New Georgia Encyclopedia

Visit the New Georgia Encyclopedia

The New Georgia Encyclopedia (NGE) is a free online resource that presents a comprehensive and thoughtful portrayal of the people, places, events, and institutions that have shaped Georgia. Launched on February 12, 2004, the NGE is one of the first online state encyclopedias in the nation to be developed exclusively on the World Wide Web, and it has been recognized by the National Endowment for the Humanities as a national model.

Comprising more than 2,000 articles and 5,000 multimedia pieces, the NGE reaches hundreds of thousands of users each year statewide, nationally, and internationally. As a humanities initiative, the NGE encourages an understanding of the history, traditions, ideas, and stories that inform the state's heritage by providing a comprehensive survey of history and biography, literature, and the arts. It also reaches beyond those disciplines to provide in-depth information on agriculture, commerce, education, the environment, folklife, foodways, geography, government, medicine, philanthropy, politics, religion, science, and sports and recreation.

Taking into account the broad and diverse audience for the NGE, researchers, writers, and editors for the project work to assure that the content is both accessible to students and general readers and useful to those with more specialized knowledge. Distinguished scholars, writers, and experts in many fields from Georgia and beyond develop the articles and other content that make up the NGE. As an online enterprise, the NGE is continuously updated and expanded. It escapes the linear boundaries of traditional print encyclopedias by permitting database searches and linkages among articles; by incorporating graphics, video, and audio; and by linking to other resources on the Internet.

The New Georgia Encyclopedia was developed by the Georgia Humanities Council, in partnership with the University of Georgia Press, the University System of Georgia/GALILEO, and the Office of the Governor of Georgia. Since 1998 the Council has led the planning and development efforts for the NGE. From 1998 to 2000 the project's staff of intelligent and creative editors worked with a team of well-respected editorial advisors to shape the initial outline of the encyclopedia, which has since been expanded to incorporate new subject areas and articles. The commissioning of articles began in 2000 and continues to the present; each article undergoes a rigorous editorial and fact-checking process before publication.

In 2007, with funding from the Watson-Brown Foundation, the University of Georgia Press and the Council copublished a print companion to the NGE's literature section The New Georgia Encyclopedia Companion to Georgia Literature. The NGE partnered in 2008 with the Digital Library of Georgia, a project of GALILEO, to enhance the NGE's searching capability by creating metadata records for all images and articles.

The NGE has received excellent reviews and a number of awards, including the 2007 Leadership in History Award, given by the American Association for State and Local History; the 2006 History in the Media Award, given by the Georgia Historical Society; the 2005 Helen and Martin Schwartz Prize for Public Humanities Programs, given by the Federation of State Humanities Councils; the 2005 "Excellence in Documenting Georgia's History" award, given by the Georgia Historical Records Advisory Board; and Best Reference Source on the Web for 2004, awarded by Library Journal.

Funding for the NGE has been provided by public and private donors. The Council would like to express its appreciation to the project's founding sponsors: the State of Georgia, the Robert W. Woodruff Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, BellSouth, the Peyton Anderson Foundation, the Georgia Power Foundation, the University of Georgia, the James M. Cox Foundation, the UPS Foundation, and the Historic Chattahoochee Commission. The Council also thanks the Technical College System of Georgia, the Wachovia Foundation, the Watson-Brown Foundation, a Friend of the Georgia Humanities Council, the Tull Charitable Foundation, the Imlay Foundation, the Frances Wood Wilson Foundation, and the Katherine John Murphy Foundation.

The Council is grateful to University System of Georgia/GALILEO for their significant in-kind contributions, and to the University of Georgia Press and the Office of the Governor for their ongoing partnership support. The NGE's database and public face were built by Merrill-Hall New Media.

If you would like to become involved as a writer or supporter, please contact Jamil Zainaldin at jz@georgiahumanities.org.

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