Russel B. Nye Popular Culture Collections

The beginnings of what are now the Russel B. Nye Popular Culture Collections date from the late 1960's, when a growing number of scholars here and elsewhere began to study the history and significance of mass-consumed entertainment materials. Believing that a given society's values and beliefs are more accurately reflected in its popular artifacts than its "high art," the student of popular culture examines a wide spectrum of phenomena, ranging from popular amusements, activities, and events to more tangible products such as popular fiction, film, comics, and confession magazines. While some scholars continue to focus in traditional ways on the artifact under consideration, more often the interest is in what we can learn about who we are, or who we were, through examination of the products of our culture. Thus, juvenile books and comics may be studied to determine what we have sought to teach our young about sex roles, race relations, patriotism, or concepts of good and appropriate behavior, while adult fiction may tell us what our culture has regarded as "manly" or "womanly." Sporting events, from football to demolition derbies, may be analyzed as modern counterparts of primitive rituals, and the Freudian undertones of nineteenth century popular sentimental songs may be explored. Indeed, the scope of popular culture research is by its very nature almost limitless.

To assist faculty members and students engaged in research at Michigan State University, the Special Collections Division began to draw together existing resources and to acquire additional materials to form the Popular Culture Collection. Significant holdings included American western fiction, detective and mystery novels, a nearly complete set of the Deadwood Dick dime novel series, and substantial numbers of the Tom Swift and Horatio Alger books. Within a short time the collection grew, through purchases and gifts, to feature representative samples from nearly every major area of the popular arts in print.

In 1978 the Popular Culture Collection was renamed the Russel B. Nye Popular Culture Collection to honor not only its chief donor and advisor, but also one of the founders of the study of popular culture. Today, the Nye Collections number over 125,000 items and are nationally recognized as a major resource for popular culture research. The major collections include comic art, popular fiction, popular information, and popular performing arts. All the collections are supported by an ongoing vertical file collection incorporating leaflets, pamphlets, unpublished papers, and other ephemeral materials covering a wide range of popular culture subjects.

While most of the material in the Nye Collections is accessible through full cataloging in the OCLC computer network and in MAGIC, the Libraries' online catalog, there are items which have not yet been cataloged. Please consult the Special Collections staff when doing research in the Nye Collections for added and specialized assistance.

Nye Collection Development Policy

Michigan State University Libraries
Special Collections Division
About the Russel B. Nye Popular Culture Collection
URL: http://www.lib.msu.edu/coll/main/spec_col/nye/aboutnye.htm
Last updated: September 11, 1998
Page editor: Randall W. Scott
scottr@msu.edu