Tips & Tutorials
Reference staff are available to conduct group classes or one-on-one tutorials to show Museum staff how to use the Library's Citation & Full-text Databases and other electronic and print resources. If you need additional information, please contact Library Reference or call the reference desk at (212)769-5400.
The following online tutorials may also be of assistance:
Catalog Help
The Library Catalog is used to search for books, journal titles (not individual journal articles), moving images, art, and other materials. You may conduct a search by using the pulldown menu, or using the links to title, author, subject, etc. Novice users may benefit from using the links because relevant search tips are provided on each search screen. If you need additional assistance, please contact Library Reference or call the reference desk at (212)769-5400.
Searching Basics
Below are basic explanations for the following types of searches: Title, Author, Subject, Call No., ISBN/ISSN, and Keyword.
Title
For title searches, type in the first word of the title (excluding "a," "an," or "the") and as many subsequent words as you like (in the exact order that they appear in the title). For example:
·silent spring
·panda's thu
·american museum novitates
·journal of the american
·national geo
To search for one-word Journal titles (i.e. Nature, Science) insert a pipe after the title:
·nature|
·science|
Author
Type the person's name, last name first. You may also type the name of an organization or governmental body. For example:
·darwin
·mead, marg
·central asiatic exped
·society of american archivists
Subject
Use Library of Congress subject headings. If you are not sure what subject heading to use, ask Reference Staff to show you how to use the multivolume set: Library of Congress Subject Headings. Or, read more about subject searching from the Library of Congress website. For example:
·natural history periodic
·mammals africa
·audubon, j
If your subject search is unsuccessful, the catalog gives you the option to "search as words."
Library of Congress (LC) Call Number
To browse, conduct a search by typing as much of the Library of Congress Call Number as you want. If you want to find a specific volume, you must enter the entire call number. For example:
·E78.N5
·QL729.P32Q57
More information about the structure of the LC call number is available on our Understanding LC Call Numbers page.
Standard Number (ISBN/ISSN)
To find a specific title type in the entire number; you may omit hyphens.
·0028-0712
·10489711
Keyword
There are two types of keyword searches: advanced and simple. The advanced search allows you to limit your search by language, material type, book or serial, location within the library, and publication date. The simple keyword search does not have these limits. Keyword searches utilize phrase searching, truncation, Boolean operators, proximity, and allow you to search within specific fields.
Multiple keywords
Multiple words are automatically combined using AND. For example, a search for birds asia will default to birds AND asia. Type in as many words as you like:
·spain paleontology cretaceous
·ants congo wheeler classification
Phrase searching
If you want to search for an exact phrase, use double quotes:
·"human genome"
·"New York City"
Truncation
Words can be right truncated using an asterisk. Use one asterisk (*) to truncate up to five characters. Use two asterisks (**) to truncate more than five characters.
Boolean Operators
All multiple keyword searches are automatically combined using AND. Use OR to expand your search and retrieve more records. Use AND NOT to exclude words. Use parentheses to group words together. For example:
·snakes texas (defaults to: snakes AND texas)
·moths OR butterflies
·(darwin OR galapagos) OR (beagle AND explor*)
·dinosaurs AND NOT juvenile
Proximity
Use “near” to specify words close to each other in any order. Use "within #" to specify words within # words of each other in the catalog record. For example:
· wildlife near conservation
· poison* within 3 snake*Fields
Specify fields to search, using field abbreviations. Fields available for this catalog are a: (author), t: (title), s: (subject), and n: (note). For example, to do an author/title search for Audubon's Birds of America, type
· (a:audubon) and (t:birds) and (t:america)
Use of Buttons
Displays author, call no., location, and availability of each title.
Runs a new search in the same index.
Provides the option to limit a search by location, publication date, language, material type, published, and words in title.
Runs search in Britannica.com, the online encyclopedia.
Runs a keyword search.
Shows record in MAchine Readable Cataloging format.
