eHRAF World Cultures
The eHRAF World Cultures contains full-text information on over 100 cultures and ethnic groups. For each culture, all aspects of cultural and social life are covered, with topics ranging from religious beliefs, bringing up children, causes and cures of diseases, to economic and political behavior.
Two thesauri organize the collections. These thesauri are the OUTLINE OF WORLD CULTURES (OWC) and the OUTLINE OF CULTURAL MATERIALS (OCM). The thesaurus is a vocabulary ordered by regions and subregions of over 2,200 cultures around the world. HRAF uses the OWC thesaurus as the universe from which HRAF selects cultures to include in the eHRAF WORLD CULTURES collection. The OCM is a subject thesaurus with nearly 800 entries and over 10,000 index entries. Every paragraph in every document in the eHRAF Collection is indexed with OCM subjects.
Search tips:
- For a basic search, enter a word(s) or OCM number(s) (Outline of Cultural Materials subject number) in the box. Words can be concepts and/or cultures or regions. Try to keep it simple to start with; you can Add/Remove later. Remember the two thesauri contain index terms for cultures and subjects mostly having to do with culture (you might want to Browse subjects and cultures first to get a better feeling for the two thesauri).
Examples:
* irrigat* (for irrigate or irrigation)
* "South America" art* if you don't put quotes around "South America" the eHRAF Search will try to look for South and America separately.
* Navajo weaving
* shaman* (for shaman, shamans, shamanism)
* 756 (the OCM number for shamans and psychotherapists)
Press eHRAF Search to execute.
To view results click on a culture. See Search Results for help.
If the results are not what you want you can modify them in two ways. First, you can return to the Basic Search page by pressing Search and set your Search Preferences. Or on the Results Page you can click Modify Search.
To do a lookup search, enter a word(s) or OCM (Outline of Cultural Materials subject number) in the box. Words can be concepts and/or cultures or regions. Try to keep it simple to start with; you can modify later.
Examples:
* art in Africa
* hunt* [for hunt or hunting]
* "south america" art* [if you don't put quotes around "south america" the lookup will try to look for south and america separately]
* Navajo weaving
* childbirth
* 844 (the OCM number for childbirth)
Press Lookup to get suggested index terms. You will see a three-part box that "mapped" to your entered words. On the left are the cultures (if any) that were mapped. If you put in no culture names or region names, the search will assume you want all cultures. In the middle you will find all the subject thesaurus terms that were found. On the right is a box that allows you to say you want to click to search for the particular words in the text of the documents (or, you can insert new terms in the empty text box). See What Words to Choose.
Examine the suggested search query and check the Boolean operators within each box and between subjects and text. Make sure to click in the box to the left of a term to include it in your search. If it is what you want, press Submit eHRAF Search. If you do not like what the map function found here are your choices:
1. Click Modify Search to return to the first search screen and retry from Step 1.
2. Click Add/Remove at the top of the Cultures box and/or the top of the Subjects box. A picklist will open for each box.
3. Choose Remove All to eliminate all choices in a box. and then click Add/Remove to find choices yourself from the picklists. See Using Picklists.
4. Delete unwanted choices by clicking on the box to the left of each item.
Submit your query by pressing Submit eHRAF Search. The search query will return all the paragraphs or paragraph level elements with your search. See Search Results.
Where is it :
Go to the UNLV Libraries' home page http://www.library.unlv.edu. Select the Journal Articles tab, click on A-Z list of databases and then on the letter E and select eHRAF World Cultures.
Quick link:
http://ezproxy.library.unlv.edu/login?url=http://ehrafWorldCultures.yale.edu