Collections

Collections acquires, manages, and provides access to books, journals, videos and more, both in print and online, for the McMaster community in the humanities and social sciences (Mills), science and engineering (Thode), and business (Innis).

Recommend a book, film, or journal

Overview

Overview

Collections acquires and supports McMaster University Library’s collection of more than 2.1 million volumes, print and online subscriptions, e-journal and e-book packages, streaming media, and user-driven acquisition programs.  To speak to someone regarding the University Library's collections, please use the 'contact us' section.

The Health Sciences Library (HSL) acquires content to support health education and research.  For information regarding the HSL's Electronic Resources & Collections, please contact Andrea McLellan, mclell@mcmaster.ca, or hsltser@mcmaster.ca.

 

Contact Us

Janice Adlington Head, Collections and Content Strategy

Wei Zhang E-Resources and Collection Analysis Librarian

Anne Pottier Associate University Librarian, Services, Collections, and Facilities

Wade Wyckoff Associate University Librarian, Distinctive, Legacy, and Digital Heritage Collections 

Keep@Downsview

About Keep@Downsview

The University Library has partnered with four other Ontario research libraries to share collection preservation and storage facilities and services. McMaster joins the University of Toronto, University of Ottawa, Western University, and Queen’s University in the Keep@Downsview partnership.

Joining Keep@Downsview ensures that infrequently used items in the Library's print collections are preserved and readily available to McMaster faculty, students, and staff for generations to come. Preservation of these scholarly but seldom used materials remains an important role for a research library like McMaster in supporting our academic community.

The Keep@Downsview partners share a high-density storage facility, optimized for long-term preservation and access to print materials. Located at the University of Toronto's Downsview campus, the facility opened in 2005. A new addition to the facility, shared by the partners and funded in part by the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities, increased the building's capacity to five million volumes.

Keep@Downsview FAQ

McMaster University Library is collaborating with the libraries at the University of Toronto, Western University, Queen’s University, and the University of Ottawa in a new partnership to preserve and ensure ongoing access to low-demand print materials. Extending the University of Toronto’s Downsview facility, Keep@Downsview brings together a purpose-built, high-density storage facility that supports long-term preservation, an existing retrieval and transportation network, and new models of desktop delivery, ensuring that low demand print materials remain available for research and study within the province.

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Over the years, the University Library, like research libraries elsewhere, has acquired a sizeable collection of print books and journals. Historically, the purchase of print volumes in advance of anticipated need was the only reliable means of providing the scholarly resources needed to support research and teaching, and building such collections was the primary function of an academic research library.

Studies of the usage patterns of research library collections conducted over many years, using a variety of methodologies, and at a variety of institutions have demonstrated that large portions of these print collections are never or seldom used by the academic community that the library supports. The overall circulation rate of print materials—the number of checkouts annually—is also steadily declining in research libraries across North America.

We believe it is important for these low-demand collections to remain available in support of the research and educational activities of McMaster’s academic community. Participating in Keep@Downsview allows us to ensure that this occurs, while creating space within the library to foster new types of scholarship, offer new library services, and support both collaborative and individual work. The University Library’s Master Space Plan recognizes and incorporates the need to maintain a significant print collection in the campus libraries and will help to guide development and balance across all of these areas.

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Yes. University libraries across North America are working together to ensure that infrequently used print materials remain available for research and study. The Center for Research Libraries currently lists many such projects on their Print Archives Preservation Registry.

A good example in Canada is the work of members of the Council of Prairie and Pacific Libraries on the Shared Print Archive Network (SPAN). Participants in SPAN include major research libraries at the University of Alberta, the University of British Columbia, and the University of Saskatchewan. Also, the Tri-Universities Group—the University of Waterloo, University of Guelph, and Wilfrid Laurier University—has a longstanding partnership that includes a shared storage facility for library collections.

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All titles that are transferred to Downsview will continue to appear in the Library’s catalogue. From our catalogue, you will be able to request that books be returned to campus, just as you can with our current storage collection. The delivery of requested materials will not normally take longer than the two-working days expected with our existing storage collection. Requests for individual chapters from a book may be delivered to you as a scanned PDF, just as chapter scanning can be requested from our print monographs in Thode, Mills, and Innis.

