Building the Seamless Web of Cultural Research Resources

Abstract

Providing integrated access to research resources thatsupport teaching and learning in the humanities andsocial sciences has been a goal of the ResearchLibraries Group since its inception in 1975. Theadvent of the World Wide Web and the tools that arenow available to librarians, archivists and museuminformation specialists for enhancing access toresearch resources electronically are making the goalattainable.

Research in the humanities has become increasinglyinternational and interdisciplinary as resourcesbecome more readily available. Being able to provideaccess to primary and secondary research materialsregardless of format and location is already beingachieved. Building the kind of critical mass ofmaterials that will adequately support the kind ofin-depth research for teaching and scholarly use isthe next step in making that seamless web of resourcesso needed and wanted by researchers.

This article describes the advantages of building theseamless web of access – the promise of doing thisand the value of collaborative efforts to reach theshared vision. Web addresses for projects and servicesmentioned in this article are located at the end.