Untitled-2 460 College & Research Libraries September 2002 460 Selected Reference Books of 2000–2002 Eileen McIlvaine Eileen McIlvaine is Head of Reference in Butler Library at Columbia University; e-mail mcilvain@columbia.edu. Although it appears under a byline, this list is a project of the reference depart- ments of Columbia University Libraries and notes are signed with the initials of one of the following staff members: Barbara Sykes-Austin, Avery Library; Mary Cargill, Anice Mills., Junko Stuveras, Sarah Spurgin Witte, Butler Library; Olha della Cava, Lehman Library; Elizabeth Davis, Music Library. This article follows the pattern set by the semiannual series initiated by the late Constance M. Winchell more than sixty years ago and contin- ued by Eugene Sheehy. Because the purpose of the list is to present a selection of recent scholarly and general works, it does not pretend to be either well balanced or comprehensive. A brief roundup of new edi- tions of standard works is provided at the end of the articles. Code num- bers (such as AA604) have been used to refer to titles in the Guide to Reference Books (Chicago: ALA, 1996). Archives Benedetti, Amedeo. Gli archivi delle immagini: fototeche, cineteche, videoteche in Italia. Genova: Erga, 2000. 444p. L30.000 (ISBN 88-8163-182-2). This directory of image archives in Italy is arranged by province and then alpha- betically by name of the establishment. As the subtitle indicates, it includes various types of images, both still and moving: photographs, slides, films, videotapes, cassettes, and CDs. A typical entry con- tains address, telephone, fax, hours, brief history, size of holdings, publications (if any), and indexes by location and broad subject area (oral history, cultural anthro- pology, aerial photography) or format (films, slides, videocassettes). Towns and cities are classified by province instead of in straight alphabetical order. This makes the index less useful because the main entries are already classed by province. The directory is followed by an anno- tated essay on six major collections of vi- sual materials: Alinari brothers; the Gabinetto Fotografico Nazionale, founded by Giovanni Gargiolli; Istituto L.U.C.E.; Archivio Storico Ansaldo; Museo del Cin- ema di Torino; and Civico Museo Biblioteca dell’Attore. Although a good source for surveying the Italian efforts to collect and conserve visual materials of all types, it is not a union catalog and the description of the subjects of individual collections is too broad most of the time. , it serves as a starting point for locating this type of material. For libraries that are building extensive image collections.—J.S. Literature The New York Public Library Literature Com- panion. Ed. Anne Skillion. New York: Free Pr., 2001. 772p. $40 (ISBN 0-684- 86890-3). LCCN 2001-034219. In its inimitable style, the New York Pub- lic Library has produced this one-volume companion chock full of biographical and literary information, sidebars, lists, and chronologies. The book is arranged in three parts: creators, works of literature, and literary facts and resources; however, Selected Reference Books of 2000–2002 461 these topics do not begin to describe the breadth of information covered. The scope is wide-ranging, covering “major figures and works of literature from around the world and all historical periods” (Ed.’s note). Each part is further divided into sections and features. The main part of the book is devoted to short, informative author biographies inter- spersed with sidebars ranging from quotes by writers about writers to author pseud- onyms. Brief descriptions of major works of literature are described in the next sec- tion along with lists of book awards cur- rent to 2001. Following this is a descrip- tion of literary characters; a dictionary of terms, movements, genres; a chronology of world literature from 3500 BC to 2000 AD; and an extensive bibliography of lit- erary factbooks and handbooks. Every sec- tion is enhanced by interesting trivia, mak- ing this an enjoyable book to browse. Also particularly useful are the annotated sec- tions on Web sites for literature, indicat- ing which sites are free and which ones are fee based; and the section on adapta- tions into other media, which describes operas, plays, ballets, and films adapted from works of literature. This volume’s scope is so broad that it cannot possibly go into the kind of detail necessary for scholarly research. A use- ful guide to literary sources, however, the handsome design allows for easy access to the material. This is a wonderful ready- reference source for general and academic libraries.