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Journal articles will generally be provided via a scanned PDF of the article, in the same way that scans can be requested from our print volumes in Thode, Mills, and Innis. If necessary, physical volumes can be shipped back to campus, but we anticipate this will be a relatively rare need. As with books, all journals that are transferred to Downsview will continue to appear in the Library’s catalogue.

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No, the selection and purchase of new books will continue as usual, and current issues of journals received in print will remain in the campus libraries.

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In terms of our book collection, we are fortunate to have a great deal of historical data available to us. The circulation (checkout) history stored in the Library’s management system extends back to 1997. Circulation is not the only type of use, of course, and we recognize that reference and multi-volume works in particular will need additional considerations, but overall, this data is the most reliable indicator that we have to assess the usage of physical volumes. We will be considering only those books that have been in the Library’s collection for some years to be sure they have had sufficient time to be discovered and used, and initially we are looking only at books that have no record of being checked out.

Journals, not having circulation data, require a different approach. We will consider a number of factors, including whether we have a currently active subscription, the availability of online backfiles, the age of the volumes, and the language of the journal, as well as the subject area covered.

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Yes, there are several areas of the Library’s collection and some specific types of materials that will not be considered in the Keep@Downsview program:

  • New and recently acquired books and current issues of journals that we receive in print.
  • Many indexes and bibliographies, particularly large ongoing works that would be difficult to retrieve effectively from storage, will be kept onsite as finding tools.
  • Multi-volume monographs will not normally be split between locations, and reference-type publications will need specific consideration as they often are easily used within the Library.
  • Books, journals, and other materials held in the Library’s William Ready Division of Archives and Research Collections are not under consideration. In certain circumstances, materials from the general stacks may be identified during this process for transfer into Archives and Research Collections.
  • A number of special formats are beyond the current scope of the program, including LPs, CDs, DVDs, and other audiovisual materials; music scores; sheet maps; and microfilm and microfiche.
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Yes. We are glad to have your thoughts about materials in your discipline so that we can factor them into our decision making process, and we would appreciate your ideas on materials in your subject area that could be placed at Downsview without causing undue difficulty for academic activities on campus.

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The Library does currently use offsite storage located in Dundas. This space was not designed with the storage of library materials in mind. Keep@Downsview will provide a better environment for the long-term preservation of these materials, as well as make the retrieval of items easier. Subsequent collection decisions have also changed the usage pattern for portions of the existing storage collection. As part of our Keep@Downsview process, we plan to return more frequently requested materials from storage to the campus libraries.

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Yes. The University Library retains its ownership of materials included in the Keep@Downsview program. All of these volumes will continue to appear in the Library’s catalogue and will be included in the statistics that we provide to various reporting bodies. The Keep@Downsview agreement also provides for the partners to share ownership of volumes that they hold in common and choose to include in the program.

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Yes. These items won’t appear in McMaster’s Library catalogue but they will be available via RACER request in the same way as items from the partners’ on-campus libraries.

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Yes. Community members may continue to access materials from McMaster’s collection that move to Downsview. Items may be obtained using interlibrary loan from the requestor’s home library and checked out according to normal interlibrary loan policies. Library Services staff at McMaster may also request that volumes be sent to one of the campus libraries for community members to use on-site in the library or to check out in accordance with existing borrowing privileges. Volumes transferred to Downsview have been identified as low-usage materials and we do not anticipate great community interest in these volumes.

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If you have further questions, please contact Wade Wyckoff, Associate University Librarian, Collections.

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New Resources

Collections Added During COVID Closures

The Library emphasizes online resources while access to the physical campus remains limited.  Some of the new titles added since March 2020 are highlighted below.

Major Additions

Dimensions Analytics
An advanced insights and discovery platform that provides access to research, including grants, publications, citations, clinical trials and patents all together in one place.

JoVE Video Journal & JoVE Science Education
JoVE publishes peer-reviewed scientific video protocols to accelerate biological, medical, chemical and physical research. All JoVE Video Journals and Science Education components are now subscribed by McMaster. 

Nature Journals  
McMaster can now access (almost) all journals published by Nature.

O'Reilly for Higher Education (Safari Tech E-books)
Primary source for technology professionals, software developers, web designers, and business and creative professionals with 40,000 technology, digital media and business ebooks and videos.

ProQuest Academic Complete E-books
This subscription collection provides over 200,000 e-books spanning a range of academic disciplines.

