About Campus Libraries

Nearly three dozen libraries, located in over a score of sites, support the University’s academic and professional programs. Campus libraries have more than three hundred staff, and their combined holdings exceed 5,000,000 volumes, 4,000,000 microforms, 2,000,000 printed government publications, 16,000,000 manuscripts, hundreds of thousands of audiovisuals, maps and photographs, and thousands of electronic titles. In terms of subject scope, campus libraries cover most areas of the fine arts, biomedical and physical sciences, humanities, law, and social sciences.

The online catalog lists most of the materials in the libraries’ collections. Its coverage of holdings varies, however, by type of material and from one library to another. Users can find items not yet in the online catalog by consulting the card catalogs, special files, and printed guides in the individual libraries.

In addition to providing users with an array of informational, instructional, and research resources, the libraries offer a wide range of campus-wide reference and referral services, many of which are now available remotely via the Internet or campus computer networks. Through cooperative agreements users also have access to additional collections and services available from nearby libraries, particularly the Triangle Research Libraries Network (TRLN), composed of UNC–Chapel Hill, North Carolina State University, North Carolina Central University, and Duke University.

The main library system consists of Walter Royal Davis Library, the central library that principally serves the humanities and social sciences; the House Undergraduate Library that includes the major reserve reading materials and nonprint and audiovisual collection; Louis Round Wilson Library, a special collections facility that includes the manuscripts, maps, and rare book collections and the North Carolina collection and gallery; and nearly a dozen branches covering art, astronomy, botany, chemistry, city and regional planning, computer science, geological sciences, information and library science, mathematics, marine sciences, music, operations research, physics, public administration, statistics, and zoology.

The Health Sciences Library, the Kathrine R. Everett Law Library , and several independent libraries, including the Carolina Population Center, Grant Source Library, Highway Safety Research Center, Institute for Research in Social Science Data Archive, Journalism and Mass Communication Library, Occupational Information Library, and Sociology and Political Science Reading Room, complete the campus network. In support of the University’s mission of service to the people of the state and the nation, every campus library is open to all users.