OC Catalog




OC Site Links

OC Library: Library Instruction for History

Introduction to Historical Research

Finding Books Finding Internet Resources
Other Sources of Information Interlibrary Loan
Finding Articles Evaluating Sources



Finding Books

OC Library Catalog (books in the OC Library)

  1. Go to library's Web site (www.oc.edu/library)
  2. Select: OC Catalog

NetLibrary (electronic books available online)
  1. Go to the library's Web site (www.oc.edu/library)
  2. Select: NetLibrary
WorldCat (books in libraries around the world)
  1. Go to the library's Web site (www.oc.edu/library)
  2. Select: WorldCat

NOTE: If you find a book in WorldCat that is not in the OC Library, you can request it on interlibrary loan by clicking on the "ILL" button.

Other Library Catalogs (through the OK-Share program, OC students and faculty can check out books from over 40 libraries in Oklahoma)
  1. Go to the library's Web site (www.oc.edu/library)
  2. Select: Other Library Catalogs
  3. Select the desired library



Other Sources of Information in the Library

Specialized Dictionaries (Contain an alphabetical listing of terms; sometimes the entries are fairly extensive. Provide an introduction to a subject.) - All books listed in this section are in the Reference area of the library.

  1. Biographical Dictionary of Scientists (Ref Q141 B528 1994)
  2. Dictionary of the Middle Ages (Ref D 114 D5 1982)
  3. Dictionary of National Biography (British) (Ref DA 28 D4)
  4. New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians (Ref ML 100 N48)
Specialized Encyclopedias (Contain alphabetically arranged articles on specific subjects.) - All books listed in this section are in the Reference area of the library.
  1. Encyclopedia of World Art (Ref N31 E533)
  2. New Catholic Encyclopedia (Ref BX 841 N44)
  3. Oxford Encyclopedia of the Reformation (Ref BR 302.8 O93 1996)
Other Sources - All books listed in this section are in the Reference area of the library.
  1. AHA Guide to Historical Literature (Ref D 20 A1 A5x)
  2. Annals of America (Ref E 173 A793)
  3. Classical and Medieval Literature Criticism (Ref PN 681.5 C57)
  4. Harvard Guide to American History (Ref E 173A F7x)
  5. Historical Statistics of the United States: Colonial Times to 1957 (Ref HA 202 A385)
  6. Literature Criticism from 1400 to 1800 (Ref PN 86 L53)
  7. Southern Historical Society Papers (Ref E 483.7 S76)
Library of American Civilization

The LAC is a collection of materials (published in microfiche) relating to all aspects of American life and literature from the beginning to the outbreak of World War I. Included are pamphlets, periodicals, documents, and many rare books not generally available. Each item is listed in the library's online catalog. The call number begins with LAC and the microfiche is located on the 3rd floor of the library.

Oklahoma Archive of Contemporary History

The archive includes 3.4 million clippings from The Daily Oklahoman dating from 1893 to 1982. The clippings are accessible by subject but not by date. Access to this collection is limited to those accompanied by a librarian.




Finding Articles

Online Databases

  • To access all databases containing articles:
    1. Go to the library's Web site (www.oc.edu/library)
    2. Select: Find Articles
    3. Select: Subject area OR database title (e.g., History or Academic Search)

  • Databases are categorized by type (full text, general, etc.) and subject (History, Religion, etc.)


  • Databases that contain materials related to History:


    1. America: History and Life (under History)

      2. Citations to articles about the history of the United States and Canada from prehistory to the present.

    2. Historical Abstracts (under History)

      3. Citations to articles about the history of the world from 1450 to the present (excluding the United States and Canada).

    3. International Medieval Bibliography (under History)

      4. Citations to articles about the history of the world during medieval times.

    4. Academic Search

      5. Online database that covers all disciplines including History. Entries are full text, abstracts, or citations.

    5. ArticleFirst

      6. Online database that covers all disciplines including History. Entries are citations.

    6. ATLA Religion (under Religion)

      Indexes articles from scholarly journals in the religious field worldwide, essays in books, and book reviews. Some of the entries are full text, but many are just citations.

