Services for Humanities Grad Students
- Sheridan Libraries
- Guides
- Services for Humanities Grad Students
- Library access beyond Hopkins
Useful Links
- WorldCatA catalog providing access to the world's largest bibliographic database.
- ArchiveGridA catalog of over 7 million records describing archival materials, bringing together information about historical documents, personal papers, family histories, and more.
- HathiTrustA not-for-profit collaborative of academic and research libraries now preserving 18+ million digitized items.
- Digital Public Library of AmericaA one-stop discovery experience designed to make millions of materials from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions across the country available to all.
- Internet ArchiveOver 41 million digitized books and texts, including primary and secondary sources on the History of Medicine.
Don't buy articles and books!
As a Hopkins graduate student, you have access to not only the vast resources available at JHU in our physical and digital collections, but also libraries worldwide.
Our two main services for accessing both physical and digital copies of books and articles are Borrow Direct (BD) and Inter-library Loan (ILL). Borrow Direct is often the fastest way to borrow a book that isn't available at JHU. If you need a book that JHU doesn't have, is checked out, or is on reserve, you can use Borrow Direct to request a copy from one of our partner libraries.
BORROW DIRECT - JHU is part of a consortium -- consisting of the Ivy League, MIT, Chicago, Duke and Stanford-- whose member have a quick and easy way to search and deliver books to one another.
We consider our participation in Borrow Direct to be one of the key services of our library system. If JHU doesn't have a book, and you have to borrow it from BD, that doesn't mean that you don't have a great library! It just means that we have freed up money to buy other books that we also circulate through our consortium.
If a book is not available in BD, or you are looking for scans of journal or newspaper articles, or even microfilm, you can use Interlibrary Loan.Interlibrary loan can take a little bit more time, but we will still do our best to get the material to you!
Materials from BD and ILL are all delivered to the library you select for pickup.You will receive an e-mail when your request is available for pick-up.
How do I use the system?
- Search the JHU catalog (Catalyst) to make sure that we do not have the item you want.
- Search the Borrow Direct catalog (enter your JHED ID to take you to the search page).
- Find the item that you want
- Look at the little symbol on the far right of the page to make sure that your book is NOT an e-book; we can't borrow e-books (yet)
- Select a pick-up location, and click REQUEST.
- If BorrowDirect can NOT supply the item, you will see a link to JHU's ILL service. Select the appropriate request form, and the information about the item you want will be added to the form automatically.
In-person access to Ivy+ collections
If you are visiting a Borrow Direct member library, you can borrow books while you are there. Present your Hopkins campus ID card and log into your Hopkins Interlibrary Loan account to show your current status. Once verified, you may check out materials under the member library's borrowing policies. If for some reason, you aren't able to log into your Johns Hopkins Interlibrary loan, please e-mail circmail@jhu.libanswers.com, so we can work with you to get you verified to the other BorrowDirect member library ahead of your office.
If you have questions about or need help with Borrow Direct, please email circmail@jhu.libanswers.com.