Library Terms

Ever feel that the library staff are speaking a different language? We are! Here are the meanings of some terms you might hear used at the library.

Note: words or terms that have links to their definitions look like this: article.

A

A summary of an article. An abstract often appears at the beginning of a scholarly or technical article. Databases and indexes often contain abstracts that can help you decide whether an article is relevant for your purposes. Examples include Chemical Abstracts and Psychological Abstracts.

A book with lists, charts and tables of factual and statistical information. Example: The World Almanac and Book of Facts

Annotation is extra information associated with a particular point in a document.

Most commonly this is used for example in draft documents, where another reader has written notes about the quality of a document at a certain point, “in the margin”.

The term marginalia is used to refer to annotations made in books.

annotated bibliography

A list of sources giving information about each and adding a short description of the item. In some bibliographies the annotation merely describes the content and scope of the item listed; in others the annotation also evaluates its quality.

A collection of writings compiled into a book.

In a journal, magazine, or newspaper, an article is a piece of writing or essay on a topic.

Athena is the product name for the software that runs our catalog. When we say we are "searching Athena" what we mean is we are searching the online catalog.

An audio recording of a person reading a book, story, or other written text. People can listen to audiobooks on cassette tape or compact disc (CD).

B

The 14 digit number that is on the back of your library card and on all library materials.

bibliography

(1) A list of sources, usually appearing at the end of a research paper, an article, a book, or a chapter in a book that documents evidence used in the work and points out sources that might be useful for further research. Each entry provides enough information about each source so that a reader can track it down.
(2) A list of recommended readings on a given topic, usually sorted into sub-categories.

Three or more overdue items, returned mail, or unpaid fines can result in a temporary suspension of library privileges. This is called "a block on your library card."

Contact any staff member for more information.

A book is a collection of leaves of paper, parchment or other material, bound together along one edge within covers. A book is also a literary work or a main division of such a work. A book produced in electronic format is known as an e-book.

In library and information science, a book is called a monograph to distinguish it from serial publications such as magazines, journals or newspapers.

(1) A function in a Web browser that allows users to mark frequently visited Web sites for easy accessibility. When a site is bookmarked, the site's URL is added to a list that the user can return to later.
(2) A tag used in a Web page that links directly to a part of the Web page.

Boolean operators

The words and, or, and not used in databases or search engines to relate the contents of two or more sets of data in different ways. When sets are combined with and, the resulting set contains only those items that are found in all the sets. When or is used, the resulting set includes all items from all sets. Not is used to exclude items in one set from the combination of sets.

C

call number

The letter and number combination that indicates where a book is kept on a library's shelves. Call numbers are assigned using a system that locates books on the same subject next to each other for easy browsing. Most academic libraries use the Library of Congress Classification; public libraries typically use the Dewey Decimal Classification.

cassette tape

The compact audio cassette audio storage medium was introduced by Philips in 1963. It consists of a length of magnetic tape inside a protective plastic shell. 4 tracks are available on the tape, giving 2 stereo tracks—one for playing with the cassette inserted with its 'A' side up, and the other with the 'B' side up, thus mimicking gramophone records.

A database containing information about the materials owned by a library and their location. Most catalogs are now computerized, though a library may have all or part of its catalog on cards. Catalogs can usually be searched by author, title, subject heading, or keyword and provide a basic description of the item (book, journal title, video, or other) and a call number.

A compact disc (or CD) is an optical disc used for storing digital data (usually audio). It was originally invented for digital audio and is also used as a data storage device, a CD-ROM. In general, audio CDs are distinct from CD-ROMs, and CD players intended for listening to audio cannot make sense of the data on a CD-ROM.

The CD-ROM (an abbreviation for "Compact Disc Read-Only Memory" (ROM) ) is a non-volatile optical data storage medium using the same physical format as audio compact discs (CDs), readable by a computer with a CD-ROM drive.

circulation desk

A desk or counter at the front of each library where you borrow, renew or return library materials.

A reference to a book, article, Web page, or other source that provides enough information to allow a reader to retrieve the source. Citations in a paper must be given in a standard format (such as MLA, APA, Chicago, CBE, or another citation and documentation style).

citation trail

A process used by researchers to track down additional sources on a topic. The tracing of citations to reference works is sometimes referred to as following the path of a "citation trail" or "citation network."

