Diverse Voices - Social Justice Research Guides

Presidential candidate and U.S. Rep.
Shirley Chisholm in 1972

Library research guides are always an incredible source of collected resources on a topic that you are interested in or just getting to know.

With the Web, you can access library research guides not only from your local library, but from around the world!  (Try using the Google Translate function on Chrome if you find a webpage that is not in a language you can read.)

The American Association of Libraries Research Instruction & Patron Services Special Interest Section recently created a webpage with links to research guides on diversity, equity, and inclusion and related topics.  These research guides provide information on legal and non-legal resources on anti-racism, critical studies, protest rights, social justice, and more.

Some research guides that I found useful were:

• Diversity in the Legal Profession (Univ. of Washington Gallagher Law Library)
• Diversity Readings Related to First-Year Courses (Univ. of Washington Gallagher Law Library
• Race, Research & Policy Portal (Harvard Kennedy School)
• Remote Resources for Anti-Racism (Univ. of South Carolina Law Library)
• Social Justice Guide (Howard Univ. School of Law Library)

Please take a browse and see what interests you!  It’s also great to revisit the webpage periodically because research guides continue to be added as they are developed!

As we all know, people who are fortunate enough to be trained in the law have a unique ability to contribute to social change.

This post is part of the Gallagher Law Library's Diverse Voices Series for DEI Week at UW Law.

Image description: 1972 poster of presidential candidate and U.S. Representative Shirley Chisholm. 

Image from: Library of Congress Free to Use and Reuse collection (Images of African American Women Changemakers).

 

Diverse Voices - Databases for Social Justice Topics on HeinOnline

HeinOnline has some excellent curated collections for researchers interested in different social justice issues in American legal history. 

Page of Cherokee laws, in
Cherokee. The Cherokee syllabary
(not exactly an alphabet) was
developed by Sequoyah
(without using any other
writing system!) and introduced
to the Cherokee people in 1821.
Sequoyah Birthplace
Museum. The syllabary is still used.
See Cherokee Nation's Language page.

The American Indian Law Collection has thousands of documents from a variety of sources. Some are from the perspective of the federal government—the government reports, legislation, and treaties. But there are also tribal documents that Hein's editors have found, such as Acts of the Cherokee Nation from 1870-72, in Cherokee, as well as hundreds of other tribal constitutions, bylaws, and acts.  

Exploring further, you can find non-legal material, like Cry of the Thunderbird: The American Indian's Own Story, a collection edited by Charles Hamilton in 1950, and the recent collection, Why You Can't Teach United States History Without American Indians (2015).

The Civil Rights and Social Justice collection brings together scholarly articles, hearings, government reports, and briefs. Browsing the briefs, I saw many topics, including fair housing, marriage equality, affirmative action, health care, and employment discrimination. With one search you can pull up books, law review articles, briefs, and more.

Did you know that Langston Hughes wrote an illustrated history of the NAACP? I didn't. But Fight for Freedom: The Story of the NAACP (1962) is on HeinOnline!

Are you interested in slavery, which has been so important in shaping American law and society? Then make use of HeinOnline's collection, Slavery in America and the World: History, Culture & Law. Edited by legal historian Paul Finkelman, this collection has statutes, cases, scholarly articles, books (from University of North Carolina Press), and an extensive bibliography. 

The Women and the Law collection (nicknamed Peggy, after a developer's mother) also has a wide variety of materials, from briefs to scholarly articles. It includes proceedings of a feminist legal theory conference that was held each year, 1985-2018. You can browse topics, such as abortion or suffrage. And it has a collection of biographies, from well-starched ladies from the nineteenth century to Florynce "Flo" Kennedy: The Life of a Black Feminist Radical, by Sherrie M. Randolph (2015).

