New Electronic Resources: January 2006 Archives

Oxford Reference Online Premium Collection provides the Temple community with access to a first-class collection of reference sources. Reference sources--such as specialized dictionaries and encyclopedias-- ideally serve as repositories for the most accepted facts and opinions about a topic, and also serve through references as springboards to further research. The best sources are written by experts and are very carefully edited. This is exactly what we get from the Oxford University Press, the publishers of the sources and this service.

The range of the collection is impressive. It contains over 100 dictionary, language reference, and subject reference works published by Oxford University Press. (See a list) It is a fully-indexed, cross-searchable database of these books, giving Temple unprecedented access to a comprehensive information resource.

The Collection contains titles from the Oxford Companions Series that provide coverage of specialized areas, for instance: The Oxford Companion to Classical Civilization , The Oxford Companion to the Body, or The Oxford Companion to English Literature. The Collection also has a growing collection of Maps and Illustrations and subject Timelines beginning in the Twentieth Century, which links to entries and articles in the sources. All entries and articles include details about how to cite them.

Temple Libraries have long been buyers of almost all of these highly-regarded sources in print. Bringing them together online in a cross-searchable platform extends not only the physical range of the sources to anywhere a Temple person might have access to a computer--but also extends the range of the sources in print and online by suggesting, in response to searches on keywords, areas and titles one might not think of looking in.

Rick Lezenby
Paley Library Reference Librarian

The library has recently subscribed to the Biblical Archaeology Society (BAS) Archive.

This resource is aimed primarily at undergraduate students but also relevant for interested faculty and graduate students. It consists of the contents of the three popular magazines from the Biblical Archaeology Society (Biblical Archaeology Review; Bible Review; and Archaeology Odyssey), five online books (Ancient Israel; Aspects of Monotheism; Feminist Approaches to the Bible; The Rise of Ancient Israel; and The Search for Jesus), and over 10,000 downloadable images that can be freely used in slideshows and powerpoint presentations. Archaeology Odyssey, covering classical archaeology, is the only publication in this collection that does not address biblical themes. Currently, the coverage goes from the start of each magazine through December 2003. Subscription year 2004 will be added within a few months. The founder and editor-in-chief of the Biblical Archaeology Society, Hershel Shanks, is widely credited with bringing the biblical world to a popular audience. The magazines feature many scholars and authorities in their respective fields. This is a good place to go for overviews of current biblical and classical archaeological issues and discoveries and for articles on the ancient Near East and Mediterranean worlds. Check it out today.

--Fred Rowland

All Elsevier, Blackwell, Cambridge journals now available online!

Temple University Libraries is pleased to announce online access to virtually the entire journal collections of three major publishers: Elsevier, Blackwell Publishing, and Cambridge University Press. In collaboration with the Health Sciences Libraries, the Temple Libraries have licensed access to more than 1500 new titles. These new collections are especially strong in the sciences, technology, and medicine; offer substantive collections in the social sciences; and include a number of important titles in the humanities. A total of 750 Blackwell Publishing journals are now available via the Blackwell-Synergy platform, and 200 Cambridge University Press titles are available via Cambridge Journals Online. Temple has also entered into agreement to provide 1500 Elsevier online journals, almost the entire Elsevier ScienceDirect collection, on a trial basis until the end of 2007.

ScienceDirect

Temple University has reached an agreement with Elsevier to provide access to nearly all of the ScienceDirect journal titles--with the exception of certain society publications--on a trial basis until the end of 2007. ScienceDirect journal content focuses on the scientific, technical, and medical fields but includes a significant number of titles in the social sciences as well. We previously enjoyed access to about 550 titles on ScienceDirect. Approximately 950 additional titles will now be available to Temple University researchers. Coverage extends back to 1995. See a list of titles here. Titles showing a green icon have online content available to Temple. We will evaluate the titles over the next two years to decide on permanent subscriptions after 2007.

Blackwell-Synergy

Temple University now has online access to all journals published by Blackwell Publishing (with a few exceptions) via the Blackwell-Synergy platform. Blackwell's journal collection includes scientific, technical, medical, social sciences, and humanities titles. A total of approximately 750 titles, with access extending back to 1997, are now online. Prior to this, Temple had subscriptions to approximately 260 Blackwell titles, not all of which were online. See a list of available titles.