—A.M. Music Baker’s Biographical Dictionary of Mu- sicians, Centennial Edition. Nicolas Slonimsky, editor emeritus. New York: Schirmer Bks., 2001. 6v. 29cm. $650 (ISBN 0-02-865525-7). LCCN 00-46375. This edition presents an enlargement, both physically and topically, of Baker’s Biographical Dictionary of Musicians (8th ed. 1992. BJ203). Formerly the standard one- volume biographical dictionary for clas- sical music, it now has been published in six volumes and has added popular mu- sic and jazz to its focus. Although it is the first edition since the fourth not to include new material com- piled or written by the noted lexicogra- pher Nicolas Slonimsky, who died in 1995 at the age of 101, Slonimsky’s work per- vades this edition. All the prefaces he wrote as editor of the Dictionary (BJ203) from its fifth through its eighth editions are reprinted here, as are his entries from the previous edition with their colorful, descriptive, and evaluative language. Replacing him are Laura Kuhn and Dennis McIntire who edited the classical entries. Composers and musicians associ- ated with popular repertories are overseen by William Ruhlmann, editor for popular music, and Lewis Porter for jazz. Entries are attributed to one of the editors or to one of the additional sixty contributors listed at the front of each volume. This edition contains more than 14,000 entries and includes about 3,000 new en- tries: 1,000 new names of composers, per- formers, musicians, musicologists, and others whose work relate to classical music; and nearly 2,000 new entries re- lated to popular and jazz music. Many of the articles on classical music figures have been expanded, and all previous entries have been revised and updated. Entries are listed alphabetically and in- clude individuals and groups, the latter for popular and jazz names. Entry format fol- lows the previous editions, with birth and death information, biographical informa- tion as it relates to the subject’s musical ca- reer, and one or more of the following: lists of works, arranged by venue or perform- ing forces; writings; discography for popu- lar and jazz entries; and bibliographies. Three indexes are found at the end of volume 6. The Genre Index organizes names into three separate categories: clas- sical, jazz, and popular. The classical and jazz entries are arranged in chronological/ stylistic groupings, whereas popular entries are organized under four genres: Country, Pop, R & B/Rap, and Rock. The National- ity Index lists entries under 174 country or regional categories (Abyssinian-Polish, Al- satian, American, etc.). The final index cov- ers women composers and musicians. 462 College & Research Libraries September 2002 Baker’s continues to provide indispens- able information on persons in a wide- ranging number of fields related to West- ern classical music where the entries con- tinue to reflect Slonimsky’s precepts. The aim is comprehensiveness, with articles of varying length depending on the subject, work lists (where appropriate), and very brief bibliographies. The jazz entries ap- pear selectively chosen, with short articles, selective discographies, and almost no bib- liographies. The articles on popular mu- sic appear fewest in number but are gen- erally longer with discographies and bib- liographies. As a result, this title now ap- pears as one in transition, and it is too soon to tell if it will continue to develop.—E.D. Psychology The Freud Encyclopedia: Theory, Therapy, and Culture. Ed. Edward Erwin. New York, London: Routledge, 2002. xxvii, 641p. 29cm. $165 (ISBN 0- 415-93677-2). LCCN 2001-048448. Written by an international team of con- tributors, this encyclopedia is a handy in- troduction to Freud’s works and his world- wide influence. The editor, Edward Erwin, is the author of A Final Accounting: Philo- sophical and Empirical Issues in Freudian Psy- chology (Cambridge: MIT Pr., 1996). The Encyclopedia gives a comprehensive over- view of Freud’s key concepts, precursors, associates and followers, and the influence of this psychoanalysis in various disci- plines and countries. All articles are signed and accompanied by bibliographical ref- erences, including references to Freud’s works, if applicable. The Encyclopedia strikes a good balance between biographical entries (Anna Freud, Melanie Klein, Nietzsche, Lacan, et al.) and topical subjects such as Freud- ian influences in other disciplines (litera- ture, genetics) and