Published 2018-09-28
Keywords
- Legal information. Sources of legal information. Legislation. Jurisprudence. Doctrine. Legal librarian.
How to Cite
Copyright (c) 2018 Ana Carolina Ferreira, Benildes Coura Moreira dos Santos Maculan
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
Abstract
Legal information can be defined as “the set of contents that belongs to the conceptual universe of Legal Science, which are discussed in documents on legal action” (GUIMARÃES, 1999, p.11). Thus, this article addresses the knowledge required for legal librarians to understand the characteristics, structure, and function of sources of legal information, particularly legislation, jurisprudence, and doctrine. In this context, the characteristics and structure of the law, ruling, and opinions are addressed by discussing excerpts from these types of texts. Customs and the negotiating source are also briefly addressed. Some sources of public access are also suggested for the research of document typologies. Furthermore, the understanding of the typologies of legal documents, their function and structure is essential for the development of the professional skills of librarians and for providing services to users, especially regarding information processing, research on databases, and the selective dissemination of information.