Research Guides: Reference Materials at NYU Libraries: Encyclopedias

Encyclopedias

Encyclopedias provide fundamental information about a wide range of subjects, sometimes organized around specialized or discipline-specific content. For example, you may come across an encyclopedia of folk music that concerns itself exclusively with topics, vocabulary, movements, and key figures related to folk music, while a general work like the Encyclopedia Brittanica will provide information about a much larger range of topics, likely including folk music as a topic.

Encyclopedias are great for establishing basic historical or biographical information, and for getting acquainted with the kind of language used to talk about a particular subject.

In the advanced search, use the Subject search to find records that “contain” the heading “Encyclopedias” (in the plural) alongside your other subject terms or keywords.

Cambridge Histories Online
Over 250 of these well-known, used and trusted volumes published since the 1960s are available online; covers 14 subject areas, including General History, Regional History, Literary Studies, Philosophy, and Religious Studies.
Credo Reference
Online collection of dictionaries, encyclopedias, biographical sources, quotations, bilingual dictionaries, and measurement conversions covering topics from the arts to the sciences.

Columbia Encyclopedia
Provides authoritative factual information about our world in its many guises - physical, historical, geographical, political, scientific, religious, and cultural.

Encyclopedia Britannica
Search authoritative entries on a number of topics.
Gale eBooks (formerly Gale Virtual Reference Library)
Search across a range of encyclopedias, dictionaries and more.
Reference Universe (Paratext)
Search across a number of reference works to find entries on a topic. Searches across 18-million articles in 40,000 reference books from 750 publishers.

Sage Knowledge
Sage eReference is a searchable collection of more than 60 scholarly encyclopedias in the social sciences: anthropology, communication, education, geography, history, law, management, politics, psychology, and sociology. New interdisciplinary titles are continuously added to the collection.
Wikipedia
Wikipedia has rapidly grown into the largest reference website on the Internet. The content of Wikipedia is free, written collaboratively by people from all around the world. This website is a wiki, which means that anyone with access to an Internet-connected computer can edit, correct, or improve information throughout the encyclopedia, simply by clicking the edit this page link (with a few minor exceptions such as protected articles).

Searching the Catalog

Using the example above, try a search for "Encyclopedias" AND ("folk music" OR "folk songs"). In the Advance Search tool of the catalog, you can search for these terms in the Subject heading field. If your research is focused on other world folk musics besides American, you can further refine your results by adding another search line using the NOT operator. Your search string would now read as "Encyclopedias" AND ("folk music" OR "folk songs") NOT American. If you have questions about how to craft a strong search, use the live Ask a Librarian chat.

Encyclopedias in Print

1900 Ingredients: a classic reference encyclopedia of world foods by Christine Ingram
Call Number: TX349 .I54 2007

ISBN: 9781844764600

Publication Date: 2007-10-10

Each entry in this guide to the cooking ingredients of the world includes a detailed description of the varieties, appearance, flavour and aroma of the ingredient and offers advice on its preparation and culinary uses. There are also illustrated step-by-step instructions for more complex techniques.
Encyclopedia of Taboos by Lynn Rosemary Holden
Call Number: GN471.4 .H65 2000 Non-circulating

ISBN: 1576070697

Publication Date: 2000-12-01

From ancient times to the present, taboos have affected our societies, as demonstrated in this encyclopedia full of unusual information from around the world. The topic of taboos has rarely been discussed in any comprehensive way in recent years, as though the word itself has become taboo in our efforts to dispel the myth of the irrationality of supposedly 'primitive' cultures. The Encyclopedia of Taboos is a mine of unusual information from around the world, including a comprehensive analysis of individual taboos from the ancient world to the present day, covering both well- and lesser-known examples. The A-Z articles cover the topics naturally associated with the concept of taboo--incest, cannibalism, pollution, food, art, dress, sex, and death--and also the foremost writers on the subject, including Sigmund Freud, Mary Douglas, Edmund Leach, Franz Steiner, and Frederick Barth.
Gardner's Chemical Synonyms and Trade Names by G. W. A. Milne (Editor)
Call Number: TP9 .G286 1999

ISBN: 0566081903

Publication Date: 1999-06-01

Through ten previous editions, Gardner's Chemical Synonyms and Trade Names has become one of the best known and most widely used sources of information on chemicals in commerce. This edition includes the results of the continuing research underlying this reference work and has seen a major expansion of the information provided for individual chemical compounds. The reference contains some 35,000 entries, many of which are new to this edition. Gardner's features a comprehensive selection of chemicals. The main criterion for inclusion in Gardner's is a material's importance as a commercially available chemical. Thus all bulk inorganic chemicals, major pesticides, dyestuffs, surfactants, metals and alloys are included. The 5,000 highest volume chemicals in the US, as defined by application of the Toxic Substances Control Act, are all represented. Almost all records describing pure chemicals now carry the appropriate CAS Registry Number and the associated EINECS number. In addition, the Merck Index Number is provided for all chemicals which also appear in the Twelfth Edition of the Merck Index. Entries, wherever possible, contain detailed information on chemical composition, functions, applications and suppliers. A feature new to this edition is the inclusion of physical property data for pure chemicals. Data that has been provided, as available, includes the melting point, boiling point, density or specific gravity, refractive index, optical rotation, ultraviolet absorption, solubility and acute toxicity. Thousands of new synonyms have been included in Gardner's to make it one of the most comprehensive sources of chemical synonym information available. Overall, both the structure of Gardner's and the quality of the information it contains have been greatly improved in this edition. The result is a reference tool that no chemical professional should be without.