Campus library collections about Africa cover almost all subjects and probably rank among the top twenty universities in the country. The libraries acquire resources at the instructional and basic research level on the entire continent for all topics covered by the Department of African and Afro-American Studies, Institute of African American Research, Sonja Haynes Stone Center for Black Culture and History, and other academic units on campus. These collections also serve as a resource for the citizens of North Carolina.

Library holdings related to African Studies are strong for contemporary politics (particularly democratization), economic development, ethnicity and race, ethnographic studies, folklore, francophone literature, gender/women, history (especially European exploration/colonization), slavery (particularly the Atlantic slave trade), and social movements. Collections for population/demography (including migration) are among the most extensive found anywhere in the world. The libraries acquire English-language books and periodicals (including e-journals) comprehensively and foreign-language materials selectively; they also provide access to the major databases. Campus libraries have in-depth collections for the francophone and lusophone countries of sub-Saharan Africa. Their coverage of North Africa has been limited to materials in Western languages, with Arabic-language holdings lmiited tof reference titles such as statistical compendia, dictionaries, and grammars. Beginning in 2002, the libraries have established a limited acquisitions program for Arabic titles in history and literature.

The Walter Royal Davis Library houses the major collections and services for African Studies, covering all the humanities and social sciences. With the exception of most older government documents and individual titles in large microform collections, nearly all library holdings are in the online catalog. In addition to comprehensive general and reference collections, Davis Library also has important specialized resources related to Africa in its geographic information systems service and government information resources and microforms collections.

The Media Resources Center, located in the House Undergraduate Library, complements Davis Library with its audiovisual resources for Africa. The Art Library and the Music Library collect materials related to Africa in these respective fields.

For specialized research materials dealing with specific countries, UNC libraries divide responsibility with Duke University libraries except for population/demography. As can be seen on the attached country listing and map, Duke is primarily responsible for the British Commonwealth countries as well as for religion generally (especially American and European missionary activity). Their coordinated acquisitions profile for African publications provides greater detail on coverage breakdowns of imprints from the continent.

The libraries' membership in the Center for Research Libraries provides users with additional collections of specialized materials, particularly foreign dissertations and government publications, books and periodicals not in English, newspapers published in Africa, and large microform and reprint sets.