outside German- speaking countries (Norway, Korea). Freud’s theories, concepts, methods and case studies are covered (for example, the Unconscious, Oedipus complex, Projec- tion, Working through, Wolfman). The book is arranged alphabetically by topic and accompanied by cross-references, an alphabetical list of entries, and a detailed index of names and subjects. The quality of writing varies from ar- ticle to article, and the reader is warned against occasional errors in bibliographic citations. (The editor ’s above-mentioned work is cited as a publication of Cam- bridge University Press in Cambridge, Mass.) Not all page references to main entries are printed in bold in the index as it is specified, for example, Lacan and Lay analysis. Some book publication negli- gence aside, this encyclopedia is a useful source for a reference department servic- ing a wide range of readers from psychol- ogy students to literary scholars.—J.S. Sociology Kaul, Chandrika. Statistical Handbook on the World’s Children. Westport, Conn.: Oryx Pr., 2002. 568p. $69.95 (ISBN 1- 57356-390-0). LCCN 2002-277771. Chandrika Kaul has rendered an enormous service by giving us a comprehensive, well- organized, thoroughly documented, and truly international compilation of statistics of the world’s children. Although several such compendia exist for U.S. children, such as Statistical Record of Children (1994), Statis- tical Handbook on Adolescents in America (1996), and the annual Kids Count Data Book, no international compilation of this kind ex- ists. Statistical Handbook on the World’s Chil- dren fills that gap. The editor encountered many obstacles to compiling such a statistical compendium. On some aspects, international data are lim- ited or nonexistent, or data exist for the gen- eral population but are not broken down by age, not to mention that there is no uni- versally accepted definition of “child.” Ob- stacles notwithstanding, however, Chandrika Kaul has managed to gather a wealth of child-related statistical informa- tion, chiefly from the past ten years, and organized it into eight broad areas: demog- raphy; education; health and nutrition; dis- ease, hunger, and malnutrition; AIDs; eco- nomics; family, social environment, and behavior; and crime, violence, and war. Each section consists of a brief overview of what will be covered and an explanation of Selected Reference Books of 2000–2002 463 indicators used, followed by the statistical tables themselves. The tables, which are drawn from a wide range of sources, list the data by country. For the most part, the tables are reproduced exactly as they ap- pear in the source document, unless it was necessary to modify the presentation to make them more readable. The source from which the table is drawn and any explana- tory information appear in footnote form at the end of the table. A glossary of useful terms, a list of or- ganizations devoted to children’s issues, the text of important international docu- ments pertaining to children, and a sub- ject index conclude this volume, which I recommend highly for all academic librar- ies.—O.dC. Black Studies Companion to Contemporary Black Brit- ish Culture. Ed. Alison Donnell. Lon- don, New York: Routledge, 2002. 356p. $120 (ISBN 0-415-16989-5). LCCN 2001-019658. In an effort to recognize the growing field of contemporary black British culture, this noteworthy volume focuses on seven ma- jor areas: writing, performance works; vi- sual and plastic arts; intellectual life; tele- vision; film and cinema; and music. Black in this context refers to people of African, Caribbean, and South Asian descent; the scope of the book is from 1970 to the present. The material ranges from a dis- cussion of the Fatwa imposed on Salman Rushdie after publication of The Satanic Verses to an in-depth discussion of the evo- lution of the roles of black actors in British television. Entries, which vary in length, are signed by a list of impressive contribu- tors and include cross-references and se- lected bibliographies. As all disciplines are interspersed in an alphabetic arrangement, one finds descriptions of rather disparate topics on a page, ranging from reggae sing- ers to filmmakers to fashion companies. As a result, the thematic entry list at the beginning of the volume is a useful means of identifying distinct entries within a field. An index provides additional access points. An additional annotated list of rel- evant Web sites provides access to both commercial and noncommercial sites. This is a fascinating book to browse through, for both its wide variety of topics and its idiosyncratic tone. As the editor notes in her introduction, “contemporary Black British culture is both complex and unstable, and it is the objective of the Com- panion as a whole to trace some of those complexities and instabilities rather than to offer any kind of resolution or settlement.” This work does not shy away from contro- versial issues or debates but does acknowl- edge multiple perspectives and the varia- tions of cultural forms. As such, it is a valu- able resource for academic libraries.