UC San Diego Library Collections
By providing access to more than 7 million digital and print volumes, journals, microforms and multimedia materials, the UC San Diego Library directly supports the research and instructional needs of the university and serves as a portal to culture and discovery.
UC San Diego Library’s Statement on Historical Context and Cultural Sensitivity in Collections
The UC San Diego Library provides access to a variety of resources, such as archival materials, images, and historical newspapers, for teaching and research purposes. These items reflect the perspectives, social norms, and biases of the time period in which they were created. Part of our mission as a research library is to preserve the original context and terminology associated with materials in our collection. This information is intended to serve as valuable evidence for analyzing and challenging the legacies of that history both as it occurred and how it unfolds in the modern-day rather than to perpetuate or endorse any discriminatory, or offensive attitudes or acts.
We recognize that the UC Library Digital Collections includes materials are troubling, discriminatory and racist, and we are critically reflecting on how to address these issues while understanding the place these items hold in history and impact scholarship. We acknowledge our responsibility and are committed to continuing to develop practices that are equitable, inclusive, and anti-oppressive at the intersections of race, gender, faith, class, sexuality, and ability. This work is iterative and ongoing.
We also strive to be respectful of the beliefs and practices of different cultures by actively following cultural protocols, building relationships, and consulting and engaging in shared, culturally responsive decision making with communities and scholars. This may include providing proper attribution, contextual statements, or mediated access.
Special Collections
The Library Special Collections house a wide range of rare books, manuscripts, periodicals, maps, photographs, artworks, films, sound recordings, archives, and digital files. This includes the Dr. Seuss collection and the UC San Diego and Scripps Institution of Oceanography Archives.
Digital Collections
The UC San Diego Library Digital Collections consists of documents, images, video and audio recordings, and research data sets made available to support scholarship, teaching and learning. Content has been drawn from primary source materials from across the Library's collections, as well as data generated by campus researchers.
Digital Exhibits
The UC San Diego Library Digital Exhibits feature curated items from our ever growing Digital Collections or compliment physical exhibits and campus events. The online exhibits tell the story about the materials that have been selected, organized, and described by curators or creators of the collections providing historical, cultural, and educational context.
For more information or questions about the Library's digital exhibits please contact Reid Otsuji, rotsuji@ucsd.edu.
Notable Collections
Over the years, the Library has built notable collections to support UC San Diego's unique areas of research emphasis, including Melanesian and Pacific Island Studies, and collections from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography.