    7. CQ Researcher (under History)

      Provides full text articles about health, social trends, criminal justice, international affairs, education, the environment, technology, and the economy back to 1923.

    8. PsycInfo (under Psychology)

      9. Citations to articles in the field of psychology. Contains articles published from 1887 on.

    9. SIRS Government Reporter (under SIRS)

      10. Government publications.

 


  • Searching Tips

    1. Boolean operators

      • AND - will retrieve articles that have both terms. Example: If you search on "cat AND dog," you'll get articles about both cats and dogs.

      • OR - will retrieve articles that have either term. (Be sure to put parentheses around words connected by OR.) Example: If you search on "cat OR dog," you'll get articles about cats, about dogs, and about cats and dogs.

      • Think in these terms:

        Person OR synonym

        AND

        Place OR Synonym

        AND

        Time OR Synonym

    2. Truncation

      • Truncation allows you to search for different versions of the same word. Basically, you substitute an asterisk (*) for one or more letters. This is a quick and easy way to include plurals, tense variations and alternate spellings. Example: "religio*" will find religious, religion, religions, etc.

      • Be careful when using truncation; "cat*" will find cat, cats, catastrophe, catalog, catapult, etc.

    3. Scope of databases

      • What are the date limitations? Example: PsycInfo includes journal articles back to 1887.

      • What are the subject limitations? Example: America: History and Life covers the history of Canada and the United States.

    4. Limiters

      • Using dates to limit your search - do you want only the most recent material?

      • Using journals to limit your search - do you want to restrict your search to certain journals?

      • Using language to limit your search - do you want to restrict your search to articles in English?


  • How to get full text articles
    1. Email
    2. printing

 

Print Indexes

  1. Biography Index, 1946- (1st floor index table)

    A guide to biographical material appearing in periodicals and current books that includes obituaries, collections of letters, diaries, etc.

  2. Essay and General Literature Index, 1900- (3rd floor index table)

    An author and subject index to collections of essays, with particular emphasis on materials in the humanities and social sciences.

  3. Humanities Index (3rd floor index table)

    An author and subject index to English language periodicals in the humanities.

  4. International Index to Periodicals, 1907- (Index archives on 3rd floor)

    An author and subject index to selected general periodicals not included in the Readers' Guide to Periodical Literature.

  5. New York Times Index (Index archives on 3rd floor)

    Indexes articles in the New York Times newspaper (Sept. 1851-1879, 1948-present). We have the New York Times Newspaper on microfilm from 1851-1877, 1953-present.

  6. Poole's Index (On microfiche with the Library of American Civilization

    A forerunner of the Readers' Guide to Periodical Literature.

  7. Reader's Guide to Periodical Literature, 1890- (Index archives on 3rd floor)

    Indexes magazine articles.



CD-ROM Databases

  • CD-ROMs that contain materials related to History:

    1. America: The Road to Independence (Primary documents from the revolutionary period)

    2. The Civil War CD-ROM (Official records of the Union and Confederate armies)

    3. On Common Ground (World religions in the United States)

    4. The Performing Arts in Colonial American Newspapers 1690-1783

    5. Southern Historical Society Papers (Complete set of the papers of the Southern Historical Society)

    6. The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade (Shipping records for the slave trade)

    7. War in Vietnam (multimedia chronicle from CBS News and the New York Times)


  • To access CD-ROM databases:

    1. Check out the CD from the front desk.

    2. Put the CD in the CD-ROM drive in the computer lab in the library.

    3. Select: Start

    4. Select: Programs

    5. Select: CD-ROMs

    6. Select: Database of choice

Finding the Article in the Library

  • After finding a citation to an article, use the E-Journals List (available on the library's Web site) to see if the journal is available online. If not, search the OC Catalog to determine:
    1. Is the journal in the OC Library? (If not, consider requesting it through interlibrary loan; articles requested through interlibrary loan usually arrive within two weeks.)
    2. Is the journal on paper, fiche, or film?
    3. Does the OC Library have the year you need?