—A. M. Women’s Studies Gerritsen Collection: Women’s History Online 1543–1945. Alexandria, Va.: Chadwyck-Healey (now ProQuest). In progress. When complete, this extraordinarily rich collection will provide full-text indexing and page images from 265 periodicals and more than 4,000 monographs. It is an in- ternational database with significant holdings in English, German, French, and Dutch, as well as some material in the Scandinavian languages, Italian, Spanish, and Latin. It is based on the collection of the Dutch physician Aletta Jacobs and her husband C. V. Gerritsen, which was mi- crofilmed in the mid-seventies by the Microfilm Corp. of America. At the mo- ment, the English material is complete. A current weakness of the database— and one that is difficult to explain to read- ers—is the fact that the periodicals are searched page by page. A search for Co- lumbia FBY:1 University retrieves a diz- zying 820 documents. Putting the records in chronological order (a necessary step in this database) reveals an astonishing num- ber of articles published in the same jour- nal issue on the same page. Because Gerritsen searches the page as a whole, it does not know where one article begins and another ends. Whenever it finds a match on a page, it cites all the biblio- graphic entries linked to that page. Read- ers must read through the entire page look- 464 College & Research Libraries September 2002 ing for the term they are seeking. There is no way to highlight the matching text and no way to remove the unwanted duplicate citations from the inflated results list. The Gerritsen also would benefit from some improved authority control: there are no author hits for Catharine Beecher; instead, one must search under Catherine Beecher (though it is spelled Catharine in most of her books and articles and in the LC authority record). There are records for both Harriet and Harriat Blatch. This would be less of a problem if there were an author browse feature, but there is not. The database is scheduled for comple- tion in December 2002. Laura Janover, project manager, has been very responsive to librarians’ concerns and the database has already seen a number of improve- ments. An early problem in the way search results were displayed for books (hits were displayed by chapter, with no indication of which page contained the search term) has been fixed. Now, results display the table of contents with the number of hits for each chapter, and one can click directly to the first hit and then forward or back- ward hit by hit or page by page. The books and journals are also fully browsable. Although a work in progress, this is an incredible resource. It is breathtaking to have full-text access to so many women’s journals and texts. The collec- tion is especially rich in suffrage material and both scholarly and popular works addressing women’s sexuality, health, birth control, education, and employ- ment, legal rights, and political status. There are publications from across the country—from liberal feminist periodi- cals to conservative antisuffrage jour- nals—most of which have never been in- dexed in any form. An especially useful feature is the ability to search for specific document types: editorial cartoon, letter, obituary, poetry, recipe, and statistics. These can be searched by date (e.g., all editorial cartoons from 1920) and do not need to be limited to a subject search. This collection is recommended for libraries supporting in-depth research in women’s studies.—S.S.W. History and Area Studies Domenico, Roy Palmer. Regions of Italy: A Reference Guide to History and Culture. London: Greenwood, 2002. 