Religious Studies Collections

Collecting Goals	Government Information	News Collections	UNC Web Sites
Reference Collections	Media Collections	Special Collections	Other Web Sites
Electronic Collections	Microform Collections	Related Collections	Library Contacts
General Collections			Faculty Library Liaison

Collecting Goals:

The religious studies collections support teaching and research at the undergraduate and graduate levels in the Department of Religious Studies and in other departments and programs at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. They also serve as a resource for the people of the State. The collections are particularly strong in the areas of specialization within the Department: American religions, ancient Mediterranean religions, history of religions, medieval and early modern studies, and religion and culture.

Reference Collections:

The library has extensive reference materials to support Religious Studies. Access to many of the major abstracting and indexing tools is available online, notably the ATLA Religion Database, the Alphabetical Subject Index and Index Encyclopedia to Periodical Articles on Religion, and the Index Islamicus. Printed works are located primarily in the Reference Department of Davis Library. E-Reference materials are a good place to begin work in religious studies, while subject guides and tutorials invite exploration in depth in selected areas. For further information about reference materials or help using them, please consult the Reference staff.

Electronic Collections:

The Library provides online access to tens of thousands of retrospective titles that are important to the study of religion. They include the Patrologia Latina Database, which contains the texts of the Latin Fathers from Tertullian (A.D. 200) to the death of Pope Innocent III in 1216. The Online Medieval & Classical Library has a large collection of classical and medieval texts in English. Early English Books Online (EEBO) and The Eighteenth Century Collection Online (ECCO) collectively cover 250,000 works published in the British Isles between 1475 and 1800. Early American Imprints I (Evans) and II (Shaw-Shoemaker) contain 75,000 items published in North America between 1639 and 1819. UNC Library's own digitization project, Documenting the American South, focuses on Southern religion in "The Church in the Southern Black Community." Other significant databases are the Bible in English (990-1970), the King James Bible, and the Patrologia Latina Database. Information about electronic journals related to religious studies is available on a collected list. However, the best way to find information about individual electronic serials is to enter a title search on the Library's "E-Journal Finder" web page. For further information about these titles or help using them, please consult the Reference staff. To request a database or serial, please contact the West European Bibliographer.

General Collections:

The religious studies collections support the study of the world's religions as historical and cultural phenomena, particularly the history, sacred texts, beliefs, rituals, and institutions of various religious traditions. Because the religious studies programs are relatively new at the graduate level, the general collections do not have the same breadth and depth as those for other disciplines. However, religious studies fields whose resources overlap with other programs in the humanities and social sciences benefit from their materials and are much stronger: American religions, ancient Mediterranean religions, history of religions, medieval and early modern studies, and religion and culture. The Library has begun to acquire materials for Islamic studies more recently but is committed to developing the collections in that field. A list of current print subscriptions in the discipline is available. For further information on these topics or to request a title, please consult the West European Bibliographer.

Government Information:

Campus libraries provide online access to the major index and abstracting databases for government information, notably the GPO Monthly Catalog (GPO), which contains more than 450,000 records for all types of government documents printed by the US government. Major full-text and statistical databases are also available, including LexisNexis Congressional, which is a comprehensive source of current and historical bills, testimony, and reports from the US Congress going back to the founding of the republic in 1789. The Documents Section located in the Reference Department of Davis Library holds over three million print and microfilm items from the federal government, U.S. states, and international intergovernmental organizations, such as the United Nations and World Bank. Foreign government printed documents are housed in the Davis stacks. For further information about government publications or help using them, please consult the Documents Staff. Online information about North Carolina is available through NC Information Resources, while the North Carolina Collection has the most complete holdings of printed documents for the state. The Law Library contains extensive electronic and paper collections of federal and state legal publications, such as codes and statutes.

Media Collections:

The Media Resources Center in the House Undergraduate Library contains more than 12,000 feature and documentary films, hundreds of screenplays, popular music, a growing collection of audio books, and other materials of potential interest to faculty and students in religious studies. The Ellen-Fairbanks D. Bodman Collection of Middle Eastern and Islamic World Films, in particular, is one of the most comprehensive collections of films on the Middle East and Islamic World found in the United States. For further information about this collection, please consult the Media Resources Librarian.

Microform Collections:

The Microform Reading Room has a number of manuscript and archival titles of potential interest to faculty and students in religious studies. For further information about microforms or help using them, please consult the Reference staff. To request a title, please contact the West European Bibliographer.

News Collections:

Current newspapers arrive daily in the Periodicals Reading Room. The Library acquires at least one print newspaper and microform backfile from each of the major regions of the country, with emphasis on the Southeast. It also subscribes to more than 40 foreign newspapers from Europe, Latin America, Russia, Eastern Europe, and China to support academic programs in those areas and provide their perspectives on this country. To request a title, please contact the Humanities Bibliographer.

Special Collections:

The Special Collections departments of the Library contain valuable materials for the study of religion, particularly in the American South. The Manuscripts Collection houses the Southern Historical Collection (SHC), which contains 15,000,000 items organized in more than 4,600 discrete collections that include unique primary documents covering the eighteenth- through the twentieth-century South. The SHC offers strong documentation of all periods of southern history since the late eighteenth century. Subject strengths include religion and religious communities. For further information, please contact the Manuscripts Department.

The North Carolina Collection has unmatched resources for the study of the culture and history of the State. It holds over a quarter of a million printed items and more than a half million photographs and artifacts documenting the history and literature of North Carolina and its people. The collection spans the entire range of the State's written history, from 16th-century accounts by European explorers to present-day histories, novels, and newspapers. For further information, please consult the reference staff of the North Carolina Collection.

The Rare Book Collection in Wilson Library holds The Southern Pamphlet Collection, which contains 10,718 pamphlets, brochures, and broadsides dating from 1820 to the present. They cover a broad range of subjects within the general context of the American South, including religion and churches. For further information, please consult the Curator of the Rare Book Collection.

Related Collections:

Collections in anthropology, history, philosophy, and sociology extend the religious studies collections. The Divinity School Library at Duke University has one of the best collections of primary sources and secondary literature on religion and religious studies in the country and enriches the UNC collections significantly. Users can therefore expect to find most of the resources they need in the area. The Center for Research Libraries supplements local library holdings with additional microform collections related to religious studies, particularly foreign dissertations and government publications, books and periodicals in languages other than English, newspapers published abroad, ethnic newspapers published in North America, and large microform sets (especially for foreign area studies). UNC faculty and students can request unlimited amounts of materials from CRL via the web and keep them indefinitely, or until another person needs them. For further information, please consult the West European Bibliographer.