Developing and Managing the Brown University Library Collections
Collection Policies by Subject:  Hispanic Studies

• Library Liaison:
  Patricia_Figueroa@brown.edu
• Departmental Library Representative (DLR): 
  Enric_Bou@brown.edu

• Description of the Academic Program | Hispanic Studies Departmental Home Page
  The Hispanic Studies Department offers undergraduate and graduate courses on Spanish and Spanish Latin American literature, language and culture. Interdisciplinary courses including history, philosophy and film studies are also taught. Both undergraduate and graduate programs are designed to provide students with the opportunity to work in a range of periods, genres, and approaches. The graduate program leads to the Ph.D. degree, and its curriculum is coordinated in a system of seminars, study courses, in dependent studies and research projects. Hispanic Studies also prepares graduates for language teaching positions through training in language teaching theory, techniques, and practices.
• 
  Database of Honors, Masters, and Ph.D Theses

• Overview of the Collection
  The Hispanic Studies collection consists of more than 28,708 titles of which 120 are currently received serials. Most items are housed at the Rockefeller Library.

  Language (PC3800-4999):	2,063
  Literature (PQ6000-8929):	20,443
  History of Spain (DP1-402, BXs):	2,947
  Social Sciences of Spain (Ls, Hs, Js):	762
  Harris Collection (Lat. Amer.):	2,200
  Bibliographies (Zs):	286
  Online databases:	7
  Total:	28,708

  See Library support statement for Graduate Program Review for Hispanic Studies
  See Library support for External Cluster Review for Hispanic Studies

• General Collecting Guidelines
  The purpose of the Hispanic Studies collection is to support the needs of undergraduates, graduates, faculty, and other users within the Brown University community. Its collection development policy focuses in the curriculum of the Hispanic Studies Depart ment, collecting primarily on the language and literature of Spain and Spanish-speaking Latin America (LC classes PC and PQ). Works on cultural aspects of these regions and, more specifically, the history and social sciences of Spain (LC classes DP, BX, L , H and J) are collected selectively.

• Specific Collecting Guidelines
  
  
  • Language: Primary materials in Spanish language form the core of the collection. Primary materials in Catalan, Galician, Basque, and Latin American indigenous languages are selectively acquired to complement the collection. Secondary materi als are collected mostly in Spanish and English, however other Western European languages such as French, Italian and German, are also considered. English translations of classic Spanish and Latin American literary works are purchased to serve Hispanic St udies as well as the Comparative Literature Department.
    
    
  • Imprint Date: The Hispanic Studies collection is for the most part a circulating collection. While retrospective scholarly materials published after 1800 are acquired according to research needs, the selection is focused on current impr ints. Original manuscripts, materials published before 1800, and those considered valuable or requiring special handling are housed in Special Collections at the John Hay Library where they do not circulate.
    
    
  • Chronological Span: For literature and language, time coverage for Spain dates back to the Middle Ages, and for Latin America to the colonial period. Both geographical areas are collected up to the present. The periods and themes of Spanish history of interest to the collection are the Middle Ages, Al-Andalus, the reconquest, Sefarad, the Catholic Kings and discovery of the New World, Charles V, Phillip II, the Spanish Civil War (including antecedents and co nsequences, such as the post-war years and the republican exile), the Franco regime, the period surrounding the transition to democracy, and Spain's membership in the European Union. General histories of Spain are also collected. After the unification of the crowns under the Catholic Kings, the tendency of the collection toward history is national vs. regional.
    
    
  • Geographical Range: While all geographical areas within Spain and Spanish Latin America are covered, the collecting emphasis for Latin American countries has been traditionally on Mexico, Cuba, Argentina, Chile, Peru, Colombia, Venezuel a and Puerto Rico. Literature texts by Latino authors in the United States are collected by the English literature/Race and Ethnicity selector at the Rockefeller Library, and the curator of the Harris Collection of American Poetry and Plays at the John Ha y Library. Both collections welcome the recommendations of the Ibero-American selector.
    
    
  • Types of Material Included: Circulating monographs are the main component of the Hispanic Studies collection, however other materials such as serials, non-circulating monographs, audiovisual and electronic resources are also collected.
    
    
  • Formats: The library acquires materials in all formats, with the exception of 8mm in the case of audiovisual items. The bulk of the collection is in print-based (monographs and serials), however microfilm is still purchased for periodical archives, pamphlet collec tions and pre-twentieth century publications. Materials in electronic formats such as CD-ROM, DVD, DVD-ROM and online access are acquired according to their licensing agreements and their compatibility with the library's system. Audiovisual materials are purchased on video, or preferably DVD format. Although the Media Services Laboratory is equipped with VCRs and DVD players that can play and copy films produced with the PAL system, the NTSC system is highly preferred. All videos purchased for this collec tion are housed at Media Services in the Sciences Library. Music CDs are for the most part purchased by the Music Librarian and are housed at the Orwig Music Library.
    
    
  • Types of Materials Excluded: Introductory general-purpose textbooks whose primary function is instruction are out of the scope of this collection.
  
  
  
• Electronic Resources
  The library subscribes to the following six new Iberian and Latin American databases, the first two are specific to humanities and social sciences in Spain:
  
  

• Bases de Datos del CSIC
• Bibliograf’a de la Literatura Espa–ola desde 1980 (BLE)
• Chicano Database
• Hispanic American Periodical Index (HAPI)
• INFO-LATINOAMERICA
• Latin American Database (LADB)

You can access these databases from the Iberia and Latin America electronic resources link available through the Library Web page.


