New Licensed Databases (available for use and now represented in the CDL Directory of Collections at [http://www.cdlib.org/])

Readers are reminded that the CDL’s “Collections Update” document (available at [http://www.cdlib.org/libstaff/sharedcoll/docs/]) is updated regularly with information about resources being negotiated and expected times for availability.  Campus Collection Development Officers also have current status information.

a. ABC/CLIO’s America: History and Life and Historical Abstracts

ABC-CLIO, headquartered in Santa Barbara, California, specializes in authoritative reference sources on topics in fields ranging from history, politics, and social sciences to mythology, military history and science.

These A&I databases are unique in their coverage of historical information, and were selected as priorities for systemwide site licensing by the systemwide Computer Files Committee in the early 1990s.  For the past decade UC campuses have subscribed individually to them.  This spring they were approved for co-investment and CDL-managed licensing, through the shared collections decision process.

America: History and Life includes historical coverage of the United States and Canada from prehistory to the present. Originally published in 1964, the database now comprises almost 400,000 bibliographic entries.

Historical Abstracts, published since 1954, includes coverage of the world from 1450 to the present (excluding the United States and Canada).  It has long been recognized as the leading bibliography for historical study in the world.  It covers over 2,000 historical periodicals from every major country and also includes a targeted selection of hundreds of journals in the social sciences and humanities that are of special interest to researchers and students of history.

b. Columbia International Affairs Online (CIAO)

CIAO is a comprehensive source for theory and research in international affairs.  It publishes a wide range of scholarship from 1991 to the present and includes the full texts of working papers from university research institutes, occasional papers series from NGOs (non-governmental organizations), foundation-funded research projects, and proceedings from conferences, where scholars provide analysis and discussion of current debates in policy and scholarship.  CIAO provides journal abstracts of articles from key foreign policy journals, 12 full-text online books, links to more than 160 other related sites, and a calendar of meetings, conferences, seminars, and research projects.  Currently, 45 leading research centers from around the world have posted working papers and conference proceedings on this site.

Each section of CIAO is updated with new material on a regular schedule.  Working papers are augmented every month, as are conference proceedings, policy briefs, and economic indicators.  Links and resources, the schedule of events, and the response files are updated weekly.  New journal issues and books are added as they become available.

CIAO content will eventually be linked to our holdings.

c. Ethnic NewsWatch (ENW)

Ethnic NewsWatch (ENW) is a comprehensive full text database of the newspapers, magazines and journals of the ethnic, minority and Native American press. Continuously growing since 1991, with archival material back to 1985, Ethnic NewsWatch is now a collection of more than 470,000 full-text articles from over 200 publications.  The database is searchable in both English and Spanish, with titles in both languages and more than 100,000 articles in Spanish.  ENW offers in-depth coverage of a wide range of current and topics easily accessed using free text and fielded searching.  An average of 7,500 new articles is added each month.

ENW includes African-American, Caribbean/African, Arab/Middle Eastern, Asian/Pacific Island, European/Eastern European, Hispanic, Jewish, Multi-Ethnic, and Native American ethnic publications.  Article types include book reviews, business articles, news columns, editorials, fashion and food articles, interviews, movie reviews, obituaries, music reviews, sports articles, television reviews, and theatre reviews.

Every article is displayed with the publication’s logo, hot linked to publication information, such as contact, subscription, and advertising information, as well as circulation, editorial staff, publication dates, and frequency.

Virtually all of the UC campuses subscribed to ENW on CD ROM prior to this CDL agreement.  This new CDL license opens up web access to all nine campuses to 20 (pooled) simultaneous users systemwide, many more than had been licensed on any single campus.

d. ITER: Gateway to the Renaissance

ITER is a good example of the value (in guiding selection priorities) that the JSC placed on publication by non-profit organizations with innovative, sustainable models for electronic resource licensing (See [http://www.cdlib.org/libstaff/sharedcoll/jsc/] for a full enumeration of JSC priorities for licensing.)

Iter, meaning ‘a journey’ or ‘a path’ in Latin, is a non-profit research project with partners in Toronto, Canada (the headquarters), New York City, and Tempe, Arizona.  The goal of Iter is to increase access to all published materials pertaining to the Renaissance (1300-1700) and, eventually, to the Middle Ages (400-1500), through the creation of online bibliographic databases.  (For more information, see the web site at: [http://www.library.utoronto.ca/iter/].)

This resource is an A&I bibliography of more than 225,000 articles and reviews drawn from over 300 medieval and renaissance journal titles (Middle Ages and Renaissance; 400-1700).  The database is updated daily, with more than 60,000 new records added annually.  Its content enhances the CDL’s Humanities collections by focusing in depth on unique subject matter.