Background Information and Reference
- "East Central Europe"By Steven Béla Várdy and Emil Niederhauser from Encyclopedia of European Social History
- "Eastern Europe" (REFERENCE ARTICLE)By Bernd Stöver from The Oxford Handbook of the Cold War
- Encyclopaedia Britannica Online This link opens in a new windowMajor encyclopedia with information on a wide range of subjects.
- Gale EbooksSearch encyclopedias and reference books from various publishers in many subjects, including art, biography, business, cultural studies, education, the environment, history, religion, science, and social science.
- Oxford Handbooks OnlineOxford Handbooks contain peer-reviewed scholarly review articles in Archaeology, Business and Management, Classical Studies, Criminology and Criminal Justice, Economics and Finance, History, Law, Linguistics, Literature, Music, Philosophy, Political Science, Psychology, and Religion. Included are classic works of scholarship along with newly-published works. Each handbook offers a critical survey of the current state of scholarship in a particular field of study. Individual articles by leading scholars review key issues and major debates, and discuss how those debates might evolve.
- Oxford Reference OnlineContains 100 language and subject dictionaries and other reference works, and searches across these resources. Limited to 5 simultaneous users.
- Sage KnowledgeSearches all library subscriptions from Sage Publishing including scholarly monographs, reference works, handbooks, series, professional development titles, and more.
- Biographical Dictionary of Central and Eastern Europe in the Twentieth Century byCall Number: eBookISBN: 9780765624628Publication Date: 2008Documents the lives of some two thousand of the region's most important twentieth century historical and cultural figures. Filled with information that is not available in any other resource, the dictionary covers Albania, Belarus, Bulgaria, the Czech and Slovak Republics, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania and Moldova, Ukraine, and the countries that made up Yugoslavia.
- Encyclopedia of Eastern Europe: From the Congress of Vienna to the Fall of Communism byCall Number: Quarto DJK6 .E53 2000 (Wilson Reference)ISBN: 0815300921Publication Date: 2000
- Historical Dictionaries of EuropeBook series of historical dictionaries covering nation-states of Europe. All contain well-written brief histories of the country and chronologies that, though they cover historical time periods, heavily feature more recent events. Brief A-Z entries cover the main people, politics, social issues, foreign affairs, institutions, and policies that make the country unique. Extensive bibliographies are divided into several general subject areas
- WikipediaCiting Wikipedia is generally not acceptable for research papers, however, it is a great starting point to get background information and can lead to scholarly sources. Also, see Academic Use of Wikipedia
Primary Sources
What are primary sources?
They are sources which provide first-hand testimony or direct evidence concerning a topic under investigation. They present original thinking, report a discovery, or share new information.
They are created by witnesses or recorders who experienced the events or conditions being documented. They are from the time period involved and have not been filtered through subsequent interpretation or evaluation.
Examples: autobiographies, letters, diaries, musical scores, works of art, speeches, recordings, photographs, articles in newspapers that describe events.
Finding Primary Sources in the UMN Libraries Catalog:
Using the UMN Libraries Catalog, enter as a SUBJECT search the name of the individual, group, or term for the topic, plus a term of what you're looking for, such as "Speeches", "Correspondence", "Diaries", "Personal Narratives", and "Sources". The term "Sources" refers to a collection of primary source materials. Here are some examples:
- "Gorbachev" and "Speeches"
- "Jews" "Czechoslovakia" "Diaries" (this would include diaries of Jews from other periods of German history but you can narrow this down by looking at the records
- "Poland" "History" "Sources"
- To search for autobiographies, search the person as both an AUTHOR and SUBJECT and the term "biography" as a SUBJECT. For example: "Dubcek" as SUBJECT; "Dubcek" as AUTHOR; and "biography" as SUBJECT.
- Socialism on Film: The Cold War and International PropagandaThis collection of films from the communist world reveals war, history, current affairs, culture and society as seen through the socialist lens. It spans most of the twentieth century and covers countries such as the USSR, Vietnam, China, Korea, much of Eastern Europe, the GDR, Britain and Cuba.
- EuropeanaSingle access point to millions of artworks, artefacts, books, films and music from European museums, galleries, libraries and archives.
- Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS) Daily Reports This link opens in a new windowFBIS Daily Reports issued by the U.S. Government. Translations ofbroadcasts, news agency transmissions, newspapers, periodicals, and government statements from nations around the world from 1941 to 1996.
- EuroDocs: Online Sources for European HistoryLinks to European primary historical documents that are transcribed, reproduced in facsimile, or translated. Video, sound files, maps, photographs and other imagery, databases, and other documentation are also available.
- European History Primary SourcesIndex of scholarly digital repositories that contain primary sources for the history of Europe.
- Historical News SourcesGuide to getting articles from The New York Times, and other newspapers
- All Primary Source DatabasesList of all primary source databases available to University of Minnesota students, faculty, and staff.
