Frequently Asked Questions: General

The bulk of the general collections are located in closed bookstacks in both the Jefferson and Adams Buildings. In general, most of the classes shelved in the Adams Building cover sciences and social science subject areas, and those shelved in the Jefferson Building cover the humanities.

The general collections include books, pamphlets, and bound (non-current) periodicals in all languages except some that use non-roman alphabets (e.g., Chinese, Arabic) and in all areas of the classification scheme except law (classes J1-J14, JX1-JX1304, JX2000-JX9999, K, and LAW, located in the Law Library), music (M, ML, and MT, located in the Performing Arts Reading Room), and maps and atlases (G1000-G9980, located in the Geography and Map Reading Room). Cyrillic materials, although in a non-roman alphabet, are housed in the general collections. 

Both Adams and Jefferson have overflow collections. To relieve overcrowding of the book stacks in the Library's Capitol Hill complex, the Library also maintains two remote storage facilities at Fort Meade and Landover in Maryland. Online catalog records describing materials stored at Fort Meade will bear the notation "Request in: Main or Science/Business Reading Rms--STORED OFFSITE." For information on what materials are stored in these facilities, and how to request these materials, researchers should consult the Collections Access, Loan and Management Division.

Non-General Collections material locations will vary based on their format and/or custodial reading room.