About THL > THL Home Resources > Guide to THL Resources
Guide to THL Resources
Introduction
The Tibetan and Himalayan Library (THL) publishes a family of websites that use the same underlying tools, as well as publishes informational services that can be used by other websites. Each of these websites has its own home page, distinctive presentation, and self-contained navigational system. Though these websites are calling upon the same common underlying collections and reference resources – image collection, map collection, place dictionary, and so forth – the content of those common sources is presented within the distinctive frame of the website in question. Thus, for example, Sera Monastery is one such website published by THL, and within it, maps, images, audio-video, texts, and more are pulled in from THL’s common repositories to be presented to users within the Sera Monastery visual framework. THL’s infrastructure has thus been built to support a vast array of collaborative resources and individual projects.
THL also has its own home website (www.thlib.org), which provides direct access to its common repositories – dictionaries, audio-video collections, image collections, bibliographies, miscellaneous resources, and the various websites that it publishes. THL’s home site classifies these for ease of access into eight overarching domains accessed through the tabs on the topmost navigation bar: Projects, Collections, Places, Encyclopedias, Reference, Instruction, Community, and Tools. This will be completed in 2009 as we conclude our migration from our old single website to a new family of websites. The present document presents the rationale behind structuring the Library in terms of these eight domains; details on the individual projects can be found at THL Projects Inventory.
Projects
Projects are the lifeblood of THL and represent the various initiatives driven by scholars, students, local residents, NGOs, photographers, videographers, and others around the world. A project may be running an entire website published by THL, or it might be of more modest scope and be embedded within one of THL’s collaborative repositories. At present this is a manual list of projects, but later in 2009 we will be launching a dynamic portal detailed people, projects, and organizations involved in THL.
Collections
Collections are the building blocks of THL – the images, audio-video, texts, maps, journals, and other types of data as such. It thus allows you to search and browse through these collections, and simultaneously see all of the media contributed by all THL projects and websites, outside of the particular way the latter may present or use those media.
Places
Places is the area of THL where spatial and geographical data is archived and presented, as well as where rich studies of specific places are published. Each study may be a separate website in its own right, and may incorporate a variety of media from THL collections – images, audio-video, maps, and so forth.
Encyclopedias
Encyclopedias are the primary site in THL containing thematic presentations of materials. It is here, then, that you may find a systematic presentation of Tibetan literature or Tibetan medicine, for example. Each encyclopedia is a separate website in its own right, and may incorporate a variety of media from THL collections – images, audio-video, maps, and so forth.
Reference
Reference presents the type of resources you would expect to find in the reference room of a library – dictionaries, place dictionary, bibliographies, and other such resources.
Instruction
Instruction presents instructional resources for teaching and researching Tibetan and Himalayan studies.
Community
Community provides information on events, people, projects, and organizations either within, or related to, Tibet and the Himalayas, as well as tools and resources to help support them.
Tools
Tools are the technologies and applications which allow people to both create and use digital content relating to Tibet and the Himalayas, with a special but not exclusive focus on THL content. It contains extensive manuals, instructions, and tips.