Finding Web Sites

  • Consult the appropriate subject listing (Chemistry, Psychology, History, etc.) listed in the Find Web Sites section of the Library's Web site.


  • Do a search in WorldCat that is limited to "Internet Resources"


  • Use the following sites to search for scholarly information on the Web
    1. Infomine
    2. Google Scholar
    3. Directory of Open Access Journals (a list of free online scientific & scholarly journals)

  • Search the Web for sites that provide information on your topic, but remember that many Web sites are not reliable and may provide false or misleading information. Some good search engines are:
    1. Google (a search engine that emphasizes academic sites)
    2. Altavista
    3. Alltheweb
    4. Yahoo!

  • More search engines are listed on the Library's Web site - click on Find Web Sites, then on Internet Search Services and Tools.

 

Interlibrary Loan (ILL)

  • Interlibrary loan is a service provided to current OC students, faculty and staff to obtain materials NOT held in the OC Library within copyright limitations.

  • Interlibrary loan requests can be made in three ways:
    1. By filling out the online form on the library's Web page
    2. By filling out the paper forms available at the front desk
    3. By clicking on the ILL button available in many of the research databases

  • To fill out the online form:
    1. Go to library's Web site (www.oc.edu/library)
    2. Select: Interlibrary loan (under Request It Online)
    3. Type in the information about the book or article you'd like to request
    4. Press the Send button.

  • When the material arrives, you will be notified by email that the item is available at the front desk.



Evaluating Sources of Information

Purpose
  1. What is the purpose? Is it to inform, persuade, present opinions, report research, or sell a product?

  2. Can you tell what the purpose is? (The purpose should be clear from the title or introductory screens.)

  3. Does the source fulfill the purpose?

  4. Is it popular, scholarly, or trade?

    • If it's a popular source (like a magazine), it may:

      1. be unsigned
      2. be written by someone outside the field
      3. have no references
      4. be written for the general public
      5. contain advertisements

    • If it's a scholarly source (like a scholarly journal), it may:

      1. be signed
      2. be written by an expert
      3. provide the author's position and institution
      4. provide references
      5. be written for a small group of people with specific interests
      6. use specialized language
      7. be published by an association or scholarly press

    • If it's a trade publication, it may:

      1. be targeted to a specific field
      2. contain articles written by staff writers or experts in the field
      3. have a colorful format similar to popular magazines
      4. provide references
      5. contain numerous advertisements that appeal to people in that field
      6. include limited footnotes or references to other works

  5. Are any biases evident?

Authority
  • For all sources:

    1. What are the author's qualifications? (Many Internet sources do not give the identity or credentials of the author or producer. Sources that do not give this information have questionable reliability.)

    2. Can you contact the author?

    3. Can the information be verified elsewhere?

  • For Web sites:

    1. Is the site maintained by a well-known association or governmental agency?

    2. What is the domain? (Many Internet sources are not reviewed before being posted; however, government, educational, and organizational sites often have some sort of review process. If no review process is stated or evident, you may assume there is none.)

      • .GOV = government
      • .COM = business
      • .ORG = organization
      • .EDU = educational affiliation

    3. How permanent does the site appear? Has it existed long?

    4. How many other sites reference this site?


Timeliness
    1. When was the information published?

    2. How current is the information?

    3. Is the date of publication important to the subject matter? (In fields such as medicine, science, business, and technology, currency of information is important. In fields such as history and literature, older materials may be just as valuable as newer ones.)

Scope
    1. What is the breadth of coverage?

    2. Does the page provide more or less information than you need?

Documentation
    1. Does the author refer to other works?

    2. Does the source have a bibliography?

Audience
    1. Who is the source meant for? A layperson or a specialist in the field?

    2. Does it answer your question?

Format
    1. Does the source have a clear, easy to read format?

    2. How easy is the source to use?

    3. Are there any special features, such as a bibliography, tables or charts?



Above all, "...trust no one." (William A. Katz)

If you don't believe us, take a look at the Web site Feline Reactions to Bearded Men. Or you can go to Urban Legends and Folklore, which lists a number of online hoaxes.





Please send comments or suggestions to library@oc.edu