[partially re-blogged from the VHL blog post by Jane Rawson.]

Our subscription to the Digital National Security Archive has moved from its own site to be incorporated into the ProQuest platform. If you’re used to using our other ProQuest resources (Historic Newspapers, American Periodicals, Ethnic NewsWatch, Dissertations & Theses among others), the new search interface will be familiar to you, and as with our other ProQuest subscriptions, it will now be possible to cross-search these with the DNSA.

What is the DNSA?

The Digital National Security Archive (DNSA) provides access to over 500,000 pages of declassified documents, starting in 1945 and going right up to almost the present day for certain topics.  The main way in which this resource differs from Declassified Document Reference System (DDRS) is that it is organised thematically, with documents arranged into collections on specific areas or events such as Afghanistan, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Vietnam War, or US military uses of space.  New collections are added relatively frequently, so even if your area of interest is not currently covered it is worth checking back periodically.  More from a VHL Blog post.

Using DNSA Collections on ProQuest

DNSA is arranged as a number of thematic collections, which could be searched individually. There are three ways to do this now it has moved to ProQuest:

1. From the basic search screen, the collections are listed at the bottom of the page (click ‘show all’ to see the full list). Clicking on any of these collections will take you to a search screen for just that collection.
2. From the advanced search screen, you can select some or all DNSA collections in the ‘search options’ underneath the search boxes.
3. Using the ‘select databases‘ option in the blue bar at the top of the screen. Click where it says ‘searching 1 database’ to expand the list, and then you can select whichever ProQuest databases you choose. If you scroll down to select Digital National Security Archive you will see a + sign; clicking on that will expand a further list of the individual DNSA collections for you to select or deselect. This is also how you can cross-search DNSA with other ProQuest databases subscribed to by Oxford.

Check out more guidance on the new platform on

• Using DNSA Bibliographies, Chronologies and Glossaries on ProQuest
• Exporting saved searches and references from My Archive – important!

Related resource:

Declassified Documents: DDRS and DNSA