Geography

Facts and Background Information
Selected print and electronic encyclopedias, dictionaries, handbooks, etc.
Maps
Find maps in Tisch Library and elsewhere.
Books
Locate items in the library catalog and other libraries.
Articles
Use indexes to search for articles in journals, proceedings, etc.
Websites
Recommended academic, professional, and learned societies sites, and more.
Contact a Librarian

Below are a few frequently used sources for the field of geography. Interdisciplinary indexes such as Expanded Academic ASAP, Social Sciences Citation Index, and Social Sciences Index also geography cover geography. These can be found in the research guide to General Social Sciences.

Please consult with a reference librarian for help with many sources in your topic. Internet resources require a Tufts I.D. number for off-campus access.

 

Facts and Background Information     [back to top]

Subject specific reference materials can help you to gain broad-based knowledge of your field, through vocabulary, factual information, additional references, and bibliographies. Doing a subject search in the catalog allows you to retrieve specific types of sources. For example:

Geography -- Dictionaries

Names, Geographical

Gazetteers

Geography -- Encyclopedias

Atlases

In addition, the following electronic resources provide valuable information:

Canadian Geographical Names
Provides access to over 500,000 geographical locations in Canada.

Geographic Names Information System
Contains information on approximately 2 million physical and cultural geographic features in the U.S.

GEOnet
Provides access to the National Imagery and Mapping Agency’s database of foreign geographic feature names.

U.S. Gazetteer
Identifies places in the United States using the Census Bureau’s database.

Massachusetts Electronic Atlas
An interactive atlas that allows users to choose a geographic area within the Commonwealth, select layers of data for display, and download the maps and associated numeric datasets.

Find Maps

Maps can be found in a number of ways. The Theresa Winsor Pratt Map Room in Tisch Library contains the USGS Topographic Map Collection. The 7.5 minute maps are arranged alphabetically by state and then by sheet name within each state. The map room also houses The Tufts University GIS Center, which provides resources for the generation of digital maps. In addition, the Tisch reference desk has the CIA maps and atlases, a two-volume set of 8.5" x 11" color political maps of countries and regions of the world. The web links below contain many valuable maps.

Maps on File (Facts on File) (How to search)
Over 500 reproducible country maps that include major cities, borders labeled with neighboring countries, major rivers and roads, scale of miles and kilometers, and a North indicator. Also includes recent global demographic, economic, political, and environmental statistics.

Find Books     [back to top]

You can search for books about geography in the library catalog in several ways:

Keyword Searching

Type in words that describe your topic, for example:

Maps and Geography

Populations and Asia

Subject searching

If you know the Library of Congress subject heading used to describe your area of research, you can search for a particular subject. If you don’t know the Library of Congress Subject Headings, speak to a librarian for help. Some examples of subject searches are:

Cartography

Human geography

Physical geography

Economic geography

Books on geography can be found under the Library of Congress call number range G1 - GB5030. For help in browsing the collection, consult with one of the reference librarians.

Find books in other libraries

To locate books in other Boston Library Consortium libraries and request them, use the Boston Library Consortium Catalogs. To locate books in many libraries throughout the world, use WorldCat.

Find Articles     [back to top]

For more information on searching article indexes, see our Database Searching Tips (also available in PDF).

Geographical Abstracts: Physical Geography 1989-
Print source provides indexing and abstracting to over 1,000 geographical journals, plus books, conference proceedings, reports, and theses. This is the print version of GEOBASE (see below). Earlier years (1966-1998), published under variant titles, are also available.

GEOBASE. FirstSearch, 1980- How To Use
Provides coverage to over 500,000 records covering the worldwide literature of physical geography, geology, and ecology. GEOBASE is the electronic version of Geographical Abstracts: Physical Geography (see above).

International Bibliography of the Social Sciences
The IBSS has more than two million references to articles and books going back to 1951 in the social sciences. It is produced by the London School of Economics and Political Science.

Electronic Journals

Periodicals held by Tufts are listed in the catalog. Holdings in all formats are unified in one record, and most entries for journals held in digital format contain a hyperlink to the source; searches in the catalog enable one to follow these links directly. A supplementary list of electronic journals is on the Tisch homepage under Electronic Journals. For an example of a catalog search for a journal, set the catalog’s Type of Search to "Journal Title," and type in Journal of Regional Science.

Many geography journals held in digital format are parts of Project Muse, JSTOR, Science Direct, Blackwell-Synergy or Wiley Interscience. Although these databases include search engines for the journals they contain, the indexes listed above are the most comprehensive and authoritative sources for the literature of the discipline, and frequently link directly to the journal article itself.

Websites     [back to top]

General Resources

Background Notes
Provides information on geographic entities and international organizations. The print version of the Background Notes is available at the reference desk [Tisch reference desk G 59 .U5].

Country Studies/Area Handbooks
A continuing series of books on foreign countries prepared by the Library of Congress and sponsored by the U.S. Army. The print copies of these Country Studies/Area Handbooks are available in Tisch Library’s reference collection.

Current Geographical Publications
The electronic version of the current issue of the American Geographical Society’s classic publication.

Map Libraries
Links to map collections located in the U.S., Canada, Europe, Asia, and Australia.

World Factbook
The CIA’s annual publication that provides demographic, economic, geographic, and political information on the nations of the world.

WWW Virtual Library: Geography

Yahoo: Geography

Interactive Maps and Route Planners

The following links allow the user either to draw a customized map of a U.S. city or to plan a trip between two U.S. cities.

Maps On Us

MapQuest

Virtual Map Collections

The following is a selected list of map collections that feature a variety of historical and political maps.

Connecticut State Maps (University of Connecticut -- Storrs)

New England Maps (University of Southern Maine)

New York State Maps (SUNY Stony Brook)

Perry-Castenada Library Map Collection (University of Texas - Austin)

Rare Map Collection at the Hargrett Library (University of Georgia)

Contact a Librarian     [back to top]

Christopher Barbour. Contact for questions about library collections.

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