How can we help? RCC Librarians are available to chat during library open hours, when school is in session. You can also email us at librarian@roguecc.edu or call 541-956-7150 to be connected with a reference librarian.
Books are found using the library catalog. RCC also subscribes to a catalog of eBooks via EBSCO. If you are unable to find books on your topic written by historians in either of these places we can also order books from other libraries through a service called Interlibrary Loan (ILL).
ILL is somewhat affected by covid as well--some libraries are not lending, and delivery from those that are may be slowed.
Tips for finding books on your topic:
Think broadly. Your paper topic will be narrow. You may need to check books out that cover the part of the world and/or the period of time you are researching so you can look through the index to see if they include any relevant information. You can also try to use Google Books to keyword search print books you find in the library catalog.
Request more than four sources. Some sources will end up being less useful, or perhaps will just repeat information you have found in other sources. This is particularly important now since materials take longer to acquire. Order anything that seems like it might be useful.
Use what you find to find more. Books written by historians will cite other books written by historians. Look at the bibliographies of materials you are able to find electronically or acquire quickly to find additional sources. You must be able to get copies of these materials to use them as sources though, you cannot cite a source that you have not seen.
Look up historians that write about your topic. If you find useful, relevant sources pay attention to who wrote them. Scholars specialize, and a historian who has written one source that is useful to you may also have written others. Find their professional web page and it will likely list all their other work (look for a bibliography or sometimes a Curriculum Vitae (CV).)
Use library "subjects" to find more. If you find a book in the RCC/JCLS or the WorldCat catalogs that seems relevant look for a section on the page called "Subject Headings." Clicking this can sometimes lead to other materials that didn't appear in a regular keyword search.