Tag Archives: research

Recognizing National Native American Heritage Month by Highlighting the Work of Lenape Center & Providing Our Patrons with a New Database

The website of Lenape Center describes Lenapehoking as “homeland of the Lenape.” Lenapehoking includes the land on which our school currently stands.  See: Brooklyn Law School, Programs on Creating a Living Land Acknowledgment Held with the Lenape Center.

Lenape Center is a nonprofit organization that states it is “[c]ontinuing Lenapehoking through community, culture and the arts” and “[w]orking towards the creation of a cultural center.”  Lenape Center’s work includes curating exhibitions (including the virtual exhibit Lenapehoking), developing educational programs, and creating Lenapehoking: An Anthology. Brooklyn Law School Library, Brooklyn Public Library and New York Public Library provide multiple copies of this insightful and powerful book. On p. 14 of the Introduction, Joe Baker (Co-Founder/Executive Director of Lenape Center) states: “This anthology of essays and interviews features leading Indigenous scholars, culture bearers, and artists offering important new scholarship and knowledge of Lenape culture and history that is not readily available to the general public.” On March 6, 2023, there was a “Live from NYPL” event at which contributors to Lenapehoking: An Anthology “explore[d] the personal journeys of people seeking welcome in their ancestral homeland while pushing back against their erasure.” This event video is available here.

Members of the BLS community now have access to HeinOnline’s searchable database: Indigenous Peoples of the Americas: History, Culture & Law:

This database includes: the subcollection Indigenous Peoples Treaties (400+ full-text treaties) and treaty-related publications; each edition of United States Code Title 25 and Code of Federal Regulations Title 25; the Indian Law Reporter (published: 1974-2013) and additional serials; a subcollection of tribal codes (published: 1981 and 1988); a subcollection of constitutions, acts and by-laws; selected Native Nations Law & Policy Center publications such as The Need for Confidentiality within Tribal Cultural Resource Protection and Tribal Implementation Toolkit; Model Tribal Probate Code; nearly 50 federal legislative histories; Congressional hearings; scholarly articles; other related works (books and pamphlets); and a bibliography. This database is accessible on campus through the BLS network or off campus through a web browser that communicates with the BLS proxy server. The library team hopes this database will assist BLS students in the spring 2024 seminar: Native American Law. Feel free to email: askthelibrary@brooklaw.edu or text: (718) 734-2432 for help in using this new resource.

Visit LibraryFest this afternoon!

Meet BLS librarians & vendor representatives + Enter a raffle to win prizes (including a $100 gift card) for learning about BLS Library’s resources

Today from 1-5 pm in BLS Library’s Nash Reading Room (3rd fl.), we are proudly hosting LibraryFest!

Enjoy a snack while

  • Receiving a few database tips – this qualifies you to enter the Library’s raffle for gift cards and other prizes
  • Discussing your class paper, note topic or other research interest with a friendly BLS librarian
  • Greeting our two Library Fellows (who are currently editing research guides to help you)

We look forward to seeing you today in the Nash Reading Room!

Trying to Research/Develop an Int’l. Law Topic? BLS Library Provides 4 Fab Online Overviews

Note: BLS students, faculty and administrators can access the sources below on campus, in BLS housing, and elsewhere off campus if one has implemented the BLS proxy instructions.

Cambridge Compendium of International Commercial and Investment Arbitration

  • In BLS Library’s SARA catalog record, click: ACCESS ONLINE VERSION – CAMBRIDGE.
  • Preface states: “Like an encyclopedia, the Compendium contains [67] entries for most of the foundational principles and concepts underlying arbitration.”  Each Compendium entry provides an overview of key issues.  Footnotes in an entry highlight many more sources. 
  • Either search this Compendium by keyword(s) + link to search results or skim the table of contents + link to a potentially useful entry.
    • Re. the “Related content” to the right of each Compendium entry: BLS researchers will need to search SARA catalog (by a book’s title) or SARA catalog’s “Find a Source” tool (by a periodical’s title) to determine if BLS Library provides a related source.  (Contact askthelibrary@brooklaw.edu for help.)
  • Publication of this online Compendium occurred in Feb. 2023.  

Elgar Encyclopedia of Environmental Law

  • In SARA catalog record, click: ACCESS ONLINE VERSION – ELGAR.
  • Comprises 12 reference volumes organized around “top level” subjects (e.g., water, energy and climate change).
  • Expand the table of contents to identify pertinent chapters.  Chapter authors are “international experts.”
  • Publication of this Elgar Encyclopedia occurred on Mar. 30, 2023.

