Databases for Arts and Humanities

Alphabetical List of Databases | Databases with Some Full-text | Multidisciplinary Databases

Databases by Subject

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Arts and Humanities

African American Biographical Database (Some Full-Text): Largest collection of electronic biographical information on African Americans, 1790-1950.
Updated bimonthly.
America: History and Life: America: History and Life is a complete bibliographic reference to the history of the United States and Canada from prehistory to the present. Over 2,000 journals published throughout the world are covered in the database. In addition to articles, each year America: History and Life includes approximately 6,000 citations of book and media reviews from a selection of over one hundred key journals in US and Canadian history and related fields. The database also includes citations to abstracts of dissertations published in thes areas.
Coverage started: 1964. Updated 3 times per year.
American Journey Online (Full-Text): Each key topic in American history and culture addressed by the series encompasses hundreds of carefully selected, rare documents, pictures, and archival audio and video - while essays, headnotes, and captions by scholars set the sources in context. Full text searchability and extensive hyperlinking provide fast and easy access and cross-referencing. Topics: African-American Experience, American Revolution, Asian-American Experience, Civil War, Constitution and Supreme Court, Great Depression & the New Deal, Hispanic-American Experience, Immigrant Experience, Native American Experience, Westward Expansion, Women in America.
AncestryPlus (Full-Text): With over 1.2 billion records in over 3,000 databases, AncestryPlus is a comprehensive online source of information for conducting genealogical and local history research available. Included in AncestryPlus are the digitized images of the U.S. Federal Census from 1790 forward, the American Genealogical Biographical Index, Passenger and Immigration Lists Index, and much more. An online tutorial is available.
NOTE: Available from on-campus only.
Anthropological Index Online: This index "is based on the journal holdings of The Anthropology Library at the The British Museum (Museum of Mankind) which receives periodicals in all branches of anthropology, from academic institutions and publishers around the world."
Coverage started: 1957.
Art Abstracts (Some Full-Text): Indexes about 400 international English-language arts publications. Includes periodicals, yearbooks, Museum bulletins, competition and award notices, exhibition listings, interviews, film reviews, and more.
List of periodical titles. Coverage started: 1984. Updated monthly. (via FirstSearch)
Art Index Retrospective: Bibliographic database that cites articles from 420 art periodicals published throughout the world. Periodical coverage includes English-language periodicals, yearbooks, and Museum bulletins, as well as periodicals published in French, Italian, German, Japanese, Spanish, Dutch, and Swedish.
List of periodical titles. Coverage: cumulates citations to Art Index 1929 - 1984.
ARTbibliographies Modern: Abstracts of journal articles, books, essays, exhibition catalogs, dissertations, and exhibition reviews. The scope extends from artists and movements beginning with Impressionism in the late 19th century, up to the most recent works and trends. Photography is covered from its invention in 1839 to the present.
List of periodical titles. Coverage started: 1974. Updated twice a year.
Arts & Humanities Search (Some Full-Text): Index to 1300 leading arts and humanities journals.
List of periodical titles. Coverage started: 1980. Updated weekly. (via FirstSearch)
Bibliography of the History of Art (BHA): This link searches three databases: Bibliography of the History of Art (BHA), including writings from 1973 to present, this database covers visual arts in all media including traditional fine arts (painting, sculpture, drawing, prints, architecture); decorative and applied arts; material culture; photography and contemporary new media; visual arts aspects of performing arts. International Repertory of the Literature of Art (RILA) includes abstracts and indexes on all aspects of European and American art and architecture. European art is covered from late Antiquity (4th c.) to the present. American art is covered from the European discoveries (16th c.) to the present. Art reflecting the Western tradition in other parts of the world is also included. Repertoire d'Art et d'Archeolgie (RAA) includes abstracts and indexes on all aspects of European and American art and architecture. European art is covered from late Antiquity (4th c.) to 1939. American art is covered from the European discoveries (16th c.) to 1939. Art reflecting the Western tradition in other parts of the world is also included. All types of publication are covered: books, periodical articles, reviews, conference proceedings, Festschriften, collected essays, exhibition catalogues, museum publications, and doctoral dissertations.
