Slavery, Abolition and Social Justice brings together a huge range of primary source materials relating to slavery and abolition studies from across the world, covering the time period between 1490 and 2007.
Primary source content
The content includes thousands of digitised sources, including images, maps, manuscripts, registers, ships’ logs and court records. It is arranged into sixteen broad themes, including Slavery in the Early Americas; Resistance and Revolt; Slave Testimony, and Urban and Domestic Slavery. Contemporary sources include materials from Anti-Slavery International, and submissions to the UNCHR.
Getting started
If you’re using Slavery, Abolition and Social Justice for the first time, we’d strongly encourage you to click on Introduction and take a little time to read about the content and themes, so you can get the best out of it: it is an extensive resource.
You can browse or search the content in various ways: we’d recommend choosing Documents from the top menu, as you can then browse by theme, geographic region, document type, date or more.
You may also find it useful to click REGISTER, so you can personalise your searching experience, including saving searches, documents and creating your own image slideshows.
Help and context
The primary sources are complemented by essays, tutorials and timelines to help you interpret the content: click on Further Resources from the top menu.
The Law in Literature collection has always strived to be diverse in stories, voices and authors. We are pleased to say that 50% of the books in this collection are written by women.
This collection, based in the Law Library, is made up of novels, short stories, plays, graphic novels and films that all reflect law in some way. We also promote films, TV shows and radio broadcasts through playlists on Box of Broadcasts (BoB). BoB is a free streaming platform available via LibrarySearch with your campus ID (available in the UK only). Search for our public playlists using ‘Law in Literature Newcastle University’.
Is there a book that you think should be on our shelves, or a film to add to a playlist? Is there a subject you think would make a good BoB playlist? Do you want to recommend a book or film and feature as one of our ‘Law School Picks’? Want to review a book or film for our blog? Then get in touch.
Thanks to everyone who came along to our Referencing drop-in session. Here you can find links to the key resources we highlighted, so you have them all in one handy place, whether you were able to participate in the sessions or not. You can also find a copy of our slides and a link to other useful referencing/managing information blog posts at end of this post.
Our Managing Information Guide and the slides from the session give you the context of why it is import to reference and why you should be managing your information. It’s easy to become overwhelmed by the amount of information out there (and that’s before you start your dissertation/project!), so getting into good habits it essential not only academically, but also for your wellbeing.
Why is referencing important?
It acknowledges the ideas and contributions of
others that you have drawn upon in your work, ensuring that you avoid
plagiarism
It highlights the range of reading you’ve done
for your assignment and makes your own contribution clear, showing how you’ve
taken ideas from others and built upon them
It enables the person reading your work to
follow up on your references so they can learn more about the ideas you’ve
discussed in your work or check any facts and figures.
How does referencing work?
Once you understand the why, you can get onto the nuts and bolts of referencing – the how:
Are there any tools that can help?
Yes! There are lots of referencing tools that can help you manage and format your citations and references correctly. Here are some examples:
A very useful online tool that lists all the information you need to include in a reference and provides examples of how a reference will look as an in-text citation and in a reference list. See our ‘Level Up Your Referencing: Cite Them Right’ blog for more information.
Citation Buttons
Keep an eye out for this symbol on Library
Search and Google Scholar. Clicking the
button will provide the option for you to copy a reference in a particular
style and paste it directly into your reference list. You might need to tidy it up a little bit but
it will save you time over writing them manually.
Reference building tools help you
to create a bibliography using the correct referencing style. You can input information manually or use
import functions to pull information through from other webpages or documents. As with the citation button above, reference
building tools can save you time but you may still need to check the references
are accurate.
Reference Management Software: e.g. EndNote
If you are writing a detailed essay, dissertation or thesis, you may like to use a reference management tool such as EndNote, Mendeley or Zotero to help keep all of your references organised. This software allows you to manually add references or import them from Library Search, Google Scholar or Subject Databases; sort references into groups; attach pdf documents or add notes. You can then use the reference management software while you write to add in-text citations and format your reference list.
The University has a subscription for EndNote which is available in all University clusters and can be downloaded to your own personal device. You’ll find information about how to get started with EndNote on our EndNote Guide.
Remember: whatever tool you use, it’s always a good idea to get to know the conventions of the referencing style your school or lecturer would like you to use.