(1) As a verb, to provide a reference to a source.
(2) As a noun, a shortened form of citation.

This term is frequently misused when referring to Web sites.

In common usage, a collection is any group of items that has one or more properties in common. For example, books in a library, paintings from the same artist, or coins from Germany before 1900.

A regular article: an item in a newspaper or magazine that is always written by the same person, or is always about the same subject.

Comics is an art form using a series of static images in fixed sequence. Written text is often incorporated into the images. The two most common forms of comics are comic strips (as appear in newspapers) and comic books (also popularly called manga when referring to Japanese comic books). Large volumes or collections of comic books are often termed graphic novels.

controlled vocabulary

Descriptive words added to the items in a database that make it easier for researchers to find works on a particular topic. When compilers of a database decide on which words to use in these descriptions (called descriptors or subject headings), they control the vocabulary users of the database will use. Researchers will retrieve more items searching with controlled vocabulary than they will using synonyms.

A copyright provides its holder the right to restrict unauthorized copying and reproduction of an original expression (i.e. literary work, movie, music, painting, software, mask work, etc.). Copyright stands in contrast to other forms of intellectual property, such as patents, which grant a monopoly right to the use of an invention, because it is not a monopoly right to do something, merely a right to prevent others doing it.

corporate author

An organization, an agency, an institution, or a corporation identified as an author of a work. Corporate authors are listed as authors in a citation.

cross-reference

A direction to reader to look elsewhere: a note, especially one printed in a book, index, or card catalog, that tells a reader to look in another specified place for information.

D

A collection of data organized for retrieval. Inlibraries, databases usually contain references to sources retrievable by a variety of means. Databases may contain bibliographic citations, descriptive abstracts, full-text documents, or a combination.

Dewey Decimal Classification

The Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC, also called the Dewey Decimal System) is a system of library classification developed by Melvil Dewey (1851-1931) in 1876, and since greatly modified and expanded in the course of twenty major revisions.

descriptors

Terms assigned by indexers of a database to describe the subject content of a document. For example, the PsycLit database uses academic achievement as a descriptor to help researchers locate texts on the subject of scholastic achievement or grade-point average. Descriptors are chosen so that all of the work on that topic can be found with a single word or phrase, even though there may be many different ways of expressing the same idea.

An academic field of study such as history, psychology, or biology. Often books and articles published by members of a discipline intended for other scholars are called the literature of the discipline—referring not to literary expression but to research publications in the field.

A document is a writing that contains information.

Traditionally, the medium of a document was paper and the information was applied to it as ink either by hand (to make a hand-written document) or by a mechanical process (like a printing press, or a laser printer).

An elemental and rough plan of a document, such as a manuscript or a piece of official government legislation. Important and lengthy documents often go through several drafts, becoming successivelly more refined at each stage until the final publishable product is produced.

DVD is an optical disc storage media format that is used for playback of movies with high video and sound quality and for storing data. A DVD disc is similar in appearance to a compact disc.

E

A short statement placed at the end of a text (such as a book article). They may be numbered, or referenced by some other conventional system. Endnotes are often of a bibliographic nature, in which case they may be referenced by the author's name and date of publication. This is the original meaning of “endnote”

encyclopedia

An encyclopedia (alternatively encyclopædia) is a written compendium of human knowledge.

The term comes from the Greek words enkyklios paideia ("in a circle of instruction").

A short nonfiction prose piece: a short analytical, descriptive, or interpretive piece of literary or journalistic prose dealing with a particular topic, especially from a personal and unsystematic viewpoint.

F

A limited set of exemptions to copyright law. Copyright law protects authors and other owners of intellectual property so their expression of ideas cannot be copied by others without payment. Some exemptions to these protections are allowed under law for limited reproduction of texts for educational purposes.

Fiction is the term used to describe works of information created from the imagination. This is in contrast to non-fiction, which makes factual claims about reality. Fictional works—books, pictures, stories, fairy tales, fables, films, comics, interactive fiction—may be partly based on factual occurrences but always contain some imaginary content.