Science & Engineering

Databases and Online Reference Resources

ASM Handbooks Online
A comprehensive and authoritative guide to the structure, properties, processing, performance, and evaluation of metals and nonmetallic engineering materials. 

Begell Digital Library
29+ journals, 12 e-books, 4 databases, 3 references, and 4 conference proceedings in engineering, and 18+ journals in biomedical sciences. 

E-EROS Encyclopedia of Reagents for Organic Synthesis
Contains a database of approximately 70,000 reactions and 5,250 of the most frequently consulted reagents and catalysts.

Engineering Case Studies Online - through April 2023
Contains video and text material focusing on engineering failures and successes such as Apollo 13, Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, Deepwater Horizon oil spill, Ford Pinto, Space Shuttle Challenger and the Titantic.

Patai's Chemistry of Functional Groups
The most comprehensive work in functional groups; Includes the content of all volumes from the landmark book series, The Chemistry of Functional Groups.

SciFinder-n - Upgrade
In addition to the same substance, reaction, chemical sourcing and reference content found in CAS SciFinder®, SciFinder-n includes advanced synthesis planning and retrosynthetic analysis tools, chemically-annotated patents, curated step-by-step synthesis methods and procedures, and biosequence searching and analysis.

Springer Materials
World's largest resource for physical and chemical data in materials science; incorporates all volumes of Landolt-Börnstein New Series; includes 250,000 substances and material systems, 3,000 properties, and 1,200,000 literature citations. 

Springer Nature Experiments (Springer Protocols)
The largest database of reproducible laboratory protocols in biomedicine and life sciences, bringing together content from Springer Protocols, Nature Methods, Nature Protocols and Protocol Exchange. Major book series such as 'Methods in Molecular Biology' are included.

Synthesis Digital Library of Engineering and Computer Science (Morgan & Claypool)
A digital library of 50 to 100 page electronic books that synthesize important research or development topics, providing concise introductions to new fields and methods of staying current.

E-Journals

Applied Physics Reviews
Features articles on important and current topics in experimental or theoretical research in applied physics or applications of physics to other branches of science and engineering.

Biomicrofluidics
Publishes research in fundamental physicochemical mechanisms associated with microfluidic and nanofluidic phenomena as well as research in unique microfluidic and nanofluidic techniques for diagnostic, medical, biological, pharmaceutical, environmental, and chemical applications.

The CRISPR Journal
The only peer-reviewed journal dedicated to the science and applications of gene editing.

Nature Aging
Lauched in January 2021, the monthly journal ims to provide a unique multidisciplinary, unifying and highly visible publishing platform for the aging-research community.

Nature Synthesis
Launched in January 2022, the journal is interested in all aspects of synthesis, from making discrete molecules to extended materials, as well as technological innovations leading to significant advances in synthetic methods and processes.

OSA Conference Proceedings
The complete collection of conference papers from more than 800 meetings as well as more than 5000 conference videos. 

Science Robotics
The newest journal to join the Science family of journals, with a goal to select the most groundbreaking advances in robotics across applications, systems, and scales of general interest to the robotics and research community. 

Soft Robotics
The leading robotics journal, publishing world-class peer-reviewed research on the emerging technologies and developments of soft and deformable robots. 

Journal Backfiles
Journal backfile packages have also been added, including ASCE Legacy Journals Archive (1872-1996), IET Journals Archive (1872-2012), and a selection of disciplines and titles from Cambridge, Taylor & Francis and Wiley. 

Ebooks

A selection of ebooks from different publishers have been added, including AIP, APA, ASCE, Elsevier (Environmental Studies) IEEE, Springer (Energy) and Wiley. Individual records are available in catalogue. 

Humanities and Social Sciences

Online Videos

Curio.ca 
Access the CBC's educational streaming platform for programs, documentaries, audio content and archival material from CBC/Radio-Canada.

Digital Theatre+ 
An online streaming video collection of current, leading British theatre productions, musicals, and operas.

Henry Stewart Talks: The Business and Management Collection 
Includes multimedia talks, case studies, and interviews on management, strategy, banking and finance; marketing, and digital business.  Added with the DeGroote School of Business.
 

Databases and Online Reference Resources

Cambridge Companions
A series of guides to major writers, artists, philosophers, topics, and periods, COO offers subject or theme based cross-searchable collections, available in three sub-collections: Literature & Classics, Philosophy, Religion & Culture, and Music.