Biography Index (Some Full-Text): Coverage includes 2700 English-language periodicals and more than 1,800 books added each year. Includes autobiographies, bibliographies, biographies, critical studies, fiction and drama, pictorial works, poetry, juvenile literature, obituaries, journals, collections of letters, book reviews, and interviews.
Coverage started: 1984. Updated monthly. (via FirstSearch)
Book Review Digest (Some Full-Text): Indexes 100 periodicals published in the U.S., Canada, and Great Britain, covering over 7,000 adult and children's books each year. Includes English-language fiction and nonfiction.
List of periodical titles. Coverage started: 1983. Updated monthly. (via FirstSearch)
Books in Print (via Bowker) (Some Full-Text): Descriptions of over 4.4 million books, 337,000 videos, and 157,000 audiobooks (new and forthcoming); 1.3 million out of print titles; 763,000 full-text reviews from 12 sources.
Updated weekly.
Children's Literature Comprehensive Database (Full-Text): Contains full-text of reviews of more than 110,000 children's books. Reviews are provided by independent reviewers as well as 20 other organizational sources, including the American Library Association's Booklist, ALAN, The Bulletin, CCBC Choices, KIRKUS, KLIATT, and VOYA.
Under "Children's Literature Comprehensive Database", click on 'Registered Users'.
Clase and Periodica: CLASE indexes documents published in Latin American journals specializing in the social sciences and humanities. PERIODICA covers Latin American journals specializing in science and technology. Offers access to more than 300,000 bibliographic citations from documents published in 2,600 scholarly journals published in the Spanish, Portuguese, French and English languages.
Coverage started: Clase: 1975- , Periodica: 1978- . Updated quarterly.
Columbia Granger's World of Poetry (Some Full-Text): This release "includes 13,000 poems in full text, and 250,000 poetry citations, in addition to several important new features—commentaries, biographies, bibliographies, notes on form, and a glossary of prosodic terms, all written by William Harmon or written under his editorship. Also new to this release is the ability to search by author category (Asian-American, Irish, Polish, etc.)."
Emerald Fulltext (Full-Text): Fulltext articles from over 100 Emerald journals covering such fields as management, HRM, marketing, librarianship, mechanical engineering, electronic and electrical engineering.
List of periodical titles. Coverage started: Varies by title; earliest 1988.
Essay and General Literature Index (via FirstSearch): Bibliographic database that cites essays and articles contained in collections of essays and miscellaneous works published in the United States, Great Britain, and Canada; 300 volumes are indexed annually. This database focuses on the humanities and social sciences, with subject coverage ranging from economics, political science, and history to criticism of literary works, drama, and film.
Coverage started: 1985. Updated annually.
Grove Dictionary of Art (Full-Text): 45,000 articles on the art and culture of Asia, Africa, Europe, the Americas and the Pacific from prehistory until today with links to images and further information in museum and other art-related web sites.
Updated continuously.
Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, Opera, Jazz (Full-Text): This site "comprises the full text of The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, second edition, edited by Stanley Sadie and John Tyrrell (London, 2001), The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, edited by Stanley Sadie (London, 1992), and The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz, second edition, edited by Barry Kernfeld (London, 2002). Articles that have been updated since their appearance in print are date-stamped in the upper right corner of the screen."
Updated quarterly.
NOTE: Only 1 user at a time.
HarpWeek (Harper's Weekly 1857-1912) (Full-Text): HarpWeek contains all the pages of Harper's Weekly (1857-1912) as scanned images, together with a series of indexes: subject, illustrations, advertising, literary genre, people by occupation/role in society.
Historical Abstracts: Historical Abstracts is your complete reference guide to the history of the world from 1450 to the present (excluding the United States and Canada, which are covered in America: History and Life). Over 2,000 journals published throughout the world are covered in the database. In addition to articles, each year Historical Abstracts includes approximately 3,000 citations to useful historical books as reviewed by the most prestigious journals in the field and citations to abstracts of dissertations completed worldwide of particular interest for historical research.
Coverage started: 1954. Updated 3 times per year.
History Cooperative (Full-Text): Site offers the full-text of a collection of history journals: American Historical Review, Common-place, Environmental History, History of Education Quarterly, The History Teacher, Journal of American History, Journal of World History, Labour History, Labour / Le Travail, Law and History Review, Western Historical Quarterly, William and Mary Quarterly.
