Chicano Studies Resources

“Aztlan,” by Emilio Aguayo (1971). Located at the Ethnic Cultural Center, University of Washington. Photo Eric Hamilton.

About this guide:

This guide helps students find print and electronic resources on topics regarding Chicano Studies. Use the tabs to navigate through the pages of this guide.

Paper Writing Assistance:

Consult these campus resources for help with writing and editing:
About SBCC’s Writing Center
The SBCC Learning Resource center writing tools online

Need more help?

Have a question? Stop by the Reference Desk, or contact a librarian by phone, text, or chat for more help.

Reference Sources:

These resources are available in the Reference section of the Luria Library:

• Dictionary of American History — R 973.03 A194d
• Dictionary of Chicano Folklore — R 398.0972 C355d
• Encyclopedia of Race, Ethnicity and Society — R 305.8 S294e
• Gale Encyclopedia of Multicultural America — R 317.3 V413
• Hispanic Literature of the United States : A Comprehensive Reference — R 810.9868 K16h
• The Mexican American Experience : An Encyclopedia — R 973.04 M511m
• The Oxford Encyclopedia of Latinos and Latinas in the United States — R 973.0468 O12e
• The Oxford Encyclopedia of Mesoamerican Cultures : The Civilizations of Mexico and Central America — R 972.01 C313o

Luria Library also subscribes to many electronic reference sources. If you are off-campus, you will need to log in with your Pipeline username and password to access these resources.

• Atlas of Hispanic-American History
• The Borderlands : An Encyclopedia of Culture and Politics on the U.S.-Mexico Divide
• Dictionary of Latino Civil Rights History
• Encyclopedia of Race and Racism
• Latinas in the United States: A Historic Encyclopedia
• Minorities: Race and Ethnicity in America
• Credo Reference is a collection of nearly 800 encyclopedias, dictionaries, bilingual dictionaries, and other reference books covering all major subject areas. Thousands of Topics Pages provide articles from different reference sources, arranged by subject.

Books

Search the library catalog for books on your topic. Try searching with some of these keywords:

chicano* (searches chicano or chicanos)
chicana*
mexican american women
mexican american men
mexican americans
chicano* and politics
chicano* and identity
borderlands

Because of the range of names for groups with which people identify, you may also find useful sources with broader keywords such as ethnic studies, hispanic, latina, or latino.

Articles

Search for articles in these databases. Here, you’ll find academic/peer-reviewed articles as well as newspaper and magazine articles:

• Academic Search Premier: a great starting point for research on any topic.
• Ethnic NewsWatch: journals, magazines, and newspapers from ethnic and minority presses. The current collection, Ethnic NewsWatch™, covers 1990-present, and the historical collection, Ethnic NewsWatch: A History™, spans 1959-1989.
• History Reference Center: this resource covers all time periods of U.S. and World History.
• JSTOR: Contains articles from hundreds of scholarly journals covering a wide range of subjects in the arts, humanities, sciences, and social sciences. Full text articles are available, from the first issue (sometimes going back over 100 years) until five years ago.

Primary Sources:

Use these resources to find primary source material:

• History Resource Center: Find primary sources in this library database. When you search for your topic, use the ADVANCED SEARCH and select PUBLICATION TYPE = PRIMARY SOURCE DOCUMENTS. Or you can select the PRIMARY SOURCES tab found in a list of results after your search.
• American Memory Project from the Library of Congress: This resource provides free and open access through the Internet to written and spoken words, sound recordings, still and moving images, prints, maps, and sheet music that document the American experience. It is a digital record of American history and creativity. These materials, from the collections of the Library of Congress and other institutions, chronicle historical events, people, places, and ideas that continue to shape America, serving the public as a resource for education and lifelong learning.
• Calisphere: Contains text and images from California history and culture.
• Farmworker Movement Documentation Project: A collection of primary sources on the history of the United Farmworkers, from the UC San Diego Library.
• El Teatro Campesino special collection at UCSB

Websites:

Finding good websites for college research can be difficult and time-consuming. Use the P.R.O.V.E.N. Test for Evaluating Sources to evaluate any websites you find.

Additional Information on the Web

Explore these resources for additional information:

• Chicano/a Movement in Washington State History Project: Excellent resources from the University of Washington with video interviews, newspaper articles, photos and more documenting the Chicano/a Movment.
• Making Face/Making Soul: A site by, for, and about Chicanas, meaning women of Mexican descent in the United States. This site contains a variety of resources ranging from short biographies of Chicanas, to Chicana poetry and literature, cultural resources, academic resources, otras chicanas on the ‘net, and more.
• UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center: Very active research center from UCLA.
• Brown Pride: A kaleidoscope of Chicana/o and Latina/o articles, music, art, and more.
• UCSB Chicano Studies Institute: Research arm of the Chicano Studies Dept at UCSB
• Chicana and Chicano Space: A resource for teachers, their students, and others interested in Chicana and Chicano art and culture.

How to Cite

Chicago

Chicago citation style is commonly used in the humanities, especially for history research papers. The following resources will help you construct Chicago-style citations:

• General Chicago style guide from Purdue’s Online Writing Lab
• Guide to citing primary sources in Chicago style from the Library of Congress.
• NoodleTools Citation Builder: use this resource to help construct citations.