A particular area, as in a record in a database, in which the same type of information is regularly recorded. A field in an article database may contain the titles of articles, for example, while another field may contain the names of journals the articles are in. Some search engines allow a user to limit a search to one or more specific fields.

A footnote is a reference which leads readers to other works. A footnote is usually flagged in the main text in the form of a superscript number¹—superscript 1 for the first footnote on a note, superscript 2 for the second footnote on the page, etc. Sometimes a number of regular height and position, demarcated by brackets or parentheses, is used instead [2].

All of a page's footnote numbers lead to bibliographical information at the bottom of the page, each source prefixed by its linked number.

Complete documents from databases and Web sites. Some databases run searches through full-text documents; others search only the citation or abstract. In some cases researchers can set their own preferences.

Illustrations or diagrams may be omitted from a full-text document.

G

graphic novel: A graphic novel is a novel or novella done in the medium of comics. It is typically a long-form work rather than a short publication such as an individual comic book, analogous to a novel rather than a short story. A graphic novel need not be a complete work unto itself, much as some novels are merely installments of an even longer work.

H

hits: The list of results called up by a search of a database or the Internet.
hold: See placing a hold.
holdings: The exact items a library owns. The term is most typically used to refer to the specific issues of a magazine or journal in a library. This information is often listed in a library's catalog as a holdings statement.
HTML: HyperText Markup Language (HTML) is a markup language designed for creating Web pages, that is, information presented on the World Wide Web. Defined as a simple “application” of SGML, which is used by organizations with complex publishing requirements, HTML is now an Internet standard maintained by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C)
hyperlink: In hypertext, a hyperlink, i.e. a provision for moving from one Web page to another.
hypertext: In computing, a hypertext system is one for displaying information that contains references (called hyperlinks) to other information on the system, and for easily publishing, updating and searching for the information. The most well-known hypertext system is the World Wide Web.

I

(1) In a book, the alphabetical listing of topics and the pages on which information on them can be found. The index is located at the back of the book.
(2) A publication that lists articles or other publications by topic.
(3) An alphabetical listing of elements that can be found in a database.

Also known as the Connecticut Digital Library. A rich array of electronic information databases including ReQuest, the statewide library catalog.

In the general sense, an internet (with a lowercase "i", a shortened form of the original inter-network) is a computer network that connects several networks. As a proper noun, the Internet is the publicly available internationally interconnected system of computers (plus the information and services they provide to their users) that uses the TCP/IP suite of packet switching communications protocols. Thus, the largest internet is called simply "the" Internet. The art of connecting networks in this way is called internetworking..

The International Standard Book Numbering is a 10- or 13-digit system allowing publishers, libraries, and book dealers to identify books.

intellectual property

The expression of ideas defined by federal and international law as property. Though ideas themselves cannot be owned, the manner in which a particular author, film director, or other creator expresses ideas belongs to him or her and is protected by copyright law from unauthorized reproduction. Materials in the public domain are freely available. Those that are not in the public domain have stringent restrictions (called fair use) on how much of a work and under what circumstances copies can be made without payment to the owner.

interlibrary loan

A service which makes it possible to borrow from another library materials which The Levi E. Coe Library does not own.

Ask for more information about this service at the circulation desk.

J

journal: A publication containing articles that is issued at regular intervals. Journals are usually written for more specialized or scholarly audiences than magazines.

K

A word used to search a library database or the Internet. Keyword searches locate results by matching the search word to an item in the database or at the Internet site. For example, a search term using the keyword third world will find items with that exact term but may not include related items that use the term developing countries.

Keyword searches often search very broadly through many database fields. However, researchers who perform a keyword search using terms that are different from those used in the database will not retrieve all of the information in the database related to their topic. See also controlled vocabulary.

L

In its traditional sense, a library is a collection of books.

However, with the collection or invention of media other than books for storing information, many libraries are now repositories and/or access points for maps, prints or other artwork, microforms, audio tapes, CDs, video tapes and DVDs, and have facilities to use CD-ROM databases and the Internet.

Thus, modern libraries have been redefined as places to get access to information in any format, whether it is stored inside the building or not.

library card

A barcoded identification card that allows the holder to borrow materials from the issuing library or any libraries that will accept the card.

library catalog

Library of Congress

The Library of Congress, the national library of the United States, is one of the most important libraries in the world. Originally founded as a research library for the United States Congress April 24th 1800, its original collection were the books of former U.S. President Thomas Jefferson.