 

Tip: When you follow a link to HeinOnline and are asked for authentication, choose Off-Campus/Remote Access. You'll want "University of Washington Gallagher Law Library," after which you'll be prompted for your UW NetID. I usually search for "gallagher" because that's faster than searching for "washington." (There's only one Gallagher in HeinOnline's list of subscribers, but there are several universities and law schools with "Washington" in their names.)

 

This post is part of the Gallagher Law Library’s Diverse Voices Series.

 

Diverse Voices Series

Presumption of Law by a Barrister &
a Lady (1891). Available from the
British Library's Flickr stream.

Leafing through a casebook or skimming a law journal, you could see a lot of upper-class white men of Northern European descent. But look again, and you might find much more diversity in the legal profession and in legal scholarship.

This week, we're going to highlight diverse voices in a series of blog posts, looking at books, databases, research guides, YouTube, and more!

Civil Liberties Day of Remembrance

Today is Civil Liberties Day of Remembrance, commemorating the anniversary of Executive Order 9066, which led to the removal and incarceration of over 110,000 Japanese Americans. 

To learn more, visit the Densho Encyclopedia, "a free and publicly accessible website that provides concise, accurate, and balanced information on many aspects of the Japanese American story during World War II." For thousands of photographs, letters, interviews, and other materials, pop over to the Densho Digital Repository. If you want to start locally, browse under Seattle. 

What happened to the hundreds of Japanese-American students at the University of Washington when the order was issued? You've probably heard of Gordon Hirabayashi, who challenged the curfew and then relocation, all the way to the Supreme Court.  (The injustice of the curfew struck him one night when he was studying late in Suzzallo Library. Why should he have to leave the library when his classmates didn't?) For more about the UW experience, see Interrupted Lives: Japanese American Students at the University of Washington, 1941-1942 from UW Libraries.

Last year's post on Civil Liberties Day of Remembrance highlighted a few books in our collection. Since Covid restrictions make it impossible to wander through the library, I updated the post to add links to ebook editions. Take a look! (One day, you'll be able to browse in the library again. We just don't know when.)

Gallagher Law Library Quarterly Newsletter (Winter 2021)

Although the Gallagher Law Library might be physically closed, librarians and library staff are still available to support you! Have a research question? Need help finding a source? Have a citation question? Have a question about your library account? Contact the Gallagher law Library! If you don't know where to start, or just want to see what the library has to offer check out our quarterly newsletter. We list some of our most recent ebooks (available for UW Community), topical blog posts, and resource guides. To help get to know our library staff, we have also included a library staff highlight section where you can read about the amazing work they are doing. This Winter 2021 edition features our very own Public Services Librarian, Mary Whisner!

Check out the full Winter 2021 newsletter here.

Missed our first newsletter? Review our Fall 2020 newsletter here. 

Want to contact us? Ask us!

Law Students

Law Faculty and Staff

UW & Seattle Community, Ask Us! or view our Library Visitors page for more information. 

Exam Prep Resources

Feel unready for exams? The library can help! 

The Gallagher Law Library maintains an archive of exams (and some model answers) from dozens of classes and professors. All you need is this link and your UW login. Happy studying!

Photo by Michelle Tresemer on Unsplash

United Nations Day — #UN75

This Saturday is a special UN Day: it's the 75th anniversary of the international body, which was founded as World War II was ending. The Charter was signed in June 1945, just after fighting had ceased in Europe and two months before Japan surrendered. It came into force October 24, 1945.

Graphic from UN Card.
The other half of the "card"
lists 11 UN actions, illustrating
the organization's wide
impact.

For a walk through the UN's history, visit 75 Years, 75 Documents, an online exhibit prepared by the Dag Hammarskjold Library. (Maybe you never thought about the United Nations having its own library, but it does, and it's a cool one!)

The United States has had a strong role in the United Nations, serving as a permanent member of the Security Council and hosting the headquarters in New York City.

