While the academic world devoted to literary study has been absorbed with new and distinct forms of literary criticism, bibliography has received scant attention--much less than in former times when it was understood as more than just an aid to research. Enormous changes have taken place in enumerative bibliography over the past thirty years, especially with the widespread use of computers, but these changes have gone unrecognized as bibliography has gone unappreciated. This work is a collection of essays concentrating exclusively on bibliography and its uses in the academic world, especially in literature, folklore, language, and linguistics. The book begins with a discussion of what bibliography is, what it does, and how to create the optimum bibliography. Other subjects include bibliography and postcolonialism, critical theory and bibliography in cross-disciplinary environments, issues and problems with tools for feminist and women's studies scholars in literature, strategies for the incorporation of pluridisciplinary work, bibliographical databases and databased bibliographies, and ideas for the future of the MLA International Bibliography.

The revised and updated edition of this standard reference work in the field of Western American Literature now contains over 6,000 bibliographic references. The topical listings have been expanded to encompass feminist and environmental studies. Rather than attempting to be exhaustive, the editors have chosen the major interpretive works, making the volume useful to both specialists working outside their area and nonspecialists seeking an overview. Broad in its scope, the guide also focuses on a number of special topics: local color and regionalism, popular western literature, western film, Indian literature and Indians in western literature, the environment, women and families, the Beats, and Canadian western literature. Logically and helpfully organized, the volume will be invaluable to scholars, researchers, students, and general readers.