Urban Studies: Grey Literature
Grey Literature in Urban Studies
A portion of the literature that you will find in urban studies is made up of reports, white papers, and more. These materials are referred to as grey literature because they are not commercially published. Rather, this literature is published by non-profits, research agencies, governments, etc. It can be helpful to supplement your searches by looking at institutional and agency web sites, and by searching databases containing citations to working papers.
Grey Literature Resources
- OpenGreyContains information on grey literature produced in Europe. Covers science, technology, biomedical science, economics, social science and the humanities.
- Social Sciences Research Network (SSRN)Features academic networks for many disciplines in the social sciences. Includes a database with abstracts of scholarly working papers and forthcoming papers. Also includes a paper collection of full-text documents.
- IssueLabContains free access to case studies, evaluations, white papers, annual reports, issue briefs, and numerous other materials addressing the world's social problems that include aging, crime and safety, government reports, nonprofit and philanthropy, race and ethnicity, and transportation.
- Policy Commons CitiesContains reports generated by local government agencies, civic organizations, and metropolitan and regional planning agencies for major cities in the United States and Canada.
- Oregon Sustainable Community Digital LibraryArchives a central online repository of key urban planning documents on the Portland Metropolitan area. Includes planning reports, digital images, and other grey literature.
- Bielefeld Academic Search Engine (BASE)BASE is one of the world's most voluminous search engines especially for academic open access web resources. BASE is operated by Bielefeld University Library.
What is Grey Literature?
Watch this two-minute video for a brief introduction to grey literature from Western University.