What Reference Sources Are LIS Students Learning?
Posted by: Admin
Annie, the publishing assistant I share with Booklist Media Editor Sue-Ellen Beauregard, is enrolled now in San Jose State's online MILS program, and this semester she's taking a reference sources class. The class has been working on the familiar assignment of using standard reference sources to find answers to a list of questions. I was curious about the reference tools she was asked to look at and she shared the list with me.
Many of these are titles I would have used a gazillion years ago when I took a reference sources class, albeit in a different format (nothing electronic back then) or an earlier edition. Even when I left reference work there were very few online sources. The titles on Annie's list are a mix--some only online, some strictly print, and some available both ways. It's interesting to see how much has changed and how much has remained the same in the toolkit of the reference librarian of the very near future.
Here's the list:
ABI/Inform Complete
Acronyms, Intitialisms, and Abbreviations Dictionary
American Factfinder
American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language
American History and Life
American Library Directory
American Medical Association Family Medical Guide
American National Biography
American Reference Books Annual
America's Top Rated Cities
Associations Unlimited
Atlas of American Politics, 1960-2000
Atlas of Medieval Europe
Atlas of the Holocaust
Barrington Atlas of the Greek and Roman World
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations
Books in Print
Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable
Britannica Book of the Year
Chase's Calendar of Events
CIA World Factbook
Columbia Gazetteer of the World
Concise Columbia Encyclopedia
Contemporary Authors
Credo Reference
Current Biography Yearbook
Dictionary of American Biography
Dictionary of American Regional English
Dictionary of the Middle Ages
Emily Post Etiquette
Encyclopedia of Popular Music
Encyclopedia of Religion
Encyclopedia of the American Presidency
ERIC
Europa World Year Book
Famous First Facts
Foundation Directory
Gale Encyclopedia of Multicultural America
Gale Virtual Reference Library
Google Books
GPO Access
Grzimek's Animal Life Encyclopedia
Hammond Historical World Atlas
Historical Dictionary of American Slang (vols. 1-2)
Historical Statistics of the United States
Hoovers.com
Infoplease
Johns Hopkins Guide to Literary Theory and Criticism
Lexis-Nexis Academic
Literary Market Place
Magazines for Libraries
McGraw-Hill Encyclopedia of Science and Technology
Merriam-Webster's Geographical Dictionary
National Geographic web site
The New Fowler's Modern English Usage
New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians
The New Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics
New York Times Obituary Index
Occupational Outlook Handbook
Oxford Art Online
Oxford English Dictionary
Perry-Castaneda Library Map Collection
Peterson's Four-Year Colleges
Physician's Desk Reference
PsychINFO
Public Papers of the President
PubMed
Rand McNally Commercial Atlas and Marketing Guide
RefWorks
Roget's International Thesaurus
Routledge Atlas of American History
Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Statesman's Year Book
Statistical Abstract ofthe United States
Thomas Register of American Manufacturers
Times Atlas of the Second World War
Times Atlas of the World
Times Atlas of World History
Ulrich's International Directory of Periodicals
Value Line
Visual Dictionary
Weather Almanac
Web of Science
Whitaker's Almanac
Who's Who in America
World Almanac
World Book
WorldCat
October 26th, 2010 at 10:39 pm
I'm surprised that they use the AMA Family Medical Guide when MedlinePlus is so much better and free. They have PubMed on the list though, but it is for deeper researchers.
October 29th, 2010 at 2:45 pm
I am disturbed that reference is still being taught as a list of sources. Many of hte works on this list were -- and still are -- some of my favorites. But with access to the Web, I have not touched them in years. Reference should focus on process, not product. Sources change constantly, but the skills required to find out what a user wants remain constant.
November 8th, 2010 at 12:13 pm
I agree with Dave - haven't used Stat Abstracts in ages. Knowledge of these (or other resources) is laudable, but not very effective or even necessary today. What does need to be taught is how to capture the essence of the question or inquiry - the reference interview - in the 'elevator speech' span of time we get nowadays.
With that, the students need better discriminatory powers and the knowledge of how to search the deep web - the sources that aren't immediately given in a Google search. They also need to know how to use the blog searching tool and Google Books to get them moving in non-traditional but highly useful directions.