Need more help?
If you feel you need to work on your referencing a bit more, and still a bit unsure about it all, we recommend that you complete Cite them Right’s Referencing and Plagiarism tutorial – You’ll need to log in then select the tutorial button on the top right of the homepage.
Slides
Here’s a copy of our slides from our referencing drop-in session:
Thanks to everyone who booked on our two Be Connected sessions to support your dissertation or project. We’re posting below links to the key resources we highlighted, so you’ve got them all handy in one place, whether you were able to participate in the sessions or not.
Getting a head start
If you’re at the early stages of planning your project or dissertation, or perhaps thinking ahead to next year, then you can get ahead of the game with our dissertation toolkit.
Search planner
This interactive toolkit includes a proposal planner, to help you refine your initial thinking as you develop your proposal, and a search planner, which takes you step-by-step through each stage of the process to create your own personalised literature search strategy. It will help you develop your search terms, identify different types of information resource, evaluate what you have found, and formulate a plan for keeping up to date and managing your references.
Our toolkit will help you translate vague thoughts into a firm plan of action!
Nearing completion: final checks
If you’re well into your dissertation or project, you may well have some last minute aspects you need to check.
Are you sure you haven’t missed any recent research in your area? Find out about 360 degree searching and make sure you check key resources for your subject area on your subject guide. Are there particular types of information missing from your search: for example: data, news, reports, images? Visit our resource guides for inspiration.
Resources guides
How is your bibliography shaping up: are all the references accurate and correctly formatted? Visit our managing information guide for all the answers, including a link to the Cite Them Right ebook for specific queries relating to a type of resource or referencing style.
Need more help?
You can book a one-to-one appointment with a member of the Library liaison team, and/or email us your draft search plan using our search planner.
Special Collections and Archives
Virtual Reading Room
Depending on your subject area, you might want to make use of some of the Library’s fabulous Special Collections and Archives in your research, or find out more about the possibilities of using archives elsewhere.
Start with the Special Collections home page: all the links you need for how to find and use our collections, including digital and virtual services while the Reading Room is still closed.
Need inspiration? Not sure where to start? Anxious about archives? Try the practical Special Collections guide for friendly, expert advice about using our collections in your research or finding collections elsewhere. Or why not see where your ideas take you with our great new Primary Sources Research Planner?
Strong information skills are not only important for improving your work in assessments, they’re also useful life-long skills that are increasingly important in our digital society. Strengthening these skills will help you to find and engage critically with information both for your assignments and in your future beyond University.
During Enrichment Week we ran a session looking at how you can reflect on your current information skills and discover resources, tools and advice that can help you take your capabilities further. If you missed the session and want to learn more, this blog summarises the steps you’ll need to take to improve your own information and digital skills. You’ll also find slides from the session at the end.
Reflect
Reflection is an important part of the learning process as it allows you to identify your current practises, see your areas of strength and what works for you, and think about how you can adapt, change or develop your skills going forward to meet new challenges.
The ASK webpage below goes into more detail about reflective practice, while our quizzes will help you reflect on your current information skills:
The next step is to consider what you want to put into practice, change, use or try based on your reflections. You need to give yourself a goal, target or action plan to work toward – this should be SMART:
Specific
Measurable
Achievable
Relevant
Time bound
So for example, you might want to improve your referencing for your next assignment or focus on searching three new subject databases for information to help you write your literature review. Alternatively, you may want to use your skills in a different way, by researching employers before you write your CV.
The frameworks below can be useful both for reflection and for selecting goals as they highlight the kinds of skills you should be developing as a University Student. You might also get ideas for goals from feedback from your assignments, from the kind of skills you’ll need in your future career, or simply by just selecting a topic you find interesting.
The Library is here to help you every step of the way and have created a host of useful tools and guides to help you develop your information skills. Once you’ve set your goal, take some time to explore the support that is available to you.
Tools:
Subject Guides – useful for finding subject-specific resources that can help you locate reliable information for your assignments.
Resource Guides – help you access a range of different information types, from newspapers to maps to company information.
Skills Guides – helpful advice and tools to aid you in finding, managing and evaluating information.
Search Planner – a great tool for helping you prepare for your dissertation literature review
ASK website – designed to support you in developing your wider academic skills, includes a host of helpful tools, guides, videos and resources.
