Christmas vacation opening hours

Over the Christmas vacation, the library will be open Monday-Friday, 9am-7pm only. We will be open this Saturday (1st December), but thereafter will be closed on Saturdays until Hilary Term.

The library will be closed from 5pm on Friday 21st December through to 9am on Wednesday 2nd January.

Please note, for those with borrowing privileges, we do not offer vacation loans. All books borrowed will continue to have their regular due dates throughout the Christmas vacation, with the exception of our closed period over Christmas and New Year.

Parliament Week at the Bodleian

The VHL has contributed to the Bodleian's participation in Parliament Week this year, in collaboration with the Conservative Party Archive, held at the Bodleian. While Parliament Week is a UK focused initiative, we discovered an interesting crossover between the CPA and the VHL's Philip & Rosamund Davies Elections Archive. The CPA contains material relating to Conservative Party operatives travelling to the United States to observe and comment on US elections, most notably in 1956 and 1980, which we have been able to supplement and expand upon from our archive.

• US and UK Elections I: Exploring elections
• US and UK Elections II: Exploring elections, part two (Conventions and ephemera)

To see the rest of the Bodleian's Parliament Week coverage for 2012, visit the Bodleian website. And don't forget you can find out more about the VHL's Elections Archive at http://www.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/vhl/collections/elections-archive.

Fastcase: new American legal resource

Thanks to the Bodleian Law Library, Oxford now has access to Fastcase, a database of, and portal to, primary sources of US law both federal and state level. Federal case library includes US Supreme Court from (1 US 1 to current), All Federal Circuit Cases (1 F 2d 1 to current), and all District (1 F. Supp. 1 – Current ) and Bankruptcy Courts (1 B.R. 1 – Current ) It also includes constitutions, legislation and cases (the last from at least 1950 onwards) for all 50 states.

Fastcase may be accessed via SOLO/OxLIP+.

WISER coming up: data, images and reference management

Next week Bodleian Libraries will be running workshops on data, images and reference management.   Also don’t forget that this Friday we’ll be running WISER: Searching Online News Sources.

WISER: Searching online news sources (Fri 16 Nov 10.15 – 12.15) (wk 6)
News sources are primary resources for researching contemporary political and social issues. This session will provide an overview of the key resources and hands-on exercises with databases such as Nexis UK, Factiva, and Proquest.
Who is this session for? Postgraduates, researchers and academics
Presenter: Mark Janes > Book Now

WISER: Social science data services (Tues 20 Nov 2.00 – 4.00) (wk 7) 
Social science data services provide archives of data for use by researchers and students. The session will provide an overview of the available services and exercises with the Economic and Social Data Service and ICPSR.
Who is this session for? Postgraduates, researchers and academics
Presenter: Mark Janes > Book Now

ARTstor and Bridgeman: using images in teaching and learning (Tuesday 20 Nov 2.00-4.00) (wk 7)
The course examines two major digital image collections subscribed to by the University - ARTstor and Bridgeman Education - geared to research and teaching in the humanities, history of science and medicine, and social sciences. Viewing, presenting and managing images are also covered.
Who is this session for? All members of Oxford University
Presenters: Clare Hills Nova and Vicky Brown > Book Now

WISER: Tech Tools - Reference Management (Wed 21 Nov 2.00 – 5.00) (wk 7)
Keeping track of your references and formatting them correctly for your thesis or publication is a chore. Reference management software makes it easy and is worth investigating. This introductory session gives an overview of how it works and the pros and cons of RefWorks, EndNote, Zotero and Mendeley.
Who is this session for? Postgraduates, researchers and academics
Presenters: Ljilja Ristic, Oliver Bridle and Angela Carritt > Book Now

Research Skills Toolkit
An introduction to 10 key IT and information tools and skills for research students in a hands on workshop run jointly by IT Services and Bodleian Libraries. Sample topics include: reference management, keeping up to date, finding articles and papers, Excel pivot tables, finding and managing images,  podcasting, Word for your thesis and measuring research impact.   
Who is this session for? Postgraduates  
>  Check dates for your subject and book your place

Keeping up with Bodleian Libraries training opportunities: Why not follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/oxwiser or visit the BodWiser blog at http://bodwiser.wordpress.com.

