SocSci 3A Exercise: Digital Archives
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Exercise: Archives
For your exercise, we get to dig into some dusty archives! Thankfully, no need to sneeze as we will do
this digitally. While the contents of most archives are not digitized, we are lucky that archivists have
worked to create digital records of them available so that you can see what is available and see which
ones might be useful for your own research. You are going to search through various archives to try and
find possible data sources. This then allows us to see what we can access digitally as well as what might
be available to get access to in person.
For this assignment, please use a different font color so it is easier to see your
answers
Part 1: Online Archive of California
Go to https://oac.cdlib.org/, which is the main list of collections across the state of California,
including the UCs
Do the following:
• Click “Contributing Institutions” at the top
• Scroll down to “” (or try doing ctrl+F to search for “irvine” to find that) and click the
link for “UC Irvine.” UCI has multiple collections listed, so make sure you click UC
Irvine.
o *NOTE* Putting “irvine” in the search bar pulls a variety of collections, from
things related to UCI to things in UCI’s collection, through to anything that has
that word in it. Though searching for just a word, as you’ll see, brings a lot of
unexpected results. For example, when I put in “Irvine” the fifth result is the
“Star Trek Association of Irvine publications 1977-1991.” If this is something
that intrigues you, UCI actually has these in their collections.
Answer the below questions
You will see five listed: Critical Theory Archive, Orange County Regional History
Collection, Southeast Asian Archive, Special Collections, and University Archives. Click
“Special Collections.” On this page, look for “Show collections with online items” so that
you see what you can access online. Click on “Braunwald (Susan R.) language acquisition
diaries.”
1. What sort of stuff (items, documents, etc.) does this archive hold? (note: look for
“collection scope and content summary)
2. How was it obtained? (look for “acquisition information”)
3. What is the size of the collection and what years does it cover? Does it specify exactly
how many items it contains? Does it give measurements/volume?
4. What is the sample/preferred citation?
5. Now that you’ve read the description, click the link near the top that says “Online
items available” and look at some of what’s here. What sorts of research do you think
these documents might be useful for?
SocSci 3A Exercise: Digital Archives
Part 2: California Archives available online
Go back to http://www.oac.cdlib.org/.
Do the following:
• Enter in a search term, anything you would like but you’re welcome to repeat prior
searches/topics you’ve used in other assignments
5. What search term did you use?
6. How many results came back? (i.e. how many collections have this term attached to
them?)
7. Pick one of the collections that appears interesting to you that is available online (it’ll
have the eye symbol next to it). Which did you pick and why?
8. Please copy and paste the web address here.
9. Which sort of stuff (items, documents, etc.) does this archive hold?
10. How was it created? (i.e. what was its acquisition)
11. What is the size of the collection and what years does it cover? Does it specify exactly
how many items it contains?
12. What is the sample citation?
13. Is everything available online or only parts of it? Are there things you wish you could
access that you can’t?
14. Now that you’ve read the description, what sorts of research do you think these
documents might be useful for?
Part 3: California Archives, not available online
Go back to http://www.oac.cdlib.org/.
Do the following:
• Enter in a search term, anything you would like but you’re welcome to repeat prior
searches/topics you’ve used in other assignments
15. What search term did you use?
16. How many results came back? (i.e. how many collections have this term attached to
them?)
17. Pick one of the collections that appears interesting to you that is not available online
(it won’t have the eye symbol next to it). Which did you pick and why?
18. Please copy and paste the web address here.
19. Which sort of stuff (items, documents, etc.) does this archive hold?
20. How was it created? (i.e. what was its acquisition)
21. What is the size of the collection and what years does it cover? Does it specify exactly
how many items it contains?
22. What is the sample citation?
23. Now that you’ve read the description, what sorts of research do you think these
documents might be useful for?
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SocSci 3A Exercise: Digital Archives
Part 4: Going Beyond California
Now you’re going to need to find an archive outside of the state of California. For this, I want
you to use ArchiveGrid (but, keep an eye out and don’t choose an archive that’s in
California!). https://researchworks.oclc.org/archivegrid/
Do the following:
• Enter the same search term you used in Part 2.
24. How many results came back? (i.e. how many collections have this term attached to
them?)
25. Pick one of the collections that appears interesting to you. Which did you pick and
why?
26. Please copy and paste the web address here.
27. Which sort of stuff (items, documents, etc.) does this archive hold?
28. How was it created? (i.e. what was its acquisition)
29. What is the size of the collection and what years does it cover? Does it specify exactly
how many items it contains?
30. What is the sample citation?
31. Is it available online? (note: on this site, it may only state this in the description, they
don’t use a clear symbol like the California site.)
32. Now that you’ve read the description, what sorts of research do you think these
documents might be useful for? (If there are items available online, you should try and
look through like the prior part of this exercise; if it says available online but you can’t
access anything make sure to note that.)
Part 5: Going Beyond California
Now you’re going to need to find an archive outside of the state of California. For this, I want
you to use ArchiveGrid (but, keep an eye out and don’t choose an archive that’s in
California!). https://researchworks.oclc.org/archivegrid/
Do the following:
33. Enter a new search term. What did you choose?
34. How many results came back? (i.e. how many collections have this term attached to
them?)
