Law Trove - making the most of Law Trove and other Library resources

As the Academic Librarians for Leeds Law School, we want to ensure all students are aware of the wide range of resources that they have access to and how to use them efficiently.

During a period when access to physical library buildings has been difficult, it is reassuring to know that the vast majority of books and journals that you need are available online. As well as knowing the text of the law (in legislation and case law), our students are expected to engage with secondary sources, such as books and journals, if they wish to further their understanding of law and achieve higher marks. Textbooks are useful in providing an overview of a topic, as they analyse and criticize the law in individual subject areas. All law students have access to Law Trove, which is a database containing the content of about 200 Oxford University Press law textbooks. If you are looking for a particular title, all the titles are listed on the Library Catalogue. You can also search across the full text of all the titles by keywords in Law Trove itself. Law Trove also allows you to browse by subject and series, through the drop-down menu and left-hand panel.

When using Law Trove always ensure you follow the links provided on the Law Library subject pages or the Library A-Z List of Databases. When searching within Law Trove by keyword, be aware that your results will contain relevant chapters as well as whole textbooks. To view the books, click on the ‘books’ tab at top of the list of results.

You might also want to take advantage of the added features available from Law Trove such as the ability to download your search results as a PDF or XLS file to browse later. Many of the textbooks link to additional learning resources, such as practical exercises, glossaries and video clips (You can find these by clicking on ‘Visit the online resources for this title’, on the left side of the screen when viewing a book). You might like to consider creating a personal profile within Law Trove to save links and searches, make annotations to parts of the text to add your own notes and download chapters to make available for offline use.

You have access to many more e-books covering a range of subjects via the Library Catalogue, and we have created a short video showing you how to find these. You also have access to many journals and databases, which we link to from the Law Library subject pages, including Lexis Library and Westlaw for cases, legislation and journal articles. The Law Library Subject Pages also contain guides on using the OSCOLA referencing system.

The Law Librarians offer 30-minute appointments via Skype or MS Teams for students who would like help using our resources. Book these via the Law Library subject pages, by clicking on ’Get help’. There is also a wealth of advice available to all students on Skills for Learning, where you can get help with useful information such as essay writing or critical thinking. You can also book onto events such as our Study Cafes or Workshops on various skills topics.