Allows you to see the previous record in your results list.
Allows you to see the next record in your results list.
Shows you the list of titles in your results list.
Conducts a search to find items with similar subject headings. (This option is only available when looking at a bibliographic record from a keyword search.)
Advances to the next screen of titles to browse.
Returns to the previous screen of titles to browse.
Marking and Exporting Records
Marking and exporting lets you save search results to a disk, e-mail them to yourself, or put them in a citation- or printer-friendly format. To save records for export, check the boxes next to each title that you wish to save. To save all on screen, click the Save All on Page button.
1. Conduct a search.
2. Mark the records you want to export using the box to the left of the title. As you scroll through and mark each page of records you must click on the grey button at the bottom that says "Save Marked Records." Do not advance to the next page without clicking on "Save Marked Records" or the records on that page will not be saved.
3. When finished, Click on the 
button.
4. Choose the format you want, and where to send list for exporting.
5. Click the "Submit" button; when you're done click 
Viewing Your Loans
Click on the link "View Your Loans." This wil prompt you to enter your name and patron barcode. If you do not have a patron barcode, please contact Library Reference or call the reference desk at (212)769-5400.
When you are logged in, you can view the records and due dates of those materials that are checked out to you.
Featured Lists
Featured lists display catalog records in browsable lists. For example, all books put out in the Current Literature room are compiled monthly in featured lists. Other featured lists include Electronic Journals, GIS Materials, and books in the Digital Library collection.
Library of Congress Call Numbers
Not sure how to find materials in the Library? Our catalog uses the Library of Congress classification system, an alphanumeric system which groups books by subject categories, or classes. For more information about how to read call numbers, the shelving and filing rules of call numbers, and LC classification, visit: Understanding Library of Congress Call Numbers.
Alerts and RSS
Keeping Up-to-date with Research Articles Using Electronic Technology
Beginning in 2008, the AMNH Library started shifting many journal subscriptions from print format to electronic-only. Since fewer print journal issues are available to browse for new content, this is a good time to review how you can take advantage of electronic technology to monitor newly published articles in your field of interest.
There are two technologies that can be used to electronically monitor new content: email alerts and RSS feed readers. With both of these technologies, you can choose what content you wish to monitor, and have it sent to directly to your email account or your feed reader, making it unnecessary to regularly search databases or visit journal websites to find new content. However, you should note that not all publishers, vendors, and databases providers support these technologies, or they may support one and not the other.
Email Alerts
Email alert services offer a way to have new content sent automatically to your email inbox. Setting up an email alert requires free registration with the publisher, vendor, or database provider offering the service. Registration allows the company to store a profile of what you want to monitor, along with your email address, so that you can be notified when newly available content fits the parameters you have established.
If you like, you can set up a filter in your email account so that these incoming messages can be viewed in a separate folder, rather than with all of your other incoming emails.
RSS Feeds and Feed Readers
An increasing amount of web content is published in a format that allows you to subscribe to it and monitor it as it is published, much like you might subscribe to a print newspaper to monitor the news every day. Such web content is syndicated, which means that it is sent out to anyone wishing to subscribe, and the name for this technology, RSS, stands for Really Simple Syndication. In order to monitor and read new content published using RSS feeds, you will need to set up an RSS feed reader (also known as a feed aggregator or news reader). A feed reader is separate from your email, but still operates a lot like an email inbox. A feed reader is a personal web space where you can log in and view your subscriptions to various types of content. Some people find a feed reader useful for managing certain tasks without cluttering up their email inbox - but this is just personal preference. However, if you are also monitoring blogs, news sites, or other types of web content that is syndicated, then a feed reader can help you manage all of this in one place, which may make this technology a handier way to keep up-to-date. Furthermore, while email alerts require that you register with the publisher, vendor, or database provider, this is not always necessary with RSS feeds.
