Subject and Course Guides: Anthropology: Statistics & Government Documents

Data and Statistics

PolicyMap

Policymap is an online data and mapping tool and analytics platform with multidisciplinary applications that gives access to over 15,000 indicators related to housing, crime, mortgages, health, jobs, demographics and education. Data are available at all common geographies (address, block group, census tract, zip code, county, city, state, MSA) as well as unique geographies like school districts and political boundaries.
Historical Statistics of the United States

The standard source for the quantitative facts of American history, a compendium of statistics from over 1,000 sources. Includes over 37,000 data series and topics ranging from migration and health to crime and the Confederate States of America are each placed in historical context by a recognized expert in the field. Users can graph individual tables and create customized tables and spreadsheets reflecting their own particular areas of interest.
PAIS Index

Provides subject access to public policy issues of concern to governments, including economic, political, and social background information and statistics. The scope is international

Provides subject access to policy approaches in areas and issues of concern to governments, including economic, political, and social background information and statistics. The scope is international with access at global, regional, national, and local levels. PAIS International contains references to journal articles, books, government documents, statistical directories, grey literature, research reports, conference reports, publications of international agencies, microfiche, Internet material, and more. Newspapers and newsletters are not indexed. The database includes publications from over 120 countries throughout the world. In addition to English, some of the indexed materials are published in French, German, Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish.

United States Census Bureau- Data Portal
One of several ways that you can explore data from the US Census and American Community Survey. Access to raw data, visualized data, and other forms of data derived from major US population surveys can be found here.
National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS)
As the nation’s principal health statistics agency, the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) compiles statistical information to guide actions and policies to improve the health of the population. NCHS is a unique public resource for health information—a critical element of public health and health policy.
EuroStat
Eurostat is the statistical office of the European Union. This website provides high-quality statistics and data on Europe including data related to demographics, economics, sustainability, agriculture, tourism, community, and more.

Federal Legislation

GovTrack
GovTrack.us is a non-profit that provides easy to use legislative tracking for the US Congress among other congressional activities. Under the “Bills & Votes” dropdown, choose “Find a Bill.” A handy list of select subject areas will appear on the right or you can enter your own keywords.
US Congress legislation information
An official website of the US Congress that tracks legislation and roll call votes. Slightly more complicated to use than GovTrack, but a more direct source of information.
Library of Congress legislative subject terms
The specific subject terms used to describe and categorize Congressional legislation are controlled by the Library of Congress. It may be helpful to browse the list if you are having trouble coming up with effective keywords for your search.

State Legislation

The National Conference of State Legislatures
The National Conference of State Legislatures offers some free databases that track legislation related to specific topics. There are some archived databases as well that might still be useful depending on the topic you are researching. When you run a search, the date defaults to the latest available year. Change the year to “all” to see all available dates.
NCSL list of state legislation trackers
A list of individual state legislation trackers provided by the National Conference of State Legislatures. While information about state legislatures is public information by law, there is no requirement that information be provided in a specific way (such as a searchable website or database). So you will see quite a bit of variety in how information about state legislatures is provided to the public.
Texas Legislature bill tracker
Here you can look up legislation that has been introduced or passed by the Texas State Legislature. Click on “select subject criteria” at the top of the subjects box and it will bring up a list of subjects to choose from or search by other custom criteria.
Texas State Law Library
Provides access to a wide variety of information including eBook and databases, historical statutes, current legislation, court rulings and records, and continuing education opportunities.

Government Documents

Government documents can cover a wide range of materials. If you think your project may involve intensive research into government documents please contact our Federal Depository Library Coordinator Troy Black for assistance.

DiscoverGov

Provides simple, one-stop searching across multiple U.S. Federal Government databases including GPO's Catalog of U.S. Government Publications (CGP) and GovInfo. It will retrieve reports, articles, and citations while providing direct links to selected resources and publications available online.

DiscoverGov- Help
Tutorials to help researchers more effectively use the resources found at DiscoverGov.