UCI Libraries Update, Volume 25, Number 2, Winter 2007

Calisphere: Digitized Primary Sources and More

Calisphere is a free public gateway to thousands of digitized primary sources selected from the libraries and museums of the UC campuses and more than 100 cultural heritage organizations across California. This easy-to-navigate portal provides access to more than 150,000 historic and cultural photographs, diaries, government documents, oral histories, fine arts, and other unique resources.

Calisphere, located at www.calisphere.universityofcalifornia.edu, also provides a single point of access for more than 300 UC-created web sites and collections covering a wide range of topics. Calisphere is of interest to UCI faculty and staff interested in teaching undergraduates to use primary research resources and those engaged in outreach to K-12 schools. The site also well serves California teachers and librarians in the K-12 school system. The content in Calisphere is drawn primarily from the Online Archive of California located at www.oac.cdlib.org.

The Calisphere search interface allows searching through the metadata describing each item in the collection. “Browse A-Z” is another easy-to-use search option that organizes multiple sets on specific topics designed for classroom use. Other features include:

Themed Collections are primary source sets created specifically to help K-12 educators easily find images aligned with the California Content Standards. These sets include 30 topics organized into six historical eras, from the Gold Rush to the 1970s. Each collection consists of 10-30 images and a brief summary describing the themes that unify them.

California Cultures provides access to more than 15,000 images from UC collections documenting ethnic communities in California and the West. UCI members of the California Cultures Editorial Board include Professors Vicki Ruiz (History), Linda Vo (Asian American Studies), and Daniel Tsang (Libraries).

The Japanese American Relocation Digital Archives (JARDA) includes more than 10,000 governmental and personal resources that illustrate the story of the Japanese-American internment during World War II.

Over time, Calisphere will expand to include additional sources from cultural heritage and research institutions throughout California, making those resources more visible and available to educators, students and society at large.

For more information, please contact Steve MacLeod, Public Services Coordinator in Special Collections and Archives (smacleod@uci.edu or x44967), or Kay Collins, Research Librarian for History (x47290 or kcollins@uci.edu).

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