• Serials
  The Serials Department at BUL currently subscribes to 120 Hispanic serial publications, 97 of them are journal titles, and 3 are newspapers. The current newspaper subscriptions are: El Pa’s (Spain), La Jornada (Mexico) and N uevo D’a (Puerto Rico). With most newspapers available on the Internet, the library prefers to focus its funds on new journals titles, however the need for more varied Hispanic newspaper archives is acknowledged and should be fulfilled in the future depen ding on budget allocations and one-time money gifts.
  
  
• Approval plan
  A Spanish approval plan will be established at the start of the 2003-2004 academic/fiscal year with the Spanish vendor Iberbook Internacional S.L. The plan will follow the guidelines of the current Hispanic a nd Latin American Studies collection development policies drafted in August 2002. It intends to serve principally the ongoing needs of faculty and students in the Hispanic Studies department for current Spanish publications pertaining to the language and literature of Spain and Spanish-speaking Latin America, and selected periods of the history of Spain. The plan also intents to provide current Latin American history monographs of Spanish origin to support the curriculum of the Center for Latin American S tudies (CLAS). Its goal is not only to build a core collection of Spanish bibliographic resources that will satisfy present needs, but also to foresee future changes in academic trends. The plan's profile has been created to maintain a Spanish monographic collection at the research level.

• Special Collections
  The John Hay Library houses materials requiring special handling and preservation, as well as large subject-oriented collections that are maintained as discrete units. While the John Hay does not maintain any collections specific to Spanish and Latin Amer ican literature, language and culture, Hispanic Studies researchers may find titles relevant to their field of study. The John Hay houses 600 volumes in the LC class PQ6000-8999 (Spanish and Latin American literature) and 30 volumes in PC3800-4999 (Spanis h language). The Harris Collection of American Poetry and Plays, contains 2200 Latin American titles (not classified under LC). Another special collection of interest to Hispanic Studies may be the Sheet Music Collection which includes music from Cuba and other Latin American countries.

• Breakdown of Subjects | Key to Collecting Levels

  Call number	Subject	Current level	Desired level
  PC 3800-3999	Catalan literature and language	Study	Study/Research
  PC 4000-4999	Spanish language	Study/Research	Research
  PQ 6000-8929	Literature of Spain and Lat. America	Research	Research
  DP1-402	History of Spain	Basic	Study
  BXs	Religion in Spain (i.e. Inquisition)	Study	Research
  Ls, Hs and Js	Social sciences of Spain	Basic	Study
  Zs	Bibliographies: Spain, Lat. America	Study	Research

• New Titles Cataloged: Language & Literature | History

• Related Collections and Other Resources
  The Language Resource Center (LCR)
  LCR houses a variety of materials such as audio, video, laserdiscs, DVDs, computer software and television news broadcasts and develops electronic resources in support of the learning and teaching of languages. LRC is affiliated with the Center for La nguage Studies which "aims to promote the teaching and learning of languages at Brown University."
  
  The John Carter Brown Library (JCB)
  The JCB is an independently administered and funded center for advanced research in history and the humanities, located at Brown University since 1901. Its internationally renowned collection of Americana focuses on historical sources describing the d iscovery, exploration, settlement, and growth of the European colonies in the New World from 1492 to 1835. The collection includes over 45,000 rare books (printed before ca. 1825) and over 16,000 reference books and secondary sources (printed after ca. 1825). Most well-known, perhaps, are the Library's extensive holdings in the literature of European explorati on and travel in the Western Hemisphere, from the first Latin edition of the Columbus letter of 1493, through nearly all of the contemporary narratives of Spanish, Portuguese, French, Dutch, and English discovery, exploration, and settlement. The Library' s collection of pre-1800 German and Italian books about America is among the richest in the United States.
  
  The JCB provides a fellowship program for scholars pursuing academic research on the colonial Americas. Approximately twenty-five fellowships are awarded each year for periods of time ranging from two to ten months. Fellowships are offered to qualifie d researchers, the main criteria for appointment being the merit and significance of the candidate's proposal, the qualifications of the candidate, and the relevance of the project to the holdings of the Library.
  
  Annmary Brown Memorial Collection
  The Incunabula Collection is part of the Annmary Brown Memorial Collection and contains two works published by Juan Pablos, the first printer in the New World. These works are:
  
  
  • Jeannes Gerson. Tripartito del christianissimo y consolatorio doctor Juan Gerson de doctrina christiana: a qualquiera muy p[ro]uechosa. / Traduzido de latin en le[n]gua castellana para el bie[n] d[e] muchos necessario. Impresso en Mexico: En ca sa de Juan Cromberger. Por ma[n]dado y a costa del. R.S. obispo de la mesma ciudad fray Jua[n] ‚umarraga. Reuisto y examinado por su mandado., A–o de M.d.xliiij. [1544]
  • Tenuxtitla, Mexico. Archdiocese. Constituciones del arcobispado y prouincia de la muy ynsigne y muy leal ciudad de Tenuxtitla[n], Mexico [1556]
  
  The Virginia Baldwin Orwig Music Library
  The Orwig Music Library, one of the libraries comprising the Brown University Library system, houses the general music collection on campus: music books, scores, periodicals, sound recordings, videotapes and microforms. The collection supports the cur riculum of the Music Department and includes recordings of music from various regions in Latin America and Spain.
  
  
  Illustration: La ni–a recluta, Anne S. K. Brown Military Collection, John Hay Library.

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