35. Pick one of the collections that appears interesting to you. Which did you pick and
why?
36. Please copy and paste the web address here.
37. Which sort of stuff (items, documents, etc.) does this archive hold?
38. How was it created? (i.e. what was its acquisition)
39. What is the size of the collection and what years does it cover? Does it specify exactly
how many items it contains?
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SocSci 3A Exercise: Digital Archives
40. What is the sample citation?
41. Is it available online? (note: on this site, it may only state this in the description, they
don’t use a clear symbol like the California site.)
42. Now that you’ve read the description, what sorts of research do you think these
documents might be useful for? (If there are items available online, you should try and
look through like the prior part of this exercise; if it says available online but you can’t
access anything make sure to note that.)
Part 4: Archival Reflection
Archives represent a variety of potential data sources that can be used (some for quantitative
work) to address aspects of a topic unexpectedly. I’d bet that many of you are aware of (and
maybe part of) fandoms. They’ve gotten a lot of coverage and are especially active on social
media, though they’re far from being something new. That Star Trek archive I mentioned at the
top is a prime example. BTS has a huge, worldwide fandom. So does Star Trek. Are they similar?
Different? Does the internet influence changes in the processes of fandom formation and
engagement? How might you figure that out? Well, one way that this can be/is approached is
accessing documentation of earlier fandoms which you can analyze and compare to more recent
ones.
This is the space where I want you to reflect upon the process of finding resources. What was it
like combing through a list of results and finding ones that seemed useful/interesting to you? Do
the descriptions of archive contents intrigue you? Why or why not? Methodologically, three
approaches regularly have the most coverage and interest: surveys/secondary data analysis,
interviews, and ethnographies. Interviews and ethnographies especially because they get to be
more interactive with people, but archives push us to deal with the traces of people. Are archives
something you could see yourself wanting to dig into? Why or why not? I even recommend you
spend some time just googling around, searching for archives and seeing what you can find,
especially since the databases used here don’t cover everything.
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Worksheet for Exercise 2 – Literature Searches
Be sure you are accessing the internet through the VPN Software. (See the library website
for how to do this)
This exercise will give you some ideas for starting searches on topics
Also, please type your answers using an easily readable color that is not black so that we can
clearly differentiate your answers from the instructions.
A. Finding an article from a news release:
1. Go to this website: http://www.sciencedaily.com/
a. This website contains news releases about recent research in any scientific
discipline.
b. There are no articles on this site, just news releases about recent research studies
and you will find some pretty good research ideas here.
2. Try a search on your social science major: for example, sociology or psychology or
“economics,” etc.
a. You may also search on a social science topic of interest instead: for example,
global warming, voting, immigration, etc.
3. Select one of the news releases that interest you.
4. Make a note of the following – type in your answers:
a. Search term used: global warming
b. Title of the Press Release in Science Daily: Higher risk of temperature-related
death if global warming exceeds 2°C
c. Date of the press release (month and year): 03/2022
d. Name of researcher(s): Wan Ting Katty Huang, Isobel Braithwaite, Andrew
Charlton-Perez, Christophe Sarran, Ting Sun.
e. Affiliation of researchers (University or Research Center): University College
London
f. Name of the Journal the research is published in: Environmental Research Letters
g. Issue the research is published in (month is mentioned most likely, although
sometimes it will state “current issue” in which it is probably the same month as
the news release) 3
h. One to two sentences about what the researchers found:
The researchers found that the death rate related to extreme temperatures due to
global warming will increase greatly. There is 42% increase in death rate related
to climate temperature in England and Wales.
B. Finding a book and article by topic:
1. Search in the UCI library, Melvyl Current Catalog, for a book on economic development.
Conduct a “Keyword” search and for the dropdown menu “Formats” select “Books”.
Type in the following information:
a. Search term used: economic development
b. Author(s): Grilli, Enzo R.; Salvatore, Dominick.
c. Title: Economic development / edited by Enzo Grilli and Dominick Salvatore.
d. Library Call No: HC59.7.E277
e. Publisher: Greenwood Press
f. Year of Publication: 1994
2. Search in the library for a journal article on a topic of interest to you. Use one of the
“Databases to get you started” options. Type in the following information:
a. Author(s): Comizzoli, Pierre; Holt, William V
b. Title:Breakthroughs and new horizons in reproductive biology of rare and
endangered animal species.
c. Journal: Biology of Reproduction
d. Date: 2019
e. Volume and Issue: Volume 101 Issue 3
f. Pages: 514-525
g. Can you access the article? yes
3. Narrow down one of the above topics (economic development or racism) to a very
specific topic and find another book or journal article. For example, for a narrow topic
on racism, you might find an article or book about white flight and its effects. Or you can
search on gender, age, etc.
a. Search term used: gender equality politics and movements
b. Author(s): Park, Jin-Kyung ; Thanommongkol, Panawan
c. Title:“Shock of Daughters”: Fashion, Unisex Style, and Gender Politics in South
Korean Media (1970s-1980s)
d. Journal: Acta Koreana
e. Date: 2020
f. Volume and Issue: Volume 23 Issue 2
g. Pages: 79-104
h. Can you access the article? yes
Complete this worksheet and save it as Your Name Exercise 2