Library Media Center Vocabulary�By: Karina Greenway
Call Number
A combination of letters and numbers placed on the spine of a book to locate it in the library.
Atlas
A collections of maps.
Biography
A written account of a person's life or the group of literature concerned with people's lives.
Database
A large, regularly updated store of digitized information (citations, abstracts, full-text, images, etc.) on a particular subject or in a specific field, consisting of records of uniform format, organized for ease and speed of search and retrieval.
Index
An alphabetical listing of the contents of a book, journal, or collection. Also, a listing of citations organized by subject.
Bibliography
A list of source materials or references used in the preparation of a text.
Alexandria Card Catalog
A tool used to learn what a library owns and where it is located. A standard format is used to describe books, journals, audiovisual holdings, etc. Most catalogs are now online or computerized.
E-book
A book published in electronic format.
Periodical
A magazine, newspaper, scholarly journal, or serial which is published on a regular schedule: daily, weekly, monthly, bi-monthly, etc.
Plagiarism
Copying or closely imitating the work of another writer or composer for the purpose of passing the results off as original work. In most colleges and universities, instructors impose penalties on students who plagiarize the works of others. To avoid plagiarism, it is wise to paraphrase or quote, then cite the original source in a footnote or endnote.
Thesaurus
A list of all subject headings or descriptors used in a particular database, catalog, or index. The thesaurus for most library catalogs is called the Library of Congress Subject Headings. Also, a list of synonyms.
URL
Uniform Resource Locators. The distinct address of a web site.
Browser
Software programs which provide access to files on the internet. Explorer and Safari are the two most common browsers.
Copyright
The privilege granted by a government to an author, composer, artist, etc. to publish and sell their own original work.
Glossary
An alphabetical list of terms within a subject field together with definitions.
Reference
The area of the library that contains aids for finding information.
Fiction
literature in the form of prose, esp. short stories and novels, that describes imaginary events and people.
Non-Fiction
Any narrative, account, or other communicative work whose assertions and descriptions are understood to be factual.
Dewey Decimal System
A call number system used to classify and organize material in libraries. The Dewey Decimal system is based ten primary categories with each category being further subdivided into more narrow and specific topics. The juvenile collections in Andersen Library are organized by the Dewey Decimal system.
Blog
A personal journal published on the World Wide Web consisting of discrete entries ("posts") typically displayed in reverse chronological order so the most recent post appears first.
Netiquette
Internet etiquette and digital manners. It is the social code of the internet.
Hardware
Physical devices related to the computer (keyboard, mouse, monitor, etc.)
Software
Programs that provide the instructions for telling a computer what to do and how to do it.
Encyclopedia
A type of reference work, a compendium holding a summary of information from either all branches of knowledge or a particular branch of knowledge.
Wikipedia
An online encyclopedia. People are able to edit the information it contains. It can be a valuable resource, but should be evaluated before using as a primary source.