Library of Congress Classification

The Library of Congress Classification (LCC) is a system of library classification developed by the Library of Congress. It is used by most research and university libraries in the U.S. (and several other countries), although most public libraries continue to use the Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC).

library classification

A library classification is a system of coding and organizing library materials (books, serials, audiovisual materials, computer files, maps, manuscripts) according to their subject. A classification consists of tables of subject headings and classification schedules used to assign a class number to each item being classified, based on that item's subject.

licensed database

See subscription database.

Literature is literally “an acquaintance with letters” as in the first sense given in the Oxford English Dictionary; the term has, however, generally come to identify a collection of texts.

The word “literature” spelled with a lower-case “l” can refer to any form of writing, such as essays; while "Literature" spelled with an upper-case “L” may refer to a whole body of literary work, world-wide or relating to a specific culture.

literature review

A descriptive survey of research on a particular topic. Often articles include a literature review section to place their research in the context of other work in the field and to call readers' attention to related work. See also review article.

M

A publication containing articles that is issued at regular intervals. Magazines are generally written for general and popular audiences, are sold on newsstands or by subscription, and earn a part of their revenue through advertising.

The books, videos tapes, audiobooks, CDs, DVDs, magazines, and other items that the library has available for borrowing.

A manuscript (Latin manu scriptus, written by hand), strictly speaking, is any written document that is put down by hand, in contrast to being printed or reproduced some other way.

The physical material, such as paper, disk, tape, etc. used for storing information. Media is plural; medium is singular.

meta-search engine

A search engine that sends a request for information to several search engines and compiles the results.

Formats that reduce texts and reproduce them on plastic film that can be read on a special machine. Microfilm puts pages of text on a continuous strip of film; microfiche puts the pages on flat sheets of film.

A monograph is a scholarly book or a treatise on a single subject, class of subjects, or person. It is a one-time publication that is complete in itself. A more specific definition is a lengthy work on a particular subject or person, detailed in treatment and often containing bibliographies.

In library and information science, a monograph is a non-serial publication complete in one volume or a finite number of volumes. Thus it differs from a serial publication such as a magazine, journal or newspaper. It is what is commonly known as a book.

N

newsletter: A newsletter is a publication generally about one main subject or topic that is of interest to its subscribers. This publication is then sent out at different periods of time, to inform the subscriber about the requested topic.
newspaper: A newspaper is a lightweight and disposable periodical, usually printed on low-cost paper called newsprint, containing a journal of current news in a variety of topics. These topics can include political events, crime, sports, opinion, and weather.
non-fiction: Non-fiction writing is essays, articles and columns written about factual things. Those include personal journals, Web logs, Web sites, letters as well as books, articles and essays. This is in contrast to fiction, which makes no factual claims about reality.
novel: A novel is a long or extended work of fiction written in prose, usually in the form of a story. It is longer and more complex than a short story or novella, and it is not bound by the restrictions of plays and poetry.
novella: A novella is a piece of short prose fiction, derived from the Italian word for new.

O

online: Online means being connected to the Internet or another similar electronic network, like a bulletin board system. Some companies have online in their name, such as America Online. Although it sounds similar, online is not the same as on air. When one is online, one can receive and transmit information, whereas when one is on the air, one is broadcasting television or radio signals.
online catalog: See online and catalog.
OPAC (online public access catalog): See catalog.

P

peer review

A process during which a group of experts examine a document before it is published to determine whether it is worthy of publication. A peer review process—usually arranged so that the reviewers don't know who the author is—helps provide quality filters for journals and other publications. See also refereed publication.

A regularly published magazine, journal, newspaper, or newsletter.

periodical index

An index to articles in magazines, journals, newspapers, and newsletters. Many periodical indexes are available as electronic databases, though many electronic versions are limited to articles published in the last ten or twenty years. Print indexes often include all years of a periodical's publication.

placing a hold

When an item that you want is checked out to another reader, you can "place a hold" on it. This reserves the item for you. You will be notified when the item becomes available.

