Hesburgh Libraries

The Hesburgh Libraries provides access to exceptional resources and services to support interdisciplinary Sports Studies research for the campus community at Notre Dame and for researchers around the world. The Sports Studies collection contains both secondary and primary sources in many formats. The strength of the collection lies in the history of North American sports, athletics, and recreation since the late eighteenth century. The collection also includes materials related to sports in Western Europe, Latin America, East Asia, and other geographic regions.

The Libraries supports the interdisciplinary study of sports in many units across campus, particularly in the Sport, Media, and Culture minor, the Department of American Studies, the Department of History, the Department of Film, Television, and Theatre, the Department of Sociology, and others studying or conducting research about the history or contemporary status of sports, athletics, and recreation.

Most relevant circulating print material can be found in the Lower Level in the GV call number range, but sports-related material can be found throughout the collection in other locations. The Libraries also licenses numerous ebooks and journals. Patrons can discover circulating material and access ebooks and many journals through the ND Catalog. The Libraries also provides access to indexing/abstracting databases, primary source databases, and other online research tools which can be accessed through the Hesburgh Libraries Databases portal.

Both Rare Books & Special Collections and the University Archives hold important and significant manuscript and archival collections documenting the history of sports. The Joyce Sports Research Collection in Rare Books & Special Collections is a premier collection documenting the history of sports, athletics, and recreation and contains hundreds of thousands of rare or scarce books and printed items, hundreds of manuscript or archival collections, as well as visual materials, posters, realia, and other formats. Finding Aids for manuscript and archival collections in both Rare Books & Special Collections and in University Archives can be consulted in Hesburgh Libraries instance of ArchiveSpace.

The librarian for Sports Studies, Greg Bond, provides research consultations to students and faculty in one-on-one, small group, or classroom settings. His expertise includes finding and evaluating primary sources and secondary sources, engaging with and analyzing primary sources, navigating online databases, and broad subject matter expertise.