Pop Culture Universe's homepage features various pop culture topics from decades throughout the twentieth-century. The database also allows users to search content by subject.
ANDREW NOSTVICK OP/ED EDITOR
The Vogel Library has taken a pop culture route by adding a new online database to its Web site and it is available for all students.
The site, which is called Pop Culture Universe, covers various subjects from the 1920s to today.
Subjects for Pop Culture Universe include politics, sports, entertainment, literature and technology.
“Pop Culture Universe really has a lot of color and sort of excitement going on when you’re searching in it and just in its basic visual appeal,” information literacy librarian Kari Weaver said.
The library decided about a month ago to give the database a trial run and after taking an in-depth look at the database, they got access to it earlier this month, Weaver said.
“We really didn’t have a collection of reference material that addressed this and there are a number of classes that take a look at those sorts of ideas,” Weaver said.
In terms of finding databases, Weaver said it’s a better option than Wikipedia because Pop Culture Universe asks scholars, who are experts in those areas, to write the articles on the site.
She said it is also a collection of these reference materials, therefore the authors of the material in the database are people who really know what they’re talking about. In Wikipedia, the information changes over time, which when trying to find something to be authoritative for an assignment is not useful, Weaver said.
“The other thing is that things can’t be changed on a whim in Pop Culture Universe,” she said. “The same article you get today is going to be the same you get tomorrow unless something dramatic changes.”
The subscription has to be renewed yearly, Weaver said. She added that some of the other librarians looked at the database for possible use in other departments.
The site has an overview of each decade including awards, sports moments, new inventions, fads and even new words and phrases.
The database recently won the prestigious Dartmouth Medal from the Reference and User Services Association at an awards ceremony hosted by the American Library Association.
To check out the site, you can type in http://pop.greenwood.com, or look for the link on the KnightOwl page of the Vogel Library Web site.