Encyclopedias

Encyclopedia articles, written by subject authorities, provide information useful for gaining a basic understanding of a topic and getting started with a research project. Typically, a bibliography of "classic" books and articles for further research follows each article. Students may also find these encyclopedias useful for brushing up on topics tangential but relevant to their central area of investigation.

Cambridge Encyclopedia of Russia and the Former Soviet Union. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1994.

Treats history, politics, culture, society, and the economy of Russia before, during, and shortly following the Soviet period, along with non-Russian regions.

CALL NUMBER: Ref DK 14 .C35 1994

Encyclopedia of Eastern Europe, from the Congress of Vienna to the Fall of Communism, edited by Richard Frucht.   New York, Garland Publishing, 2000.

Concerns itself with the names, places, events, and movements in 200 years of history of the primary countries of the former Eastern bloc, exclusive of the GDR (East Germany).

CALL NUMBER: Ref DJK 6 .E53 2000

Encyclopedia of the Holocaust, edited by Israel Gutman.  New York, Macmillan, 1990.

Premier among several reference sources related to the Holocaust; near this number in the Reference Collection are several other relevant titles.

CALL NUMBER: Ref D 804.3 .E53 1990

Modern Encyclopedia of Russian and Soviet History. Gulf Breeze, Florid, Academic International Press, 1976-1993.

For a title comprising a massive 45 volumes plus 10 further supplementary volumes, the subject index volumes are important resources in the use of this monumental history.

CALL NUMBER: Ref DK36 .M55 1976

Guides and Handbooks

These specialized subject-specific volumes perform various functions: overview, chronology, survey, definition of terms, and biography.

Chronology of 20th-Century Eastern European History, edited by Gregory C. Ference.   Detroit, Michigan, Gale Research, 1994.

CALL NUMBER: Ref DJK 30 .C47 1994

Dictionary of East European History since 1945, by Joseph Held. ; Westport, Connecticut, Greenwood Press, 1994.

CALL NUMBER: Ref DJK 50 .H43 1994

Political Parties of Eastern Europe: a Guide to Politics in the Post-Communist Era, by Janusz Bugajski. Armonk, NY, M.E. Sharpe, 2002.

For each Eastern European country, this guide supplies a historical political overview, a summary of each political party's career to date, and the results of recent elections.

CALL NUMBER: Ref JN96 .A979 B84 2002

Newly Independent States of Eurasia: Handbook of Former Soviet Republics, Stephen K. Batalden and Sandra L. Batalden.  Phoenix, Arizona, Oryx Press, 1997.

For Russia and 13 other nations, the handbook provides statistical profiles, maps, histories, and discussions of contemporary issues.

CALL NUMBER: Ref DK17 .B34 1997

Republics and Regions of the Russian Federation: a Guide to Politics, Policies, and Leaders, edited by Robert W. Orttung, et al.  Armonk, NY, M.E. Sharpe, 2000.

Each of Russia's 89 regions (oblasts, cities, republics, krais, or okrugs) is surveyed here, with political, economic, commercial, and demographic detail provided.

CALL NUMBER: Ref JN6699 .A88 R47 2000 

Territories of the Russian Federation 2002.  London, Europa, 2002

Describes each of the 89 Russian regions, together with a historical chronology from the ninth century, statistics, maps, and a bibliography.

CALL NUMBER: Ref JN6699 .A88 T47 2002

Cultural Atlas of Russia and the Former Soviet Union, by Robin Milner-Gulland with Nikolai Dejevsky.  New York, Checkmark Books, 1998

CALL NUMBER: Ref DK32 . M62 1998

Sources of Statistics

IMPORTANT: For a categorized listing of MANY titles, some in the Library's Reference Collection and some available on the Internet, please click here to utilize the Library's Statistical Data page.

Need more? ... The library subscribes to the "statistical" component of Lexis-Nexis, and that resource gives Union users access online to three large databases of data: the American Statistics Index, the Statistical Reference Index, and the Index to International Statistics. These contain, respectively, data of the U.S. federal government, of states and commercial bodies, and of international organizations. 

Much--not all--of what Lexis-Nexis cites is available in full text online.  For the rest, Schaffer Library also subscribes to microfiche copies of all the statistics cited in the above (with certain exceptions).

