Historian Information Sources

 In their article, Historians and Their Information Sources, Margaret Stieg Dalton and Laurie Charnigo (2004), found that historians are seldom overwhelmed by information overload.  This is surprising considering the abundance of electronic journals and databases with a proliferation of resources on an over-abundance of topics. Part of this reason might be the greater specialization seen in many academic fields that have left some historians feeling as though their particular field is under-represented in the available databases. Another problem that occurs is that particular libraries and universities do not have access to all available databases, and as a result, some historians are denied access to potentially useful resources (pp. 414-5).

Interesting, as well, is that the historians maintain a distrust toward e-journals in general and remain fixed on the use of printed sources as a more trustworthy information source (pp. 414).  Perceived problems with e-journals and databases included (pp. 412-4):

• Sources not having the needed information
• Sources not covering the dates needed
• Sources not offering full text
• Sources not having a worldly view, being mostly Anglo-oriented
• Inadequate indexing terminology
• Problems with sources in non-English languages and translations

 The historians surveyed expressed an opinion that e-journals were often more useful to undergraduate students, as opposed to true scholarship (pp. 414).

Early on in the article, the authors characterize history as being a kind of sense-making of a heap of facts (pp. 400), and as such, the historian is characterized as being interested in primary sources and historical objects, as well as being highly interdisciplinary.  With a high interest and focus on wading through these heaps of facts from a multifaceted world of knowledge and information, it is a shame that electronic resources are being under-appreciated in this discipline (at least, as this article shows); electronic databases have the potential of uniting disciplines almost seamlessly through the use of Knowledge Organization Systems, and ideally, should result in less travel expenses and leg work on the part of the scholar. Instead, the resources are viewed (perhaps rightfully so) as containing research that is not as rigorous or valuable as their physical counterparts, and historians are still waiting to see a greater maturation of e-resources.

Dalton, S. M., (2004). Historians and Their Information Sources. In College & Research Libraries.
Vol. 65. No. 5. pp. 400-425. http://crl.acrl.org/content/65/5/400.full.pdf+html

Royal Society 
The website royalsociety.org offers a unique perspective on the history of science from an interdisciplinary perspective.  I was most interested in the different research projects that the Royal Society is currently involved in. Among the projects are:

• Constructing scientific communities
  This is a look at how scientific communities entered into the popular cultures of the 19th and 21st centuries.  This project is interesting because of the rising interest that seems to be had in promoting STEM curriculums, television programs based on scientific discovery, the popularity of science fiction as entertainment, and the growing interest in Maker Spaces, with their focus on technology.
• Publishing the Philosophical Transactions: the social, cultural, and economic history of a learned journal 1665-2015
  As the title of the research project indicates, this project aims to illuminate researchers on the socio-economic historical development of very old, circulating scientific journal. This project really highlights the interdisciplinary nature of history.
• Origins of science as a visual pursuit
  Another project that widens the scope of historical study. This project examines the effect of art and artists on natural philosophers of the 17th century, and how their relationship effected the development of both the arts and the sciences.

Lib Guides
The lib guide that stood out the most to me, was the lib guide published by David C. Murray at Temple University, last updated 2014 (http://temple.v1.libguides.com/content.php?pid=1264&sid=5395).  This lib guide offers suggestions for print and electronic resources down both the left and right navigation areas that include resources that are of a high interest to history students. Each of the sections that are offered by this lib guide are very nicely divided and easy to follow. The section on databases is divided into three tiers, with the top tier offering the most comprehensive collections of articles.  Finally, Murray has separated primary and secondary resources along with definitions of each and guides on how to find each type of resources.