The unattributed use of a source of information that is not considered common knowledge. Three acts are considered plagiarism:
(1) failing to cite quotations and borrowed ideas,
(2) failing to enclose borrowed language in quotation marks, and
(3) failing to put summaries and paraphrases in your own words.

A play is a common literary form, usually consisting chiefly of dialog between characters, and usually intended for performance rather than reading. However, many scholars study plays in this more academic manner, particularly classical plays such as those of Shakespeare (rare authors, notably George Bernard Shaw, have had little preference whether their plays were performed or read). The term play refers both to the written works of dramatists and to the complete theatrical performances of such.

Poetry is an art form in which human language is used for its aesthetic qualities in addition to, or instead of, its notional and semantic content. It consists largely of oral or literary works in which language is used in a manner that is felt by its user and audience to differ from ordinary prose. It may use condensed or compressed form to convey emotion or ideas to the reader's or listener's mind or ear; it may also use devices such as assonance and repetition to achieve musical or incantatory effects. Poems frequently rely for their effect on imagery, word association, and the musical qualities of the language used

primary source

An original source, such as a speech, diary, novel, legislative bill, laboratory study, field research report, or eyewitness account. While not necessarily more reliable than a secondary source, a primary source has the advantage of being closely related to the information it conveys and as such is often considered essential for research, particularly in history.

professional journal

A journal addressed to a particular professional audience such as doctors, lawyers, teachers, engineers, or accountants.

Prose is a class of literature, in the voice of commonplace or ordinary speech.

Prose may be artful, and employ metaphor, meter, or rhyme by the cartful. However, if it is versified or has a strict structure of meter or rhyme, or if it is read in a stylized fashion, this is a genre of poetry in the voice of ordinary speech, called prose poetry. Prose writing is usually adopted for the description of facts, or the discussion of ideas. It describes the writing of the newspaper, encyclopedia, fiction and fact, of screenplays, of philosophy, letters to Dad and appeals to the bank examiner.

public domain

The status of works that are freely available and not governed by copyright restrictions. Most government documents are in the public domain, as are works for which copyright has expired. Many classic works of literature and primary sources available in full text on the Internet are in the public domain and thus can be copied without restriction. However, many (if not most) of the texts and other works in print and on the Internet are protected by copyright law; users must request permission of the copyright holder to reproduce such works. See also fair use and intellectual property.

publication

The word publication means the act of publishing, and it also means any writing of which copies are published, and any Web site. Among publications are books, and periodicals, the latter including magazines, scholarly journals, and newspapers.

Q

R

record: Each item included in a database. Records contain the information about the books, articles, or other sources that users can search for in a database.
refereed publication: A publication for which every submission is screened through a peer review process. Refereed publications are considered authoritative because disinterested experts have reviewed the material in advance of publication to determine its quality.
reference: (1) A source used in research and referred to by a researcher.
(2) In libraries, a part of the library's collection that includes encyclopedias, handbooks, directories, and other publications that are useful in research for finding overviews of information and facts.
Note: Reference may also indicate a desk or counter where librarians provide assistance to researchers.
review article: An article that evaluates the published research on a topic. The purpose of a review article is to select the most important publications on the topic, sort them into categories, and comment on them so that a researcher can gain a quick overview of the state of the art in that area.
research paper: A paper or report that states a thesis or topic in the introduction and develops supporting points of the thesis or topic in the body of the paper.
research library: ToDo - help

