On this page
Contact info
For Library research help, please contact Moninder Lalli, Librarian for Sociology / Anthropology by email (moninder_lalli@sfu.ca) or Ask a librarian.
Essay
Start Your Research Here - This page gives you an overview of the research process, or in other words how to find materials for your essay.
Selected encyclopedias and handbooks
Use encyclopedias, handbooks or textbook for overviews, definitions, and to identify key authors or concepts.
- Capital cities around the world : an encyclopedia of geography, history, and culture
- Encyclopedia of community: from the village to the virtual world [print or online]
- Encyclopedia of social and cultural anthropology
- Encyclopedia of the city
- Encyclopedia of urban studies [online or print]
- Encyclopedic dictionary of landscape and urban planning
- Global urban growth: a reference handbook
- Handbook of creative cities
- Handbook of research methods and applications in urban economies
- Handbook on transport and urban planning in the developed world
- Handbook on shrinking cities
- Handbook on urban social movements
- International encyclopedia of housing and home
- International handbook of urban policy (vol. 1)
- International handbook of urban policy (vol. 2)
- International handbook of urban policy (vol. 3)
- International encyclopedia of human geography
- Oxford handbook of the modern slum
- Palgrave Encyclopedia of Urban and Regional Futures
- Palgrave Handbook of Bottom-Up Urbanism
- Routledge companion to smart cities
- Routledge handbook of anthropology and the city
- Routledge handbook of comparative global urban studies
- Routledge encyclopedia of social and cultural anthropology
- Routledge handbook of people and place in the 21st century city
- Routledge handbook of urban public space : use, design, and management
- Sage handbook of cultural anthropology
Find Journal Articles
For journal articles, it is useful to search for databases for the discipline for which your are writing your essay.
How to find journal articles tutorial.
What is a scholarly (or peer-reviewed) journal?
If the full-text of the article is not available within the database then use the "Get@SFU" link to find it or to initiate an inter-library loan request.
- Anthropology Plus — Key database for Anthropological journal articles
- AnthroSource Full-text access to journals produced by the American Anthropological Association
- ProQuest Sociology Collection - for issues related to class, gender, racism, sexuality and sexism and theoretical and applied sociology, social science, and policy science.
- TRID Online - Transportation research, for topics such as "bike lanes in Vancouver"
- GEOBASE - main database for human geography. The scope is international, dating back to 1980
- Environment Complete Urban planning, public policy
- Social Sciences Full Text -- for scholarly articles in social sciences.
- CBCA Reference and Current Events -- covers Canadian topics including business, politics, literature, history, current events and news
- Canadian Newsstream -- covers the major Canadian daily newspapers.
- Canadian Research Index -- Canadian government publications.
- Canada Commons (formerly, Canadian Electronic Library from desLibris) - for public policy documents from Canadian institutes, think-tanks and research groups.
For more, try the databases for "urban studies"
Find books in the library
How to use the Library Catalogue [guide]
Do a Library Catalogue search to see if the Library owns or provides access to the sources that you've identified.
For known items it is best to check using "Browse by title" icon.
