Welcome to the History Guide. This guide contains information to help you with any of your Literature Classes, no matter the subject. If you have questions, please email us at library@rosemont.edu.
Some example searches through the Kistler Library catalog. Note: "Books" comprises physical and digital books here.
a) Searching "kw:("women's history")" with the limit of Books = 327 results.
b) Searching "ti:(military history)" with the limit of Publication within the Last 5 years = 917 results.
c) Searching "au="Grafton, Anthony"" = 242 results.
d) Searching "historical maps" with the Limit of Maps = 31 results.
e) Searching "kw:("intellectual history") OR kw:("history of ideas")" with the limit of Print Books = 66 results.
A brief note about abbreviations
You can search the library catalog with abbreviations, such as "au." Here are a few abbreviations defined. au = author kw = keyword su = subject ti = title
Primary Source and Secondary Source -- definitions quoted from "Guidelines for Primary Source Literacy"
Primary source
Primary sources are materials in a variety of formats, created at the time under study, that serve as original evidence documenting a time period, event, people, idea, or work. Primary sources can be printed materials (such as books and ephemera), manuscript/archival materials (such as diaries or ledgers), audio/visual materials (such as recordings or films), artifacts (such as clothes or personal belongings), or born-digital materials (such as emails or digital photographs). Primary sources can be found in analog, digitized, and born-digital forms.
Secondary source
A work synthesizing and/or commenting on primary and/or other secondary sources. Secondary sources, which are often works of scholarship, are differentiated from primary sources by the element of critical synthesis, analysis, or commentary.
Work Cited
SAA-ACRL/RBMS Joint Task Force on the Development of Guidelines for Primary Source Literacy. “Guidelines for Primary Source Literacy.” https://www2.archivists.org/sites/all/files/GuidelinesForPrimarySourceLiteracy-June2018.pdf .
SAA = Society of American Archivists
ACRL = Association of College & Research Libraries
RBMS = Rare Books and Manuscripts Section
Selected digital sites that contain primary sources
Academic Search contains a wealth of essential material for learning and detailed research in a single, easily searched database, with the full text of articles from over 3,700 publications, and indexing and abstracts from nearly 5,300 publications.
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