Coverage started: Varies, earliest: 1999.
History E-Book Project (Full-Text): Site offers 775 books of high quality in the field of history. These are works of major importance to historical studies—books that remain vital to both scholars and advanced students, and are frequently cited in the literature.
Title List.
History Resource Center: US (Full-Text): The History Resource Center: U.S. provides integrated access to over 1,000 historical (primary) documents, more then 30,000 reference articles, and over 65 full-text journals covering themes, events, individuals and periods in U.S. history from pre-Colonial times to the present. The material also includes access to the citations for over 180 additional history journals from the Institute for Scientific Information's Arts and Humanities Citation Index.
Title List.
Humanities Abstracts (Some Full-Text): Indexes about 400 periodicals in archaeology, art, classics, film, folklore, journalism, linguistics, music, the performing arts, philosophy, religion, world history, and world literature.
List of periodical titles. coverage started: 1984. Updated monthly. (via FirstSearch)
JSTOR (Full-Text): Complete text of the backfiles of about 600 core scholarly journals in the arts, humanities, and the social sciences.
List of full text periodicals by title and discipline.
Library Literature (Some Full-Text): Indexes about 200 library and information science periodicals.
List of periodical titles. Coverage started: 1984. Updated monthly. (via FirstSearch)
Linguistics & Language Behavior Abstracts: This indexing/abstracting service covers all aspects of the study of language including phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax and semantics. Complete coverage is also given to various fields of linguistics including descriptive, historical, comparative, theoretical and geographical linguistics.
List of periodical titles. Coverage started: 1973. Updated monthly.
Literature Online (LION) (Full-Text): Literature Online contains criticism and reference resources in addition to the full text of poetry, drama, and prose fiction from the seventh century to the present day. Contemporary criticism is available through the full text of 120 current literature journals that can be accessed through the Annual Bibliography of English Language and Literature (ABELL), which contains over 880,000 records of literary criticism from 1920 to date.
Literature Resource Center (Full-Text): LRC combines biographical, bibliographical, and contextual information to deliver a complete reference/resource package on authors and their works (fiction, nonfiction, poetry, drama, history, and journalism). Centering on Contemporary Authors, Dictionary of Literary Biography, and Contemporary Literary Criticism, this data set is augmented with full-text, excerpted, and commissioned critical material illuminating an oeuvre or era. In partnership with Merriam-Webster, Inc., LRC offers the Encyclopedia of Literature including over 10,000 entries for authors, works, literary landmarks, literary and critical terms, mythological and folkloric figures, fictional characters, literary movements, and prizes.
MLA Bibliography (Some Full-Text): Index to about 4000 periodicals published worldwide covering literature, languages, linquistics, and folklore.
List of periodical titles. Coverage started: 1963. Updated ten times per year. (via FirstSearch)
Media Review Digest (Some Full-Text): Provides extensive review coverage of educational media, along with strong supplemental coverage of entertainment resources from 1989 to the present. In addition to providing citations to reviews of media resources in several leading print publications, the Media Review Digest database also contains links to over 300,000 full-text reviews and related resources accessible on the Internet.
List of periodical titles. Updated quarterly.
Michigan Authors and Illustrators: This "is a database of information on authors and illustrators born in Michigan, who live in Michigan, or who have written books about or set in Michigan. Each entry includes biographical information, lists of works by the person and lists of works about the person. More complete information is available for those authors and illustrators who provided information to us." A collaboration of the Michigan Association for Media in Education, the Library of Michigan and the Michigan Center for the Book.
Updated: continuously.
Philosopher's Index: Provides indexing and abstracts of articles from about 480 international journals as well as books on philosophy.
Coverage started: 1940. Updated quarterly. (via SilverPlatter)
Poole's Plus-The Digital Index of the 19th Century: Currently includes: Poole's Index to Periodical Literature (1802-1906), Stead's Index to Periodicals (1890-1902), Nineteenth Century Monographs File, Nineteenth Century Serials Masterfile, and Library Journal Cumulative Index (1876-1897).
Project Muse (Full-Text): Project Muse is an online journal collection containing the full-text of 112 titles in the humanities, social sciences, and mathematics.