Cambridge Histories
A series reference works of over 400 volumes spanning fifteen subject areas across the humanities and social sciences, with a concentration on political and cultural history, literature, philosophy, religious studies, music and the arts.

Caribbean History and Culture, 1535-1920
More than 1,200 fully catalogued and searchable books, pamphlets, almanacs, broadsides and ephemera cover the history of this broad region from the 16th century to the early 20th century.

Caribbean Newspapers, 1718-1876
The largest online collection of 18th- and 19th-century newspapers published in this region, the collection provides a comprehensive primary resource for studying the development of Western society and international relations within this important group of islands. 

Digital Loeb Library
A fully searchable, virtual library of Greek and Latin literature with English translations.  

Encyclopaedia of the Qurʼān / Qurʾānic Studies Online
An encyclopaedic dictionary of qurʼānic terms, concepts, personalities, place names, cultural history and exegesis extended with essays on the most important themes and subjects within Qurʼānic studies.

Encyclopedia of Women & Islamic Cultures
An interdisciplinary, trans-historical, and global project embracing women and Islamic cultures in every region where there have been significant Muslim populations.

Oxford Bibliographies Online - 10 Subjects
Identify the best scholarship in Anthropology, Biblical Studies, Geography, International Relations, Jewish Studies, Literary and Critical Theory, Philosophy, Political Science, Social Work, and Sociology.

Oxford Handbooks Online - 12 Subjects
Provides in-depth introductions to topics, with scholarly review articles that summarize current thinking in Archaeology, Classical Studies, Economics/Finance, Criminology, History, Linguistics, Literature, Philosophy, Political Science, Psychology, Religion, and Sociology.

Policy Commons
the world’s largest database for public policy, the collection includes more than 3.2 million reports, working papers, policy briefs, data sources, and media drawn from a directory of more than 24,000 IGOs, NGOs, think tanks, and research centers.

Religion Past and Present (RPP): Encyclopedia of Theology and Religion
online version of the updated English translation of the 4th edition of the Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart (RGG), providing deep knowledge and authority  in religious, theological, and biblical studies.

Social Work Online - through April 2023
A multimedia database that combines recently published social work books along with documentaries, clinical demonstration videos, and lectures that illustrate the complex and challenging issues faced by social workers.  

Very Short Introductions
Oxford's Very Short Introductions series offers concise and original introductions to a wide range of subjects across Arts and Humanities, Law, Medicine and Health, Science and Mathematics, and Social Sciences.

E-books:  Publisher Collections

Bloomsbury
A select list of 3,500 e-books with particular strengths in Theatre and Film, Classical Studies, History, and Religion/Theology.

Brill
Over 16,000 e-books published by Brill, providing in-depth academic studies of topics in the Humanities and Social Sciences.

Cambridge University Press
Over 40,000 e-books published on Cambridge Core are available, with new titles to be added through April 2023. 

DeGruyter and the University Presses
Over 85,000 e-books published by DeGruyter and the University Presses, with individual titles listed in the catalogue.

Routledge, and the Routledge Handbooks
Over 110,000 e-books published on the Taylor & Francis platform, with new titles added through May 2023. 

Wiley E-books
Over 22,000 e-books published by Wiley, providing current science, engineering, business, and social sciences content.

E-Journals

London Review of Books
Europe’s leading magazine of culture and ideas. Published twice a month, it provides a space for some of the world’s best writers to explore a wide variety of subjects in exhilarating detail. 

Primary Sources

Accessible Archives
Primary source material from the 18th century to the early 20th century devoted to American history, particularly strong in African American newspapers, the Civil War, Reconstruction, Women's Suffrage, and World War I.

Archives of Sexuality & Gender: L'Enfer de la Bibliothèque nationale de France
Enfer ("Hell") from the Bibliothèque nationale de France is one of the most storied and sought-after private case collections of forbidden books. The collection was created in the 1830s to protect and isolate works that were considered contrary to the morals of the time.

Archives of Sexuality & Gender: LGBTQ History and Culture since 1940
A robust and significant collection of primary sources for the historical study of sex, sexuality, and gender with material dating back to the sixteenth century.  Added in 2021: International Perspectives on LGBTQ Activism and Culture.

Archives of Sexuality and Gender: Sex and Sexuality, Sixteenth to Twentieth Century
The collection is made up of more than five thousand rare and unique books covering sex, sexuality, and gender issues across the sciences and humanities from 16th to 20th century.