Elgar Encyclopedia of Human Rights 

  • In SARA catalog record, click: ACCESS ONLINE VERSION – ELGAR.
  • Includes 340+ entries on the study and practice of human rights.  Entries include bibliographies.
  • Click a letter of the alphabet in the table of contents or use “Search within Book” feature (on right).
  • Publication of this Elgar Encyclopedia occurred on Sept. 6, 2022.

Max Planck Encyclopedias of International Law

  • In SARA catalog record, click: ACCESS ONLINE VERSION – OXFORD.
  • Provide 1,700+ peer-reviewed articles on key international law topics.  Contain articles from both Max Planck Encyclopedia of Public International Law and Max Planck Encyclopedia of International Procedural Law.  Articles highlight many primary legal sources and include bibliographies.  
  • Tab: Subject lists articles arranged by topic.  Also, use the search box (top right).
  • Tip: Be aware that articles have different dates.  Example: article Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (1969) states: “last updated: March 2023.”

Hundreds of additional resources to support international law paper topic research and development appear in these two publicly-accessible BLS Library guides:

Paper Topic Selection: International (focus: sources to identify new developments)

Paper Topic Development: International (focus: tools to identify articles, books, treaties, UN documents, jurisprudence and other sources)

BLS librarians want to help!  Contact us to obtain more information about library sources and services:

Researching Copyright Law or Trademark Law? BLS Library Offers 2 Online Guides to Help!

This summer, attorney and BLS Library volunteer Grace Pickering worked with BLS librarians to substantially revise Researching Copyright Law and to create Researching Trademark & Unfair Competition Law.

The home pages of these two guides feature introductory sources in guide boxes Copyright 101 and Trademarks 101. The home pages also highlight sources (examples: podcasts, hearings, case trackers and books) on selected hot topics. Moreover, these guides feature: casebooks, study aids and legal encyclopedia entries; treatises and practice guides; current awareness sources to help law students choose paper topics; sources of scholarly articles; starting points in Bloomberg Law, Lexis+ and Westlaw Precision; and WIPO’s resources.

Tip: Both guides link to key BLS subscription sources like: The Fashion Law (TFL) and Law360.com > topic: Intellectual Property. (In BLS Library’s SARA catalog records, click: ACCESS ONLINE VERSION.) BLS students: remote access to these sources requires implementation of the BLS proxy server instructions for one web browser. BLS librarians recommend the instructions for Firefox.

Tip: BLS librarians are happy to support your paper topic research–feel free to email us at: askthelibrary@brooklaw.edu or to text us at: (718) 734-2432.

Thank you, Grace Pickering, for your hard work!

Note: If you are an MLIS student who wishes to learn about BLS Library’s fellowship program, please contact Associate Librarian for Public Services/Adjunct Professor Kathleen Darvil at: kathleen.darvil@brooklaw.edu.

Preparing for Remote Work During the BLS Winter Recess  

If you need to conduct remote research during the BLS Winter Recess (Dec. 23–Jan. 3), these are our suggestions:

  • NOW is the time to email askthelibrary@brooklaw.edu or to text (718) 734-2432 and state: “My [professor/journal editor] encouraged me to find additional articles and treatises to support [assertion X].  Can you help me?”  A reference librarian can recommend searches in our SARA library catalog to find e/books and “advanced searches” in our OneSearch discovery platform to find articles.
  • NOW is the time to implement the BLS proxy server instructions for off-campus access to many ebooks, ejournals and databases.  Prior to Winter Recess, you can still troubleshoot implementation problems with our library tech staff, accessible through: library.lab@brooklaw.edu  Librarians recommend either the Firefox (Mac) Proxy Instructions or the Firefox (Windows) Proxy Instructions. 
  • Check out needed print sources in BLS Library by Dec. 22.
  • If you find cites to articles or books unavailable through BLS Library, as of Dec. 15, 2022, you still have time to place requests for scans of articles and book chapters through the BLS interlibrary loan process. 
    • To place an ILL request, access SARA library catalog and click tab: ILL, enter your BLS username [format: firstname.lastname] & password, then click: Create Request. 
      • Fill out the appropriate template: Article, Book or Other (choose Other to request a scan of a single book chapter).
    • Feel free to email askthelibrary@brooklaw.edu or to text (718) 734-2432 to learn more about making an ILL request. 
    • If you place an ILL request, please monitor both your BLS “In” box and “Clutter” folder for replies from lenders. 
    • Note: ILL requests will not be processed from Dec. 23-Jan. 3. 
  • For further information, BLS patrons can access the Canvas page: Librarians’ Research Presentations > under heading: Materials from Librarians’ “Alcove Academy” Presentations, click: PowerPoint: “Effective Remote Research.”

We hope our tips will improve your research during Winter Break.  Remember: Right now, we are here to help! 

