Collection Development Policy - Women's Studies

SCOPE AND PURPOSE: A library collection in support of the curriculum and research needs of the women's studies program needs to cover the fields of literature, history, politics, business, health, psychology, education, law, and marriage and the family as they relate to women. It should also cover sex roles and women's occupations and professions. The collection draws upon materials in the social sciences, humanities, natural sciences, and fine and applied arts. It is collected at the levels detailed below.The scope is worldwide and from ancient times to present day. The emphasis is on the modern period, particularly the 19th and 20th centuries, collected at the advanced study level, with greater depth on those eras and for the United States and Great Britain which are collected at the research level. The immediate background centuries, the 16th through the 18th, should also be built at the advanced study level for those two countries. Materials for other countries and eras are collected at the initial study level.Support from other departments, whose courses are part of the women's studies certificate curriculum, will have support for those courses in their collection development policies.

CURRICULUM: The program in women's studies articulates and strengthens the connections among courses offered in differing fields, and gives students a coherent background, knowledge and a theoretical framework with which to analyze and evaluate material from varied disciplines. The certificate program in women's studies is also significant for university faculty. With its emphasis on women's studies, the program becomes a means uniting faculty and community women with similar interests. By encouraging cooperation and interchange across disciplines, it opens up new areas for research.

The women's studies program is an undergraduate interdisciplinary certificate program. There already exist at the university several courses concerned with women which this certificate program may use as electives if approved by the program for cross-listing. Requirements are: Introduction to Women's Studies, Feminist Theory, and Women's Studies Lecture Series. Also available in women's studies are Individual Studies on Women and a special topics option. The elective courses are drawn from the social sciences, humanities, fine and applied arts, and specified additional areas. Twelve credits (two course at the 300-400 level), one course from each of these areas are required.

Feminist Theory, Special Topics on Women's Studies and a workshop are 400/500 courses and are therefore available for graduate credit.

GEOGRAPHICAL COVERAGE: Coverage is worldwide with major emphasis on women in the United States, then England, then Europe and the third world. This is not because the latter areas are of less importance but because there is greater concentration of available courses in the first two areas, especially in literature, the history of women, and the women's movement. The collection should be built at the research level for the United States and Great Britain and at the initial study level for the other areas.

LANGUAGE: English is the only language necessary for the collection.

PERIOD COVERAGE: Coverage is from ancient times through the present day with emphasis on the 20th century. There will be less collected on ancient times. There will be the most on the 19th and 20th centuries because most of the major figures and movements are from those eras. The collection should be built at the advanced study level for the 16th through 20th centuries and at the initial study level for the rest except for 19th and 20th century United States and Great Britain which should be built at the research level.

PUBLICATION TYPES: The following publication types are included: general works, scholarly works, textbooks, collected works, government documents, and research reports. Journals are also included. The collected works are those of individual women, both literary and non-fiction, and the document collections include materials from all areas and times illustrating the lives of women.

FORMATS: Print and audiovisual materials are both acquired. About 95 percent of the materials will be in printed formats.

REMOTE SOURCES: Of the NEOMARL schools which have women's studies programs Oberlin College is the only one with special library resources for women's studies. The existence of that resource does not eliminate our need to collect the resources described in this policy.

EXCLUSIONS: Technical works that deal with medicine for women are not included on this policy, but are acquired under other departmental collection policies.

Revised 9-30-97

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