465p. £49.95 (ISBN 0-313-30733-4). LCCN 0052434. This encyclopedia of the twenty regions of Italy is very well written. Each region is described in its geographic setting, economy, cuisine (with a recipe), and his- tory from archaeological beginnings to the present, including a brief account of recent politics. Under each region are sec- tions for provinces, each consisting of profile, history, arts and culture, and other significant regional centers. Each regional section also has a short bibliography. At the end of the volume, a nine-page chro- nology covers a history of Italy as a whole. The encyclopedia has a glossary of terms, a bibliography that includes several Web sites of official nature, a detailed in- dex by subject, geographical and personal names, and a number of black-and-white photographs and maps. The photographs are rather unremarkable, but the maps help the reader by showing the region’s position in Italy and giving just the right amount of information on essential geo- graphic characteristics of the region. This is suitable for all types of libraries.—J.S. Oxford Companion to Scottish History. Ed. Michael Lynch. New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 2001. 732p. il. maps. $45 (ISBN 0- 19-211696-7). LCCN 2002-276941. The Keays in their Editor’s Note to Collins Encyclopedia of Scotland (London: Harper/ Collins, 1994 1,046 p.) state that “Distilling and presenting information in an accessible format has long been a Scottish specialty” and then go on to cite the DNB and the Britannica. And Scottish history has been well treated. To name a few works: Donnachie and Hewett’s Companion to Scot- tish History for the Reformation to the Present (London: Batsford, 1989. 245p. DC365.) with entries for events and personalities— Aberdeenshire Canal to the Young Pre- tender. The Dictionary of Scottish History, ed. Gordon Donaldson and Robert Morpeth (Edinburgh: Donald, 1977. 234p. DC364), is another short dictionary. Selected Reference Books of 2000–2002 465 More specialized ones exist, such as the Dictionary of Scottish Business Biography 1860–1960 (Aberdeen Univ. Pr., 1986–1990. 2v. CH97) and the Dictionary of Scottish Church History and Theology, edited by N. M. Cameron (Downers Grove, Ill.: Inter- Varsity Pr., 1993. 906p.). The latter is an extensive dictionary, strong on biography, and much broader than the title indicates, but still concentrating on the Reformed tradition. The latest dictionary is the Oxford Com- panion to Scottish History, edited by Michael Lynch which has a distinctively Scottish agenda “by drawing together important forces, factors and themes which shaped Scotland over the course of many centuries such as climate, fam- ine and disease, geology and topography, living conditions and settlement, as well as more conventional themes such as kingly power, nobility, government and politics” (Pref.). The first theme agreed upon by the 180 contributors was national identity (see the article Scottish Links and also Highland). Signed articles resulted from discussions of the mid-1990s. Most useful is the “Guide to Further Reading” (pp. 684–732), which is a bibli- ography of mostly books recently pub- lished with some articles cited. The com- piler points out there are four ways to find a topic in the volume: headword, cross- reference, index, and a classified contents page that uses fairly broad headings to refer to articles on that topic. So which to keep? I think the larger works are the ones to retain—unfortu- nately for those with crammed shelves— because they have the most extensive cov- erage and are current.—E. M. Mexico and Central America Archaeology of Ancient Mexico and Cen- tral America: An Encyclopedia. Eds. Susan Toby Evans and David L. Webster. New York: Garland, 2001. 948p. il. $150 (ISBN 0-8153-0887-6). LCCN 00-56155. “This volume includes more than 500 ar- ticles that together provide basic informa- tion about the ancient past of middle America, the geographical area that in- cludes the modern nations of Mexico, Gua- temala, Belize, Honduras, El Salvador, Nica- ragua, Costa Rica, and Panama” (Pref.) As the first such encyclopedia in English, it has already proven its usefulness in this library, having been consulted by readers and ref- erence staff within days of its arrival. Much can be learned just by browsing. It is well illustrated, with geographical and topographical maps, site and building plans, reconstruction drawings, figures, photographs, and numerous charts that organize such disparate topics as the tax- onomy of Mesoamerican flora and fauna; Aztec medicinal plants; clothing (illus- trated by line drawings and arranged by piece, period, and cultures): dynasties; ethnohistorical written records (grouped by type, including codices, native-lan- guage poetry, songs and prose, conquer- ors’ accounts, and official, civil, and reli- gious chronicles) and museum