Looking for information?

[KAREN RONDESTVEDT]

In our enthusiasm for new technology, contact with distant colleagues, etc.,
let's not forget a (modernized) old-fashioned resource for finding books of
proverbs, information on Russian dialects, resources for using linguistics to
teach foreign languages, and other matters of interest: the library with a
large Slavic collection. Those of us lucky enough to work at an institution
with such a library have it easy. For example, a search of our local on-line
catalog using the subject heading PROVERBS, RUSSIAN produces 46 entries,
including bilingual English-Russian ones. A search with the heading RUSSIAN
LANGUAGE--DIALECTS produces 150 entries. Using the heading SERBO-CROATIAN
LANGUAGE produces 578 entries, including the subheadings --BOSNIA AND
HERCEGOVINA and --DIALECTS.

Even those at smaller institutions can search the catalogs of larger libraries
using Telnet and borrow what you find using interlibrary loan. Ask at your
local library how to do that and for Telnet addresses of the libraries of your
choice.

Virtually all of us in the U.S. use Library of Congress subject headings.
There should be lists of them at your local library; use the same ones at any
library whose on-line catalog you search. That's one of the reasons we use
standardized headings instead of making up our own.

It's fun and easy to ask colleagues for information, but you'll get a much
more systematic answer from a library. If you need help there, ask; that's
what we librarians are there for. (But please don't everyone reading this mes-
sage ask me! There's only one of me, but I have colleagues all over the coun-
try.)

End of lecture.

-*-  Karen Rondestvedt, Slavic Bibliographer
-*-  University of Pittsburgh Library System
-*-  rondest at vms.cis.pitt.edu
-*-  Web: http://www.pitt.edu/~rondest/