Key Reference Work
African American National Biography by Call Number: E185.96 .A4466 2008ISBN: 9780195160192Publication Date: 2008-02-18This reference work ranks along with American National Biography among the best for African American biography. Its readable, signed entries include persons from all walks of life including literary and other creative figures. Entries conclude with a helpful further reading section.
Selected Reference Works
Question: What value has a reference book? Why, for example, consult a scholarly history encyclopedia?
Answer: Encyclopedias are two steps removed from the primary historical evidence, that is from the letters, diaries, oral histories, and other first-hand accounts of history. For that reason encyclopedias belong to a class of information librarians call reference or tertiary sources.
- Encyclopedias help researchers to contextualize their topics, situating the primary source evidence within broader scholarly (or historiographical) debates. Context is critical, not least because researchers cannot elicit relevant search results from library databases such as JSTOR if they do not know which keywords (or search terms) to employ.
- Obtain from encyclopedias background information about your historical topic. Easily track down additional sources for further reading.
- Browsing a history encyclopedia can even help you to choose and/or refine your research topic. The Gitenstein Library reference works listed on this page, in short, are a great way to begin any history-related research project.
See the main History libguide > Reference Shelf page > African Americans tab for additional sources.
The Cambridge Companion to the African American Slave Narrative by Call Number: Gitenstein Library E-BOOKISBN: 9780521850193Publication Date: 2007-05-31also available in print, General Collection, Call # E444 .C36 2007
Encyclopedia of Antislavery and Abolition by Call Number: HT1031 .E53 2007ISBN: 0313331421Publication Date: 2006-11-01
Encyclopedia of Emancipation and Abolition in the Transatlantic World by Call Number: HT985 .E53 2007ISBN: 9780765612571Publication Date: 2007-11-15
Enslaved Women in America: An Encyclopedia by Call Number: E443 .E57 2012ISBN: 9780313349089Publication Date: 2012-06-12
The Oxford Handbook of Slavery in the Americas by Call Number: HT1048 .O94 2010ISBN: 9780199227990Publication Date: 2010-09-25
Slavery in the United States: A Social, Political, and Historical Encyclopedia by Call Number: E441 .S635 2007ISBN: 9781851095445Publication Date: 2007-03-20
The Underground Railroad: An Encyclopedia of People, Places, and Operations by Call Number: E450 .S65 2008ISBN: 9780765680938Publication Date: 2007-12-13
A Companion to 19th-Century America by Call Number: E338 .C85 2001ISBN: 0631209859Publication Date: 2001-02-08
The Encyclopedia of the New American Nation: The Emergence of the United States, 1754-1829Call Number: E301 .E53 2006ISBN: 0684313464Publication Date: 2005-10-21
See the main History libguide > Reference Shelf page > African Americans tab for additional sources.
A Companion to African American History by Call Number: E185 .C66 2008ISBN: 9781405179935Publication Date: 2008-06-16
A Companion to African-American Studies by Call Number: E184.7 .C65 2006ISBN: 0631235167Publication Date: 2006-02-10
See the main History libguide > Reference Shelf page > Civil War tab for additional sources.
A Companion to the U.S. Civil War by Call Number: Gitenstein Library E-BOOKISBN: 9781118802809Publication Date: 2014-01-01This critical, up-to-date companion is the best source of historiographical essays about the Civil War.
The Encyclopedia of Civil War Usage: An Illustrated Compenium of the Everyday Language of Soldiers and Civilians by Call Number: E468.9 .G373 2001ISBN: 1581821867Publication Date: 2001-04-21Use this work to identify "keywords" (search terms) with which to search Gitenstein Library primary source databases such as African American Newspapers, Series 1.
The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Civil War by Call Number: Gitenstein Library E-BOOKISBN: 9780199782017Publication Date: 2011-08-02
A Companion to the American South by Call Number: F208.2 .C66 2002ISBN: 0631213198Publication Date: 2001-10-22
A Companion to the Literature and Culture of the American South by Call Number: PS261 .C555 2004ISBN: 0631224041Publication Date: 2004-06-18
The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture [see v. 3, History] by Call Number: F209 .N47 2006ISBN: 0807830283Publication Date: 2006-09-18
The South [an encyclopedia] by Call Number: E169.1 .G7553 2004 v.7ISBN: 0313327343Publication Date: 2004-12-01
