From October 1, Access to the Directory and Choice Reviews

We are pleased to announce two new benefits for AHA members on the Association's web site, www.historians.org. Starting October 1, all members have complimentary online access to the AHA's annual Directory of History Departments, Historical Organizations, and Historians and to Choice book reviews in history and related fields.

The Directory

First, we are pleased to announce that the online edition of the Directory of History Departments, Historical Organizations, and Historians will be available to all members of the Association starting October 1. On that date, simply login to the AHA web site using your member ID, and you will see a link that gives you instant access to the online Directory.

We hope that online access will provide yet another helpful way to use the Directory. With information on 800 history departments and historical institutions, and nearly 20,000 historians, the Directory is a great resource for any member of the discipline.

In addition to providing addresses and other contact information, the online Directory will now have special value as a community-building tool—allowing you to identify specialists in particular subject areas, locations, or schools that could be useful when forming an annual meeting panel or organizing a seminar. It also allows departments, administrators, and prospective students to develop benchmark groups and profiles of departments with similar degrees, tuition levels, and numbers of students and faculty.

Choice

In addition to the Directory, members will also have the benefit of online reviews from Choice. A publication of the Association of College & Research Libraries, Choice publishes over 7,000 reviews of new scholarly books and electronic resources annually. Its online database holds reviews of over 160,000 titles extending back to September 1988. Choice aims to produce reviews that are “concise, authoritative, and timely.”

History is one of the most extensively reviewed areas by Choice (each year 1,000 reviews are published in history, geography, and area studies.) We think access to the Choice history reviews will complement the American Historical Review's coverage. Intended by the publisher to be “concise, authoritative, and timely,” the brief reviews in Choice will be invaluable tools for teaching and research by providing quick and helpful glimpses of current scholarship; they can also serve as useful lead-ins to the more elaborate discussions in the AHR. Keep an eye out also for “Choice Essentials,” which will feature in the AHA's electronic newsletter, Fortnightly News.

Just as with the access to the Directory, AHA members who log on to the members-only section of the AHA site will see a link that takes them directly to Choice Reviews Online. You will then have full access to the entire Choice web site and will be able to take advantage of its full functionality. You can, for example, search in and browse through its current and archived reviews; create, edit, and save lists; and e-mail and print out reviews.

These two invaluable online resources are available for free only to members, beginning October 1. Log on to historians.org/members to join or renew your membership and have instant access to the Directory and Choice.