Assistance with data retrieval is available at the Library's Reference Desk.

Below are listed some particularly relevant titles in the Reference Collection, selected from the Library's Statistical Data page:

The Demographic Yearbook of Russia = Demograficheskii Ezhegodnik Rossii. Moskva : Goskomstat.

The yearbook presents data on general population, mortality, marriage, fertility, and migration for Russia, with some international comparisons, in volumes having begun in 1995 and continuing.

CALL NUMBER: Ref HB 3607 .R487a

Europa World Year Book. London, Europa Publications Limited. (Library owns volumes at regular intervals since 1962)

Europa remains today the valuable source of comparative international economic, political, and social statistics that it has been for over 40 years;  Russia and the Eastern European states are included in its coverage.  (Besides statistics, covers historical and current national developments.)

CALL NUMBER: Ref JN1 .E85

European Marketing Data and Statistics. London, European Research Consultants, Ltd. (The Library owns volumes at frequent intervals since 2000).

This volume defines "marketing" quite broadly, giving comparative figures for all European nations on demographic, economic, energy, environmental, media, health, educational, travel, and cultural variables.

CALL NUMBER: Ref HA1107 .E87

International Financial Statistics Yearbook.   Washington, D.C., International Monetary Fund, 1963-

Exchange and interest rates, banking and monetary data, investment and national accounts figures, by nation.  Each successive yearbook covers a rolling 20-year period.

CALL NUMBER: qHG 61 .I57
(Latest year shelved in the Reference Collection, 1st floor)

Russia and Eurasia Facts and Figures Annual.   Gulf Breeze, Florida, Academic International Press, 1993- (formerly USSR Facts and Figures Annual, 1977-1992)

Extensive economic, political, and social data at the national level, both before and after the breakup of the Soviet Union (note title change above, although all the volumes are shelved together in the Reference Collection.

CALL NUMBER: Ref HA 1446 .U17

 

World Development Indicators.  Washington, D.C., World Bank, 1998-

Also available online at WDI Online. (Restricted to Union College)
For all nations, publishes comparative data on demography, environment, and economics.  Current and previous issues are all kept in the Reference Collection.   Selected tables from the printed annual volumes of World Development Indicators are found online in the World Bank's Data Query.

CALL NUMBER: Ref HC 59.15 .W656

Directories

Directories serve to identify relevant professionals, institutions, organizations, and associations.  The first is the most recent edition of a classic among academic reference books.  The rest are online sources with varying foci.

Directory of American Scholars. ; 10th ed. ; Detroit, Michigan, Gale Group, 2002

CALL NUMBER: Ref LA 2311 .C32

F&P Friends and Partners
In the site's own words, "a community of people all over the world who provide information and communications services to promote better understanding, friendship and partnership between individuals and organizations of the United States (and, more broadly, 'the west') and countries of the Former Soviet Union" via the Internet. [http://www.friends-partners.org/friends]

Latvian Business Directory
With various parts in English, Latvian, or German, the site's "Branch Catalogue" is a directory of business Websites in this Baltic nation. [http://www.zl.lv/]

Offitsalnaia Rossiia
Here is the Russian government's Russian-Language-only Web-site with much directory-type information. [http://www.gov.ru]

Citation Guides and Style Manuals

Style manuals and citations guides illustrate how to cite book, journal, and other research sources, including materials found in online databases and on the Web according to the conventional format of a particular discipline. Subject specific citation guides are listed below, and a complete listing appears at Reference Sites: Citation Guides and Style Manuals.

Chicago Manual of Style. ; Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1993.

[ Online ] Available: http://www.bedfordstmartins.com/online/cite7.html

CALL NUMBER: Ref Z253 .C57 (kept at the Reference Desk)

Columbia Guide to Online Style, edited by Janice R. Walker.  New York, Columbia University Press, 1998.

This volume is a leader in establishing standard methods of citing electronic sources.

CALL NUMBER: Ref PN171.F56 W35 1998 (kept at the Reference Desk)

Online! A Reference Guide to Using Internet Sources. [ Online ] Andrew Harnack and Eugene Kleppinger. Available: http://www.bedfordstmartins.com/online/

Publication Manual of the APA. Washington, D.C., American Psychological Association, 2001.