Scholarly Articles
Click "view online," "PDF," or the button to connect to the full text if we have it. The will also indicate whether a print copy is held in the Libraries. If not available, request the item via Interlibrary Loan.
- ABSEEES Online (American Bibliography of Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies)Search for journal articles and book reviews on East-Central Europe, Russia, Soviet Union and the former Soviet republics, with a vast collection of indexed sources published in the United States, Canada and some European countries.
- Academic Search PremierA great place to start your research on any topic, search multidisciplinary, scholarly research articles. This database provides access to scholarly and peer reviewed journals, popular magazines and other resources. View this tutorial to learn how to go from a general idea to a very precise set of results of journal articles and scholarly materials.
- ATLA Religion Database with ATLASerialsThe American Theological Library Association (ATLA) Religion Database lists journal articles, book reviews, and collections of essays in all fields of religion. Some listings link to full text of articles.
- Central and Eastern European Online LibrarySpecialized and comprehensive collection of full text indexed documents in the fields of Humanities and Social Science publications from and about Central, Eastern and Southeastern Europe in Russian, Eastern European/Slavic, English and other languages.
- EconLitContains bibliographic citations and selected abstracts to the professional and scholarly literature in the field of economics and allied disciplines.
- Historical AbstractsFind journal articles covering world history from 1450 to the present. Limited to 6 simultaneous users.
- JSTORFind full text articles in academic journals or books on the arts, humanities, social sciences, and sciences. JSTOR provides articles from the journal's first issue. In some cases the most recent 2-5 years may not be available. View this tutorial to learn how to go from a general idea to a very precise set of results of journal articles and scholarly materials.
- Sociological AbstractsThis core database for the field of sociology contains information on sociology and social policy worldwide. Sociological Abstracts includes citations from the 1952-present. It provides abstracting and indexing of articles and book reviews drawn from thousands of journal publications, plus books, book chapters, dissertations, conference papers, and working papers.
- Women's Studies InternationalThis database is a compilation of ten databases covering journal articles, books, anthology chapters, and reports for feminist writings from 1972 to the present.
- Worldwide Political Science AbstractsThe database provides citations, abstracts, and indexing of the international serials literature in political science and its complementary fields, including international relations, law, and public administration & public policy from1975 to the present.
- Libraries SearchSearch the University of Minnesota Libraries to find books, scholarly journal articles, news, magazines, media, and other items in the University's collection. View this tutorial to learn how to go from a general idea to a very precise set of results of journal articles and scholarly materials.
Useful Books on Eastern Europe
- Long Awaited West: Eastern Europe since 1944 byCall Number: eBookISBN: 9780253030207Publication Date: 2017
- The Routledge Companion to Central and Eastern Europe since 1919 byCall Number: DJK48.5 .W43 2008(Wilson)ISBN: 9780415445627Publication Date: 2008
Tips for Using Libraries Search and Catalog
Libraries Search will search many article databases, the UMN Library Catalog and other resources. But it doesn't search everything. You may want to search subject specific article databases to find more articles and for more search options. .
The UMN Library Catalog searches books, journals, DVDs, other formats but NOT articles.
You don't need to input diacritics or worry about capitalization. Searching "dubcek" will bring up "Dubček."
To limit by language, format, or subject, use the limits on the right after performing a search in Libraries Search.
One of the most effective ways to search for items on a country, city, or region is to do a subject browse search. Input the geographic place name and browse through the list of subtopics.
Besides searching "Europe, Eastern," you may want to search under specific countries, cities, or regions.
You can also perform a subject browse for a topic or group related to a particular country or place. Search under the group or topic and then the place name (e.g. "women poland").
Citing your sources (e.g. MLA, APA, etc.)
- Citation Managers (e.g. Zotero, EndNote Online, etc.)Citation managers are software packages used to create personalized databases of citation information and notes. They allow you to: import and organize citation information from article indexes and other sources; save links to pdfs and other documents; format citations for your papers and bibliographies using APA and many other styles; and include your own notes.
Many article databases (e.g. Academic Search Premier, Google Scholar) will create a citation for you. After you found the item, look for "cite" or "quotes." Here are examples:
In Google Scholar:
In Academic Search Premier:
- Chicago Manual of Style OnlineThis resource provides online access to the latest edition of The Chicago Manual of Style, which covers a variety of topics from manuscript preparation and publication to grammar, usage, and citation formating. The citation quick guide covers both the author-date and the notes and bibliography systems.
- Citation and research help (from Purdue OWL)Examples and instructions for how to cite many types of materials in MLA, APA, Chicago, and AMA styles.
Learn more about on annotated bibliographies
Annotated Bibliography from UW-Madison
An annotated bibliography is an organized list of sources, each of which is followed by a brief note or “annotation.”
- How to write an annotated bibliographyLearn more about annotated bibliographies.
- Writing Evaluative Annotated BibliographiesThis chapter includes useful questions to guide you in writing annotations for an annotated bibliography.