Religion: 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

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