S

scholarly journal: A journal that is primarily addressed to scholars, often focusing on a particular discipline. Scholarly journals tend to be refereed publications and for some purposes may be considered more authoritative than magazines. Scholarly journals tend to have articles that are substantial in length, use specialized language, contain footnotes or endnotes, and are written by researchers (whose academic credentials are often provided) rather than by journalists. See also refereed publication.
search engine: A program that allows users to search for material on the Web or at a specific Web site. Sometimes the search function of a database is called its search engine.
secondary source: A source that comments on or relies on primary sources. An article in a newspaper that reports on a scientific discovery or a book that analyzes a writer's work is a secondary source.
serial: A term used in libraries to encompass all publications that appear in a series: magazines, journals, newspapers, and books that are published in a regular series such as annual reviews.
server: A host computer that is linked to other computers over a network. A corporation may have one server through which users have access to the Internet, e-mail, data files, databases, and software. A computer that hosts Web sites is also called a server.
short story: The short story, as a form in writing, is prose writing of less than 10,000 to 20,000 words (and usually more than 500 words) which may or may not have a narrative arc.
source: A news source or literature reference.
stacks: The rows of shelves that hold the library's books and other materials.
subject heading: A descriptive word or phrase assigned to an item in a database using controlled vocabulary. Most academic library catalogs use The Library of Congress Subject Headings to describe the subjects of books in the catalog. Other databases create their own list, or thesaurus, of accepted descriptive terms. In some databases subject headings are called descriptors. Researchers can benefit by examining subject headings as they search a catalog or database. Subject headings provide content information that can help the researcher evaluate whether a book or article is worth further examination. Subject headings also suggest alternative terms or phrases to use in a search.
subscription database: A database that can be accessed or licensed only through a subscription. Libraries provide a wealth of information freely to their patrons, but most of the electronic materials they provide are paid for by the library through a subscription. Often the material provided in a subscription database is more selective and quality controlled than sources that are freely available on the Web. Because databases are often provided through a license agreement, these databases are sometimes referred to as licensed databases.

T

thesaurus: The word thesaurus is New Latin for treasure; coined in the early 1820s. Besides its meaning as a treasury or storehouse, it more commonly means a listing of words with similar or related meanings. For example, a book of jargon for a specialized field; or more generally a list of subject headings and cross-references used in the filing and retrieval of documents. (Or indeed papers, certificates, letters, cards, records, texts, files, articles, essays and perhaps even manuscripts.)
treatise: A detailed written account of a subject: a formal written work that deals with a subject systematically and usually extensively.
thread: A list of postings in electronic communications that deal with a common topic. A thread is usually used in the context of newsgroups and discussion lists and often contains a common or slowly evolving subject line.
truncation: In online research, a shortened version of a search term. In some search engines and databases, the root of a word plus a wild card symbol (such as an asterisk[*] or a question mark[?]) can be used to search all possible variations of the root. For example, the search term psycholog* will find instances of the terms psychology, psychologist, and psychological.

U

URL (uniform resource locator): A Web address, such as <http://www.mit.edu/>.
user agent: A user agent is an application which is used to browse the World Wide Web. Web user agents range from Web browsers to search engine spiders, but also include screen readers and braille browsers which can be used for people with disabilities.

V

VCR: video cassette recorder
VHS: The Video Home System, better known by its acronym VHS, is the recording and playing standard for video cassette recorders (VCRs).
video tape: Video tape standard for home use is called VHS. Tapes made to this standard are played on machines called VCRs.

W

Web browser: A Web browser is a software package that enables a user to display and interact with HTML documents hosted by Web servers. It is the most commonly used kind of user agent. The largest networked collection of hypertext documents is known as the World Wide Web.
Web page: A webpage or Web page is a “page” of the World Wide Web, usually in HTML format (the file extensions are generally *.htm and *.html) and with hypertext links (hyperlinks) to enable navigation from one page or section to another.
Web site: A website or Web site (often shortened to a site) is a collection of Web pages, that is, documents accessible via the World Wide Web on the Internet. The pages of a Web site will be accessed from a common root URL, the homepage, and usually reside on the same physical server. The URLs of the pages organize them into a hierarchy, although the hyperlinks between them control how the reader perceives the overall structure.
World Wide Web: The World Wide Web (the "Web" or "WWW" for short) is a hypertext system that operates over the Internet. Hypertext is browsed using a program called a Web browser which retrieves pieces of information (called "documents" or "Web pages") from Web servers (or "Web sites") and displays them on your screen. You can then follow hyperlinks on each page to other documents or even send information back to the server to interact with it. The act of following hyperlinks is often called "surfing" the Web.
wild card: A symbol used to substitute any letter or combination of letters in a search word or phrase. A wild card symbol may replace a single letter (as in wom*n, to search for women or woman in one search) or any number of letters (as in psycholog*, to search for psychology, psychologist, and psychological). Though an asterisk is frequently used as a wild card symbol, some databases use other symbols such as a question mark or an exclamation point. See also truncation.

X

Y

Z

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