Women and Human Rights

This is a research guide to some of the print, electronic and Internet resources available in the Henry Birnbaum Library for researching issues related to women’s rights and human rights.

Reference Materials | Circulating Books | Journal Articles | Web Sites

REFERENCE MATERIALS

These reference books will provide background information, and are located on the first floor of the Birnbaum library.

Adler, Lenore Loeb. International Handbook on Gender Roles. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1993. (Ref HQ1075 .I58 1993)
Overview essays comparing gender roles and equity between men and women in 31 countries, mostly 2nd and 3rd world nations. Each essay contains a useful list of references.

Encyclopedia of Cultural Anthropology. 4 vols. New York: Henry Holt and Company, Inc., 1996. (Ref GN307 .E52 1996)
Covers a range of topics related to cultural anthropology. Entries include bibliographies and cross references. Includes an index. Useful for information about women and gender issues.

Encyclopedia of Cultures and Daily Life. 4 vols. Detroit, MI: Gale Research, 1998. (Ref GN333 .W67 1998)
Covers 500 cultural groups in Asia, Europe, the Americas and Africa. Includes articles on a wide range of topics such as food, clothing, interpersonal relations, family life, social problems, clothing and food. Each entry includes a bibliography and some include statistics. Includes an index.

Encyclopedia of Social and Cultural Anthropology. Alan Barnard and Jonathan Spencer, eds. New York: Routledge, 1996. (Ref GN307 .E5 1996)
This single volume covers a range of contemporary social and cultural anthropology topics. Over 230 entries are arranged alphabetically and include short bibliographies as well as cross references. Also includes a glossary. Useful for information on gender, family, and marriage.

Encyclopedia of World Cultures. 10 vols. Boston: G.K. Hall, 1991. (Ref GN307 .E53 1991)
Covers various ethnic and national subcultures. Topics covered for each group include history, location, religious beliefs and practices, arts, socio-political organization, language, economy, family, and kinship relationships. Entries include short bibliographies.

Human Values and Beliefs: A Cross-Cultural Sourcebook: Political, Religious, Sexual and Economic Norms in 43 Societies; Findings from the 1990-1993 World Value Survey. (Ref HM73 .I544 1998)
Based on the responses to the World Values Survey, this book examines cross-national opinions on more than 350 variables that measure political, economic, social and cultural values in terms of age, income, and educational level. The original questionnaire is included. Includes index.

International Encyclopedia of Sexuality. 4 vols. NY: Continuum, 1997-2001. (Ref HQ21 .I68 1997)
Presents scholarly information about sexual beliefs and behaviors currently practiced in 32 countries. Each essay includes current demographics and a brief history and then discusses a range of topics including religious and ethical factors, sexually transmitted diseases, and sex education. Entries include bibliographies. Include an index.

Neft, Naomi and Ann D. Levine. Where Women Stand: An International Report on the Status of Women in 140 Countries, 1997-1998. New York: Random House, 1997. (Ref HQ1154 .N39 1997)
Arranged in two parts. Part 1 is a global progress report on women’s political representation, education and employment. It also discusses marriage and divorce, family planning and violence against women. The second section uses these topics to compile statistical profiles of 140 countries.

Routledge International Encyclopedia of Women: Global Women’s Issues and Knowledge. 4 vols. New York: Routledge, 2000. (Ref HQ1115 .R69)
Entries are included on a wide range of topics of concern to women and the theory and practice of global feminism. Includes cross-references, bibliographies and an index.

Sisterhood is Global: The International Women’s Movement Anthology. Garden City, NY: Anchor Press/Doubleday, 1984. (Ref HQ1154 .S54 1984)
Includes data on the status of women and essays by feminists in each country.

Women in the Third World: An Encyclopedia of Contemporary Issues. Nelly P. Stromquist, ed. New York: Garland Publishing, Inc., 1998.
Includes lengthy essays on a range of topics such as politics, legal issues, sex role ideologies, demographics and health, marriage and family. Essays include bibliographies. Includes appendices and an index.

Women’s Rights: A Global View. Walter, Lynn, ed. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2001. (Ref HQ1236 .W6527 2001)
Presents case studies of the fight for women’s rights in 15 countries that examine the social implications of women’s rights from a historical and culturally comparative perspective. Countries included provide a representative sample of different cultural practices and historical processes. Includes statistics, a bibliography, and an index.

The World’s Women, 2000: Trends and Statistics. New York: United Nations, 2000. (Ref HQ1154 .W95 2000)
Includes information on population and demographics, marriage, households and childbearing, health, education and communication, work, human rights and political decision making. Includes statistics, tables, charts and a bibliography. Also see:

The World’s Women, 1970-1990: Trends and Statistics. New York: United Nations, 1991. (Ref HQ1154 .W675 1991) which includes statistics on families and The World’s Women 1995: Trends and Statistics. New York: United Nations, 1995. (Ref HQ1154 .W675 1995) which considers media, violence against women, poverty, the environment, refugees and displaced persons and 50 years of women in the United Nations and peacekeeping.

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CIRCULATING BOOKS

You can find books to check out in the library’s online catalog, using either keywords or Library of Congress subject headings. Some possible subject headings include:

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JOURNAL ARTICLES - LIBRARY DATABASES

To find articles related to women's studies in newspapers and other periodicals, use the databases that are accessible from the Library’s homepage. Click on Articles via Databases and use the pull-down menus provided to select a databases to search. The following is a list of database often used by WS students:

ABI Inform
Business, management and economics articles from general and scholarly sources. A good source for women's employment and economic issues.

Academic Search Premier
Includes articles from a range of disciplines including the humanities and social sciences.

America History and Life
Citations and abstracts of scholarly articles; covers the history of North America.

Contemporary Women's Issues
Provides access to journals, newsletters, research reports from non-profit groups, government and international agencies, and fact sheets on global and domestic women's issues.

Historical Abstracts
Citations and abstracts of scholarly articles; covers the history of the world outside of North America.

JSTOR
Provides access to back issues of scholarly journals.

Lexis-Nexis
Full-text articles from U.S. and international news sources. Also includes specialized legal and business information. A good source for following a current issue, as well as get information regarding federal and state laws affecting women's lives.

National Criminal Justice Reference Abstracts Database
contains summaries of more than 140,000 publications on criminal justice.

New York Times Archive (1851-1999)
Current (1980- ) available through Lexis-Nexis.

PAIS
Indexes articles and other materials in the field of public affairs.

Research Library
Includes articles from the humanities and the social and natural sciences.

Sociological Abstracts
Covers journals in sociology, social work, and other social sciences.

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FINDING AND EVALUATING WEB SITES

You should be able to find web sites related to your topic by using a general web search engine such as Google (http://www.google.com).  However, if you're tired of shifting through junk and want to find good sites that will please your professors, try these search tools as well.

RECOMMENDED INTERNET SEARCH TOOLS:

INFOMINE    http://infomine.ucr.edu/

A collection of scholarly Internet resources, arranged by subject.  INFOMINE was developed by the University of California, Riverside.

Resource Discovery Network    http://www.rdn.ac.uk

Search more than 100,000 resources via a series of subject-based information gateways (or hubs). The RDN is primarily aimed at Internet users in UK and higher education but is freely available to all

The Scout Report Archives    http://scout.cs.wisc.edu/archives/

Search for critical evaluations of Websites that have appeared in previous editions of the Scout Report.

Google Scholar    http://scholar.google.com

Find book citations, journal articles (both $$ and free) & abstracts, conference papers, preprints, thesis, and technical reports.

Regardless of the method that you use to locate Web resources, you will need to ask yourself evaluative questions about those resources before you use them in a college-level paper.  Specifically, you should think about whether your sources are:

• Accurate:  Is the resource free of obvious errors?  Does the resource provide appropriate documentation of information presented as factual?

• Authoritative:  Does the author of the resource have credentials or expertise on the subject s/he is writing about?  What are his or her qualifications?  If no author is given, how reputable in the organization providing the resource?

• Objective:  Is the resource biased, and if so, is the bias clearly acknowledged?

• Current:  Is the date of publication given, and if so, is it recent enough to be useful?

• Appropriate in Scope and Coverage:  What are the topics included in the resource?  Are they covered in sufficient depth?

For more information on evaluating Websites, please see the library's page on Evaluating Resources.

RECOMMEND WEB SITES

Amnesty International’s Work on Women     www.amnesty.org/ailib/intcam/women/index.html
Amnesty International is a worldwide campaigning movement that works to promote internationally recognized human rights. This portion of its website is devoted to its work on behalf of women.

Council of Europe (COE)     www.coe.int
The COE is an intergovernmental organization with a variety of purposes among which is the goal of protecting human rights. The Human Rights portion of this site includes information on gender equality and a link to the Court of Human Rights (www.echr.coe.int) which hears cases related to abuses of women’s human rights around the world.

Country Reports on Human Rights Practices     www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/
Released by the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor of the United States Department of State, these reports are full text electronic documents listed by country and updated annually. Under Section 5 of each report: Discrimination Based on Race, Sex, Religion, Disability, Language or Social Status, is a brief summary of human rights and women.

Digital Freedom Network (DFN)     www.dfn.org
The DFN promotes human rights education and activism around the world, primarily through the use of internet technology. Information is arranged by region. Topics covered include many issues related to women.

Division for the Advancement of Women     www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/daw/
The DAW advocates the improvement of the status of women of the world and the achievement of their equality with men. This site includes information about the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination, adopted in 1979 and described as an international bill of rights for women. One feature of the site is a series of reports from various countries that have ratified or acceded to the Convention.