But the relationship has sometimes had strains. Most recently, the Administration announced withdrawal from the World Health Organization, one of the UN's specialized agencies. A CRS report reviews the issues: Blyther et al., Cong. Research Serv. R46575U.S. Withdrawal from the World Health Organization: Process and Implications (Oct. 21, 2020). (Following the  Bluebook, I'd only give the publication year, but I want to show that this was published just yesterday!)

The US is the single largest financial contributor to the UN. The Administration has sought to reduce US funding. See Luisa Blanchfield, Cong. Research Serv. IF 10354, United Nations Issues: U.S. Funding to the U.N. System (March 10, 2020). 

Want to do some research? Try these databases:

• United Nations Digital Library (from the Dag Hammarskjold Library)
• AccessUN (licensed for UW users)
• United Nations Law Collection [HeinOnline] (licensed for UW users)

National Day on Writing

The National Council of Teachers of English has declared October 20 the National Day on Writing "to help writers from all walks of life recognize how important writing is to their lives." Law students and lawyers might not need much of a reminder, since putting words on paper (or onto a computer screen) is one of their key activities, but why not celebrate the day anyway?

To hear a lot of interesting people talk about writing, visit Bryan Garner's LawProse website, where you can choose "Judges, Lawyers, Writers on Writing" or "Supreme Court Interviews." The first collection includes law professors, judges, and one person from outside the law—the novelist and essayist David Foster Wallace.

You can also watch Bryan Garner's Writing Lessons on YouTube.

You probably already know a lot about writing sentences, but this short video, "6 Ways to Start a Sentence" can help prepare you for Halloween (just eleven days away!) as well as help you think about, well, different ways to start a sentence.

Are you tired of watching videos on your computer screen? Yeah, me too. I think a lot of us are Zoom-weary. So why not observe this National Day on Writing by picking up a pen or pencil and writing something on paper?

 

International Translation Day #ITD2020

 In honor of International Translation Day, take a look at the UW Language Learning Center's site.  I'm intrigued by the streaming video options, particularly SCOLA, a non-profit educational organization that receives and re-transmits television and radio programming from around the world in native languages.

In the section for on-demand video, you can search by language and by genre. Just for fun, I tuned in to a children's program in Farsi. I don't know any Farsi, but it was interesting to see some cute Iranian kids, puppets, a woman dressed up in colorful robes, and a cartoon. Of course, if you know another language (or are learning it), these videos would be even more interesting!

Image from the opening credits of فرزندان ایران originally broadcast 3/5/20.
Google Translate tells me the title means "Children of Iran." 

 

Access to Information - There's a Day for That?

The United Nations has declared September 28 to be the International Day for Universal Access to Information. Even before UNESCO made that announcement in 2015, an international group has been marking International Right to Know Day since 2002. I'm afraid I've been too busy to plan a party, so let me just mark the occasion with a couple of notes about access to government information. 

The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) gives everyone the right to request information from the federal government. The Department of Justice set up FOIA.gov as a central site to learn about FOIA procedures. 

Each agency has an Electronic Reading Room where it posts frequently requested records. So you don't have to start from scratch requesting CIA materials relating to Ethel and Julius Rosenberg  or the FBI's file about Muhammad Ali's relationship with the Nation of Islam, because they're already posted. To browse, just search for an agency name and FOIA reading room.

But what if what you want hasn't been posted already? You can submit your own FOIA request. To help you, Emily Willard from the UW's Center for Human Rights wrote How to FOIA: A Guide to Filing Freedom of Information Act Requests (2019).

In Washington, use the Public Records Act, RCW 42.56. For guidance, see Eric M. Stahl & Michael J. Killeen, Washington Open Government Guide, from the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. UW users also have online access to WSBA's Public Records Act Deskbook: Washington's Public Disclosure and Open Meetings Laws (2d ed., with 2020 supp.). 

Our subscription to WSBA deskbooks is a site license, so the servers need to recognize you as a UW user. If you aren’t on campus (and most of us aren’t, these days!), use Husky OnNet. Then, on the library’s homepage, look under Selected Databases for Washington State > Deskbooks.