Feed readers are so common now that they are often built in to web browsers or part of the package of applications you get with a Hotmail, Google, or Yahoo email account. You might want to explore this list of web-based feed readers. If you set up a feed reader, then you'll want to start subscribing to some feeds. As you surf the web, look around on the sites you visit for this icon: 
or icons like these:
Instead of an icon you might also see a text link such as: "RSS Feed," "XML RSS Feed," "RSS," or something like that. If you see one of these icons or links on a site, it means that a feed is available, and if you subscribe to it, you can view that site's newly added content using your feed reader. More information about how to set up a reader and add feeds is provided below, but you can also get a good overview of how RSS feeds and readers works by watching this 4 minute video or this 8 minute video.
Example: Setting up a feed reader
To set up a feed reader using Google Reader you will first need to register for a Google Reader account. If you already have a Google email account, you can use that as your login. Once logged in you may see a welcome screen or a screen that tells you your reading list is empty, but to the left you should see a link to "Add subscription" as shown in the graphic below. This is what you will click to add feeds to your reader.
Monitoring Research Topics Using Email Alerts or RSS Feeds
You might decide that you want to monitor newly published articles on a particular research topic in which case it is usually a good idea to set this up in a Citation or Full-text Database, as this sort of database is not restricted to the journals published by a particular publisher and will allow you to throw as wide a net as possible to gather articles on your topic. You will likely have to go through several steps where you register to create a profile, conduct a search, save it to your profile, and request that the search be automatically and periodically run against any new content added to the journal or database so the results can be sent to your email or feed reader. The exact steps will depend on the publisher, vendor, or database provider.
Example: Setting up an email alert to monitor topic results in Zoological Record
You will need to register with ISI Web of Knowledge (the name of the search interface for Zoological Record) in order to set up an email alert. To register, just click on the link to Zoological Record from the Library's Citation & Full-text Databases page. You'll see a link at the top of the resulting screen to "Sign In." Click that, and then click the link to "Register" in the section called "Customize Your Experience." Register in order to set up a login and password for yourself.
Now, let's say you were interested in having any new articles on the species Mugil trichodon sent to you by email as they are added to the database. Go to Zoological Record and conduct a search on this species. Once your search is done, click on the "Search History" link at the top of the results page. You'll then see a link to "Save History/Create Alert" - click this and log in. On the next page you will see that you can name the search, and make adjustments to the format, etc. Make sure to check off the box that says "Send me email alerts." When you have finished making selections on this screen, click on the "Save" button to save your history to the server. You will now get monthly emails letting you know if anything new has been added to the database matching your search criteria.
Example: Subscribing to an RSS feed to monitor topic results in Zoological Record
You will first have to register and establish a profile in order to set up RSS feeds in Zoological Record. Information about how to register is provided in the example above. You'll also need to conduct a search on a topic within the database - go through the same steps described above, but this time try doing your search on amphibia. When you get to the page where you name your search and make other adjustments, don't click on the box that says "Send me email alerts." Make all the other adjustments that you want on this page, and then click on the "Save" button to save your history to the server. On the resulting page, click on the link that says "RSS Feed: XML." Then copy the URL of the next screen. Now open your feed reader and look for options to add a new feed (in Google Reader, click on the link to "Add subscription." You will be prompted to paste in the URL of your feed, which is the URL you just copied. Take a look at the screen image below showing your newly added feed in Google Reader. You can see the name of your feed on the left under the green bar and the articles from the feed show up in the main reading area to the right.
Monitoring Journals Using Email Alerts or RSS Feeds
It is usually quite easy to set up monitoring of journals important to your research - many publishers have a direct link for setting up either an email alert or RSS feed on the home page of the journal. Often it just takes one click to request that tables-of-contents be automatically sent to your feed reader, while sending this information to your email account is more likely to require that you first register with the publisher to create a profile (once you have done so, in the future you will only need to sign in to your account to add another journal to monitor).
Start by navigating to the journal's home page. Conducting an Internet search will usually get you there the quickest, or navigate from the Library's E-journals list (if there are several links, choose the one that goes directly to that journal's publisher, if possible).
Whether you want to set up an email alert or an RSS feed to get updated content for a journal, expect that you might need to poke around a bit on the journal's website to look for the links that will help you set up these features. Usually these links are quite obvious, but be aware that different publishers organize their sites differently, and may use slightly different terminology to describe these services.
Example: Setting up an email alert to monitor new content in the journal Science
The main page of the journal Science has a link to "Alerts" on the blue bar across the top of the page. Clicking that link will result in a page with a list of different email alerts that you can set up, and a button to "Add/Edit/Delete Alerts." Click that button and then sign in with your Science login and password. If you don't have one, then you will have to click on the link to "Register" and go through the process of registering in order to set up a login and password.
Once you have logged in, you can select which alerts you want to receive, such as the weekly table of contents of Science. Click on the "Submit" button once you have made your selections, and you should be all set to receive regular email alerts.
Example: Subscribing to an RSS feed to monitor new content in the journal Science
The main page of the journal Science has a link to "Alerts" on the blue bar across the top of the page which you should click; on the Alerts page, you will see a link to "RSS Feeds XML" in the left column under the section called "User Tools." Click this link and then choose the feed you want by clicking on the feed and copying the URL of the resulting page. Now open your feed reader and look for options to add a new feed (in Google Reader, click on the link to "Add subscription." You will be prompted to paste in the URL of your feed, which is the URL you just copied.
Take a look at the screen shot below showing how your reader looks once you have added the Science feed. If you select a feed from your subscription list on the left (which now has two items) it will be highlighted, and the items from that feed will show up in the main reading area to the right.
More Tips on Using RSS Feed Readers
Web sites that offer RSS feeds often have quick links to some of the most commonly used feed readers, so that you can quickly access and add the feed to your reader without copying the URL (you will still be prompted to log in to your reader.)
Once you have added some feeds to your reader, explore a bit. Feed readers have a variety of options for organizing your feeds into folders, marking off items after you have read them (so you know what you have read and what you still need to read), sorting items in your feed by date, unsubscribing from feeds, etc.
As mentioned above, you might want to take a look at this 4 minute video or this 8 minute video for a good overview of how RSS feeds and readers work. Sometimes it helps to see the process in action rather than read instructions.
Access from Outside the Museum
When you set up email alerts or a feed reader in order to monitor articles electronically, articles will likely appear in your email account or feed reader as a list of bibliographic citations, often with a link to the full-text of the article. If you click the link from a networked Museum computer, you should be able to go right to the full-text of the article on the publisher's website (assuming the Library has a subscription to the journal). If you click the link from home (or anywhere else outside the Museum), then you will probably not be allowed access to the full-text. This is because access to the electronic subscription of a journal is based on your computer's address. The Library has provided the publisher with the entire range of Museum computer addresses in order to allow anyone using a Museum computer seamless access to content, but we are not able to provide the publisher with all of the addresses of computers that Museum staff use outside the Museum. Thus, publishers will not recognize Museum staff using an outside computer as legitimate subscribers to their content, and content will be blocked. You can still get access to full-text content from home, just not directly from the hyperlinks that show up in your email message or feed reader. Instead, you will have to access the journal directly from the Library's website, as this will prompt an authentication process to verify that you are a legitimate user. See our off-site access access information for further details.
Additional Help
If you have a list of electronic journals or topics that you wish to monitor and you want help setting up email alerts or RSS feeds, please contact the Reference Desk (x5400 or Email) for assistance. We are happy to help!
Citation Metrics
Understanding and Finding Citation Metrics
Introduction
Citation metrics are statistics gathered on the number of times an article has been cited by other articles. There are several databases that gather these statistics, and they are described in more detail below. These statistics are gathered for two main purposes, to assess the quality of a researcher or to assess the quality of a journal.
