Resources for the study of Latin America

(The following hypertext is a general introduction; a more specialized resource for History 330 is also available)

Highlighted words and phrases link to texts and Internet destinations; use the spacebar to move from one page to the next, the b key to move to the previous page, the TAB key (or UP and DOWN arrows) to move from one link to the next, and the u key (or LEFT arrow) to move back to a previous document --Hugh Blackmer 24 April 1994)

Begin with the nearest resources:

ANNIE

The Leyburn Library's holdings on Latin America will be adequate for many research projects, and the sources and locations described in this section should be your first stop in gathering information.

The Reference Collection on the Main level includes Latin American resources in these areas:

The main section for most historical materials on Latin America is on LL4 between F1200 and F3799 (SEE DETAILS); literary sources are on LL3, between PQ1200 and PQ7090; and political, economic, anthropological and sociological materials are found in the G and H sections on LL4, but are not grouped together in Latin American sections.

The best way to locate book resources is to begin with a W (keyword) search and use its results to identify

Here's an example of Brazilian literature holdings.
If you have a quite specific subject and find that our library has little to offer AND if you have time for Interlibrary Loan (often 2 weeks for books, more if they are rare or obscure) it may be worthwhile to search the online catalogs of universities with large Latin American holdings (University of Texas at Austin, Stanford, and Harvard are examples).

Each online catalog has its own conventions and peculiarities, generally well documented in internal HELP files. Before connecting to a remote catalog you should be sure that you know how to start the search process and how to EXIT from it.

The Campus Information System provides connections to other catalogs, in Virginia and elsewhere. You can EXPLORE Yale's worldwide directory of online catalogs.


PERIODICAL ARTICLES on Latin American history are indexed by Historical Abstracts, which we have on CD-ROM and in annual print indexes. Consult the instruction card on the computer which shares Historical Abstracts with the America History and Life CD-ROM.

The Handbook of Latin American Studies is the single most important source for access to the research literature on Latin America. It is produced annually by the Library of Congress, publishes volumes on Humanities and Social Sciences in alternate years, and is available in paper (REF F1401 .H233) and can be searched via LOCIS, the online catalog of the Library of Congress. Instructions and examples (and a TELNET CONNECTION to the Library of Congress) are available through the University of Texas Gopher.

The MLA (Modern Language Association) Bibliography, available for searching on a CD-ROM workstation near the Reference desk, has extensive indexing of articles on Latin American literature.

Periodical Abstracts Online (PAO), searched on Annie terminals, includes only the last 5 years or so of magazines and journals but does index a number of History journals that often have articles on Latin American subjects. An example of a search for articles on CHIAPAS will give you an idea of what you can expect in the way of coverage and up-to-dateness.

The Leyburn Library's Latin American JOURNAL HOLDINGS include some 20 titles, about half in Spanish.


GOPHER RESOURCES: The W&L Gopher has a link to a specialized gopher burrow at the University of Texas which offers access to a broad variety of resources on Latin America, including links to allow you to search the main Latin American bibliography (via the Library of Congress) and the archive of postings to an important usenet group on Latin American Studies. You can EXPLORE this resource here, or find it one the /History menu in our Gopher's /Libraries and Information Access area. (Return to this document by hitting the LEFT ARROW KEY or the u [for 'up'] key).

Gophers in Latin American countries may be worthwhile sources of information, though exploring them can be time consuming.

To find GOPHERS in various countries:

      Choose  Netlink from the second screen of the CIS menu 
      Select 4. Menu  Geographic                   
 
            Netlink Server      1.  Search:           
                                2.  Menu:   Subject/      
                                3.  Menu:   Type (Telnet, Gopher, WWW, WAIS)/ 
                           -->  4.  Menu:   Geographic/
 
           Hit the spacebar to see the next screen and search for the 
           country of your choice; countries are listed alphabetically 
           after the states of the US.     

Brazilian gophers are an example.


USENET GROUPS are another potential resource, since many countries are represented in the soc.culture.xxx area. Discussions in these groups are sometimes quite heated and posters are often opinionated, but if you post a question you will probably get answers. To learn more about the details of TIN (Threaded Internet Newsreader) highlight THIS and hit ENTER.

You might wish to look at soc.culture.mexican or soc.culture.brazil as an example.

Many USENET groups have Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) documents with extensive basic information. The soc.culture.brazil FAQ is an example.


LEXIS/NEXIS is another resource available to you through your Liberty account. The Lexis/Nexis service offers a gargantuan collection of full text databases which includes many newspapers and a range of specialized files.

Lexis/Nexis requires some effort to learn to use efficiently, and you should begin by picking up the Guide to Searching Lexis/Nexis at the Reference Desk. Highlight THIS to see a brief guide to Lexis/Nexis commands.

A Lexis/Nexis 'library' called NSAMER collects a variety of materials on Latin America, the US and Canada. To search in this area type NSAMER when prompted for a Nexis/Lexis library and then choose ?? to see the available files. There are country files for the nations of Latin America as well as files of current news (CURNWS) and archived news stories from the last decade (ALLNWS), material on NAFTA, and a range of legal and business resources.


The NEW YORK TIMES is a valuable tool when you need to find news stories on nations, or on events that happened in a nation in a specific year. Although primarily concerned with American news, the Times has always prided itself on its international coverage, and we have microfilm going back to 1851.

The New York Times Index (in the section of Indexes on the Main Level of the Library) is most useful if you know the year in question. The Newspaper Abstracts workstation has CD-ROM indexes covering 1987-1994.

If you need to find whether the New York Times has done any stories on a person there is an index of names (Personal Name Index 1851-1974 and 1975-1989 [REF CT104 .F28]) which is VERY useful in locating stories.

The Times of London has quite extensive Latin American coverage; we have annual indexes from 1785 to 1993 and microfilm covering the same span.

The Washington Post and Wall Street Journal are other sources worth examining; we have indexes of the Post from 1971 to 1992 and of the WSJ from 1955 to 1992, and microfilm holdings of both papers going back considerably farther.


Literary Criticism and Literary History

You should be aware of: