Alexander Library is the oldest and largest of the Rutgers University Libraries. It supports doctoral programs in anthropology, economics, geography, history, linguistics, literature (classical, comparative, English & American, French, German, Italian, Spanish & Portuguese), philosophy, political science, and sociology. Alexander also supports four professional schools: the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning & Public Policy; the Graduate School of Education; the Graduate School of Social Work; and the School of Communication and Information - all of which include doctoral programs. In addition, Alexander supports major interdisciplinary programs in African studies, Latin American studies, medieval studies, and South Asian Studies, as well as undergraduate study across the range of the humanities and social sciences.

Alexander Library has an especially strong collection in government publications: United States (with special strengths in Congressional and Presidential documents, census materials from 1790 to the present, federal court decisions, and a wide range of departmental publications); New Jersey; foreign (with strong holdings in materials from the United Kingdom); and international (the European Community, the International Monetary Fund, UNESCO, the World Bank, and, in particular, the United Nations). Alexander's extensive microform collections include Black Literature, 1827-1940; Spanish Drama of the Golden Age, Bibliothek der Deutschen Literatur, plus extensive collections of United States and English periodicals and newspapers. Alexander also owns the system's largest collection of foreign language books, periodicals, microforms, and CD-ROMS, ranging from classical Greek and Latin to contemporary Latin American and European literature, and including the vernacular materials of the East Asian Library. In addition, Alexander has a collection of children's books, a small collection of elementary and high school textbooks, and an extensive ERIC microfiche collection. Alexander's reference collection, totaling more than 30,000 volumes, includes Rutgers' largest collection of foreign language dictionaries, encyclopedias, and biographical sources.

Kevin Mulcahy