collections of Pre-Columbia art and artifacts. Organizationally, the volume is pre- sented as signed articles of varying length in alphabetical order with suggested “Further Readings” proceeded by a de- tailed subject guide. This is a list of the topics to be found in the alphabetical sec- tions but arranged here under major cat- egories encompassing, first, geography and climate, natural resources, and demo- graphics; followed by the titles of entries related to distinct chronological periods, from Paleo-Indian (before 8,000BC) to the Colonial period (AD 1521-1800s). Cultural features such as language, settlement pat- terns, material culture, calendrics, ideol- ogy and ritual, art, and architecture come next. Following are regional summaries of the areas delineated in the introduc- tion, an essay covering general chrono- logical developments and geographical distinctions specific to “Middle America” and “Mesoamerica.” Biographies of im- portant scholars in the field make up the final section of the subject guide. The list of 233 contributors with the titles of their entries immediately pre- cedes the entries themselves. Cross-ref- erences for variant place names are interfiled or come at the end of a related 466 College & Research Libraries September 2002 entry. An extensive index of 93 pages com- pletes the volume.—B.S-A. The Oxford Encyclopedia of Mesoamerican Cultures: The Civilizations of Mexico and Central America. Ed. David Carrasco. New York: Oxford Univ. Pr., 2001. 3v. 1,385p. il. $395/set (ISBN 0-19- 510815-9). LCCN 00-032624. It is always with confidence that a re- searcher or reference librarian can ap- proach an Oxford publication, and this three-volume encyclopedia is no excep- tion. Its geographical coverage is the same as the archaeological encyclopedia of an- cient Mexico and Central America (re- viewed above), but its alphabetical ar- rangement encompasses more essays of greater length and scope by two-thirds more contributors (344), somewhat longer bibliographies after each entry, and a lengthier chronology (to the postcolonial and contemporary eras), all requiring al- most 450 additional pages. The two works together make a formidable collection in this rapidly expanding field, and both the similarities and differences in their ar- rangement act as aids to understanding the cultures under study. A synoptic outline of contents in vol- ume three corresponds to the subject guide in the Evans-Webster volume, but coming after the articles rather than as a way of introducing them. The synoptic guide may be underutilized or even overlooked by novice users. It precedes the somewhat shorter index (76p.) to the set at the end of volume three. The arrangement is similar, however, organizing entry titles under major themes for Geography and History; Mesoamerican Studies; Written and Oral Sources; Economy and Subsistence; Social, Political, and Religious Organization; Cul- tural Interaction and Social Change; Cosmovision and Ritual Performance; Cre- ative Expressions and Materials Forms; Sites, Cities, and Ceremonial Centers; and, like the other title, they conclude with bi- ographies, although there are many more here and they include historical figures, artists, and photographers, as well as an- thropologists, archaeologists, and other scholars. There are fewer maps and charts, but more photographs than the Evans- Webster volume and more article headings (617) to embrace Mesoamerica as “a living world of complex and dynamic futures. The Oxford Encyclopdia of Mesoamerican Cultures is the most recent attempt to de- scribe, interpret, and raise issues of mean- ing and significance about all these pat- terns and developments” (Pref.).—B. S.-A. United States History Documents of American Diplomacy from the American Revolution to the Present. Comp. Michael D. Gambone. Documentary Reference Collections. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood, 2002. 579p. $105 (ISBN 0-313-31064-5). LCCN 2001-018021. This compilation reproduces the text of 167 documents relating to American for- eign policy. The documents are arranged chronologically from the Declaration of Independence to President Clinton’s Octo- ber 17, 2000, address, “A Pathway Back to Negotiations.” The documents are di- vided into chapters (for example, The Colonial Era), each with a five- to six-page introduction to the period. The compiler has included a bibliogra- phy with a list of archives (mainly presi- dential libraries) and secondary sources, again divided into chronological periods, a very useful arrangement; however, the Foreign Relations of the United States is not included in the bibliography, a puzzling omission. Libraries with Henry Steele Commager’s Documents of American His- tory (DB62) will probably not need this compilation (indeed the Commager book is the source cited for many of the docu- ments), but it is a useful update for librar- ies with large undergraduate popula- tions.