Not a member of Oxford University? - If you are not a current member of Oxford University but would like to attend a workshop please contact usered@bodleian.ox.ac.uk. Please quote your Bodleian readers card barcode number.

Questions? - Please contact usered@bodleian.ox.ac.uk

WISER coming up: E-books, News sources, and Research Skills Toolkit

Next week Bodleian Libraries will be running workshops on searching online news sources, finding and manipulating academic e-books and using e-book readers.

WISER: E-Books (Tuesday 13 November 2.00 – 3.00) (wk 6) -   This session will introduce Oxford’s collection of e-books, helping you not only to successfully locate e-books but also to manipulate them and make the most of their functionality.
Who is this session for? All members of Oxford University.   Presenters:  Hilla Wait and Jo Gardner.  > Book Now

WISER: E-Book Readers (Tuesday 13 November 3.15 – 4.15) (wk 6) - How useful are e-book readers in academic work? Can they be used for accessing library materials? What are the features to look out for when considering purchase? These and similar questions will be considered with reference to the i-Pad, the Amazon Kindle and Sony Touch e-readers and smart phones.  
Who is this session for? All members of Oxford University and other Bodleian Libraries readers  Presenters:  Hilla Wait and Jo Gardner > Book now

WISER: Searching online news sources (Fri 16 Nov 10.15 – 12.15) (wk 6) - News sources are primary resources for researching contemporary political and social issues. This session will provide an overview of the key resources and hands-on exercises with databases such as Nexis UK, Factiva, and Proquest.
Who is this session for? Postgraduates, researchers and academics.    Presenter: Mark Janes > Book Now

Research Skills Toolkit – An introduction to 10 key IT and information tools and skills for research students in a hands on workshop run jointly by IT Services and Bodleian Libraries. Sample topics include: reference management, keeping up to date, finding articles and papers, Excel pivot tables, finding and managing images,  podcasting, Word for your thesis and measuring research impact.    Who is this session for? Postgraduates   >  Check dates for your subject and book your place

Keeping up with Bodleian Libraries training opportunities: Why not follow join our mailing list by sending an empty email to wiser-subscribe@maillist.ox.ac.uk, follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/oxwiser or visit the BodWiser blog at http://bodwiser.wordpress.com.

Not a member of Oxford University? - If you are not a current member of Oxford University but would like to attend a workshop please contact usered@bodleian.ox.ac.uk. Please quote your Bodleian readers card barcode number.

Questions? - Please contact usered@bodleian.ox.ac.uk

Take the Bodleian Libraries 2012 reader survey

By now you should have received an e-mail asking you to assist in assessing the quality of our library services by filling out a Web-based survey.  If you have already completed the survey, thank you!   If you have not yet filled out the survey, please take a few minutes to go to URL below and help us in this important endeavour by taking the survey.  Only you can tell us how well we are serving your library needs.  Please complete the survey no later than 16th November

http://www.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/about/libqual-survey

When you complete the survey, please respond by giving your assessment of our services based on the Bodleian Libraries library that you use most frequently (you’ll be asked to specify this as part of the survey).  Please use the survey comments box if you have feedback on other Bodleian sites or on the Bodleian Libraries generally.

Please complete the survey even if you rarely visit one of our libraries - the survey also covers feedback on our extensive range of online services such as our electronic journal collections.

Don’t forget to key in your e-mail address at the end of the survey if you want to enter the draw for an opportunity to win an iPad or one of five £30 Amazon vouchers.

Full access to ProQuest Congressional now available *until end of November*

We now have full access to the complete collection of congressional publications via ProQuest for the month of November. ProQuest have opened up their full collections to institutions in this way to coincide with the US Elections, and this gives Oxford readers an opportunity to make use of collections we don't normally have access to.

As well as the Congressional Record, you can now access committee prints and hearings from 1817-, and Congressional Research Service Reports from 1916-. In addition, the full Serial Set is now also searchable via the ProQuest platform as well as through our usual access via Readex. All these collections may be cross-searched.

We only have this access for the month of November, so be sure to make full use of it by the end of the month. From December we will revert to our subscribed access to the Congressional Record only via ProQuest, and the Serial Set only via Readex.

To access the collections, search OxLIP+ for the Congressional Record, or go directly to http://congressional.proquest.com. Remote access should be available for University members if you have signed in to SOLO/OxLIP+ first.