TU Libraries has recently added Literature Criticism Online to its suite of electronic resources!

Literature Criticism Online is an outstanding reference literature database, offering biographical and bibliographical information on over 3,000 20th century and contemporary literary figures (novelists, poets, playwrights, short story writers, and literary theorists), in addition to scholarly and popular commentary from books, journals, magazines, broadsheets, pamphlets, diaries, and newspapers.

This collection contains the scanned pages of every single volume from two of Gale’s popular, print literary series: Contemporary Literary Criticism (245 volumes currently) and Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism (196 volumes currently). Just think how much shelf space that would be! Users can search by known author, text, critic, or source title, as well as by keyword.

Literature Criticism Online is a valuable literary resource and complements well with the Libraries’ subscription to Literature Resource Center which contains select collections of critical material from Gale’s other literary resources: Children’s Literature Review, Classical and Medieval Literature Criticism, Nineteenth-Century Literature Criticism, and Short Story Criticism.

Be sure to check it out!

-Kristina De Voe, English & Communications Librarian

We are pleased to announce that Temple University Libraries has acquired Web of Science backfiles to the year 1900. The breakdown by discipline is:

• Arts & Humanities back to 1975
• Social Sciences back to 1956
• Science back to 1900

Web of Science is a repository of historic, multi-disciplinary journal literature. The backfiles are critical to locating a wealth of useful historic source and citation information. Of the 50 most highly cited items in Web of Science, more than 60% were published over 20 years ago. Via the powerful linking capabilities of the Web, retrospective data becomes easily available and maximizes serendipitous discovery. —Kathy Szigeti

…from The Teaching Professor.

Rare is the instructor who hasn’t encountered a challenge in the classroom. Equally rare is the instructor who couldn’t benefit from proven techniques shared by colleagues who’ve discovered ways to enhance the teaching and learning process. Within higher education, a respected and popular source that faculty use to share their ideas and best practices in teaching and learning is a publication called The Teaching Professor. Published 10 times a year, it incorporates into 6-8 pages of fast reading tips and techniques for everything from better tests and quizzes to improved classroom discussions to effective technology integration.

Temple University Libraries has just made it easy for all University instructors to be up-to-date with every new issue of The Teaching Professor. The Libraries now offer institutional access to the electronic version of the publication, both on and off campus. There is also an audio MP3 version of each issue. You can directly access The Teaching Professor here.

There you can examine the latest issue, any issue in the archive, or you can search for articles on a particular topic (e.g., lectures, quizzes). The November 2007 issue features articles on engaging large science classes, dealing with students who participate too much, and making the syllabus more than a contract.

In addition, interested faculty and administrators can sign up to receive e-mail alerts of the latest issues. To do so, register using this account information:

Voucher code: TEMPLE
PIN Number: 2310

-Steven Bell, Associate University Librarian