For example, one might look at the citation count for a particular researcher (which would be the grand total of all the times that researcher's articles have been cited in other articles). This metric might be used to compare and judge the quality of that researcher's work and productivity with other researchers. The assumption is that researchers with high citation counts are writing articles that describe significant research (therefore this research is likely to be cited frequently by other authors), and/or the researcher is highly productive because they are publishing many articles for other researchers to cite. There are also more complex metrics used to evaluate the quality of an individual's research, such as the h-Index and the g-Index. Both of these indices involve more complicated calculations of citation counts in an attempt to provide a more accurate evaluation of quality and output. More information about these indices is available here:
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v436/n7053/full/436900a.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hirsch_number
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G-index
As mentioned above, citation metrics are also used to assess the quality of a journal. A journal's impact factor is basically a measure of the number of times that articles published in that journal are cited, but is calculated with a bit more complexity than that; it measures the "ratio between citations and recent citable items published "and "is calculated by dividing the number of current year citations to the source items published in that journal during the previous two years." The assumption is that if a journal is cited frequently, it must be publishing important, high-quality, or ground-breaking research. For these reasons, it is more prestigious for researchers to publish in journals with a high impact factor. The company Thomson Scientific (a.k.a. Institute for Scientific Information, or ISI) developed this measurement, and more information is available here:
http://scientific.thomson.com/free/essays/journalcitationreports/impactfactor/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impact_factor
These metrics are important because the number of times a researcher's work has been cited, and the impact factor of the journals that a researcher publishes in, are often used to evaluate that researcher's merits for applications for academic positions, tenure review, or promotions.
Finding Citation Metrics for an Individual
Two subscription-based indexes, Web of Science and Scopus, are notable for tracking article citations. The AMNH Library does not subscribe to either of these indexes, but they are often available at university libraries, and some coverage of Web of Science is available at New York Public Library (see http://www.nypl.org/databases/index.cfm?act=3&id=896). Features of these two indexes, as well as Google Scholar, are described below. Google Scholar is free to use and available here: http://scholar.google.com.
Web of Science offers two ways to obtain citation counts for a researcher. One way is to conduct an author search on a researcher (it is useful to first use the author index to choose all name variants) and then once the search has been conducted, click on the link to "Create Citation Report." This report includes a sum of the times the researcher's articles have been cited, as well as a more detailed analysis, including graphs and a calculation of the researcher's h-Index. However, take note of the announcement at the top of the report:
"This report reflects citations to source items indexed within Web of Science. Perform a Cited Reference Search to include citations to items not indexed within Web of Science."
So, this report only includes data compiled from those publications that Web of Science formally indexes, which excludes books, grey literature, journals outside the subject scope of the Web of Science indexing policy, etc. It is useful to note, for example, that the Museum's in-house publication, American Museum Novitates, only began being indexed in Web of Science in 2004, so a citation report would exclude citation analysis of articles published in the Novitates before 2004.
For a more complete picture of a researcher's citation counts, a Cited Reference Search should be conducted. Choose the tab for conducting a Cited Reference Search and enter the researcher's name in the search box to conduct an author search. Again, it is useful to use the author thesaurus to search for name variants. This search will result in a more thorough list of that researcher's works, and the numbers listed in the column entitled "Citing Articles" can be added together to produce a more accurate number of citation counts. Unfortunately such a search will not provide a citation report that includes any analysis of results, such as the h-Index.
Scopus also tracks citations, but with shorter coverage; indexing for journals in the database only goes back to 1996 (for Web of Science indexing for some journals goes back as far as 1900). To check a researcher's citation check, simply click the tab to conduct an author search, or perform a regular search entering the author's name and then selecting "authors" from the drop-down list to designate the appropriate field to search in. Either way, the next step is to select the results to be analyzed, and then click the "Citation Tracker" button. In Scopus it is not necessary to try to collect all variants of a researcher's name, as this database provides an author identifier feature, described as follows:
"Scopus Author Identifier uses an algorithm that matches author names based on their affiliation, address, subject area, source title, dates of publication citations, and co-authors. When you search, this feature returns documents written by that author, even when an author is cited differently."
