AustLit is a non-profit collaboration between twelve Australian Universities and the National Library of Australia providing authoritative information on hundreds of thousands of creative and critical Australian literature works relating to more than 100,000 Australian authors and literary organisations. Its coverage spans 1780 to the present day.

AustLit indexes and describes Australian literature published in a range of print and electronic information sources. It also makes available selected critical articles and creative writing in full text. Researchers, bibliographers and librarians, working around the country, gather information about Australian writers and writing, providing authoritative information on and facilitating access to Australian literature.

AustLit's mission is to enhance and support research and learning in Australian literature. AustLit is committed to a cooperative, collaborative, non-profit ethos and aims to:

• Provide a discovery service for Australian literature research
• Integrate existing Australian literature infrastructure and content
• Use new technologies to assist discovery
• Fulfil and deliver on obligations to the Australian Research Council and Contributors;
and
• Deliver a public good in the public interest.

The Australian Research Council and the university partners have contributed substantially to development funding. Resources for ongoing development are provided by the universities and from subscription income. Subscription income is fully reinvested in AustLit content and service delivery.

Subscribers have access to the following AustLit information:

• Constantly updated citations for monograph, journal and electronic publications by and about Australian authors
• Biographical information about authors including pseudonyms and alternative names
• Subject indexing of most works
• Links to available full text
• Links between authors, works, subjects, and places
• Sophisticated search and retrieval capabilities
• Specialist research subsets for targeted searching
• Holdings information from The National Bibliographic Database, accessible via Libraries Australia, the Register of Australian Archives and Manuscripts (RAAM) and the Guide to Australian Literary Manuscripts

The majority of AustLit records relating to literary works provide citations and library holdings information for published works, rather than access to full text. However, a range of selected creative and critical works is available via AustLit from a variety of full text sources.

AustLit information is produced and updated by a team of expert librarians and bibliographic researchers, and is overseen by an Editorial Board of distinguished academics and information professionals.

The Bibliography of Australian Literature is currently being compiled by AustLit researchers at The University of Queensland, Monash University and UNSW @ ADFA under the General Editorship of John Hay and John Arnold and Associate Editorship of Kerry Kilner and Terry O'Neill. The biographical and bibliographical research adds to the depth and breadth of AustLit and a print format is derived from the AustLit database for publication by The University of Queensland Press (UQP). Four volumes of The Bibliography, covering the period from the late 18th century to the end of 2000, will appear by 2008. Click here for more information about The Bibliography.

AustLit employs new web technologies and metadata models to maximise the utility of its data.

A number of websites have a similar URL address to AustLit's. Check our Related Sites to find similar addresses, or to find other sites relating to Australian literature on the Internet.