Archives Unbound
30 collections in African Studies, American Studies, British and European History, Business and Economic History, Cultural Studies, Holocaust Studies, International Relations, Latin American and Caribbean Studies, Law, Politics, & Racial Studies and Religious Studies have been added to Gale Primary Sources. 

Disability in the Modern World: History of a Social Movement - through April 2023
Includes primary sources, supporting materials, and archives, along with video covering history, media, the arts, political science, education, and other areas where the contributions of the disability community are often overlooked.  

Financial Times Historical Archive 
Covers the complete run of the London edition of this internationally known daily business newspaper, from its first issue in 1888 through 2016.

Health & Fitness Magazine Archive - through April 2023
Includes the backfiles of the following nine major US and UK consumer magazines devoted to health, fitness, exercise, nutrition, and medicine, charting trends in these areas from the mid-20th century to the 21st. 

Men's Magazine Archive - through April 2023
Provides digital access to the backfiles in full color page image of six major US and UK men’s-interest consumer magazines covering contemporary issues and trends in history and society, masculinity, sex roles, literature, sports, fashion, popular culture, entertainment, and more. 

Le Monde 
Covers 1944 to 2000.

Montreal Gazette
Covers January 2, 1857 to December 31, 2010.

The Times of India - through April 2023
Covers 1838-2010 of this Indian English-language daily newspaper.

War, State and Society
Explore the reality of Britain's Home Front in World War II through thousands of primary source documents reporting on and managing every aspect of the civilian population's daily lives, from evacuation to food rationing, and air raids to propaganda, sourced from The National Archives U.K. and The History of Advertising Trust.

 

Faculty Representatives

Faculty Liaisons

Library materials are obtained in a variety of ways, including firm and standing orders, monograph approval plans (in some areas), print or online subscriptions, consortial e-journal and e-book packages, and user-driven acquisition. Each department nominates a Faculty Library Representative from among their faculty. The function of the Library Representative is to serve as a communications link between the department and the Library, to assist us in making decisions about the value to students and faculty of new or existing electronic resources or serial subscriptions, and to recommend monograph titles for acquisition by the Library.

For 2022/23, the faculty representatives for each department are:

Program/Dept/School Faculty Representative Faculty Contact
Anthropology John Colarusso website
Art / Art History Alison McQueen

Angela Sheng

 website

website
Arts & Science Jean Wilson website
Biology Suleiman Igdoura website
Brockhouse Institute for Materials Research       Bruce Gaulin website
Business Glen Randall
Chris Longo		 website
website
Chemical Engineering Robert Pelton website
Chemistry Gary Schrobilgen website
Civil Engineering Hao Yang website
Classics Claude Eilers website
Communication Studies & Media Arts Chris Myhr website
Computing and Software Ryan Leduc website
Divinity Chris Land website
Earth, Environmet & Society Richard Harris website
Economics Maxim Ivanov  website
Electrical & Computer Engineering Jun Chen website
Engineering Physics Ryan Lewis website
English & Cultural Studies Mary Silcox website
French William Hanley website
Gender and Social Justice Gena Zuroski-Jenkins website
Global Peace & Social Justice Chandrima Chakraborty website
Globalization Robert O’Brien website
Health, Aging & Society Randy Jackson website
History Stephen Streeter website

 
Indigenous Studies Rick Monture email
HH-103
Ext. 27615
or 27426
Kinesiology Krista Howarth website
Labour Studies David Goutor
Tommy Wu		 website
Linguistics & Languages Victor Kuperman
Daniel Pape
Nikolai Penner
Ivona Kucerova		 website
Materials Science Engineering Igor Zhitomirsky website
Mathematics & Statistics Fred Hoppe website
Mechanical Engineering Stephen Veldhuis website
Music Michael Schutz website
Philosophy Megan Stotts website
Physics & Astronomy Ralph Pudritz website
Political Science James Ingram website
Psychology, Neuroscience & Behaviour Steven Brown website
Religious Studies Mark Rowe website
Social Work Ameil Joseph website
Sociology Gregory Hooks website
Theatre & Film Beth Marquis website

Z39.50 Catalogue

Connect to the Library Catalogue via Z39.50

Host: catalogue.mcmaster.ca

Port: 210

Database: INNOPAC

Syntax: marc 21