Like the "Citation Report" in Web of Science, the "Citation Tracker" in Scopus provides a total sum of citation counts as well as the h-Index and additional analysis, but only for those publications that are formally indexed in Scopus. There is no way to see additional citation counts for non-indexed publications as is possible when using the Cited Reference Search in Web of Science.
Google Scholar does not provide citation analysis tools like the two indexes described above. However, it is free. When searching for a researcher, each resulting citation provides a count of papers that article is "Cited by." To find as many articles as possible in order to add up these citation counts, it is important to thoroughly search on variants of the researcher's name. A good start is to try a phrase search using initials both before and after the surname, as in this search: "Smith MJ" OR "MJ Smith" - but it is not a bad idea to try other variants, being careful to omit from the citation count those articles that are by another author with a similar name.
Finding a Journal's Impact Factor
The traditional source for finding a journal's impact factor is Journal Citation Reports, or JCR, another product of Thomson Scientific and available by subscription only. The AMNH Library does not subscribe to JCR. However, it is usually available from university libraries and can also be accessed from New York Public Library through their Web of Science subscription. To search this resource, simply type in the name of the journal title, and a report with the impact factor will be presented (assuming a matching title is found). It is also possible to look at a list of journal titles by subject area in order to quickly compare their impact factor rankings. For more information about Journal Citation Reports, and journal impact factors, take a look at these sites:
http://scientific.thomsonreuters.com/products/jcr/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impact_factor
An alternative resource for determining a journal's importance is Eigenfactor.org available at http://www.eigenfactor.org/index.php. This free resource provides two scores for a journal: "Article Influence (AI): a measure of a journal's prestige based on per article citations and comparable to Impact Factor" and "Eigenfactor (EF): A measure of the overall value provided by all of the articles published in a given journal in a year." For more information about how scores are calculated and how Eigenfactor was developed, take a look at the Eigenfactor website (provided above) and this article: "Eigenfactor: Measuring the value and prestige of scholarly journals".
Controversy Over the Use of Citation Metrics
The use of citation metrics is controversial for a number of reasons. For one, it is difficult to obtain accurate metrics on a particular researcher because the scope and coverage of databases like Web of Science, Scopus, and Google Scholar is not exhaustive. The indexing for these databases may not go back very far in time, nor are they comprehensive in the publications they index; therefore, results will vary. Also, researchers who have changed their name, or have been inconsistent with the use of their initials in the byline of their published works, or who simply have a name that is common, will be more difficult to analyze. (The Author Identifier developed by Scopus helps to eliminate this problem.)
Furthermore, the validity of citation metrics as a measure of worth has been criticized on a number of fronts. One controversy is that a researcher might be frequently cited because their research is contentious, not because it is high quality, useful research. Also, the use of citation metrics as an evaluation tool penalizes those researchers who have long-term projects that result in few publications, even though such long-term studies might be very important. Furthermore, comparing citation metrics of researchers across disciplines might be ill-advised since research and publication patterns vary by discipline. These are just a few issues that have been identified as potential problems. For more information, take a look at the following article on the h-Index which describes how it is weighted in order to address certain problems, and which issues are still left unresolved: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hirsch_number. Some of the pros and cons of Google Scholar vs. Web of Science for citation analysis are discussed in this article: http://www.harzing.com/h_indexjournals.htm. And, for more information about the controversies surrounding metrics for journal impact factor, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impact_factor.
Library of Congress Call Numbers
Understanding Library of Congress (LC) Call Numbers
Our catalog uses the Library of Congress classification system, an alphanumeric system which groups books by subject categories, or classes. Below, we explain what a call number is, how to read call numbers, the shelving and filing rules of call numbers, and LC classification.
What is a call number?