List of periodical titles. Coverage: varies with journal; often starts with 1995. Updated when new issues are available.
RILM Abstracts of Music Literature: Index to the contents of about 1400 internationally-published music periodicals.
List of periodical titles. Coverage started: 1969. Updated monthly. (via FirstSearch)
Schwann Online: "Schwann Online is the electronic edition of the classical recording catalog information of Schwann Opus and the pop, rock, jazz, world music recording information of Schwann Spectrum...Schwann Online includes the music of yesterday--details on all the titles that have been available over the last 5 years. Plus, Schwann Online includes the music of tomorrow--articles and features, sneak previews of the music about to be released."
Short Story Index (Some Full-Text): The electronic version of the standard reference work Short Story Index. An index to short stories written in or translated into English that have appeared in collections and selected periodicals. Content indexes approximately 65,000 stories; 56,000 stories from approx. 3,400 collections; 8,300 stories from 182 periodicals in Humanities Index and Readers' Guide. The full text of about 900 stories are included.
Coverage: 1984-1997. Updated annually.
Textile Technology Digest: Produced by the Institute of Textile Technology, this database contains bibliographic citations with abstracts from a variety of formats, such as journals, books, conferences, theses, technical reports, trade literature. "Coverage includes the various aspects of textile production and processing and the automation and management systems of these operations. Coverage also includes the major resources from the apparel, home furnishings, flooring, and polymer industries."
Coverage started: 1978. As of June 2003 no abstracts have been added
or modified.
Times Literary Supplement Centenary Archive (Full-Text): Full-text of the Times Literary Supplement from 1902-1939, plus the TLS Index. Issues to the end of 1990 will be added by the end of 2000.
Click on 'Subscribers'.
What Do I Read Next?: This readers' advisory database includes over 100,000 recommended titles, more than 58,000 plot summaries, and awards information from 562 awards, all to help users uncover new reading adventures, find long-remembered favorites, and discover award-winning titles. Search by genre, subject, author, title, series, locale, and more.
Wilson Select Plus (Full-Text): Index to the contents of about 1300 periodicals, all with ASCII full text online.
List of periodical titles. Coverage started: 1994. Updated weekly. (via FirstSearch)
WorldCat: WorldCat is the OCLC Online Union Catalog, containing more than 35 million records describing items owned by the Library of Congress, EMU, and about 19,000 libraries around the world; each record contains library holdings.
Coverage started: 1000 A.D. Updated daily. (via FirstSearch)

Multidisciplinary Databases

ArticleFirst (Some Full-Text): Indexes 12,500 journals in science, technology, medicine, social science, business, the humanities, and popular culture and allows browsing of contents pages.
List of periodical titles. Coverage started: 1990. Updated daily. (via FirstSearch)
Associations Unlimited (Full-Text): Contains information for approximately 444,000 international and U.S. national, regional, state, and local nonprofit membership organizations in all fields, including IRS data on U.S. 501(c) nonprofit organizations. For some 2,500 major U.S. national associations, provides full-text association materials such as brochures, pamphlets, and membership application forms.
Blackwell Synergy (Some Full-Text): Blackwell Synergy holds the content for about 740 Blackwell Publishing journals, the majority of which are published on behalf of international scholarly and professional societies. While citations and abstracts for all articles can be searched and displayed, full-text is available only for articles from the 135 journals to which EMU subscribes.
List of EMU subscription titles. Coverage: varies with title.
Books in Print (via Bowker) (Some Full-Text): Descriptions of over 4.4 million books, 337,000 videos, and 157,000 audiobooks (new and forthcoming); 1.3 million out of print titles; 763,000 full-text reviews from 12 sources.
Updated weekly.
Detroit News & 4 Other Michigan Newspapers (Full-Text): In addition to the Detroit News (1999- ), other Michigan newspapers included are the Battle Creek Enquirer (May 2002- ), Grand Rapids Press (2002- ), Lansing State Journal (1999- ), Port Huron Times Herald (1999- ).
Note: After connecting to database, click on "America's Newspapers".
Dissertation Abstracts: Index of doctoral dissertation accepted at accredited institutions.
Coverage started: 1861. Updated monthly. (via FirstSearch)
Eastern Michigan University Theses and Dissertations (Full-Text): Site offers the full-text (in PDF format) of many EMU theses and dissertations mostly published after 1996. Search by keyword in title or abstract, author name, or advisor name.
