Databases & E-Reference Materials

This database is a multidisciplinary collection of streaming videos spanning a wide range of subject areas, including anthropology, business, psychology, film, history, music, and more. Resources include acclaimed and award-winning interdisciplinary documentaries, independent films, training and instructional videos, foreign films and shorts, newsreels, and other educational titles. 

NOTE: AVON video access is mediated. This means that any video not currently licensed for use will require the user to request access. Access is being enabled for class use with instructor approval.

This six-volume set provides comprehensive information and evaluations on musicians from all musical genres.

This open access collection provides access to the digitized histories of civil rights activism by Black, Latine, Indigenous, Asian American, and Pacific Islander communities. Materials are drawn from universities, public libraries, community archives, and historical societies and include photographs, unofficial letters, correspondence, demonstration plan outlines, meeting minutes, newsreels, interviews, and musical recordings. This collection is actively being developed in stages and is targeted for completion at the end of 2025. 

This reference work provides descriptions of the taxonomy, systematics, ecology, physiology and other biological properties of all named prokaryotic taxa.

This database indexes western-language articles and book chapters on East, Southeast, and South Asia. All subjects are covered with special focus on the humanities and social sciences.

Covers Native North American history, life, and culture from the Human Relations Area Files (HRAF). Materials indexed include the cumulative eight volumes of the Ethnographic Bibliography of North America, books, journal articles, essays, conference papers, dissertations and U.S. government documents. This database was formerly known as Bibliography of Native North Americans.

Covers European and American visual arts material published between 1975 and 2007. Also see International Bibliography of Art (IBA) for material published after 2007.

The Big Ten Geoportal provides access to geospatial resources, including GIS datasets, web services, and digitized historical maps. The resources in the portal are selected and curated by librarians and geospatial specialists at twelve research institutions in the Big Ten Academic Alliance.

The Biodiversity Heritage Library is the world's largest open access digital collection for biodiversity literature and archives. This free resource provides access to hundreds of thousands of volumes from library and museum collections all over the world. It also provides a range of tools and services to enhance research, including scientific name tools, data exports and APIs, altmetrics, and reference management tools. 

This two-volume set includes approximately 1550 biographical sketches on astronomers from antiquity to modern times.