End Violence Against Women     www.endvaw.org/index.htm
This website is an outgrowth of a joint project between the Johns Hopkins Population Information Program and the United Nations Development Fund for Women to share materials produced to end violence against women. The site provides access to current news articles about violence against women from newspapers and magazines around the world. Other useful portions of the site are the Online Resources section and the search feature.

Human Rights Watch     www.hrw.org
The largest human rights organization based in the United States, HRW‘s researchers conduct fact-finding investigations into human rights abuses in all regions of the world. The Women’s Rights Division portion of the site provides information arranged by thematic issues such as women workers, sexual violence, women in state custody. Includes the text of the Human Right’s Watch’s annual World Report portion related to women, information on other publications and links to related web resources.

INCORE Internet Country Guides     www.incore.ulst.ac.uk/cds/countries/index.html
This is part of a larger site, INCORE, (Initiative on Conflict Resolution and Ethnicity). The country reports provide information on ethnic conflicts and human rights in selected countries. Each country report provides documents, news sources, articles, maps, and links to other sites.

INSTRAW (United Nations International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women)     www.un-instraw.org/
INSTRAW was established in 1976 to promote gender equality and women’s advancement worldwide through research, training, and the collection and dissemination of information. This site provides access to a searchable database which is an online library of over 1000 gender-related resources from around the world.

International Labour Organization (ILO)     www.ilo.org/dyn/gender/gender.home
This website is managed by the Bureau for Gender Equality, part of the ILO. The Bureau’s mandate is to promote equality between men and women in all aspects of the work of the ILO. In addition to other information, the Resources link on this site provides access to a collection of material s searchable by country or subject.

The National Council for Research on Women     www.ncrw.org
The National Council for Research on Women is a working alliance of 92 women’s research and policy centers, more than 3,000 affiliates and a network of over 200 international centers. Its mission is to enhance the connections among research, policy analysis, advocacy and innovative programming on behalf of women and girls. This site provides links to publications, information on periodicals and reports, and links to electronic resources.

UNESCO Website on Women and Gender Equality     www.unesco.org/women/
The Women and Gender Equality unit is part of UNESCO’s Division of Women, Youth and Special Strategies and is charged with promoting and facilitating UNESCO’s efforts to integrate a gender perspective into its work. This site provides access to many publications including Guidelines on Gender-Neutral Language; links to other sites, and access to Mapping the World of Women’s Information Services, which is a database of over 350 women’s information centers and libraries from 125 countries.

UNICEF Gender, Partnerships and Participation     www.unicef.org/programme/gpp/index.htm
This portion of the UNICEF website provides information on its gender-related efforts. The Resources Policy and Profiles links provide information on UNICEF initiatives as well as links to other sources of information.

United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM)     www.unifem.org
UNIFEM is the women’s fund at the UN and provides financial and technical assistance to innovative programs and strategies that promote women’s human rights, political participation and economic security. This site includes information on UNIFEM’s publications and other documents as well as links to the group’s regional websites around the world.

United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)     www.undp.org/
The UNDP, the United Nation’s global development network advocates for change and helps developing countries attract and use aid effectively. This site includes links to the UNDP’s country websites as well as to speeches and statements, press releases and other publications. The full text of the most recent Human Development Report is also available.

Women Watch     www.un.org/womenwatch/index
Women Watch is a joint United Nations project created in 1997 to provide internet space for global gender equality issues and to support implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action. This website is a gateway to information and resources on the promotion of gender equality throughout the UN system, including the UN Secretariat, regional commissions, funds, programs, specialized agencies. The Women of the World link provides access to information about initiatives in various countries and regions.

Women’s Human Rights Resources     http://www.law-lib.utoronto.ca/Diana/
This site includes information on a variety of topics such as health, labor and employment, violence against women, humanitarian laws. It includes a searchable Women’s Human Rights Database and serves as a gateway to other related websites.

Women’s Human Rights Net (WHRNET)     www.whrnet.org
WHRNET is an international network of women’s human rights organizations that seeks the effective utilization of all available information and communication technologies toward the advancement of women’s human rights. The site covers these topics among others: custodial abuse, education, family, violence against women. The Research Tool portion of the site provides useful links to a variety of related resources such as women’s studies journals, human rights documents and journals, and human rights documents databases

World Bank Group – GenderNet     www.worldbank.org/gender/
This site describes how the World Bank seeks to reduce gender disparities and enhance women’s participation in economic developments through its programs and projects. The site includes World Bank publications, summaries of research, statistics (searchable by country), and links to related sites.

Pace Library Internet Resources
The are resources selected according to topic by Pace University Librarian. Of use to Women's Studies students wouuld be the Women's Studies selections, as well as Sociology, Statistics, Multiculturalism, History, and many others.

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