Finding Casebooks & Study Aids in BLS Library

Questions & Answers, Torts
by Prof. Anita Bernstein

In its first-floor Reserve collection, BLS Library provides current editions of casebooks/textbooks that are required for classes.  There also are current editions of many treatises, hornbooks and other study aids in the Reserve collection.  Note: Study aids are only supplements to required course readings.  These print books circulate for two hours.  You can search for a specific source by title, author or keywords in SARA catalog.  Feel free to email askthelibrary@brooklaw.edu or to text (718) 734-2432 if you have questions about finding or accessing specific sources.

BLS Library’s guide 1L Resources, Tips and Tools highlights 1L casebooks and study aids available through BLS Library in both print and digital formats.  The top-level guide tab: 1L Course Study Aids provides a pull-down menu of subjects.  Click a subject, like: Civil Procedure.  There are “quick links” to boxes highlighting:

  • Selected CALI Lessons (online lessons on specific legal topics created by law professors/librarians – these lessons include review questions)
  • Casebooks
  • Treatises & Hornbooks
  • Study Aids Containing Multiple-Choice Questions
  • Additional Study Aids

In the 1L guide, sources in a box appear in reverse chronological order (“newest first”).  Guide pages also include a search feature (top right).  Recently, vendor EBSCO began supporting BLS Library’s desire to circulate Reserve copies of ebooks for two hours.  So, EBSCO ebooks like Mastering Multiple Choice for Federal Civil Procedure and A Short & Happy Guide to Torts circulate for two hours.  BLS Library’s e-copies of study aids in the Q&A, Understanding and Gilbert Law Summaries series (available through Lexis Digital Library) circulate for three days. 

Additionally, the 1L guide identifies print sources and online tools to support legal research and writing.  Top-level guide tab: Research, Writing & Citation provides a pull-down menu of resource pages on:

  • Legal Research
  • Legal Writing & Analysis
  • Legal Citation

Please reload the 1L guide’s web page when you visit this guide – BLS Library frequently adds new sources.  Reference librarians are happy to help you identify BLS Library’s sources!   

Need to find and research a paper or presentation topic? BLS librarians (and their guides) can help!

BLS librarians have created 40+ publicly-accessible legal research guides. Tips: A BLS student can email askthelibrary@brooklaw.edu, text (718) 734-2432 or chat with us for help determining whether there is a guide to support research on a specific topic. Off-campus use of many subscription databases described in BLS research guides requires implementation of the BLS proxy server instructions.

Also, your librarians serve as liaisons to the BLS full-time faculty–we can tell you which librarian works most closely with a particular professor. A librarian liaison might have created research links in the Canvas page for a paper-writing course or other material to support students’ research. Note: BLS librarians can highlight resources to support any type of law student paper, article or presentation.

A useful starting point for many types of paper research is the guide: Selecting & Developing Your Seminar Paper Topic. This guide’s home page includes videos on: selecting/researching a topic; developing a thesis for a seminar paper topic; and avoiding plagiarism. Guide tab: Selecting a Topic links to: indexes of legal blogs; legal news sources; and selected legal journals and newsletters. All of these sources highlight new and developing legal topics. Guide tab: Developing an Argument through Commentary links to both full-text sources of articles and indexes of articles. Guide tab: Developing an Argument through Grey Literature includes sources to find material published by think tanks, NGOs and interested organizations.

Moreover, there are BLS guides to international law research. The broadest two guides are: Paper Topic Selection: International (highlights news/legal news sources) and Paper Topic Development: International (highlights sources of articles and primary law). If you need to find a topic for a “Rule of Law/Law of War” seminar, you could access the Paper Topic Selection guide > tab: Pull-down Menu of News: Specific Topics and choose sub-tab: Law of War. The English Legal Sources guide includes links to newly available resources in Westlaw Edge UK.

Additionally, there are many subject-focused BLS research guides. If you need to develop a topic in the “Art Law” seminar, the Art Law guide > tab: Other Resources links to websites of organizations and the searchable ArThemis database of news/case notes on art and cultural property disputes. If you need to conduct research for the “Topics in White Collar Crime” seminar, you could link to many resources through guide: White Collar Crime Research. If you are writing in the “Civil Practice Workshop,” the New York Civil Practice guide might be helpful. (This is a guide BLS librarians like to highlight to all BLS students who might wish to become litigators.) If you are writing on a tax topic, see: Federal Tax Research Guide and International Tax Research Guide. These guides include instructions to access BLS subscription databases to support tax research.

COMING IN EARLY OCTOBER: A presentation for students on selecting a paper topic and avoiding plagiarism. We will provide the date/time soon!

