LibGuides: Finding Resources: For Graduating Students

Research After SLC

Alumni Borrowing Privileges at SLC

Alumni can get a library card by registering at the Info Desk. As Special Library Patrons, alumni can borrow 5 items at a time (with a 4-week loan for books and 7 days for videos / DVDs). At this time alumni do not have ILL privileges nor access to paid databases remotely. However, alumni using wifi on campus are able to search all of our electronic resources.

Get to Know Your Local Library

In addition to the borrowing privileges for print books that come along with a library card at local libraries, many libraries also provide access to research databases, e-resources such as e- and audiobooks, music and film resources, and even community resources such as library passes and workshops. Check your local library to see which privileges you have access to.

Use WorldCat to Locate Items at Libraries Near You:

WorldCat
You can use WorldCat's freely available version to find resources in a library near you. Click on a resource you are interested in, then look at the "Find a copy in the library" section to see local libraries based on your zip code.

Learn More:

Databases with Free Content

Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) Directory of more than 8,000 free, full-text, peer-reviewed journals from many disciplines.
PubMed Central A free full-text archive of biomedical and life sciences journal literature at the U.S. National Institutes of Health's National Library of Medicine (NIH/NLM).
JSTOR for Individuals Access to some of JSTOR's content. Look for "Open Content on JSTOR," "Read Online for Free," and "Individual Research Subscription (JPASS)" for more information. In some cases, requires registration before you can search.
JSTOR Early Journal Content The JSTOR Early Journal Content is a selection of journal materials published prior to 1923 in the United States and prior to 1870 elsewhere. It includes discourse and scholarship in the arts and humanities, economics and politics, and in mathematics and other sciences - nearly 500,000 articles from more than 200 journals.
HathiTrust A shared digital repository created by major research libraries. Features millions of digitized texts, some freely available in full-text, some limited to search-only.
Free Legal Research Resources from Harvard
Free Resources by Subject Listed by U Chicago
SLC's Full List of Open Access Databases

Databases with Limited Free Content

Education Resource Information Center (ERIC) Sponsored by U.S. Department of Education, provides access to educational-related literature including peer-reviewed journals.

PubMed This link opens in a new window 25 million citations for biomedical literature from MEDLINE, life science journals, and online books. Includes content not in PubMed Central that costs money.
Google Scholar This link opens in a new window Broad multidisciplinary search tool which contains articles, theses, books, abstracts and court opinions from academic publishers, professional societies, online repositories, universities and other web sites. Specify Sarah Lawrence College through Library Links under Settings to see link-outs to full-text in Sarah Lawrence College databases. Scope: Worldwide. Dates: Varies.
Follow these instructions to set your Google Scholar settings for access to Sarah Lawrence College Full Text.

Digital Libraries

DPLA (Digital Public Library of America) A portal that provides different ways to search across a wide selection of digital collections from libraries, museums, archives, and other institutional repositories in the United States. Search through curated exhibitions, explore by place or date, search through images, text, and more.
American Memory Provides free and open access to written and spoken words, sound recordings, still and moving images, prints, maps, and sheet music that document the American experience. Collections are primarily from the Library of Congress, but also includes material from other institutions as well.
Internet Archive Internet Archive is a non-profit library of millions of free books, movies, music, images, TV news, and more.

Other Free Resources

Free Images
Free Newspaper Databases
Google Books Google Books is an index of full-text books and magazines that Google has digitized. You can view the full-text of books in the public domain. Google also provides partial previews of some books still within copyright.
Librivox Free public domain audiobooks.
Project Gutenberg Project Gutenberg offers over 56,000 free eBooks.

Open Access

What is Open Access?

Simply put open access offers access to content for free. Open access can be useful for your research but it is also something for you to think about as you create your own work.

There are two types of Open Access that you can use to make your work freely available

Green OA refers to access provided through self-archiving, often with an institutional repository, such as Digital Commons @ Sarah Lawrence (see the box to the right on this page for more information).
Gold OA refers to access provided through publication in an open access forum, whether a journal or a monograph.

See some of the resources below for more information.

Learn More

The Access Principle by John Willinsky

Authors Alliance Open Access Portal Please note: Downloading the text is free.
PLOS: The Case for Open Access
Open Access: Six Myths to Put to Rest

Image retrieved from https://www.plos.org/open-access/

Open Access

Install these browser plug-ins to help you find free full-text of articles when you're browsing on the web.

Unpaywall Add the plug-in to your browser and skip the paywall on millions of peer-reviewed journal articles. It's fast, free, and legal.
Open Access Button Free, legal research articles and data delivered instantly or automatically requested from authors.

What is Fair Use?

In order to balance the interests of the creators of copyrighted works with the public's ability to benefit from those works, copyright law includes the exemption of Fair Use.

Fair use allows limited use of copyrighted material without permission for purposes such as criticism, parody, news reporting, research and scholarship, and teaching.

However, just because a use is educational does not mean that it automatically qualifies as fair use. When using content for certain purposes it is important to consider copyright and if you might be infringing on it.

Columbia Fair Use Checklist

Fair Use Evaluator - American Library Association

Stanford Copyright & Fair Use Center - Stanford University Libraries

Reproduction of Copyrighted Works by Educators and Librarians - U.S. Copyright Office

ACRL