wiser : information sources for african studies friday 12th june 2009 sarah rhodes and lucy mccann
TRANSCRIPT
WISER : Information Sources for
African Studies
Friday 12th June 2009
Sarah Rhodes and Lucy McCann
Structure of today’s session
How to find relevant Africa resources in Oxford: Identify the key tools to access resources: SOLO,
OxLIP+ and e-journals Explain what you would use each for and how best
to search them
Ways to find free Africa web resources outside Oxford
Other key sites useful for research eg Archives and primary sources
Key Starting points for African resources in Oxford
African Studies subject page
www.ouls.ox.ac.uk/libraries/subjects/african Key information on one page Contact information Collection policy for African Studies Collection overviews: principal and associated Links to key websites
African collections in Oxford: Reference
Main research collections and archives are housed at BLCAS at Rhodes House
www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/dept/rhodes Specialises in history and current affairs
(political, economic and social) of sub-Saharan Africa and the Commonwealth
Houses books, journals, theses, government publications, newspapers
Circa 4,000 manuscript and archive collections Reference only
African collections in Oxford: Teaching
The core teaching collections are held at Social Science Library and History Faculty Library – these can be borrowed by University members.
Other collections of interest include the Law Library, English Faculty Library and Radcliffe Science Library
Information for all OULS libraries can be accessed through the homepage
www.ouls.ox.ac.uk/libraries/libraries
Use different sources for different types of information
Books: SOLO; COPAC Known journal titles: SOLO, Oxford e-journals Articles/reports/conferences: OxLIP+ subject
databases and resources: see the listing for African studies
Useful websites: African studies page; BLCAS webpage; Intute web gateway
SOLO: Search Oxford Libraries Online
http://solo.ouls.ox.ac.uk/ Searches OLIS, Oxford University Research
Archive (ORA), Oxford University e-journals Used to find books, theses and journal titles Also searches for databases by title (eg Social
Science Citation Index) ‘Articles and databases sampler’ allows
searching within some databases by subject
Articles and databases sampler The sampler will give you a sample of results;
you can then search the individual databases for more comprehensive coverage
The quickset of databases for cross searching for African studies comprises: Worldwide Political Science Abstracts PAIS International; ASSIA; SCOPUS; Historical Abstracts
(Please note for a full listing of databases you will need to use OxLIP+)
OxLIP+: Oxford Libraries Information Platform
http://oxlip-plus.ouls.ox.ac.uk/ Gateway to subject databases and e-resources
subscribed to by the University of Oxford Facilitates connection to databases from on and
off campus Allows you to find useful databases for your
subject area
Key OxLIP+ features
Linked A-Z of databases (full-text, abstracts / indexes, websites)
Search for databases by keyword Browse by title / subject / type of resource Cross search a range of databases (see sub-set
above) Access individual databases for more in-depth
searching
African Studies on OxLIP+
17 databases have been listed for African Studies
Click on subject tab and scroll down to African Studies, click on GO for full listing
Includes access to Aluka, FRANCIS, Empire On-Line (Colonial history), ELDIS etc
Information is available on each database to guide users.
Keyword & subject searching tips:
Keyword searching Searches for terms anywhere in the field or record Useful as a starting place but results can be less
relevant Subject indexes
Where possible tap into the subject headings or thesauri provided by the databases
Citation searching (available in SCOPUS, Web of Science and Google Scholar)
Oxford e-journals:
http://sfx7.exlibrisgroup.com/oxford/az Also linked through the SOLO home-page Journals are listed A-Z ‘by Title’, ‘by Subject’,
and ‘by Citation’ No subset for African related e-journals but, for
example, a search by title for Africa retrieves 183 titles
Clicking on individual titles will allow searching by Year, Volume, Issue, Start Page
Full-text articles will be retrieved only for e-journals to which Oxford University subscribes
Africa Web resources outside Oxford
Wealth of information freely available on the web Key gateways to this can be found through
portals which organise web information in a more user friendly way.
Key access points include: Intute British Library Nordic Afrika Institut Columbia University Libraries SOAS
Intute: Arts and Humanities – African Studies
http://www.intute.ac.uk/artsandhumanities/african/ ‘Web resources for the study of the African
languages, literature written in those languages, or the history and culture of Africa. Each resource has been evaluated and categorised by subject specialists based in UK universities’.
