Research Guides: Indigenous Studies Guide: Books & Media

Featured Resources

Handbook of North American Indians (Smithsonian)
Print anthropological encyclopedia (17-volumes). Information on the Northwest Coast First Nations can be found in Vol.7, "Northwest Coast."
The Annotated Indian Act and Aboriginal constitutional provisions
Xwi7xwa holds print copies of the Indian Act from 1996 to the present.
DesLibris [electronic]
E-books published by Canadian public policy institutes, government agencies, advocacy groups, and research centres. For example, National Aboriginal Health Organization, Assembly of First Nations, First Nations Education Council, National Centre for First Nations Governance, and various provincial and federal government bodies.
Native American Authors (Internet Public Library)
Browse by author, title, or tribe. Archived (Internet Public Library ceased operations in 2015).

Search the UBC Catalogue

TIP: If you limit your search to Location: X̱wi7x̱wa Library, you do not need to use keywords like "Indigenous" because our collection centres Indigenous scholarship and perspectives.

Finding Materials in the UBC Catalogue

IMPORTANT: you may need to use, or encounter, outdated, sometimes offensive, terminology to find resources.

Keyword Searching

Combine keywords about your topic AND keywords relating to the concept of Indigenous identity. For example:

"First Nations"
Indigenous
Aboriginal

Aboriginal
Indian
Native

Native
Inuit
Métis
Nation name (ex. Squamish)

AND

climatic
climate
"climate change"
"climate action"

"environmental conditions"
"environmental concerns"
"environmental protection"

Tips:

Use quotation marks to search for a phrase. Example: "First Nations"
Use a question mark to truncate a term to search for words with the same stem. Example: Aborig? retrieves Aboriginal, Aboriginals, Aborigine, etc.
Combine terms by using AND to join them together. Example: "First Nations" AND Vancouver

Subject Headings

Subject headings are a tool designed to help researchers find similar materials. These are only some examples of the many subject headings that X̱wi7x̱wa Library uses.

Browse Call Numbers

X̱wi7x̱wa Library uses a unique Classification Scheme. Come visit us and ask a X̱wi7x̱wa librarian for a tour of the system. Here are a few highlights:

B	History and Culture
E	Education
S	Health
W	Fine Arts
X	Languages
Y	Literature