—M.C. Encyclopedia of the American Civil War: A Political, Social and Military His- tory. Eds. David S. Heidler and Jeanne T. Heidler. Santa Barbara, Calif.: ABC- CLIO, 2000. 5v. 2,733p. il. $470 (ISBN 1-57607-066-2). LCCN 00-011195. Selected Reference Books of 2000–2002 467 This encyclopedia is intended “for both serious scholars and interested amateurs” (Pref.), and the 1,600- plus entries “cover the coming of the war, its conduct, and its consequences in a political, military and social context” (Pref.). The entries are arranged alphabetically, and the final vol- ume has texts of selected documents, a bibliography, a chronology, and an index. The list of entries at the front shows that the encyclopedia concentrates on specific subjects rather than broader is- sues: the majority of the articles are about individuals or battles. The reader can find entries on balloons and the song Dixie, but nothing on states’ rights or slavery. The specificity may be interesting to the gen- eral reader, but students often need a broader overview. The bibliography at the end, too, is not especially useful, because it is 63 pages of works arranged in alphabetical order, pre- sumably by a computer because A Picture of Slavery … is the first title. It is impossible to find works on a specific subject without reading the entire list. And for a work in- tended for scholars, the government publi- cations listed in the bibliography are as- toundingly scanty. There are only three works listed by the U. S. Congress, and only eleven by the U. S. government, including the surely tangential Despatches from United States Consuls in Alexandria 1835–1873. The writing style, too, sometimes seems a bit simplistic for an academic audience. For example, under “Medi- cine,” the first sentence reads: “The Civil War gave birth to a staggering amount of disease and mayhem” (p. 1,303). What is more worrying than the somewhat jejune style is that the brief bibliography at the end of the entry does not list the Surgeon General’s Medical and Surgical History of the War of Rebellion, a basic source for the medical history of the Civil War. The final volume includes the texts of a selection of documents, the most impor- tant of which are readily available else- where. These documents might be useful in high schools or in a college survey course, but the documents are far too se- lective to be used for research. This ency- clopedia would be a useful supplement to more general American history ency- clopedias, but students needing a good introductory discussion of the major is- sues of the Civil War will probably find this work frustrating.—M.C. Olson, James S. Historical Dictionary of the Great Depression 1929–1940. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood, 2001. 355p. $90 (ISBN 0-313-30618-4). LCCN: 2001- 019988. This dictionary has 500-plus alphabetically arranged entries of life during the Great Depression, with an emphasis on popular culture. Brief bibliographies accompany most of the entries, and there are a brief chronology, a general bibliography, and a subject index. Unfortunately, there are no statistical charts, a disappointing omission. A student asking about unemployment can read that “the economy had become. mired in a liquidity trap where the undercomsumption led to production de- clines, deflation and layoffs” (p.292), but other than finding out that unemployment was 25 percent in March 1933, he will find little concrete statistical information. Students who have always enjoyed FDIC protection will need more explana- tion of the banking system and its failure than the entry on the banking crisis pro- vides. Many of the entries seem some- what tangential. DDT, for example, was invented in 1939 and could not have had much effect on the Depression. Many of the entries on popular culture seem unnecessary. It is hard to imagine students looking in a work on the Great Depression for information about the Barrymores, Clark Gable, or The Good Earth. Gone with the Wind (premiered De- cember 1939) gets twice the space devoted to the Gold Standard. More statistics and fewer Hollywood stars would have made this work much more useful.