Within African Studies search by heading: general resources; time period; or resource type
Resource type includes sub-divisions such as Archives; Digital repositories; Academic libraries etc
British Library: African Collections
http://www.bl.uk/reshelp/bldept/apac/africancoll/index.html ‘Rich resource for the study of Africa. Relevant
material can be found throughout the collections, in the form of printed books and serials, newspapers, MSS, archives, sound recordings, music, prints, drawings, photographs and stamps’
Africa pages deal mainly with sub-Saharan Africa. Links to bibliographies; e-resources; e-journals
British Library: Africa WWW links
Internet links via the BL Asian and African Studies: world wide web links
http://www.bl.uk/reshelp/bldept/apac/worldwideweblinks/wwwlinks.html
This is an invaluable access point to African resources, covering:
Portals Bibliographies Current Affairs Official publications Archives Visual material African languages African studies and library networks
Nordic Afrika Institut
The NAI based in Uppsala, Sweden Hosts a Guide to Africa on the Internet http://www.nai.uu.se/library/resources/guidetoafrica Sorts links by country or region; by subject; and
other guides and directories
Columbia University Libraries: African Studies African Studies Internet Resources:
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/indiv/africa/cuvl/
This lists electronic resources from Africa organized by region and country. All materials are arranged to encourage an awareness of authorship, type of information, and subject. The scope of the collection is research-oriented, but also provides access to other web sites with different or broader missions. Beginning in early 1999, the site became the "official" African Studies web site for the Web.
This gateway is extremely comprehensive and lists sources by region/country; organisation; and topic.
School of Oriental and African Studies: (SOAS) The SOAS African collection is extensive and covers the
whole continent with the exception of Egypt. Main strengths include vernacular languages; anthropology and ethnic minorities; religion; economics; development issues; politics and government; law; film; the press and media studies.
The subject guide url for Africa is listed below: http://www.soas.ac.uk/library/subjects/africa This provides links to key organisations including:
African Studies Association of the UK (ASAUK) Standing Conference on Library materials on Africa
(SCOLMA) Royal African Society
Accessing archive materials
The main tools for accessing primary source materials and archives for Africa in and outside Oxford include: Online catalogues of Western MSS Archives Hub National Register of Archives A2A (Access to Archives) Mundus Gateway Anti-Slavery International CAMP
Online catalogues for Western MSS
http://www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/dept/scwmss/wmss/online/online.htm
Includes collections at Rhodes House and in the central Bodleian
Some full catalogues and some collection level descriptions
‘Search Electronic Catalogues’ is a facility to search across the catalogues
Archives Hub
http://www.archiveshub.ac.uk/ Provides descriptions of archives in over 150 UK
universities and colleges Circa 700 archives held at BLCAS are listed
National Register of Archives
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/nra/default.asp Provided by the UK National Archives: Historical
Manuscripts Commission, the NRA consists of indexes to the records of persons, families and corporate bodies mainly held in Britain. It is an essential tool for locating manuscripts and archives in the UK
Search by corporate, personal, family or place name
A2A: Access to Archives
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/a2a/ Online catalogue for archives held locally in
England and Wales
Mundus Gateway
http://www.mundus.ac.uk/ The Mundus Gateway is a web-based guide to more
than four hundred collections of overseas missionary materials held in the United Kingdom.
These materials, comprising the archives of British missionary societies, collections of personal papers, printed matter, photographs, other visual materials and artefacts, are held in a large number of libraries, record offices and other institutions in England, Northern
Ireland, Scotland and Wales.
Anti-Slavery International
http://www.antislavery.org/homepage/resources/library.htm
Houses a library of contemporary and historical material relating to slavery world wide and its related subjects
Co-operative Africana Microform Project: CAMP http://www.crl.edu/areastudies/CAMP/index.htm CAMP is based at the Center for Research Libraries,
University of Chicago CAMP promotes the preservation through microfilming of
publications and archives on and from Africa. It then makes these available on request to students and
researchers at member libraries, of which BLCAS is one. Materials so acquired and conserved include mainly
historic newspapers and journals; government publications; personal and corporate archives; personal papers of scholars, government leaders and journalists; writings in European and African languages.
Contact Rhodes House Library to borrow CAMP material.
Contact details:
Contact e-resources helpdesk [email protected]
Ask in your Libraryhttp://www.ouls.ox.ac.uk/libraries
Contact the African Studies Subject [email protected]
Contact the African Studies Archivist
We value your feedback
We will be sending an email feedback survey
Any Questions?