American History and American Studies
Research Guide

For help with your research, visit the reference desk (hours) on the second floor of Barnard Library, or contact a Barnard reference librarian:
       Phone: 212-854-3953
       Chat: IM BarnardReference
       E-mail: refdesk@barnard.edu
Request a one-on-one consultation with a Barnard librarian if you have an in-depth research need.

This guide is intended as a starting point in your research; these resources are a selective list.
  

CONTENTS

PRIMARY SOURCES
Printed Guides and Indexes
Using CLIO to find Primary Sources
 Databases for Primary Sources
     Newspapers, Journals and Magazines
     Archives

SECONDARY SOURCES
Printed Sources
     Reference Books
     Using CLIO to Find Secondary Sources
Databases for Secondary Sources

PRIMARY SOURCES

PRINTED GUIDES AND INDEXES

  • American Diaries: an Annotated Bibliography of Published American Diaries and Journals (1983)
    BARNARD REFERENCE Z5305.U5 A74 1983

  • Essay and General Literature Index (online version): Lists essays and articles in periodicals and books published back to 1900; search by subject or author. 
    BARNARD REFERENCE  A    I3 .E752   (1900 - 1994)

  • Monthly Catalog, United States Public Documents: A bibliography of publications issued by all branches of the government (Congressional, departmental and bureau publications), begun in 1895. Available online as the Catalog of United States Government Publications back to 1976. Use it to find links to Federal agency online resources.  
    BUTLER REFERENCE R328.734 D5  (1895 - present)

  • The Published Diaries and Letters of American Women: an Annotated Bibliography(1987)
    BARNARD REFERENCE Z5305.U5 G66 1987

  • Union List of Serials in Libraries of the United States and Canada (ULS): Multi-volume set showing which libraries subscribed to which periodicals before 1965.  Sometimes needed because CLIO does not show all the periodicals that Columbia has ceased subscribing to (although it does show all the current subscriptions).  The code showing that Columbia subscribed to a journal is NNC; the code for the New York Public Research Libraries is NN. 
    BARNARD REFERENCE Z6945 .U45 1965

USING CLIO (Columbia Libraries Catalog) TO FIND PRIMARY SOURCES
For a general guide to searching CLIO for secondary sources, see below, under "Using CLIO"

  • Primary sources in CLIO include diaries, letters, autobiographies and zines.  Look for these terms in the subject field or elsewhere in the record: Archives, Correspondence, Diaries, Interviews, Memoirs, Sources
    For example: Roosevelt, Eleanor, 1884-1962 --Correspondence
                        Women --United States --History --Sources
    "Biography" in the subject field includes Autobiographies
    For example: My Autobiography by Charlie Chaplin has the subject heading: Comedians --United States --Biography.
     

  • There are several archives at Columbia, which can be searched through CLIO:
    Avery Library Dept. of Drawings & Archives
    Barnard Archives
    Burke Library Archives at UTS
    Columbia University Archives
    Health Sciences Library Archives
    Rare Book & Manuscript Library
    Starr East Asian Rare Books
    The best way to search them simultaneously is to carry out a keyword search in CLIO using the Quick Limit "Archival Collections", or after the search click on the "Post Limit" button on the results page, and then limit the results to Library Location: Archival Collections (at the bottom of the list), and set the date range required. (Looking for Archives and Manuscripts? CLIO help page)
     

  • Zines: These items in the Zine Collection at Barnard Library are identified by the call number, as well as the added subject term, Zines.
    They are primarily in the area of women's studies, featuring personal and political publications on anarchism, body image, feminism, lesbianism, parenting, sexual assault, war, and other topics.
    Search for zines using a keyword search, for example: zines and women and movie?
    If you need help, please contact the Zine Librarian, Jenna Freedman.

Other Library Catalogs:

American Newspapers in the Columbia University Libraries
A checklist of U.S. newspapers, from 1704 to the present, arranged by state and city of publication, owned by the Columbia University Libraries.

U.S. Government Documents at Columbia
A useful guide on the Columbia Libraries Website to finding older government documents held by the Columbia Libraries 

DATABASES FOR PRIMARY SOURCES

Newspapers, Journals and Magazines

  • 19th Century Masterfile: Includes several 19th-century periodical indexes, as well as indexing of the New York Daily Tribune (1875-1906).
    Use CLIO to find which library owns the periodical.
    If the title does not appear in CLIO, check the Union List of Serials (see above).

  • Essay and General Literature Index Online: Use to find essays published in anthologies (1985 - present). 

  • Gerritsen Collection: Women's History Online, 1543-1945: A full-text collection of periodicals and books covering the history of women from 1543 to 1945, with the bulk being from 1880-1920.

  • HarpWeek: Full text and page images of the popular illustrated 19th-century American periodical Harper's Weekly.

  • JSTOR: Full-text articles from many scholarly journals, from the first issue of each journal (including some started in the nineteenth century) up to 3 to 5 years ago.  Only the science and social science articles have abstracts, so searching in the title is the most direct search for articles in humanities journals; searching for a term in the full text of an article will often find too many irrelevant articles.

  • LexisNexis: Includes a database of Primary Sources in U.S. History, as well as full text newspapers, magazines and journals.

