Your Librarian
Get to Know Your Country
One of the best places to go to get a broad overview of a country's characteristics is a reference book like the Europa World Yearbook.
Europa will help you understand a country's demographics, its economic system, organization of government, etc. You'll also find other kinds of information like its:
- Major industries
- Economic affairs
- Political history
- Judicial system
- Climate
- Education
The Europa World Year Book 2015Call Number: REF JN1 .E851 2015 v.1 -3ISBN: 9781857437515Publication Date: 2015From the publisher: Globally renowned for its accuracy, reliability and consistency, The Europa World Year Book provides detailed country surveys containing the latest analytical, statistical and directory data available for over 250 countries and territories.
How to Find Your Reference Source
The Europa World Year Book is an example of a standard reference book.
What's A Reference Book?
Reference books are materials you can use to look up quick facts or broad overviews of topics. Reference books aren't really the kind of book you read cover to cover. You usually just need bits and pieces relevant to your current interests.
Wikipedia is a good example of a massive general encyclopedia. However, there are lots of subject-specific encyclopedias that can also be more useful, depending on your area of interest.
Where Are the Reference Books?
In the Beeghly Library, the reference section is on the first floor. When you enter Beeghly and turn to your right, you enter the Information Commons. Along the back wall, you'll see a set of low black shelves (pictured above). You'll find the Europa World Year Book in this section by its call number: JN1 .E851 2015
These books, like all books in the library, are organized by call number. The call number is like an "address" that helps you find exactly where in the library the book is shelved.
At the end of each shelf, you'll see a small sign like this:
Just look for the shelf that includes the call number for the Europa World Year Book. Again, if you have trouble finding books in the library, just ask me or any one at THE DESK, Beeghly's main service desk.
Reference Sources in General
Reference sources, both online and in print, are often a good place to start in any research project when you are just beginning to learn about your topic. They're typically written for people that are not yet experts in the subject but want to learn something about it.
The library has many online reference sources as well as physical books, and of course, the open Internet is full of helpful reference sites, provided that you're able to tell the difference between authoritative and non-authoritative sources.
Power Tip!
Try Credo Reference, an online reference site with coverage of nearly all major subject areas. It's sort of the librarian-approved Wikipedia.
- Credo Reference This link opens in a new window
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