New online reference resources

Check out the two newest online resources at Hostos Library:

Milestone Documents in American History provides the full text and analysis of key primary texts in American History. These documents offer historical context (1807 Act to Prohibit the Importation of Slaves ) as well as context for more recent events (U.S. Supreme Court's 2000 decsion Bush v. Gore).

Magill's Medical Guide online, a medical reference resource that Library Journal describes"authoritative and up-to-date yet highly accessible and admirably succinct. All the articles are signed, and to the left of the article text are links to the proper citation for the articles."

Palgrave Dictionary of Economics

CUNY has subscribed to the Palgrave Dictionary of Economics. It is an authoritative source for students of economics with contributions by experts in the field worldwide.

April is for Poetry

Hostos Library has hundreds of books of poetry -- from entire volumes by a single author to anthologies by selected authors or about specific subjects. You can also find classics and contemporary poems published in literary magazines in our licensed databases. In both Literary Reference Center and Literature Resource Center, use "advanced search,"limit to "poems" and type in a key word.

"If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry." -- Emily Dickinson.

Credo Reference Trial

Check out Credo Reference, a platform that enables users to search 240 reference titles across disciplines. Resources like Credo reference, Gale Virtual Reference and Oxford reference provide current, basic reference titles online so we can devote more library space for students. Credo offers images, audio files, and the new interface that will be released this summer will enable users to search other databases directly (without going back out to the library web page) and choosing another title. The trial ends April 15th.

Palgrave Dictionary of Economics

Check out the Palgrave Dictionary of Economics which is on trial at all CUNY libraries until the end of March. It is a standard reference tools in the field with in-depth articles by experts. It is a good resource for students new to economics, providing a browsable list of topics, keywords, and citation help.

New books on Women and Women's History

Women writing Africa. The eastern region / edited by Amandina Lihamba ... [et al.] New York : The Feminist Press at the City University of New York, 2007.

Call number PL8014 .E22 W66 2007

"The third volume from the Women Writing Africa Project makes a significant contribution to the study of African literature and offers a textured portrait of women's lives in Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia. These pieces span the centuries from 1711 to 2003, address topics ranging from religion to HIV and represent prose and poetry, fiction and nonfiction, lullabies and protest songs. Marriage is a theme that runs throughout: "A Mother's Advice and Prayer" from 1858 is a nuptial manual in verse, and "I Want a Divorce," taken from a 1922 court record, gives a valuable glimpse of the power struggles between husband and wife..." From Publisher's weekly.


No seat at the table : how corporate governance and law keep women out of the boardroom / Douglas M. Branson. New York : New York University Press, c2007

Call no. HD6054.4 .U6 B73 2007

”This book should be read by anyone interested in advancing to the boardrooms in corporate America. . . . Branson provides interesting discussions on linguistic differences between males and females as well as gender differences in play, along with their implications for success in business. . . . Branson reveals how corporate governance practices hinder women’s career advancement and suggests strategies women should adopt to succeed in the corporate world….Highly recommended.” —Choice


From Black power to hip hop : racism, nationalism, and feminism / Patricia Hill Collins. Philadelphia : Temple University Press, 2006.

Call no. E185.625 .H55 2006

"As the title suggests, Collins's overarching focus is on African American nationalism and feminism between the end of Black Power and the rise of hip hop culture. She offers a lively analysis of "hip hop feminism" espoused by Joan Morgan and other writers. "They see the incongruity of learning about feminism in their college classrooms, yet their response lies not in becoming academics who broker commodified knowledge within the academic marketplace." Also intriguing is her assessment of the divergence within the feminism movement, fueled in part by white feminism's failure to recognize the value of the work women of color do in their communities, resulting in a "colorblind racism" that has taken the place of active discrimination and leaves young African American women torn between an individualistic feminism and a community-oriented black nationalism." -- Publisher's weekly.

New Titles for Black History Month

Encyclopedia of antislavery and abolition / edited by Peter Hinks and John McKivigan ; assistant editor, R. Owen Williams. Westport, Conn. : Greenwood Press, 2007.

"... covers the ideology and activism of the various international movements that resisted and ultimately led to the repeal of slavery. Though the focus is mainly on the Atlantic World in the 1700s and 1800s, entries trace the changing fortunes of slavery worldwide, from early beliefs in the necessity, righteousness, and divine approval of the peculiar institution to the later beliefs in the mid–nineteenth century that slavery was evidence of moral decay in a society and little short of evil incarnate. Overall, the encyclopedia outlines and explains the various antislavery movements—their origins, structures, accomplishments, seminal figures, and historic import. The consequences of manumission are covered in great detail as well, with reverberations that often reach to the present day..." Tosko, Michael--Booklist


The curse of caste, or, The slave bride : a rediscovered African American novel / by Julia C. Collins ; edited by William L. Andrews and Mitch Kachun. New York : Oxford University Press, 2006.

In 1865, The Christian Recorder, the national newspaper of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, serialized The Curse of Caste; or The Slave Bride, a novel written by Mrs. Julia C. Collins, an African American woman living in the small town of Williamsport, Pennsylvania. The first novel ever published by a black American woman, it is set in antebellum Louisiana and Connecticut, and focuses on the lives of a beautiful mixed-race mother and daughter whose opportunities for fulfillment through love and marriage are threatened by slavery and caste prejudice. The text shares much with popular nineteenth-century women's fiction, while its dominant themes of interracial romance, hidden African ancestry, and ambiguous racial identity have parallels in the writings of both black and white authors from the period. Begun in the waning months of the Civil War, the novel was near its conclusion when Julia Collins died of tuberculosis in November of 1865. In this first-ever book publication of The Curse of Caste; or The Slave Bride, the editors have composed a hopeful and a tragic ending, reflecting two alternatives Collins almost certainly would have considered for the closing of her unprecedented novel. In their introduction, the editors offer the most complete and current research on the life and community of an author who left few traces in the historical record, and provide extensive discussion of her novel's literary and historical significance. Collins's published essays, which provide intriguing glimpses into the mind of this gifted but overlooked writer, are included in what will prove to be the definitive edition of a major new discovery in African American literature. Its publication contributes immensely to our understanding of black American literature, religion, women's history, community life, and race relations during the era of United States emancipation--Publisher's description.