Library News: Women’s History Month

March is Women’s History Month. As in Black American History Month and Native American Heritage Month, libraries across the United States will feature specialized reading lists, lectures, exhibits, workshops, and cultural events about women this month. Reading a book about women or by a woman, in particular, may not be a part of one’s reading plans, but try to fit at least one library material about women or produced by a woman into your busy schedules. As I mentioned with other heritage remembrance months, the library materials are available all-year-round. We don’t have to wait for March to come around for us to read about women or read something written by a woman. Women’s History Month just reminds us to learn something new about women through our local libraries.

We can all recall the names of men in history, but many of us struggle to recall the names of women in history. Even if we are no longer students, we can still take some time to borrow library materials about women this month or any time throughout the year. Parents and teachers can borrow a children’s book about women for their children and students.

Busy adults can borrow a documentary or an e-audiobook about women from their libraries and from Hoopla. A subject heading search for “women” via my local library’s online catalog yielded nearly 76,000 materials. I narrowed the subject down to “history.” Then, I narrowed the results further by clicking on “DVD” and “English.” The query produced 53 results, so this is how a busy adult can find a documentary about women’s history or about an individual women in history. Look around your library’s website. Your library may have a link leading to a list of Hoopla’s e-audiobooks and music.

Personally, I was bored with my college course on American women. The class I took focused on women’s domestic lives, which I simply could not get excited about. I don’t recall having to write a research paper about women, so I have never read or utilized the list of books I have listed below in the references section. I am simply listing them for your referral if any of you must research women’s history for a school paper.

When I searched my library’s online catalog, I used subject headings, “women United States sources.” Only one book came up. I clicked on that book’s title. Then I found its subject headings and clicked on subject heading, “Women’s Rights United States History Sources.” Eight book titles appeared. I saw other subject headings as I scanned the list of results that yielded different results such as “Women United States History Sources” and “Women United States Social Conditions Sources.”

When I searched my library’s online catalog under subject headings, “women sources,” my search generated three book titles that had nothing to do with United States history.

When I searched my library’s online catalog under subject headings, “women social conditions,” my search generated 540 library items and 474 book titles in printed format. The majority of these books are going to be secondary sources, even if you narrowed them down by subject. If you could, try to borrow and cite at least one book that contains the word, “sources” or some other keyword, indicating that the research subject wrote the literature in her own words. Other keywords used in subject headings that may indicate the research subject penned her own words include correspondence, diaries, personal narratives, autobiography, and personal memoirs. You may have to try letters, journal, diary, memoir, autobiography, and “the writings of” as keywords and/or title searches. If you can’t find what you want under subject headings, you can search under a keyword or title word search.

When we conduct research at a library, most of the books we rely upon will be secondary sources. However, here is a trick. Let’s say the best secondary sources you have found do not quite have the information you are looking for. Photocopy the bibliographies of those secondary sources. You can research those photocopied bibliographies for other books or scholarly journal articles that specifically deal with your research paper’s topic. Put a circle next to the promising titles on those photocopies. Write a check mark in the circle if you were able to find that book or scholarly journal article in your local or college library. Write an X-mark in the circle, if you weren’t able to find the title in your local or college library. Write “NA” or “N/A” inside the circle you’re your library has it within its collection, but someone else has borrowed it. Why waste time reinventing the wheel? Those published authors, researchers, and professors have already done the research for you and compiled a bibliography of sources. If you have referenced other authors’ bibliographies, you must cite them as a source for your own research paper even if you are not quoting them. You are using their work, so you still need to give them credit as a source.

Again, I have never read the following list of references. I ran several searches for primary “sources” through my local library’s online catalog. The following references constitute the most interesting titles likely to contain primary “sources” for independent researchers and students. Hopefully, these books have indexes that will allow you to find quotes, specifically relevant to your research topics. Enjoy.

 

References

Bandel, Betty. An officer and a lady: the World War II letters of Lt. Col. Betty Bandel, Women’s Army Corps. Hanover: University Press of New England, 2004.

Carney, Virginia Moore. Eastern Band Cherokee women: cultural persistence in their letters and speeches. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 2005.

Conway, Jill K. The female experience in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century America: a guide to the history of American women. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985.

Cullen-DuPont, Kathryn, ed. American women activists’ writings: an anthology, 1637-2002. Blue Ridge Summit: National Book Network, 2002.

Grunwald, Lisa and Stephen J. Adler, eds. Women’s letters: America from the Revolutionary War to the present. New York: Dial Press, 2005.

Kenyon, Olga. Eight hundred years of women’s letters. New York: Penguin Books, 1994.

Kerber, Linda K. and Jane De Hart Matthews, eds. Women’s America: refocusing the past. New York: Oxford University Press, 1982.

Langley, Winston E. and Vivian C. Fox, eds. Women’s rights in the United States: a documentary history. Westport: Greenwood Press, 1994.

Mankiller, Wilma, ed. The reader’s companion to U.S. women’s history. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1998.

Melton, J. Gordon and Gary L. Ward, eds. The Churches speak on—women’s ordination: official statements from religious bodies and ecumenical organizations. Detroit: Gale Research, 1991.

Millstein, Beth and Jeanne Bodin. We, the American women: a documentary history. New York: J.S. Ozer, 1977.

Norton, Mary Beth. Liberty’s daughters: the revolutionary experience of American women, 1750-1800. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996.

Rappaport, Doreen, ed. American women: their lives in their words: a documentary history. New York: T.Y. Crowell, 1990.

Rhoades, Nancy L. and Lucy E. Bailey, eds. Wanted—correspondence: women’s letters to a Union soldier. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2009.

Ruiz de Burton, Maria Amparo. Conflicts of interest: the letters of Maria Amparo Ruiz de Burton. Houston: Arte Público Press, 2001.

The Indian peoples of Eastern America. New York: Oxford University Press, 1981.

 

Links:

Library of Congress: Women’s History Month

National Women’s History Project

 

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