The Government Information Center of the Ronald Williams Library at NEIU serves the University community and the citizens of the 5th Congressional District in Illinois. It has been a selective depository for the publications of the federal government since 1963 and a complete depository for state of Illinois publications since 1968.
Please be aware that many of the items in our Government Documents collection are historical in nature. These historical items cannot be relied upon to provide accurate or current advice regarding any laws, policies, or procedures.
Over 430 languages are spoken or signed in the United States, including at least 177 indigenous languages. Most Americans speak English, with 77% of the U.S. population speaking only English at home. Spanish is the next most widely spoken language, with 13% of the population speaking it at home. In the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, 94.8% of the population speaks Spanish. The next most commonly spoken languages are Chinese (3.40 million), Tagalog (1.71 million), Vietnamese (1.52 million), Arabic (1.39 million), and French (1.18 million).
American Sign Language (ASL) is the native and most common sign language used in the United States. ASL is not a coded version of English - it's a fully fledged language with a unique grammar. There are an estimated 250,000 users of ASL.
Many indigenous languages of the United States have gone extinct. However, as of 2010 there were at least 372,000 speakers of indigenous languages in the United States. Navajo has the most speakers of any indigenous North American language, with nearly 170,000 speakers. The next most commonly spoken of these languages are Yupik, Dakota, Abache, Keres, and Cherokee.
Many states and territories celebrate and provide support for the languages spoken by their residents by making languages other than English official. These include Alaska (20 indigenous languages), Hawai'i (Hawai'ian), and South Dakota (Sioux), as well as American Samoa (Samoan), Guam (Chamorro), Northern Mariana Islands (Chamorro and Carolinian), and Puerto Rico (Spanish).
This display was created with the assistance of the students in LING 405 - Typology.
Selected Books and Pamphlets on Display:
Online Resources:
NEIU Libraries has a number of resources for immigrants that can be checked out. Some of these are located on the large desk on the second floor. Additionally, there are many great resources from the United States Government that can assist with immigration and naturalization.
Government documents are located on the 2nd floor of the Ronald Williams Library and are indicated by with the prefix DOC.
Federal publications are organized under the Superintendent of Documents classification scheme (SuDocs) which categorizes documents based on the publishing department or agency and the individual item number.
For example:
DOC.CSA 1.10:SU6 Geographic Distribution of Federal Funds in Summary. The first part of the call number (DOC.) indicates that this document is located on the 2nd floor. The CSA represents the publishing agency (in this instance the Community Services Administration) and the final part represents the indivdiual item.
Publications of the State of Illinois are indicated by the prefix DOC.IL and are organized under the Nakata-Strange classificaiton scheme, which also categorizes documents based on the publishing department or agency and the individual item number.
Publications of the City of Chicago and of Cook County are indicated by the prefix DOC.CHI. and are organized under the Library of Congress classification system like most of the other books in the library.
This subject guide was designed for NEIU by Anthony Sigismondi, MLIS as part of the practicum program at the University of Illinois Graduate School of Library and Information Science.
