LibGuides: English Composition Course Guide: Primary Sources

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American Drama 1714-1915 Containing more than 1,500 dramatic works from the early eighteenth century up to the beginning of the twentieth, American Drama 1714–1915 reflects American dramatic writing in all its richness and diversity: plays in verse, farces, melodramas, minstrel shows, realist plays, frontier plays, temperance dialogues and a range of other genres are represented. Major dramatists include David Belasco, Rachel Crothers, Augustin Daly, Clyde Fitch, Edward Harrigan, James Herne, William Dean Howells and Joaquin Miller.

Asian American Drama This link opens in a new window
Contains 252 plays by 42 playwrights, together with detailed, fielded information on related productions, theaters, production companies, and more.
Black Drama This link opens in a new window
Black Drama contains approximately 1200 plays from the mid-1800s to the present by more than 200 playwrights from North America, English-speaking Africa, the Caribbean, and other African diaspora countries.

English Drama English Drama contains more than 3,900 plays in verse and prose from the late thirteenth century - the likely date of the Shrewsbury Fragments - to the early twentieth. It offers exhaustive coverage of the prodigious dramatic literature of the Elizabethan and Jacobean periods, as well as Restoration plays, medieval morality plays and mystery cycles, and nineteenth-century closet dramas, including works by major dramatists such as Ben Jonson, Aphra Behn, William Wycherley, Oliver Goldsmith, Richard Sheridan, Oscar Wilde and J. M. Synge.

LitFinder This link opens in a new window
Provides access to literary works and authors throughout history and includes more than 150,000 full-text poems and 800,000+ poetry citations, as well as short stories, speeches, and plays. The

Twentieth century Drama 1891-2008 features plays from noted playwrights as well as lesser known dramatists. The collection includes works by over 300 writers including Amiri Baraka, Noël Coward, Susan Glaspell, Langston Hughes, Brian Friel, David Mamet, Eugene O’Neill, John Osborne, Sean O’Casey, Harold Pinter, Bernard Shaw, Neil Simon, Gertrude Stein, Tom Stoppard, Derek Walcott, August Wilson and Elizabeth Wong.

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American Music
The database includes songs by and about American Indians, miners, immigrants, slaves, children, pioneers and cowboys. Included in the database are the songs of Civil Rights, political campaigns, Prohibition, the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, anti-war protests and more.
Contemporary World Music
The database will contain important genres such as reggae, worldbeat, neo-traditional, world fusion, Balkanic jazz, African film, Bollywood, Arab swing and jazz, and other genres such as traditional music - Indian classical, fado, flamenco, klezmer, zydeco, gospel, gagaku, and more.
Classical Music Library
Labels represented inclue EMI, Warner Music and Deutsche Grammaphone.

DRAM: Database of Recorded American Music This link opens in a new window
A scholarly resource of recordings, including CD quality audio, liner notes and essays from several important labels.

Jazz Music Library
Covers a variety of artists, labels, genres and periods.
Naxos Music Library
Available through the New York Public Library
Popular Music Library
A wide range of popular music from around the world, including sub-genres of pop music like alternative, country, Christian, electronic, hip-hop, metal, punk, new age, R&B, reggae, rock, and soundtracks.
Smithsonian Global Sound for Libraries
Collection of traditional, folk and world music.

Streaming Video

Academic Video Online (AVON Alexander Street) This link opens in a new window Academic Video Online (AVON) is a collection of 70,000 videos covering all academic interests. Videos are fully transcribed and indexed. Users can create & share playlists, video clips, and embed content in Blackboard.
Popular Channels Include:
1. Film Platform
2. American History
3. Anthropology
4. BBC Landmark
5. Black Studies
6. CNN
7. Counseling and Therapy
8. Documentaries
9. Music and Performing Arts
10. PBS
11. Science and Engineering
12. SONY Pictures Classics
Format: Streaming Videos
Kanopy This link opens in a new window CCNY's access to movies in Kanopy is limited to licenses we have purchased. Professors can order a film for a class by filling out a purchase request at https://library.ccny.cuny.edu/services/purchase .
As of September 2023 , the CCNY Library has licensed the following Kanopy titles.
5 Broken Cameras - Non-Violent Resistance in the Middle East
8 1/2
A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night
A Woman Under the Influence
Adventure Never Ends: A Tabletop Saga
Alphaville
Anthropocene: The Human Epoch - How Humans Have Impacted the Planet
Balseros - Cuban Rafters
Battleship Potemkin
Be Natural - The Untold Story of Alice Guy-Blaché
Bicycle Thieves
Black Orpheus
Blood Memory
Boy
Breathless - À bout de souffle
Capital in the Twenty-First Century
Cleo From 5 to 7
Close-Up
Concerning Violence - Nine Scenes from the Anti-Imperialistic Self-Defense
Criterion Essential Collection
Dogtooth - Kynodontas
Eraserhead
Grey Gardens
Hoop Dreams
Hyenas
I Am Not Your Negro - James Baldwin and Race in America
In Jackson Heights - One of America's Most Ethnically Diverse Neighborhoods
In the Mood for Love
Ixcanul
Kino Lorber Essential Collection
La Haine
La Jetée
Last Year at Marienbad - L'année dernière à Marienbad
Long Day's Journey into Night - Di qiu zui hou de ye wan
M
Metropolis
Modern Times
Mountains May Depart - Shan He Gu Ren
Nosferatu
Obit. - The New York Times Obituary Writers
Pather Panchali
Quo Vadis, Aida?
Rabble Rousers - Frances Goldin and the Fight for Cooper Square
Rashomon
Rome Open City
Seven Samurai
Stagecoach
Stalker
Taqwacore - The Birth Of Punk Islam
The 400 Blows - Les quatre cents coups
The Battle of Algiers
The Birth of a Nation
The Conformist
The Edge of Eachother's Battles
The Five Obstructions
The General
The Harlem Renaissance & Beyond
The Holy Mountain - Der heilige Berg
The Pearl Button - The Coastline of Chile
The Tin Drum
The Umbrellas of Cherbourg
Tie Me Up, Tie Me Down
Tout Va Bien
What Is Democracy? - A Philosophical Journey Exploring Government
Within Our Gates

English Composition Course Guide

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