Moving Images Archive = free movies and primary sources online!

Oh, Archive.org, you are totally non non non heinous. (Note: Use Urban Dictionary at your own peril. It is a really good resource for current slang, but some things, once learned, CAN NEVER BE UNLEARNED. You have been warned.)

Okay, on to the Moving Images Archive -- the amount of content here is pretty incredible from a research perspective -- or even possibly, maybe, the perspective of entertainment. I must admit I cannot really take a look at an ephemeral film and not MST3K* it in my head.

Remember, copyright law is still in effect for most newer releases, but if a film is in the public domain, or it was created by the U.S. government, or if it was released under a Creative Commons license it can be in this archive. (Click here for the FAQ)

Here are just some of the collections (descriptions taken from the site):

Film Noir: "Expressionistic crime dramas of the 40s and 50s: tough cops and private eyes, femme fatales, mean city streets and deserted backroads, bags of loot and dirty double-crossers."

Animation & Cartoons: Contains "classic cartoons from a bygone era, Brick Films made with your favorite building toys, Machinima patched together from video games, or the artful computer animations selected for the 2001 SIGGRAPH competition"

Cultural & Academic Films: "This library of academic and cultural films features collections from the Academic Film Archive and the Media Burn Independent Film Archive, as well as a selection of documentaries created by Dorothy Fadiman." ...and more!

News & Public Affairs: "An analysis of news and public affairs independent from traditional corporate media is available from this diverse video library. From Democracy Now's daily news program, to three days of TV news coverage following the 911 attacks, to Mosaic’s timely clips of Middle East newscasts, to UCSF's Tobacco Industry Videos"

There are also collections focused on: sports, spirituality & religion, arts & culture, computers & technology, home movies, The Prelinger Archives, videogames, youth media...and more.



* Mystery Science Theater 3000 (MST3K) was a GENIUS SHOW. We don't have any DVDs of episodes at the library, but we do have an academic text on it! (at least, one of the chapters is on it)

This is one of my favorite MST3K clips that dealt with a ephemeral film. If car commercials were still like this, I might be more interested in cars.




AND! UT Arlington library has EVEN! MORE! resources. Take a look at our Film Studies Guide which lists resources like Pop Culture Universe

WordCat (Specifically, the FirstSearch version, and how to use it to find publisher, translation, etc. information)

Ok, first you want to go to FirstSearch WorldCat. There are also links to it on the English and Textual Histories guides.

WorldCat is a union catalog - what that means is that not only does it have the records from UTArlington library, it also has the records from many, many other public and academic libraries worldwide (over 32 million records).

FirstSearch refers to the specific interface. There are other ways to access WorldCat (for example there is a free public version) but the directions I am going to give apply specifically to the FirstSearch interface.


Link to video
If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me!

Octavia Butler's papers! (and other authors, in CA.)

This library sounds like it has a really impressive collection of authors papers and manuscripts! They just got Octavia Butler's which should be accessible in about a year. Octavia Butler is one of my favorite science fiction authors, but I can only read so much of her at a time, because it is so well written and sometimes depressing (sort of how I view Battlestar Galactica, though her works are much more internally consistent. Also, I finish books by Butler. I am stuck on season 4.5 of BSG, and apparently I am never, ever going to finish.)

The Huntington Library is in California, so that could be an issue and you have to submit an application but their collections look amazing. They have papers from Jack London, Christopher Isherwood, W.H. Auden, Langston Hughes, and Charles Bukowski. If you can't make it out there, it looks like you can request reproductions here.

NARA Holocaust records online and NARA Ft. Worth

For the first time ever, over one million Holocaust-related records – including millions of names and 26,000 photos from the National Archives– will be available online.
The collection can be viewed here or here

After October, the Stories section will remain publicly accessible but not the entire archive. After October, you will need to be on a NARA computer to access them (there is a NARA facility in Fort Worth) and then they will become publicly accessible again in five years. See the full press release for details.

I have added these online resources to the Web Resources section of the history guide
My social bookmarking account can be found here

Information on National Archives Southwest Region in Fort Worth, Texas can be found on the Primary Resources Guide under the Government Documents tab

Via h/t framesofref