—M.C. James Ciment, author of the Encyclope- dia of the Great Depression and the New Deal (Armonk, N.Y.: Sharpe Reference, 2001. 2v. 917 p. $199. LCCN: 00-056285) also covers popular culture (e.g., Fred Astaire and Gin- ger Rogers). He breaks his treatment of this 468 College & Research Libraries September 2002 period into thematic essays, general entries, government and international affairs; that is in volume 1. Volume 2 reprints docu- ments, including court cases, and offers a long series of biographies. The bibliogra- phy (v. 2, pp. 871–92) is an unannotated A– Z listing of books, articles, and essays. Each entry has a brief bibliography as well.— E.M. New Editions and Supplements The Encyclopedia of World History: Ancient, Medieval, Modern Chronologically Arranged by Peter Stearns Completely Revised and Updated Edition of the Classic Reference Work Originally Compiled and Edited by William L. Langer (Bos- ton: Houghton Mifflin, 2001. 1,243p. $59.95 with a computer optical disc [4 ¾]). The subtitle explains the background of the work, with its relationship to Langer. This is an “update from the early 1970s where the previous edition left off to the end of the second millennium, con- centrating on events in new nations in Asia, Africa and the Pacific, increasing globalization, the end of the Cold War,” circa 1989 (Pref.); diffusion of technology, the impact of immigration. A handsome volume with maps and genealogies, it reflects the explosion of knowledge. The first supplement to the American Na- tional Biography issued both as a Web site (http://www.anb.org/) and on paper (N.Y.: Oxford Univ. Pr., 2002. 792p. $150) covers 1996 through early 2001. The pub- lisher forecasts updates at regular intervals, this first one covering Bella Abzug to Fred Zinnemann. An effort has been made to feature individuals from all walks of life and a “few people of admiringly ephemeral sig- nificance … , but the aim is to show how they were representative of American popular culture (Pref). The cumulative in- dex “includes all subjects found in the origi- nal edition as well as those found in the Supplement.” The headings are broad with subheadings, and there could be multiple headings. Indexed by contributor, place of birth, cumulative index by occupation, and realms of renown. A new edition of the Oxford Companion to Irish History; Sean J. Connolly, ed. (2d ed. Oxford Univ. Pr., 2002. 650p. maps $60; 1st ed. 1998) has been updated from 1997 “with a variety of additions and improvements … Particularly in two areas: visual arts and Irish prehistory “ (Pref.). The bibliography has been updated and, in a few cases, cor- rected. The subject index is to headword (e.g., Acts of Parliament, Unionism, Women, Irish Abroad [but no reference to Scotch-Irish]). See also similar companions: Oxford Companion to British History, John Cannon, ed. (2001. 708p. $49.95); Oxford Compan- ion to Irish Literature; Robert .J. Welch, ed. (1996. 614p. $66.00); Oxford Companion to Irish History (2001. See above). Coverage extends now from the pre-Christian era to the end of the 20th century in more than 1,800 entries by 87 contributors. Care has been taken to cover politics in Northern Ireland as well as the Irish Republic. Reaching its 4th edition, the Longman Handbook of Modern British History 1714–2001 (Harlow, Eng.: Longman, 2001. 506p. £16.95) compiled by Chris Cook and John Stevenson, now covers to the general elec- tion of June 2001 for “facts, figures and sta- tistics that we believe are most needed for courses in the later British history” (Pref.), that is, from the death of Queen Anne. Use- ful, too, is the Topic Bibliography (pp. 403— 83), which is keyed to the 38 chapters. This work is related to other compilations by Cook and Stevenson, for example, Longman Companion to Britain Since 1945 (2d ed. 2000. 349p. $86) and the Longman Handbook of Modern European History, 1763–1997 (3rd ed. 1998. 550p. $30.95). Turkey and the World: A Complete Bibliog- raphy of Turkey and the Turks in English, com- piled by Sedat Laçiner (Istanbul: Kaknus Yayinlari, 2001. 446p.) is in its fourth edi- tion (1st ed. London: CLPS, 1998. 69p.), list- ing 530 entries. The arrangement is under broad headings: Ottoman History and Poli- tics; Turkey History and Politics; Turkish Foreign Policy—External Relations; Turk- ish Political Economy; Turkish Law and Legal Studies; Bibliographies; Dictionaries; Periodicals; Libraries, Institutions and Cen- ters. This is a very useful compilation but it badly needs an index.—E.M.