The SFCC Library offers a variety of sources useful for researching topics in Latin American history, and this guide is intended to help you identify them and use them effectively. Unfortunately, we do not subscribe to many history journals in general, or to Latin American history journals in particular. Therefore, research may be a bit more challenging in this class than in some others.
It's always a good idea to start early, as research takes time. It is quite possible you will need to use interlibrary loan, and if so, please allow extra time for us to locate and retrieve copies of articles.
It also a good idea to keep a record of where you get information as you go along–nothing is more frustrating than trying to compile a Works Cited list when you can't remember where you got your information!
Above all, don't hesitate to ask a librarian for help.
Finding Books & Videos
The SFCC Library shares a joint online catalog with SCC at http://ccs.wash-id.net/ The catalog lists books, videos, magazines, journals, and other items held by one or both of the two libraries.
SFCC is a member of the Washington-Idaho Network (WIN) of libraries. Students and faculty can use our online catalog to search for and request items from the libraries at Gonzaga, Whitworth, North Idaho College, the University of Idaho, and other regional libraries. Items will be delivered via courier, usually within 3-4 days, to the SFCC circulation desk, where they may be checked out.
In addition, consider searching catalogs for libraries physically nearby, such as Eastern Washington University and the Spokane city and county public libraries. Links to these are provided at http://library.spokanefalls.edu/LibraryandCatalogs.stm
Reference sources
Reference items are usually distinguished by having an "R" or "REF" before the call number. Reference works are especially good for statistical data, information which must be up-to-date (e.g., addresses and phone numbers), and for quick overviews of a topic such as one finds in an encyclopedia.
Items in a reference collection usually cannot be checked out, but you can make photocopies if you like. You can also browse similar call numbers in the circulating stacks to find books which can be checked out.
The following reference books are in the SFCC library; you might want to look around the same call numbers in other libraries for similar kinds of books.
While the library has and will continue to buy printed reference books, the trend these days is to purchase reference books as online editions. This allows students to access the contents of such books from home at times when the library isn't open.
The following online reference books can be accessed almost any time, wherever you have an internet connection; off-campus users will need to put in their usernames (without the @stu part) and passwords:
American Mosaic is a full-text database on the history and culture of African-Americans, Hispanic-Americans, and American Indians. It includes, among other things, more than 500 full-text titles, 4,000 interviews with former slaves, over 6,500 photos, illustrations, maps, and charts, timelines, and nearly 500 vetted web sites.
Focuses on cultures and countries around the world, specifically what is and is not shared culturally by the people who live in a particular country. Entries contain descriptive summaries of the country in question, including demographic, historical, cultural, economic, religious, and political information.
Social history products including education, family life, holidays, housing, political and economic life, recreation and more. You can browse by region or time period. Note: There are numerous titles from this source which might be useful for history classes; the SFCC Library does not subscribe to all the titles on this list.
Information on the culture and traditions of 177 nations around the world is contained in CultureGrams. Special features include authentic recipes and short biographies of famous individuals from each county and a photo gallery.
Examines the many issues surrounding immigration from a wide variety of perspectives. Places special emphasis on the many ethnic communities that have provided American immigrants. Would be good for Asian and Latino immigration immigration history in the northwest.
Normally you would not use a general encyclopedia for college level research, but the online version of Britannica has some useful features you may wish to explore, including an updated world atlas, thousands of images and videos, over 300,000 articles from respected magazines and journals, and a guide to the Web's best sites.
Databases
The SFCC Library subscribes to a number of commercial databases, some of which offer access to complete newspaper, magazine, and journal articles. Others include online books, primary documents, images, statistical data, and a variety of other things.
In addition to the full text of more than 130 leading history periodicals, the History Reference Center also offers the entire contents of 2,300 reference books, encyclopedias and other non-fiction titles; more than 60,000 historical documents, biographies of historical figures, historical photos and maps, and some 80 hours of historical video.
Academic Search Complete is a full-text database of almost 6,000 mostly peer-reviewed academic articles. This is a more academic database than ProQuest, which emphasizes popular magazines and newspapers.
JSTOR provides complete academic journal articles for a variety of subject areas; it is intended to offer archival access to older issues, and is not meant to locate the most current articles.
ProQuest is our best general purpose index for a broad range of articles. In most cases Proquest offers the full text of articles, in either scanned text format or as a PDF. Proquest is available from any campus computer; students who have Internet access from home can log in using their usual login and password. Although ProQuest is our basic research index, please be aware there are many other highly specialized indexes available. If you decide to continue your education elsewhere, ask a librarian about indexes specific to your field.
Comprehensive, country specific information about political, economic, cultural, business and environmental information can be found in the Country Reviews. Current news wire reports can be located for each country via the Country Wire.
The following indexes may have articles on Latin American topics. However, they are more often useful for contemporary controversial issues, and are worth considering as general-purpose research databases.
CQ Researcher is published about 45 times per year, and covers one topic very thoroughly in each issue. While the topic you're interested in might not have been covered recently, the online version goes back some fifteen years. The Library also has print editions in the reference section.
Opposing Viewpoints provides full-text pro- and con- coverage of numerous topics. It can be browsed or searched. Also provides some access to magazine and journal articles.
World Wide Web Resources
The World Wide Web has become indispensable for research, but the challenge is to identify stable, reputable academic sources. Search engines such as Google return too many hits, and most of them are not suitable. An excellent site listing various specialized search tools is
Look for sites that are kept up to date and which have an identifiable author or responsible party. You should be able to locate contact information easily (postal addresses, phone numbers, or at least an email address, ideally to someone more specific than "webmaster"). Individual or hobbyist sites are often entertaining and even authoritative for some subjects, but probably should not be your primary source.
Once you find suitable sources of information, you will need to cite what you use. Please consult our list of citation resources.
Suggested Sites
Finally, the following Web sites may offer useful advice and guidance:
Claims to offer "everything you'll ever want to know about sentence structure and using the parts of speech correctly." This is one of a set of related, interlinked pages, all addressing topics of clear writing, punctuation, and communication in general.
The Online Writing Lab, or OWL, at Purdue University has dozens of handouts and guides available, both on matters of grammar, punctuation, and style, as well as on professional/business topics such as report writing, abtracting, resumes, cover letters, and so forth. A very useful resource.