Electric Library Elementary (K-6) (Full-Text): Geared to children in grades K-6, contains the full-text of selected articles from: about 30 magazines (e.g., Jack & Jill, Ranger Rick, Highlights for Children, Time for Kids, Entertainment Weekly); about 10 newspapers; about 50 books (e.g., Alaska Purchase, Battle of the Alamo, Gold Rush of 1849); as well as maps and pictures.
List of titles. Periodical coverage started: 1992. Updated daily.
Electronic Collections Online (ECO) (Some Full-Text): Index to the contents of over 2700 journals in a variety of subject areas. EMU is paying for access to online full-text for 664 of the titles. Articles are presented in page image formats (predominately PDF) that include all original content and images. The interface supports cross-journal searching and browsing within selected journals. Users can view bibliographic information for all journals and view full-text articles from journals to which their institution subscribes. Adobe's free Acrobat PDF viewer and CatchWord's free RealPage viewer are required to view the full-text articles.
List of titles available full-text to EMU community. List of all titles available. Coverage started: 1995, but varies by journal. Updated daily. (via FirstSearch)
Expanded Academic ASAP (Some Full-Text): This multidisciplinary database indexes about 3,200 mostly academic titles and offers full-text from about 2,000 of the titles.
List of periodical titles. Coverage started: 1980. Updated daily.
Facts.com (Full-Text): Answer questions about events, issues, statistics, and people of the last 20 years with selected content from seven databases, including Facts On File World News Digest, Issues and Controversies On File, Today's Science On File, Editorials On File, Funk & Wagnalls New Encyclopedia, Reuters On-Line News Service, and World Almanac and Book of Facts. Delivers additional special features including maps, photographs, historic documents, and overviews of key issues, newsmakers and events.
Coverage started: 1940. Updated weekly.
FactSearch (Some Full-Text): Contains full-text statistical statements on current social, economic, political, and environmental public policy issues. Entries come from more than 1,000 print sources as well as a wide range of Web-based resources.
List of publication titles. Coverage started: 1984. Updated quarterly. (via FirstSearch)
GenderWatch (Full-Text): GenderWatch (GW) is a full-text collection of international journals, magazines, newsletters, regional publications, special reports, and conference proceedings that focus on how gender impacts on a broad spectrum of subject areas.
List of titles. Coverage started: 1970.
General Reference Center Gold (Some Full-Text): An index to the contents of about 1000 periodicals, with about 60% available with full-text.
List of periodical titles. Coverage started: 1980. Updated monthly.
NOTE: There is a delay when adding new issues of certain titles to the database. List of embargoed titles and their database inclusion delays.
InfoTrac Custom Full-Text Newspapers (Full-Text): Includes the full-text of articles from the last 365 days of the New York Times. Other newspapers from around the United States as well as Australia, England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland and Mexico have varying full-text coverage dates.
List of newspapers and coverage dates.
InfoTrac OneFile (Some Full-Text): This multidisciplinary database indexes nearly 8,000 titles and includes more than 4,200 full-text titles. It includes indexing of The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times and Christian Science Monitor; full-text from 89 wire services covering agriculture, general news, broadcast news, government, business press releases, industry topics, sports and current events from all over the world; and indexing and some full-text from general interest magazines; refereed academic journals; business publications; technology periodicals; plus specialty titles in law, health care and computers.
List of titles. Coverage started: 1980. Updated daily.
InfoTrac Student Edition (Some Full-Text): This database is comprised of a variety of full-text sources that support the curriculum needs of secondary school students. It offers 330+ indexed and 270 full-text periodical titles, more than 40,000 full-text newspaper articles, 14 full-text reference books, 500 historical images and more than 300 full-color maps.
List of titles. Coverage started: 1985. Updated daily.
Ingenta (Some Full-Text): Search and browse the contents of over 27,000 periodicals. Full text of some articles available via EMU Library subscriptions.
Periodical titles. Coverage started: 1985. Updated daily.