The "APA guide" sets the standard for much social-science writing. Also available online through Citation Guides and Style Manuals.

CALL NUMBER: Ref BF76.7 .P83 2001  (kept at the Reference Desk)

Books in Schaffer Library are arranged by Library of Congress Class number. Class numbers are searchable in the Web Catalog and browseable in the Stacks and Reference Collection.

DJK	History: Eastern Europe (General)
DK	History: Russia. Soviet Union. Former Soviet Republics. Poland
HX	Socialism. Communism. Anarchism
JN	Political institutions and public administration: Europe
DJK	History: Eastern Europe (General)
JZ	International relations
KJ-KK	Law: Europe
PG	Slavic, Baltic, Albanian languages and literature

The New Acquisitions List  (residing on the Library Catalogs page) is generated on the 10th of each month and includes items added to the library's collections for the previous calendar month.

The links below produce lists of Union College senior honors theses held in Schaffer Library.  The lists appear in reverse chronological order and are mostly quite long; however, they can be narrowed by using the "Modify Search" button at the top of the results screen.

Microfiche copies of Senior honors theses are maintained in the Library. For details on the Library's theses holdings, formats, access, photocopying restrictions, and searching for a thesis in the online catalog, see Thesis Search page.+

Research Guides supplement the broader Research by Subject pages by focusing on the print and electronic resources that are most useful for a course-specific research assignment. For faculty, the Research Guides provide structured access to the Library and Internet resources relevant to their own work or in advising students on their research projects. For students working independently, they serve as a reminder of services and materials offered within the Library, while at the same time providing a gateway for information available from remote sites.

Faculty using Blackboard are encouraged to incorporate links to Library resources—and specifically the Research by Subject pages and the appropriate course-related Research Guides—into the Blackboard course pages. Your Departmental Liaison or Bibliographic Instruction Contacts can assist you.

Schaffer Library provides to range of general and subject-specific electronic databases—some offering full-text access to articles or library holdings information.

Databases & Indexes > Russian and East European Studies

Center for Russian and East European Studies
The University of Michigan's departmental site with further links to Internet information including electronic library sources. [http://www.umich.edu/~iinet/crees/]

Czech and Slovak Yellow Pages
An English-language index of information on the Internet about these countries, with a broad scope of topics covered. [http://users.aol.com/mpgregor/private/title.htm]

Erik Herron's Guide to Post-Communist States on the Web
A scholar at the University of Kansas, under the aegis of the Department of Political Science and the Center for Russian and East European Studies, puts this site up with country-specific links, separate pages for Russia and Ukraine, as well as separate pages for regional sites on Central and Eastern Europe, Eurasia, and the Baltics. [http://www.ku.edu/~herron]

REES Web
This University of Pittsburgh site hosts the Russian and East European Studies resource page on behalf of the WWW Virtual Library, the oldest standing catalog of Web-sites on academic topics (and widely considered reliable and top-quality).  REES Web has a multi-function subject approach allowing focusing a search by topic, culture, geographic area, and time period at once. [http://www.ucis.pitt.edu/reesweb]

Tools for tracking news, recently published articles, and current regional events.

ABYZ News Links
A portal site to global sources of news online, ABYZ affords access to newspapers, broadcast media, periodicals and newspapers, and press agencies. [http://www.abyznewslinks.com/]

CDI Russia Weekly
Newsletter on current issues concerned with Russia, from the war-questioning Center for Defense Information. [http://www.cdi.org/russia/]

Internews
This is an international, non-profit NGO that "fosters independent media in emerging democracies" and offers links to the online newspapers and broadcast-media outlets of most of the Russian and East European region. [http://www.internews.org/]

Live Camera
A Russian-language-only site linking to live Web-site audio and video broadcasts. [http://www.guzei.com/live/]

Seerecon
Announces current events in South East Europe; the site operates under the auspices of the European Community and the World Bank. [http://www.seerecon.org]

Departmental Liaison For information on resources, services, collections, and book ordering for your department
Bibliographic Instruction Contact For information on scheduling course-related instruction session or faculty training session
Russian and East European Studies Program
Blackboard
Created by: Professor David Gerhan, Head of Public Services and of Reference, Schaffer Library, Union College, Schenectady, NY 12308
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