Researching legislation related to the coronavirus? Check out the Law Library of Congress’s Coronavirus Resource Guide

If you are researching legal issues related to the coronavirus pandemic, you will definitely want to check out the comprehensive coronavirus resource guide published by the Law Library of Congress, which provides links to laws, regulations and executive actions in the United States at both the federal and the state level, and in various countries.  The guide is updated at least weekly and in addition to direct links to laws and regulations, it includes Congressional Research Service reports which provide information to Congress about the coronavirus, law library blog posts, and articles from the Law Library of Congress Global Legal Monitor which tracks global legal developments. 

Some interesting Congressional Research Services reports listed in the Coronavirus Resource Guide include:

Todd Garvey, Constitutional Considerations of Remote Voting in Congress, Congressional Research Services(Apr. 14, 2020)

Colby Leigh Rachfal, COVID-19 and Broadband: Potential Implications for the Digital Divide, Congressional Research Services (Mar. 13, 2020)

Marc Labonte, COVID-19: Potential Economic Effects, Congressional Research Services (Mar. 11, 2020)

The Law Library of Congress’s Global Legal Monitor has dozens of articles organized by region which track individual country responses to the coronavirus, such as an article detailing Germany’s changes to its rules of procedure in Parliament and one discussing legislation in China that punishes the trade and consumption of wild animals.   

The guide also includes a link to a law library report on Legal Responses to Health Emergencies. Though written five years ago, the report provides useful summaries of regulations addressing health emergencies in 25 jurisdictions as well as a comparative summary and bibliography that may be useful in analyzing the level of preparedness of different countries for the current pandemic.

Welcome Back! A Few Resources to Help You This Spring

As you begin your Spring 2019 classes, keep in mind all of the resources available to you while you are a student at BLS:

Developing and Researching a Paper Topic:

Research Guides: If you are researching a particular subject area and don’t know where to start, or if you are trying to come up with a paper topic, check out the BLS Research Guides at http://guides.brooklaw.edu/. These guides cover a wide variety of topics such as EU Legal Research, Federal Securities Law, NY Civil Practice, and many others.

Finding Journal Articles and Cite Checking:

HeinOnline: Westlaw and Lexis have an excellent collection of journal articles. But especially if you are cite checking for a journal, you should also check out HeinOnline (https://www.heinonline.org/HOL/Welcome) which posts PDF versions of journal articles so you can view them exactly as they appear in the print copies.

Foreign and International Legal Resources:

HeinOnline: If you are researching foreign and international law, once again HeinOnline may be a great resource for you. HeinOnline has several databases devoted to foreign and international law including the Foreign and International Law Resources Database, United Nations Law Collection, and World Treaty Library.

Justis:  If you need to find caselaw or legislation from the UK, Ireland or EU, check out Justis, an online library of UK, Irish, EU, and international caselaw and legislation.

For more foreign and international legal resources check out the International and Foreign Law Databases in the A-Z database guide.

Corporate, Securities, Bankruptcy, Tax:

Bloomberg Law Practice Centers: Bloomberg Law is an excellent source for news and updates in specific practice areas such as corporate law, securities, tax, and bankruptcy. To access these resources, log into Bloomberg Law and click on the “Browse” icon on the upper left corner. Then click on “Practice Centers” on the left and choose the area of law you want to research.

If you don’t have a Bloomberg Law account, you can set one up by going to https://www.bloomberglaw.com/activate.

Westlaw and Lexis also have a wealth of information including cases, statutes, regulations, and secondary materials organized by practice area. On Westlaw, click on the “Practice Areas” tab on the homepage, and on Lexis, click on the “Practice Area or Industry” tab on the homepage. There you will find several areas of law such as Tax, Copyright, or Immigration which if you click on will bring you to primary and secondary source materials including statutes, regulations, caselaw, practice guides, and treatises for that topic.

And for your other research needs….

Check out the library’s A-Z Research Guide for a list of all of the databases available at BLS organized by subject area. And don’t forget about OneSearch (for searching articles and materials across all databases), SARA (for searching books & e-books), and Find A Source (for finding out whether BLS has access to specific journal titles).

Lastly, whenever you’re stuck, contact a librarian! Come find us at the reference desk or email askthelibrary@brooklaw.edu or use the “chat” feature on the library homepage.

Good luck!!!

Looking for Federal Government Information? Try the New Govinfo website.

Govinfo

The U.S. Government Publishing Office (GPO) has launched a beta version of its new GovInfo web site.  After it completes its beta phase, Govinfo will replace FDsys, the federal government website currently providing  free public access to over 50 different collections of federal government information, including the United States Code, the Code of Federal Regulations, Congressional materials, and selected federal case law.   Users of GovInfo can browse by A-Z list, by category, by date, and by congressional committee content.  To see a list of collections available on Govinfo, visit here.