Review of Database: America, History and Life

Posted on by admin
Database America: History and Life. Picture taken by author.

This is a review of the database America: History and Life. The following information has been collected from the database homepage, search page, and parent company page.

  •  Overview:
    • This database, America: History and Life, is hosted on EBSCO which is a corporation focused on providing access to research databases, journals, and other online, academic content. For a brief history of EBSCO, please click here. However, the contents of the database is owned by ABC-CLIO, an academic reference publishing company. There company about page can be found here.
    • Full text of 280 journals and 80 books that include indexing of 1,800 journals that range between the late 19th century to the present. More on the statistics can be found here.
    • Regarding search options, the advanced search feature is the first feature displayed. One is able to search with AND and OR search limiting factors. Moreover, this database allows for one to search based on publication year, type, and discipline. Simply, EBSCO has created a great search home page. However, newer researchers may feel daunted by the advanced search options; therefore, one is able to select “Basic Search” under the search bar. Click here for “advanced search” and click here for “basic search”. Next, there is also a text prediction algorithm within the search bar. Meaning, the database will predict words to help with correct spelling. Lastly, this database provides a “Search History” tab that allows for one to revert back to a previous search. This is helpful when creation a search log during a research project.
    • Moreover,  there no mission statement on the immediate database website that testifies to the digitization on the contents of the database. One is only able to find a general mission statement on the company’s parent website.
  • Facts:
    • Date range: 1863-Present
      • This is an ongoing database, continually updated.
    • Publisher: EBSCO or the Elton B. Stephens Company.
    • Publisher About: Page Link.
    • Object Type: Academic Journals
    • Location of Original Materials: In various journal domains. America: History and Life displays a collection of journals and other materials from subsidiarity journals and academic presses. In many cases, these journals produce both hard and soft copy prints.
    • Exportable Image: Yes, users are able to download digital content from the database.
    • Facsimile Image: N/A
    • Full Text Searchable: Yes, the database allow for specific, keyword searching within each journal entry.
    • Titles List Link (subject):  https://www.ebscohost.com/titleLists/31h-subject.htm.
    • Title List Link (covering): https://www.ebscohost.com/titleLists/31h-coverage.htm.
  • History / Provenance: Original catalog?; Digitized from microfilm?; Original sources
    • History: This is a database with collections of journals from the US and Canada. These are literature journals pertaining to studies in the humanities. A vast majority of the original journals were printed in English; however, they are translated into 41 languages. The University of Delaware has provided a brief commentary on the database: https://library.udel.edu/databases/ahl/.
    • Original Catalog: It it possible to contact the content owner of the database, contact site. The content owner is ABC-CLIO. One could also contact the content hosting company, EBSCO here.
    • Microfilm: No
    • Original Sources: The original sources are edited and produced by subsidiarity journal and publication companies. Moreover, these original sources are produced by academic scholars, and the manuscripts are retained by the publisher.
  • Reviews
    • While this database contains thousands of articles, journals, conference papers, books, and magazines, it does provide an easy to use “advanced search” option. However, one would have to be well-versed in database research to understand tools like proximity searching. Simply, this database must be used in the “advanced searched” setting in order to find any meaningful objects.
    • In critique, this database does not allow one to limit searches by “peer-reviewed” statues. Although one is able to limit the publisher, one has dig into each article to see if it has been peer-reviewed. Some libraries are adding this function to their search parameters. George Mason University in Fairfax, VA offers researcher the option of limiting searched to academic, peer-reviewed journals and books.
  • Access
    • Pricing: This database can be accessed through one’s educational institution. For individual users, pricing is done on a request only basis. Furthermore, one may be able to access the database by using a local networked computer at a public library. I have attached a link here  of the New York Public Library, one is able to use library computers for database access.

  • Info from Publisher
  • Citing
    • The database does offer a citation help to its users. Once one has selected a journal article for review, a tool bar will appear on the right side of the screen. Within this tool bar one is able to select citation and then proceed to select what type of citation is required. See below for an image of this tool bar:

      Tool Bar. Picture taken by author.
css.php