Reference sources are a group of resources including dictionaries, encyclopedias, and fact books. They cover definitions of subject-specific vocabulary, provide general overviews of a topic, and answer quick facts. They may also suggest sources for further reading.
Reference material can be designed for general audiences or for specialists on a subject.
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Books provide in-depth coverage of a topic and, since they are longer, they provide a big-picture view. They may be targeted at general audiences or experts. Since the book publication process takes time, information is not the most up to date, especially for fast-changing fields, like the sciences.
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Reconstruction by
There are few periods in American history more consquential but less understood than Reconstruction, the tumultuous twelve years after Appomattox, when the battered nation sought to reconstitute itself and confront the legacy of two centuries of slavery. This Library of America anthology brings together more than one hundred contemporary letters, diary entries, interviews, petitions, testimonies, and newspaper and magazine articles by well-known figures--Frederick Douglass, Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, Andrew Johnson, Thaddeus Stevens, Ulysses S. Grant, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Mark Twain, Albion TourgUe--as well as by dozens of ordinary men and women, black and white, northern and southern, to tell the story of our nation's first attempt to achieve racial equality. Through their eyes readers experience the fierce contest between President Andrew Johnson and the Radical Republicans resulting in the nation's first presidential impeachment; the adoption of the revolutionary Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments; the first achievements of black political power; and the murderous terrorism of the Klan and other groups that, combined with northern weariness, indifference, and hostility, eventually resulted in the restoration of white supremacy in the South. Throughout, Americans confront the essential questions left unresolved by the defeat of secession- What system of labor would replace slavery, and what would become of the southern plantations? Would the war end in the restoration of a union of sovereign states, or in the creation of a truly national government? What would citizenship mean after emancipation, and what civil rights would the freed people gain? Would suffrage be extended to African American men, and to all women?
The American West by
Part geographical location, part time period, and part state of mind, the American West is a concept often invoked but rarely defined. Though popular culture has carved out a short and specific time and place for the region, author and longtime Californian Stephen Aron tracks "the West" fromthe building of the Cahokia Mounds around 900 AD to the post-World War II migration to California. His Very Short Introduction stretches the chronology, enlarges the geography, and varies the casting, providing a history of the American West that is longer, larger, and more complicated than popularculture has previously suggested. It is a history of how portions of North America became Wests, how parts of these became American, and how ultimately American Wests became the American West.Aron begins by describing the expansion of Indian North America in the centuries before and during its early encounters with Europeans. He then explores the origins of American westward expansion from the Seven Years' War to the 1830s, focusing on the western frontier at the time: the territorybetween the Appalachian Mountains and the Mississippi River. He traces the narrative - temporally and geographically - through the discovery of gold in California in the mid-nineteenth century and the subsequent rush to the Pacific Slope. He shows how the passage of the Newlands Reclamation Act in1902 brought an unprecedented level of federal control to the region, linking the West more closely to the rest of the United States, and how World War II brought a new rush of population (particularly to California), further raising the federal government's profile in the region and heightening theconnections between the West and the wider world. Authoritative, lucid, and ranging widely over issues of environment, people, and identity, this is the American West stripped of its myths. The complex convergence of peoples, polities, and cultures that has decisively shaped the history of the American West serves as the key interpretive threadthrough this Very Short Introduction.ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, andenthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.
Scholarly journal articles are written by experts to further the research of their academic field. They consist primarily of new research, though they can include literature reviews, editorials, some news, and reviews of books and products that scholars might use.
Since the target audience for scholarly articles is academics (including undergraduates, in many cases), they are often narrow in focus and presume the reader is already familiar with the topic. Most scholarly journals practice peer review, where an article is not published until it has been approved by multiple experts on that topic.
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Professional, or trade, journals are similar to news sources or magazines, but are focused on a specific industry, business, or profession. Unlike scholarly journals, they are targeted to practitioners rather than researchers and are usually not peer reviewed. For example, a professional education journal would be aimed towards teachers and school administrators, rather than education researchers.
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Magazines are usually a mix of short news, investigative news articles, longer articles that provide analysis or context, and/or opinion pieces. Some magazines are very broad in coverage, while others focus on specific topics or interests. Magazines are not peer reviewed nor considered scholarly. Many blogs replicate the mix of content that characterizes magazines.
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News sources cover current events. They tend to be more focused on the details rather than the big picture, though they will provide some overview information. Some news sources feature detailed investigative reporting. They can be delivered in a wide variety of formats, such as in print, online, television, and radio programs.
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176 Central Drive
Cullowhee, NC 28723
Administration: 828-227-7485
Reference: 828-227-7465
Circulation: 828-227-7485