  • ProQuest: Online journal articles and citations, as well as the full text of the New York Times from 1851 to the present.  For the backfiles of the New York Times and other newspapers, select the collection ProQuest Historical Newspapers.    

  • Reader's Guide Retrospective: Citations to articles in popular and general-interest periodicals, 1890-1982. Click in the Readers' Guide Full Text box once you're in the database interface to search 1982-current materials, as well.

  • Women's Journals in the Columbia and Barnard Libraries: A checklist of women's magazines and journals held by the Columbia/Barnard Libraries. Displays the titles alphabetically by title, or by date. 

  • American Memory: A collection of primary source materials relating to U.S. history and culture compiled by the Library of Congress National Digital Library Program.

  • ArchiveGrid: Provides collection guides to archival collections and links to digitized archival materials, but has a very limited search interface.

  • Archives and Manuscript Collections: Columbia University Libraries guide to archival collections, mostly outside Columbia.

  • ArchivesUSA: The most useful directory of archives and manuscript collections in the United States, with descriptions of their holdings.

  • Barnard Library History Research Guide: U.S. History Documents and Primary Sources: A list of Web sites with primary materials.

  • Columbia University Archival Collections Portal: lists many collections in the archives and special collections, including finding aids, and offers the ability to browse a specific library's collection.

  • Making of America: A digital library of primary sources in American social history from the antebellum period through reconstruction, at the University of Michigan.

  • Oral History Research Office at Columbia University: Provides a guide to the collection of the Oral History Research Office, as well as links to other oral history internet resources.
    See also: The Oral History Collection of Columbia University  (BARNARD REFERENCE  Z1361.C6 C64 1979), a catalog of the collection published in 1979.

SECONDARY SOURCES

PRINTED SECONDARY SOURCES
Reference Books
Useful for an overview of a topic, background information and bibliographies:
Title and BARNARD REFERENCE call number
American Decades: Primary Sources E169.1 .A471977 2004
Encyclopedia of American Cultural and Intellectual History E169.1 .E624 2001
Encyclopedia of the United States in the Nineteenth Century E169.1 .E626 2001
American Decades E169.12 A4196 1994
Dictionary of American History E174 .D52 2003
Reader's Guide to American History E178.1 .R43 1997
Encyclopedia of American Foreign Policy E183.7 .52 2002
Civil Rights in the United States E184.A1 C47 2000
Gale Encyclopedia of Multicultural America E184.A1 G14 1995
Jewish-American History and Culture: an Encyclopedia E184.J5 J48 1992
Encyclopedia of African-American Culture and History E185 .E54 2006
Encyclopedia of the American Civil War E468 .E53 2000
Encyclopedia of the United States in the Twentieth Century E740.7 .E53 1996
Encyclopedia of American Social History HN57 .E58 1993
The Routledge Critical Dictionary of Feminism and Postfeminism HQ1115 .R68 2000
From Suffrage to the Senate: an Encyclopedia of American Women in Politics HQ1236.5 .U6 S32 1999
Oxford Reference Online (full text of over 100 reference titles published by Oxford University Press)

USING CLIO TO FIND BOOKS OR JOURNALS (NOT ARTICLES IN JOURNALS)

  • CLIO includes the holdings of Columbia libraries and Barnard Library, as well as those of the Health Sciences Library and Union Theological Seminary libraries.

  • If searching for a known item, start with a title search: it's best to leave off the initial article (the, der, un, etc.).

  • If not searching for a known item, start with a keyword search using terms relating to your topic: use quotes for a phrase, and ? for truncation (to find variant endings of a word).  Think of as many synonyms for your search terms as you can; put OR between them.

  • Or search by author, authorized Library of Congress subject, ISBN, etc.

  • To limit to books in a particular library, or by date, format, etc., use the Pre-Select Limits or Post Limits options.

  • A Library of Congress guide to call numbers is at http://www.loc.gov/catdir/cpso/lcco. Call numbers A through N are on the first floor of Barnard Library, and P through Z are on the second floor.

  • If you don't find what you are looking for in CLIO, search WorldCat, a composite of many libraries' catalogs.   After finding items that look useful, use Borrow Direct or Interlibrary Loan to borrow them from other libraries.

DATABASES FOR SECONDARY SOURCES
This is a small selection; many other databases may be useful for your research, and are listed on the Databases list.

  • America: History and Life: Online periodical index to scholarly journals for all aspects of American history.   Useful for finding articles about topics, but it can also lead to primary material.  

  • Arts & Humanities Citation Index: References and bibliographic information for the arts and humanities, with some links to full-text articles.  Useful for tracing who cited a given article or book, or for tracing an idea. 

  • Humanities Full Text: Citations and abstracts for articles in archaeology, art, classics, film, folklore, arts, philosophy, religion, world history, and world literature.

  • Project Muse: Full-text articles from scholarly journals published by university presses in the arts, humanities, sciences, and social sciences.

  • ProQuest Direct : Full-text articles and abstracts from scholarly journals, newspapers and dissertations. 

SELECTED WEB SITES AND GUIDES TO PRIMARY SOURCES

Finding Your Senior Thesis Topic: A guide for students who are just beginning the senior thesis process.

Last Modified 3/31/09
Lois Coleman
Reference Librarian

 
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