Issues & Controversies @ FACTS.com (Full-Text): This full text reference database "presents and enhances the full backfile of Issues and Controversies on File, which has probed more than 250 controversial topics in the news since its debut in September 1995. Chronologies, illustrations, maps, tables, sidebars, bibliographies and contact information augment the balanced, accurate coverage of current and historical events."
Kluwer Online (Full-Text): Complete contents of about 265 Kluwer journals in subjects including sciences, social sciences, technology, and humanities.
List of full text titles and start dates.
LexisNexis Academic (Full-Text): Access to a wide range of FULL-TEXT news, business, legal and government information sources, as well as company, country, financial, market research and industry reports, biographical and medical and health information.
List of titles. Updated daily.
netLibrary (eBooks) (Full-Text): eBooks are electronic versions of printed books. Through this service we now have access to about 14,000 copyrighted books in addition to about 4,000 public domain titles.
Complete list of titles is available as two Excel spreadsheets: eBooks Michigan and MEL Ebooks
New York Times (June 1980- ) (Full-Text): Text-only articles from June 1980. When connected, click the word 'Sources' on the top right menu, type 'new york times' (without the quotes) in the Source List search box, click the 'Find Title' button, click 'Search This Title' below 'New York Times, The'. In the search dialog box that appears, fill in your search terms. (In Step Four, you might want to expand the time frame of your search beyond six months.)
New York Times Backfile (1851-2001) (Full-Text): Every backfile issue from 1851-2001 has been digitized from cover to cover in pdf format, including news stories, editorials, photos, graphics, and advertisements.
NewsBank-NewsFile (Full-Text): Full-text news resource containing coverage of current issues and events from over 500 US and Canadian newspapers, news sources and domestic and international newswires. More than 70,000 articles selected annually provide regional, national and international perspectives and coverage of the arts, and people and professions in the news.
List of titles. Coverage started: 1991. Updated daily.
OAIster (Full-Text): "OAIster is a project of the University of Michigan Digital Library Production Services [whose] goal is to create a collection of freely available, difficult-to-access, academically-oriented digital resources that are easily searchable by anyone."
Oxford English Dictionary Online (Full-Text): "The OED Online contains the complete text of the 20-volume Second Edition, first published in 1989, together with its 3-volume Additions Series, published in 1993 (volumes 1 and 2) and 1997 (volume 3)...The OED is currently being revised, with the aim of producing a completely updated third edition by the year 2010. Draft material from the revision programme will also be published online..."
Updated quarterly.
PapersFirst: Index to papers included in every congress, conference, exposition, workshop, symposium, and meeting received at The British Library.
Coverage started: 1993. Updated 24 times per year. (via FirstSearch)
Periodical Abstracts Full-Text (Some Full-Text): Index to about 2000 general and academic journals, covering business, current affairs, economics, literature, religion, psychology, women's studies, and others.
List of periodical titles. Coverage started: 1987. Updated weekly. (via FirstSearch)
ProceedingsFirst: Index of every congress, symposium, conference, exposition, workshop and meeting received at The British Library.
coverage started: 1993. Updated 24 times per year. (via FirstSearch)
Readers' Guide Abstracts (Some Full-Text): Index to the contents of about 180 popular periodicals published in the U.S. and Canada.
List of periodical titles. Coverage started: 1983. Updated monthly (via FirstSearch)
Readers' Guide Retrospective (1890 - 1982): Index to the contents of popular magazines published in the U.S. and Canada.
List of periodical titles. Coverage: 1890-1982.
Union List of Periodicals: Lists the periodical holdings of thousands of libraries.
Updated semiannually. (via FirstSearch)
Who's Who on the Web (Full-Text): Over 1 million biographies taken from 20 Marquis Who's Who print titles. Updates to biographies made daily, and new biographies added daily.
NOTE: Up to two users at a time. Try again later if you cannot connect.
World Almanacs (Full-Text): The World Almanacs database includes the contents of: The World Almanac and Book of Facts 1998; The World Almanac of the U.S.A.; The World Almanac of U.S.; Politics; The World Almanac for Kids.
Updated annually. (via FirstSearch)

Alphabetical List of Databases | Databases with Some Full-text | Multidisciplinary Databases

Databases by Subject

Click Here to Try Limited-Time Free Trial Databases

Last Updated: July 7, 2004
Technical Contact: Keith Stanger, keith@stanger.com