One-to One appointment – chat to your Liaison Librarian about your information skills, we can help you find information, think critically about resources and manage your references.
Practise
As with any skill, the only way to improve your chosen information skill is to practise it, so look out for chances to do this. These opportunities may pop up in your modules with formative assessments or quizzes, or you may need to set aside some time to practise independently. For example, you could try some of the tutorials or workbooks below that were designed to help you practise some key skills:
Reflection is an iterative process. Once you’ve had time to explore, practise and apply your chosen skill and feel that you’ve achieved your goal, repeat the reflective process to see how far you’ve come and think about where you might go next!
Containing over 520 volumes of Latin and Greek poetry, drama, oratory, history, philosophy and more, the Loeb Classical Library is a key resource for those studying the ancient Greek and Roman world. The side-by-side layout of the ancient text and English translation makes the literature accessible to readers and can be especially helpful to those new to the study of ancient Greek or Latin.
The online Library presents tools that allow readers to explore the texts at various levels, via browsing, searching, annotating, and sharing content. The online works include the same content, page, and volume numbers as their print counterparts so you can easily switch between the two or share ideas related to certain passages or pages.
Loeb volumes
For each volume in the Library, you’ll find an introductory page containing useful information on the author, some details of the Loeb edition, a bibliographic reference for the text as well as a table of contents that you can use to navigate through the online work. You can access this page at any time by clicking on the LCL number located above the right hand page.
In the text itself, the left (verso) page contains the original Greek/Latin language, while the right (recto) presents the English translation. Tools along the bottom of the page allow you to hide either the left or right pages as needed. The tool bar also includes options for searching within the work or printing sections of the text. Further options to bookmark pages, highlight and annotate text, and organise or share your annotations with others, are also available in the toolbar but require you to create a free My Loeb account.
Browsing the Library
The browse option allows you to scan the Loeb Library by author name, Greek or Latin works, and Loeb volume number.
When browsing Greek or Latin works, you’re given further filter options so you can narrow your search by author, form (poetry or prose), time period, and genre/subject. These options can be particularly useful if you are interested in certain themes presented in the ancient world across specific time periods.
Searching the Library
The search box at the top right of the page allows you to do a quick search for titles, authors, keywords or phrases.
Alternatively, advanced search allows you to be more specific, searching for terms within introductions, bibliographies, or indexes. You can also limit your search to verso or recto to focus on the Greek/Latin text or the English translations. All search boxes provide you with a Greek keyboard to simplify searching for keywords in the original language.
As within browse, the search results allow you to filter records further by language, author, period, or genre. If you’ve searched for a specific keyword, clicking on ‘Show results within’ allows you to browse instances of the word appearing within a text from the results page.
Find out more
For more help, visit the Using the Library link at the top right of the Loeb Library page. Here you’ll find further advice on using tools within My Loeb, how to search and how to cite volumes from the Library.
You can find out more about key features and take a quick visual tour of the digital Library via the Loeb Classical Library website.
The Bibliography of British and Irish History (BBIH) is a database of over 600,000 records about British and Irish history from 55BC to the present day. It indexes publications from the early 1900s to the present, including journal articles, books, book chapters and theses, making it an indispensable resource for finding secondary literature. It’s updated three times a year, and is curated by historians, so it’s a very high quality, well-organised database.
Searching
You can search it in various ways, including by subject, author, place and date. Choose Advanced search to get the full range of options, including browsing a subject ‘tree’ (or index) to help you select appropriate search terms, and broaden or narrow your search.
Finding the full text
Your records will link to the full text article at Newcastle University Library if we have access to it. Just click to display the details of a record, and the full text links will be at the bottom of the record in an external links section.
If we don’t have access to the full text of an article, there won’t be an external links section. Please note that if the item you want is a book or book chapter, BBIH won’t link to it automatically, so you’ll need to search for the book separately in Library Search.
You can export records in various ways to create your own bibliography: just click on Export at the top of the screen to see the options.
Need more help?
BBIH has recently released a really helpful set of short videos and guides, aimed at first and second year students; students doing a dissertation or thesis, and lecturers.
Get the latest news about BBIH, including content updates and features, via its blog.
