Abstract

THE GRAND CANON is a worldwide bibliography of the Grand Canyon and lower Colorado River regions in the southwestern United States and northwestern Mexico (in Arizona, Nevada, California, Baja California, and Sonora). This canon—a single, essential resource and guide—saves the extensive record of general, creative and technical compositions about, or even just touching upon, the land, the river, and the people there.

The bibliography is a historical record of activities and interests, divided into 32 subject areas—in Volume 1/Part B: Bibliography and a separate Cartobibliography (Volume 2)—containing 111,000 citations in 115 languages published during 489 years, from circa 1535 to 2024, produced in countries from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe. Proving a long-lasting, worldwide engagement with this region, the items embrace general and specific subjects including history, biography, and geography; social, natural, physical, and environmental sciences; engineering projects and water management policies; administrative oversight; legislative and judicial affairs; concerns of public-interest and special-advocacy organiza-tions; interests and activities of Indigenous peoples; and works for and by youth and young adults. Publications are commonplace, technical, and specialized; in inkprint, special media for the visually impaired, and audio, audio-visual, and physically produced digital media. They have been published in popular, academic, commercial, and governmental venues, and privately.

No comparable bibliography exists for any other historical, natural, recreational, or utili-tarian area overseen by federal or state agencies of the United States or Mexico. Value-added products can be created by academics, professionals, and avocational enthusiasts—even now Artificial Intelligence practitioners. Trends in personal, professional, and official interests may be detected in citations spanning decades and centuries. It serves, too, as a unique evidentiary record for administrators and resource managers who work within federal, state, Native American, and other jurisdictions covered by this work, and for specialists in public advocacy and not-for-profit organizations that have concerns in this region. Subsets of citations from this bibliography may serve as foundations for specialized and applied uses, scholarly studies, and administrative analysis and record.

Additional sections within Volume 1/Part A introduce readers to the Grand Canyon and lower Colorado River regions, and to the continued value of bibliographies even in the digital age.