The Library has recently acquired the Marital Rape Collection, a unique collection of national importance in Women's Studies. The collection is scattered throughout most of the library system, with approximately one third of it in the Bookstacks. English is the dominant language of the collection. Materials in Western Europe languages are also collected in varying degrees of intensity. Materials in Slavic and Eastern European languages and materials in Asian and Middle Eastern languages are collected only in cooperation with the Slavic and Eastern European Library and the Asian Library, respectively.
Emphasis is on scholarly treatment rather than popularization, textbooks, and children's literature.
The Undergraduate Library normally collects more popular treatments and the Education and Social Sciences Library collects children's literature for its School Collection. Materials with primary focus on females of all age groups in all historical periods and cultures or on gender-related phenomena. Materials about issues of special concern to women. Feminist studies, i.e., works that are self-identified as feminist or are identified by critics as feminist or which present a feminist perspective or are about feminism, are of special concern. Due to the multidisciplinary nature of Women's Studies, there are overlaps in collecting responsibilities with those of other Library selectors, especially within the social science, humanities, and area studies libraries and collections.