History & Political Science

If I had to make a list of the five most important library research tools for historians, I would put WorldCat at the top of the list without a moment’s hesitation. While in the past, scholars were limited to local libraries, print bibliographies and the occasional visit to other libraries, today WorldCat provides them a gateway to the global print collection. WorldCat thus levels the playing field between the top-tiers research libraries and smaller libraries, such as Falvey Memorial Library. Our history students can discover and request basically all the published books on any given topic with the help of WorldCat. If they would only knew about WorldCat!

Remember the student who told you that there is nothing published about her topic? Did she know about and search WorldCat? Remember the student who told you that the library does not have any books about his topic? Did he know about interlibrary loan and how to request books from other libraries via WorldCat? The majority of history students are unfortunately not familiar with WorldCat, and the few who do know about it are often intimidated by some of its unnecessarily complicated search features.

Falvey’s 2012 Research Center Intern, Matt Ainslie, has put together a Brief Introduction to WorldCat, a short online video tutorial that will introduce your students to WorldCat. His Brief Introduction to the Chicago Manual of Style has been widely popular with our students. At last glance, it was viewed more than 1,200 times. Given the unexpected popularity of the Chicago Style tutorial, I would like to hear your ideas and suggestions for additional tutorials.

Try Declassified Documents Reference System (DDRS) (available until Sept. 28)

Background

In 1998, the systematic digitization and online publication of Declassified Documents Reference System (DDRS) was initiated by Gale Cengage Learning.  The process involves indexing, abstracting, and capturing on microfiche a large selection of U.S. government documents obtained from presidential libraries. These libraries receive declassified documents from various government agencies, including the White House, the CIA, the FBI, the State Department, and others. As researchers visit these presidential libraries and request documents, the libraries photocopy and provide for filming. The result is a collection of more than 75,000 documents, consisting of more than 465,000 pages, that has literally been built by researchers themselves for nearly two decades.

Searching

DDRS supports basic and advanced searching.  Basic search includes keyword and full-text searching.  Advanced discovery provides for searching by keyword/subject, title/abstract, source institution, and full-text, including the use of Boolean logic. Searches can be limited to a range of issue dates, a range of declassified dates, document type (such as bill, agenda, cable, airgram), source institution (such as agency, department, Supreme Court, Warren Commission), sanitized or unsanitized, completeness, number of pages.

Search history can be accessed during a search session. An InfoMark at the top of any page indicates that the URL of the page is persistent and can be bookmarked or copied for future reference.  Help links and search tips are also available.

Document facsimiles can be viewed as electronic text.  Document facsimiles can be scaled for ease of viewing, by choosing a size percentage. Facsimile documents can be viewed or printed as a PDF version but due to some excessive sizes cannot be emailed. Electronic texts of the documents can be emailed and printed.

Questions or comments? Contact me directly (merrill.stein@villanova.edu) or post your comments online.

2010 saw the publication of two important new reference works on American political history: The Encyclopedia of U.S. Political History, published in seven volumes by CQ Press, and the Princeton Encyclopedia of American Political History, published in two volumes by Princeton University Press. Both encyclopedias are available online through the library’s catalog.

The Encyclopedia of U.S. Political History is organized in chronological order from the colonial period to the present. The chronological organization belies the print origin of this reference work and results in multiple entries for different time periods on topics such as woman suffrage and civil rights. However, a reader interested in the early republic may choose to browse the e-Table of Contents of the second volume only.

A Reader’s Guide brings together entries on broad topics such as Elections & Electoral Politics, Wars & Foreign Policy, and Domestic Policy & Policy Issues to give some examples. Entries are between three and six pages long and can be downloaded as PDF files. Each entry includes a persistent URL for easy sharing with colleagues and students. Other options include citation tools, export links to RefWorks and EndNote, as well as email, print and download icons. Cross references are highlighted as Related Entries. Each entry includes a bibliography and suggestions for further reading. In some instances the bibliographies include web links. One such link took me to A New Nation Votes, a digital collection of election returns from 1787 to 1825, a collaborative project of the American Antiquarian Society and Tufts University. Illustrations such as photos, maps, graphs, and cartoons are part of some entries.

Explore the variety of topics covered in the Encyclopedia. Here are some sample entries to whet your appetite: public opinion polling, third parties, conservation policy, reconstruction, Election of 1928, suffrage.

Although much smaller in size, the Princeton Encyclopedia of American Political History edited by Michael Kazin holds its own next to the Encyclopedia of U.S. Political History. Its entries tend to be broader in scope and are in some cases split up to cover different time periods. The entries on Women & Politics are divided into five time periods: up to 1828, 1828-1865, 1865-1920, 1920-1970, and 1970 to the present. Available through the Gale Virtual Reference Library, the Princeton Encyclopedia has the same features as the Encyclopedia of U.S. Political History. I invite you to take a closer look at the selected sample entries below: cartooning, Catholics & politics, environmental issues & politics, television & politics.

Other reference titles at Falvey, both online and in print, include The Encyclopedia of American Parties, Campaigns, and Elections, The Encyclopedia of American Foreign Policy, The Encyclopedia of U.S. Campaigns, Elections, and Electoral Behavior, and many more.  Feel free to contact me with any questions or comments that you may have.