Cambridge Journals Online

Temple University now has access to all online journals from Cambridge University Press via Cambridge Journals Online. Cambridge journals are in the sciences, social sciences, and humanities. See a list of titles here. There are a total of about 200 journal titles, only 80 to which we previously had access. New titles generally extend back to 2003. For titles to which we previously subscribed our access may extend back farther.

To access these important new resources, use Journal Finder to locate individual titles, or select the resource: ScienceDirect, Blackwell-Synergy, or Cambridge Journals Online from our list of full-text databases on the Library website.

Please feel free to contact me or Ask A Librarian about questions or for assistance with these resources.

Gretchen Sneff
Head, Engineering & Science Libraries

African-American Newspapers: The 19th Century is an important, primary resource for the study of U.S. history.

Containing over 100,000 articles from seven newspapers including The North Star (Rochester, NY), The National Era (Washington, D.C.), and Freedom's Journal (New York, NY), African-American Newspapers: The 19th Century provides an extraordinary window into the events and issues that affected the course of American history. When used in conjunction with our 20th Century African-American newspaper holdings on microfilm -- e.g. Pittsburgh Courier, New York Amsterdam News, Philadelphia Tribune -- Temple students and scholars can now study first-hand the entire sweep of American print media published by people of color for people of color. African-American Newspapers supports the study of social, political, and military history, African-American studies, literature, and a number of other humanities and social sciences disciplines. It does not provide analysis of the primary documents it contains. Instead, students should turn to the secondary literature, scholarly books and journal articles, to help contextualize the articles found in African-American Newspapers. Part IX of this database, acquired recently by the Libraries, brings full-text coverage of The Christian Recorder up to 1887.

--David C. Murray

More new electronic resources for the New Year:

• Biblical Archaeology Society Archive: The BAS Archive contains the editorial content of each issue of the bimonthly magazines Biblical Archaeology Review (1975-2003), Bible Review (1985-2003) and Archaeology Odyssey (1998-2003), as well as five books published by the Biblical Archaeology Society.
• World Development Indicators: Provides direct access to more than 600 development indicators (full list of indicators), with time series for 208 countries and 18 country groups from 1960 onward.
• Oxford Digital Reference Shelf : 10 more e-books have been added to this collection. They are individually searchable or accessible through our new Oxford Reference Online service.
  
  
  
  • Encyclopedia of Evolution
  • Encyclopedia of Global Change
  • Encyclopedia of the Enlightenment
  • Encyclopedia of the Middle Ages
  • Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium
  • Oxford Dictionary of the Renaissance
  • Oxford Encyclopedia of American Literature
  • Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt
  • Oxford Encyclopedia of Economic History
  • Oxford Encyclopedia of the Reformation
  
  
  
  
• Smithsonian Global Sound: Includes the published recordings owned by the non-profit Smithsonian Folkways Recordings label and the archival audio collections of Folkways Records, Cook, Dyer-Bennet, Fast Folk, Monitor, Paredon and other labels. It also includes music recorded around the African continent by Dr. Hugh Tracey for the International Library of African Music (ILAM) at Rhodes University as well as material collected by recordists on the South Asian subcontinent from the Archive Research Centre for Ethnomusicology (ARCE), sponsored by the American Institute for Indian Studies.

  Recordings can be streamed (requires Macromedia Flash Player and Windows Media Player [PC] or Macromedia Flash Player [Mac]) at either 22kbps (default) or 64kbps. Users can create their own playlists after free registration.

• Encyclopedia of African American Society: This two-volume reference work details the ways in which the tenets and foundations of African American culture have given rise to today’s society. Approaching the field from a “street level” perspective, these two volumes cover topics such as rap music, sports, television, cinema, racism, religion, and literature, among others.
• Worldmark Encyclopedia of Religious Practices: Worldmark Encyclopedia of Religious Practices presents detailed information on current religious practices around the world, with an emphasis on how religion impacts the daily lives of its followers. Entries cover everything from central doctrines and sacred texts to dietary customs and significant holidays. The three-volume set explores 13 major religions, plus 24 sects, and spans Asia and Oceania, Europe, the Americas, Africa, and the Middle East. Also includes 300 illustrations, belief tables showing how individual religions are unique and what they share with other religions, a glossary, maps, a cumulative index, and much more.

All these items are listed and linked on our new New Electronic Resources page.