Search by topic, using Basic or Advanced Search
- (city OR cities OR urban*) AND (communit* OR cultur*)
- (urban* OR city OR cities) AND (elder* OR senior*) AND space*
- (urban* OR city OR cities) AND (equity OR equality) AND space
- (urban* OR city OR cities) AND soundscapes
- (urban* OR city OR cities) AND (ghetto* OR slum* OR inner-city OR inner-cities)
Combine different concepts using AND
Combine same concepts using OR
Use quotation marks to search for a phrase
Use brackets for synonyms
Use asterisk (*) for different endings of words
Use pulldown menu and select, "Source Types" as "Books"
Note: For Catalogue Search, when combining concepts, use CAPITAL letters ( "OR", "AND")
Selected books
- Advancing urban rights : equality and diversity in the city [print]
- Cities and spaces : an introduction to urban anthropology [print]
- Cities as Spatial and Social Networks
- City as power : urban space, place, and national identity
- City of equals
- Cities of North America : contemporary challenges in U.S. and Canadian cities
- City living : how urban dwellers and urban spaces make one another
- Creating spaces for an ageing society : the role of critical social infrastructure
- Dying at the margins : reflections on justice and healing for inner-city poor
- Emergent Spatio-temporal Dimensions of the City : Habitus and Urban Rhythms
- Engaged urbanism : cities & methodologies
- Emerging global cities : origin, structure, and significance
- Equality and the city : urban innovations for all citizens
- Fallen monuments and contested memorials
- Gentrification, displacement, and alternative futures
- Globalizing cities reader
- Injustice of place : uncovering the legacy of poverty in America [print]
- Introducing urban anthropology
- Livability and Sustainability of Urbanism : An Interdisciplinary Study on History and Theory of Urban Settlement
- Many urbanisms : divergent trajectories of global city building
- Neighborhood and life chances : how place matters in modern America
- New Towns for the Twenty-First Century : A Guide to Planned Communities Worldwide
- Order and disorder in urban space and form : ideas, discourse, praxis and worldwide transfer
- Paradoxical Urbanism: Anti-Urban Currents in Modern Urbanism
- Participatory Design and Self-building in Shared Urban Open Spaces : Community Gardens and Casitas in New York City
- Places and Spaces
- Planetary gentrification reader
- Post-industrial precarity : new ethnographies of urban lives in uncertain times
- Potential for anthropology and urban community engagement : lessons learned from twenty-five years in Milwaukee
- Precarious constructions : race, class, and urban revitalization in Toronto
- Prioritizing the environment in urban sustainability planning : policies and practices of Canadian cities
- Providing public space in a contemporary metropolis : dilemmas and lessons from London and Hong Kong
- Right to an age-friendly city : redistribution, recognition, and senior citizen rights in urban spaces
- Rise of cities : Montréal, Toronto, Vancouver and other cities
- Sanctuary cities, communities, and organizations : a nation at a crossroads
- Sound and noise : a listener's guide to everyday life
- Sounds and the City : Popular Music, Place and Globalization
- Sounds and the city. Volume 2.
- Syntax of city space : American urban grids
- Temporary and tactical urbanism : (Re)assembling urban space
- Tent city : refusing homelessness and making a home
- Urban Ethics in the Anthropocene The Moral Dimensions of Six Emerging Conditions in Contemporary Urbanism
- Urban inequalities : ethnographically informed reflections
- Urban Inequalities from Space : Earth Observation Applications in the Majority World
- Urban surfaces, graffiti, and the right to the city
- Why public space matters
- Women reclaiming the city : international research on urbanism, architecture, and planning
- Zoned out! : race, displacement, and city planning in New York City
Browse subjects
- Cities
- Cities and towns
- Cities and towns. -- Canada
- Cities and towns -- United States
- City planning
- Gentrification
- Public spaces
- Sociology, Urban
- Urban anthropology
- Urbanism
Find data
Canada
Data and statistics provided by the Government of Canada, covering the population, resources, economy, society, and culture of Canada. : Includes: data tables, statistical analyses and reports, survey methodologies and documentation, and census information. Use "subjects" tab or their search engine.
- Subjects - check the categories under "subjects" for more topics
Library guides
- Library Research Tutorials. Animated tutorials on search techniques for finding books and journal articles.
- Annotated bibliographies
- Evaluating sources
- How to find journal articles.
- Library Catalogue search guide.
- What is a scholarly (or peer-reviewed) journal?
- What is plagiarism? Guide to common forms of plagiarism and how to avoid them.
- Library Research Tutorials. Animated tutorials on search techniques for finding books and journal articles
- How to place an Inter-Library Loan request - to obtain books and articles from another library (free).
Writing help
- Student Learning Commons
- Academic writing resources
- Writing for university
- Academic writing - a list of over 200 books.
- Academic writing resources
- Book a consultation
Selected resources on writing
Ethnology -- Authorship (books on writing ethnographies)