Students often think about dusty archives and special collections when thinking about primary sources when, in fact, primary sources are available in all types of collections and formats. Widespread digitization efforts have made access to primary sources easier in more than one way: Not only are many primary sources accessible anytime and anywhere on the world-wide web or through the Library’s online collections, but their content can now be reviewed much faster than ever before through simple keyword searches. Where in the past a scholar had to spend many hours reading through page after page of a single source, the student today can quickly find keywords of interest in the text of multiple sources with comparatively little effort.
Falvey has a wide variety of primary sources in its digital collections, such as the complete archives of the New York Times, all 96,000 titles printed in England between 1473 and 1700 through Early English Books Online, 150,000 book titles published in the eighteenth century through Eighteenth Century Collections Online, both series of Early American Imprints and American Periodicals Series Online to name but a few of the more outstanding collections. Many other primary sources remain accessible only via microfilm or microfiche as well as “hidden away” in print volumes spread throughout Falvey’s sizable collection.
In short, primary sources can be anywhere and this is what makes it so confusing for our students. The Library has set up an online primary source research guide to help students with their research. The guide covers definitions and types of primary sources with numerous examples of Library of Congress subjects for primary sources. Hyperlinks take the student into the Library’s catalog and online collections. It concludes with some useful tips on how to evaluate primary sources. Students can also set up a research appointment via an online form.
Never has research based on primary sources been more accessible than today, but even today a visit to an archive is sometimes still the only means of obtaining rare and hard to find sources. The online Primary Sources Research Guide can be found via the Library’s Course & Topics Guides site as well as via the Primary Sources tab on the History Subject Guide.
Please feel free to contact me with any questions or comments that you may have.
It’s that time of the year again: The fall semester is right around the corner and everybody is scrambling to finish his or her syllabus. Please contact me as early as possible if you plan to bring your class to the Library for a research workshop, even if it will be much later in the semester. The Library’s classroom tends to get booked quickly. I find that research workshops are most beneficial when they are scheduled after students have picked their paper topics.
There may be no room in your syllabus for a library workshop, but you feel that your students could definitely use some extra help. A research course guide is a practical alternative. Please take a look at some of the online course guides from previous semesters: art history, criminal justice, history, and sociology. In the past I have often done both, research workshops and online course guides in lieu of handouts.
Last but not least, remember to order books and videos early, so that they will be available in the Library when you or your students need them.
Here is my contact information:
E-mail: jutta.seibert@villanova.edu
Phone: 610-519-7876
Office: 1st floor, Falvey Library
Falvey is delighted with its acquisition of 19th Century UK Periodicals.
Series 1 of this collection, entitled New Readerships, consists of women’s and children’s periodicals, as well as humor and leisure/sport magazines and chronicles the rise of modern magazine culture. Featured are women’s magazines, such as Hearth and Home and the Women’s Penny Paper, satirical titles such as Punch and Fun, magazines aimed at the young, such as Boy’s Own Paper, as well as a number of sports and leisure magazines.
Series 2 of 19th Century UK Periodicals, entitled Empire, includes the complete run of over 90 magazines. Topics range from the abolition of the slave trade within the British Empire in 1807 to the first Opium Wars (1839-42) and the “scramble for Africa” in the 1880s and 1890s.
Records to all magazines in the collection will be added to the Library’s online catalog. Each record will have a link to individual titles. Links to the digital collection itself appear on the Databases A-Z list (under N), as well as on the primary sources tab of the history subject guide.
Comments? Please let us know what you think.
Falvey now offers the university community online access to the Chronicle of Higher Education, “the No. 1 source of news, information, and jobs for college and university faculty members and administrators.” Widely valued for the timeliness and credibility of its news coverage, the Chronicle has won numerous awards for its coverage of political issues with impact on higher education. Popular features include the careers section with its job listings, annual salary surveys, and the scholarly productivity index, ranking 375 Ph.D. granting institutions. In addition, the online Chronicle offers exclusive daily news articles, podcasts and access to its digital archive dating back to 1995.
Because the site license includes off-campus access through LDAP (Villanova email ID and password) authentication, readers who already have a personal or departmental subscription may consider canceling it now. Those who still enjoy holding the print version of the Chronicle in their hands will find it on the periodical shelves on the first floor of the Library.
For quick, convenient access to the online Chronicle, bookmark the link found in the Library’s catalog. Better yet, create an RSS feed to bring the Chronicle’s features to your browser automatically. For information on how to set up RSS feeds and download a free feed reader, check the Chronicle’s web site.
Comments? Please let us know what you think.
You can now use the Falvey online catalog to search for contents of
For instance, searches for eebo AND bible or eebo AND london AND maps in the online catalog will retrieve a large number of titles from the EEBO collection. Results can then be further refined by author, topic or genre. Each record contains a direct link to the full text of the work.
In addition, the EEBO search interface now makes it possible to search EEBO and ECCO simultaneously. At the top of the search screen, simply check off the box “Include records from ECCO in your search.” The ECCO titles will be identified with a green logo and include direct links to the documents. The ECCO search interface also offers convenient, reciprocal access to EEBO records.
For comprehensive full text searching of these documents, use the EEBO text creation partnership, which will eventually include 25,000 titles.