A call number is like an address; it tells you where the book is located on the shelf. Each book, CD-ROM, journal, etc., has its own unique call number which is attached to the book's spine or upper left hand corner of the cover (or envelope). A book's call number also appears in the catalog entry in the library's online catalog (OPAC).
Reading Call Numbers
The Library of Congress arranges materials by subject, or 'class' (see the last section below for more information on classes). The first section of the call number represents the subject of the book. The second section often represents the author's name, and the last section is the date of publication.
In the following example of a call number for the book "What you need to know about developing study skills" by Marcia J. Coman published in 1991. LB2395 is the subject (Methods of Study), .C65 represents the author's last name (Coman), and 1991 is the year of publication.
Shelving/Filing Rules of LC Call numbers
Single letters are filed before double letters:
Q |
QC |
QL |
R |
RA |
The second part of a call number is made up of a number that may have one or more digits. This line is read numerically. A call number with a smaller number is shelved before one that has a larger number. Some of these numbers may be divided by a point: these are also read numerically (smaller numbers are shelved before larger numbers).
QA
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QA
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QA
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QA
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QA
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QA
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QA
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QA
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QA
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The third part is the trickiest part of the call number. This part of the call number is called the "cutter". The numbers in this part are treated like decimals.
Follow these general rules when dealing with cutter numbers:
- Treat the letter of the cutter number alphabetically. For example, cutter numbers beginning with .B are shelved before those starting with .E.
- Smaller first digits after the letter are shelved before larger ones. For example, all cutter numbers beginning with .E3 would be shelved before all cutter numbers beginning with .E4, and those would be shelved before cutters beginning with .E8.
- Smaller second, third, etc. digits are shelved before larger ones. For example, cutters beginning with .E35 are shelved before cutters beginning with .E39. Likewise, for the third number: .E353 is shelved before .E355 and .E359.
- Items with only one digit after the letter are shelved before items with multiple digits beginning with the same number(s). So, the cutter number .E3 is shelved before .E35 , which is shelved before .E359.
QL
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QL
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QL
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QL
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QL
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QL
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QL
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QL
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QL
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QL
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QL
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Sometimes there are TWO cutter numbers in a call number. The first cutter, in these cases, is related to the subject of the work. The second cutter is related to the author. The shelving order of the second cutter follows the same four rules described above.
QE
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QE
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QE
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QE
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QE
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QE
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QE
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QL
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QL
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Sometimes, the top of the call number has the item's location: "Ref" for Reference room, etc. The final lines of the call numbers may include copy numbers, issue numbers, volume indicators and other annotations such as supplement or index specifiers. For example, the call numbers below are shelved in Reference:
Ref.
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Ref.
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Ref.
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Ref.
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Ref.
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Library of Congress Classification
To recap, a call number is a subject formula that groups materials by subject categories, or classes. Each class is identified by a letter. Classes are broken down into subclasses by adding more letters. These subclasses, in turn, are more finely delineated by numbers. Using the scheme, books are grouped together on the shelf, making it easier for you to browse the library's holdings on a specific topic. For a detailed breakdown of the subject categories, see the Library of Congress Classification Outline .
In the AMNH Library, many of our books are classed in QL (Zoology), which is a subclass in the major class Q (Science). Here is a breakdown of class QL:
| QL1-991 | Zoology |
| QL1-355 | General zoology, including geographical distribution |
| QL360-599.82 | Invertebrates |
| QL461-599.82 | -Insects |
| QL605-739.8 | Chordates, Vertebrates |
| QL614-639.8 | -Fishes |
| QL640-669.3 | -Reptiles and amphibians |
| QL671-699 | -Birds |
| QL700-739.8 | -Mammals |
| QL750-795 | Animal Behavior |
| QL791-795 | -Stories & anecdotes |
| QL799-799.5 | Morphology |
| QL801-950.9 | Anatomy |
| QL951-991 | Embryology |
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