Enrichment week is a great opportunity to take some time to reflect on your academic skills and practice ahead of completing upcoming end of year assessments.
Throughout Enrichment week the Library and Writing Development Centre are hosting a series of live events that will help you grow and enhance those all-important academic skills. During the week we will be highlighting our very best resources, so you’ll have a host of useful tools and advice at your fingertips.
A good place to start
It’s early days in this semester, so you have time to take a step back and assess your academic skills, review your feedback, and organise your studies. Join the Writing Development Centre for live Q&A sessions on Time Management, and Feedback, or register for the Library’s live session on Developing your Information Skills, which will give you the tools to evaluate and improve your skills:
As you embark on your dissertation there are many ways the Library and Writing Development Centre can advise and support you with your reading, notetaking, searching, and critical thinking. Our two live Dissertation and Literature Review sessions are a great starting point for planning your next steps, while the Write Here, Write Now session will help you kick start your writing. Also check out a fantastic session from our Special Collections and Archives, which highlights you how you can use our collections for your dissertation.
You might feel confident with your academic skills, but maybe some of those abilities could use a little bit of fine-tuning? Take time during Enrichment week to hone your skills with the help of our live sessions. Referencing can easily fall off your list of priorities, so to help you keep on top of all those citations and bibliographies the Library will be looking at common referencing problems and where to find help. Or you might like to perfect your presentations with help from the Writing Development Centre.
Even in a ‘normal year’, exam time is always a tricky period. You will often be juggling different exams, trying to revise, as well as meeting other deadlines. This year, it’s made even harder by Covid-19 and the need to take online assessments, rather than traditional exams. This may come in the form of a 24 hour take home exam or you may need to produce coursework under time constraints. Whatever you are facing in the next few weeks, we want you to know that you aren’t alone and we are here to help you through.
But how exactly can we help? Sadly, we can’t do the exam with you, or magically freeze time to give you more hours in the day, but we have a list of resources that will hopefully help you tackle the next few weeks with more of a sense of calm.
Online Assessment guidance– put together by the Writing Development team, these pages will take you through how to revise for a 24 hour take home exam, what to do before hand, as well as running you through exam technique and how to tackle coursework under time restraints.
Library Help – whether you have a question about an essential text or access to a database, Library Help is the place to go when you have a question. Contact us via chat, email, text, twitter, Facebook or alternatively search our Frequently Asked Question (FAQ) database.
Subject guides – these guides, put together by your Liaison Librarians, are designed to save you time and energy by drawing together the main resources for your subject. They are a great starting point for your research and will help you access high quality information that’s needed for you to get those top marks.
Skills guides– similar to the subject guides, our skills guides focus on how to find, evaluate and manage information. These are all essential skills which you will need during this assessment period, as well as throughout your degree.
Book a one to one – both the Writing Development Team and the Liaison Librarians are available for an online one to one appointment. These appointments work best if you come with a specific issue to address. This will ensure that you get the most our of your time with us. You will need to book in advance.
Additional support – it really is ok to ask for help. The pressures are real and can feel completely overwhelming. Do contact your module leader or supervisor if your struggling. You can also seek additional support from your NUSU, Student Wellbeing Service, Nightline and the University chaplaincy.
So good luck. Remember……pace yourself, access the help you need and believe that you can do this!
The Library has lots of great collections and resources, so when it comes to finding wider reading for your topic or beginning research for your assignment or dissertation it might all seem a bit overwhelming. Library Search can be a great place to start looking for information but there are many other resources you might want to try. To help you get the best out of our resources we’ve put together this list of some of the most useful online databases and collections for Archaeology.
Let’s dive in!
Scopus
Scopus is a large, interdisciplinary database of peer-reviewed literature, providing an index of articles, book chapters, conference papers and trade publications.
One of the main advantages of using Scopus is that it provides a lot of useful information about the articles it indexes. This includes full reference lists for articles and cited reference searching, so you can navigate forward and backward through the literature to uncover all the information relevant to your research. You can also set up citation alerts, so you can be informed of new, relevant material automatically.
https://youtu.be/qCu-obYMFsE
Scopus tutorial: How to expand your search results
Scopus includes other smart tools that can help you track and visualise the research in your area, including author and affiliation searching, visual analysis of search results, a journal analyser, and author identifier tools. You’ll find tutorials and advice on using these features in the Scopus support centre and on their YouTube Channel.
