How to Use the Library in the thesis

How should a student conduct preliminary research in the library? If he already has a reliable bibliography, he can obvi­ously search the author catalog to discover what a particular library has to offer. If the library lacks some of the titles in his bibliography, he can search another library, and so on. But this method assumes that he already has a bibliography, and that he is able to access a series of libraries, maybe one in Rome and another in London. But as we have previously discussed, readers of this book may not have such oppor­tunities. Nor do many professional scholars. Furthermore, although we sometimes go to the library to find a book that we already know exists, we often go to the library to find out if a book exists, or to discover books about which we have no previous knowledge. In other words, we often go to the library to compile a bibliography, and this means searching for sources that we do not yet know exist. A good researcher can enter a library without having the faintest idea about scholarship on a particular topic, and exit knowing more about it, if only a little more.

The catalog The library offers some resources that allow us to find relevant sources about which we have no previous knowledge. Naturally, the first is called the subject catalog. Of course there is also an alphabetically arranged author catalog that is useful to those who already know what they want, but the subject catalog is for those who do not yet know. Here, a good library tells me everything that I can find in its stacks, for example, on the fall of the Western Roman Empire.

But querying the subject catalog requires some skill. Clearly we cannot find the entry “Fall of the Roman Empire” under the letter “F,” unless we are dealing with a library with a very sophisticated indexing system. We will have to look under “Roman Empire,” and then under “Rome,” and then under “(Roman) History.” And if we have retained some pre­liminary knowledge from primary school, we will have the foresight to consult “Romulus Augustulus” or “Augustu- lus (Romulus),” “Orestes,” “Odoacer,” “Barbarians,” and “Roman-barbarian (regna).”

Our problems do not end there. In many libraries there are two author catalogs and two subject catalogs: old ones that stop at a certain date, and the new ones that are works in progress and that will absorb the old ones only at some future date. And we will not necessarily find information on the fall of the Roman Empire in the old catalog simply because that event took place centuries ago. In fact there could be recent books on the subject that are only indexed in the new catalog. Also, in certain libraries there are sepa­rate catalogs for different collections. In other libraries, sub­jects and authors are indexed together. There also may be separate catalogs for books and journals, divided by subject and author; and we may even encounter a library that stores books on the first floor and journals on the second. Con­sequently, we must study the system used by the library in which we are working, and make our decisions accordingly. Also, some intuition is usually necessary. For example, if the older of the two catalogs is very old, and I am researching the Greek region of Laconia, I should also search for the obsolete spelling “Lacedaemonia,” because an overly diligent librarian may have indexed this entry separately.

Also note that the author catalog is always more reliable than the subject catalog because the act of compiling it does not depend on the librarian’s interpretation, as is the case with the subject catalog. In fact, if the library has a book by John Smith, you will invariably find “Smith, John” under “S” in the author catalog. But if John Smith has written an arti­cle on “The Role of Odoacer in the Fall of the Western Roman Empire and the Advent of the Roman-Barbarian Regna,” the librarian may have recorded it under the subject “(Roman) History” or “Odoacer,” but not necessarily under the entry “Western Roman Empire” where you are currently looking.

Finally, the author and subject catalogs simply may not provide the information you require, and in this case you must settle for a more elementary approach. In every library there is a reference section (or an entire room) that contains a collection of encyclopedias, general histories, and bibli­ographical indexes. If you are looking for works on the West­ern Roman Empire, you can search the subject of Roman history, compile a basic bibliography starting from the refer­ence works you find, and then search for the authors in the author catalog.

Bibliographical indexes These are the safest resources for a student who already has clearly defined ideas about a topic. For some disciplines there are famous manuals where the student can find all the necessary bibliographical information. For other disciplines there are periodical in­dexes that contain updates in each issue, and even journals dedicated solely to a subject’s bibliography. For others still, there are journals that include an appendix in every issue that documents the most recent publications in the field. Bibliographical indexes are essential supplements to catalog research, as long as they are updated. In fact, some libraries may have an extensive collection of the oldest publications, but little or no updated work. Or they may offer histories or manuals of the discipline in question that were published in 1960, and that provide useful bibliographical information, but will not tell you if an interesting work was published in 1975. (The library may actually contain these recent works, but may have indexed them under a subject that you have not thought of.) An updated bibliographical index gives you exactly this kind of information on the latest contributions to a particular field.

The most convenient way to learn about bibliographical indexes is to ask your advisor. You can also ask the librarian (or a staff person at the reference desk) who can direct you to the room or the section of the stacks that contains the bibliographical indexes. Again here, the issue changes from discipline to discipline, so I cannot offer further advice.

The librarian You must overcome any shyness and have a conversation with the librarian, because he can offer you reliable advice that will save you much time. You must con­sider that the librarian (if not overworked or neurotic) is happy when he can demonstrate two things: the quality of his memory and erudition and the richness of his library, especially if it is small. The more isolated and disregarded the library, the more the librarian is consumed with sorrow for its underestimation. A person who asks for help makes the librarian happy.

Although you must rely on the librarian’s assistance, you should not trust him blindly. Listen to his advice, but then search deeply and independently. The librarian is not an expert on every subject, and he is also unaware of the par­ticular perspective you wish to adopt for your research. He may deem fundamental a particular book that you end up barely consulting, and may disregard another that you find very useful. Additionally, there is no such thing as a prede­termined hierarchy of useful and important works. An idea contained almost by mistake on a page of an otherwise use­less (and widely ignored) book may prove decisive for your research. You must discover this page on your own, with your own intuition and a little luck, and without anybody serving it to you on a silver platter.

Union catalogs, electronic catalogs, and interlibrary loan Many libraries publish updated inventories of their holdings. Therefore, in some libraries it is possible to consult catalogs that list the holdings of other national and foreign libraries, at least for some particular disciplines. Asking for informa­tion from the librarian is also useful in this case. There are certain specialized libraries linked via computer to a central memory that can quickly inform you whether and where you can find a certain book. For example, the Venice Biennale instituted the Historical Archives of Contemporary Arts that are linked via computer to the National Central Library’s ar­chive in Rome. You can search the catalog by author, title, subject, series, publisher, year of publication, etc.

If you have located a book in a national or foreign library, keep in mind that a library usually has an interlibrary loan service that may be national or international. It may take some time to get what you need, but it is worth trying if you need sources that are difficult to find. Even if there is such a service, the library that has the book may not lend it, as some libraries will only lend duplicate copies. Here again you should consult your advisor about all the possibilities of locating needed sources. In any case, remember that the ser­vices we need often do exist, but they only work if they are patronized often.

Also remember that many libraries keep a list of their new arrivals, their most recent acquisitions that have not yet been indexed. Finally do not forget that, if you are work­ing rigorously on a project that interests your advisor, you may be able to convince your institution to purchase some important texts that you cannot obtain otherwise.

Source: Eco Umberto, Farina Caterina Mongiat, Farina Geoff (2015), How to write a thesis, The MIT Press.