Reference at Newman Library

Year: 2020

Gale Literature as Starting Point for Our Students

Recently, Gale overhauled its interfaces for their databases, giving them a unified look as well as some new functionality. Now you can now search across all the key Gale databases that have literary criticism and author bios in a new database called “Gale Literature.” It searches across:

  • Gale eBooks (formerly known as Gale Virtual Reference Library)
  • Gale Literature Criticism (formerly known as Literature Criticism Online)
  • Gale Literature Resource Center
  • Dictionary of Literary Biography
  • LitFinder

Chris Tuthill and I met recently to discuss these changes and have agreed that on the page listing English databases, we’d simplify the list of “Recommended” databases and put a spotlight on Gale Literature by listing it first. If you’re helping a student who needs literature criticism, work overviews, or bios of an author, please steer them to Gale Literature as their starting point. In some cases (such as a student who needs to search more deeply for works of literary criticism), you can also recommend MLA International Bibliography, which is now exclusively on EBSCO’s platform.

Getting Started with the Rosetta Stone Database

Rosetta Stone is one of two databases we subscribe to that offers foreign language instruction. Getting started in it requires a few more steps than the usual database:

Step 1: After clicking the link for “Rosetta Stone” from our database pages, you’ll see this page with an icon you have to click to proceed.

Click Rosetta Stone icon

Step 2: First-time users will have create an account on Rosetta Stone. They can use any email address and password they want. Then they select what language they want to use. Returning users can use the Rosetta Stone credentials they created previously.

Create Rosetta Stone account

Step 3: On the next page, users should click “Launch Rosetta Stone Foundations” to (finally) get to the language lessons.

Launch Rosetta Stone