JSTOR
JSTOR provides access to full-text materials including scholarly journals, books and book chapters in the arts, humanities, and social sciences. It has basic and advanced search options that allow you to search by topic keyword, author, subject area, title or publisher.
Take a look at our Get more out of JSTOR blog post to find tips for advanced searching on this database.
Archaeology Data Service Library (ADS)
ADS is a database which brings together material from the British and Irish Archaeological Bibliography (BIAB), the ADS library of unpublished fieldwork reports, as well as documents from the ADS archives and publishers such as Oxbow.
There are three ways to search ADS:
Archsearch – for searching for short records about a monument or historic environment event from the UK.
ADS Library – for a report, book or article about the historic environment of Britain and Ireland.
Find out how to search ADS for a known article in this video guide:
PastScape
The information on PastScape is derived from the National Record of the Historic Environment (NRHE) which holds records on the architectural and archaeological heritage of England. The NRHE contains over 420,000 records of archaeological sites and buildings in England and its territorial waters. The record is very broad in scope and contains information on sites dating from prehistoric times to the modern period, from finds of early stone tools to contemporary architecture, from Roman roads to disused railways and 19th century shipwrecks.
Although PastScape is no longer being updated, it is still a useful resource for finding descriptions of sites or buildings, surveys and excavation information and other useful links.
BAR Digital Collection
The BAR Digital Collection gives full text access to over 3,100 titles published from 1974 to date. The collection includes both BAR’s British and international series, and covers archaeological research, excavation reports and other important series from around the world. You can browse or search the entire collection in various ways (e.g. by location, author, subject, time period or series). Each report is also individually catalogued on Library Search.
Encyclopedia of Ancient History
The Encyclopedia of Ancient History is a reference work containing a comprehensive collection of 21st century scholarship on the ancient Mediterranean world. Entries span the bronze age through to 10th century Byzantium and extend to all Mediterranean civilisations including the Near East and Egypt. Materials include articles, images and maps of the ancient world. Our video guide below demonstrates how to browse and search for information using the Encyclopedia:
Video Guide to finding information on the Encyclopedia of Ancient History
Abstracts of International Conservation Literature (AATA)
AATA Online is a comprehensive database containing over 150,000 abstracts of journals and conference proceedings related to the preservation and conservation of material cultural heritage, including archaeological sites and materials.
You can browse the database by topic or use the search tab to do a quick keyword search, a more detailed search in particular fields or a text search for a more detailed keyword search.
The results tab allows you to sort items by date, author or title, and export record details to a reference management tool such as EndNote.
Historical Abstracts
Historical Abstracts provides bibliographic records for thousands of journals and books, including several key archaeology journals such as Historical Archaeology, International Journal of Historical Archaeology, International Journal of Nautical Archaeology and World Archaeology. Content covers the history of the world (excluding the United States and Canada) from 1450 to the present, including world history, military history, women’s history, history of education, and more.
This video explains how to search effectively in EBSCOHost databases such as this one:
https://youtu.be/DjKNxqiuwpY
EBSCOHost Tutorial: Creating an Advanced Search
Aph
l’Année philologique is a bibliographic database, indexing journal articles and book chapters about the classical world, going back to 1924. It’s an excellent resource for researching topics related to Greek and Latin literature and linguistics, Greek and Roman history, art, archaeology, philosophy, religion and more. Our video guide below demonstrates how to find information on l’Année philologique:
Video guide to finding information on l’Année philologique
Box of Broadcasts (BoB)
Box of Broadcasts allows you to access TV and radio broadcasts from over 65 channels, including most of the UK’s Freeview network, all BBC TV and radio content from 2007, and several foreign language channels. It’s a great resource for finding documentaries or critical opinions.
You can view archived programmes, create clips and playlists, and see transcripts to help with citation and translation. You can also search other user’s public playlists to see curated lists around topics similar to your own. There are lots of helpful tutorial videos on the BoB website.
Unfortunately, Box of Broadcasts is not available outside the UK.
Archaeology Subject Guide
This list was just a taster of all the great resources available for your subject area, to access these and to find out more visit your Subject Guide and explore the journals, databases and subject specific resources we’ve curated for Archaeology students.
