker, and information on citation styles.

A Guide for Writing Research Papers based on Modern Language Association (MLA) guidelines is available online.

For help with selecting a topic, writing an outline, dealing with writer’s block, etc., consult the MIT Writing Center or the Paradigm Online Writing Assistant.          

 

Last Modified 04/13/2005
Jenna Freedman, Coordinator of Reference Services and Zine Librarian
Barnard College Library