Kevin Mulcahy English and American Literature Librarian mulcahy@rci.rutgers.edu November 2009

Research Resources: Subject Research Guides: Literatures in English:
Indexes to Periodical Literature

These indexes/databases are available from the Libraries' Indexes pages. You may find the correct index by looking in the Alphabetical lists or by looking in Arts & Humanities Indexes section under Language / Linguistics or Literature.

Please note that in most cases you must be either a Rutgers student, faculty or staff member to access these indexes. Access can also be had from the computer terminals in the library.

^**MLA International Bibliography (1926+).
The most important index for students of literature. The best source for criticism, theory and other scholarly works. Other important titles are listed alphabetically below.

America: History and Life (1964+).
While the scope of this database is American history, not literature, the interdisciplinary nature of much literary research makes this an important source for many scholars. See also Historical Abstracts, below.

Annual Bibliography 0f English Language and Literature (1920+)
More than 900,000 records covering monographs, periodical articles, critical editions of literary works, book reviews, collections of essays and doctoral dissertations published anywhere in the world; unpublished doctoral dissertations are covered for the period 1920 1999. All aspects and periods of English literature are covered, from Anglo Saxon times to the present day. British, American and Commonwealth writing are all represented. Coverage is international, including scholarly material in languages other than English. Part of Literature Online (LION) .

C19: The Nineteenth Century Index (1800-1900). A multi-disciplinary database providing bibliographic access-more than 20,000,000 records-to books, periodical and newspaper articles, government publications, and archival collections. It is probably the most comprehensive source for English language material printed in the 19th Century. C19 combines a variety of print and digital resources into one database, and also allows limited searching of specialized sub-collections. Collections indexed include:

Dissertations and Theses (1861+).
Covers nearly 150 years of dissertations. Rutgers users have free access to PDFs of Doctoral dissertations completed at Rutgers University since 1997. A small number of Rutgers dissertations from previous years are also available full text. See also RUcore, the Rutgers Community Depository for the most recent Rutgers dissertations (October 2007+) in PDF format.

FIAF International FilmArchive Database. (1972+).
An international compendium of information on film and television maintained by the International Federation of Film Archives (FIAF). It provides over 325,000 indexed citations to articles from over 300 film periodicals, including academic journals and trade papers. Each entry consists of a full bibliographic description, an abstract and comprehensive headings (biographical names, film titles and general subjects). Additionally, FIAF includes "The Treasures from the Film Archives" database, which contains unique information about silent film holdings in international film archives.

Film & Television Literature Index (FTLI). (1990+, with selective earlier coverage).
A comprehensive bibliographic database covering all types of writing, including industry papers, news journalism, and scholarly academic journals on topics for film and television. Its coverage includes Film Journal International, Journal of British Cinema & Television, Film Criticism, Post Script, and Variety, as well as technical publications such as SMPTE. FTLI also includes most all existing international film and television publications such as Cahiers du Cinema, Cinema in India, Cinemamaya, Filmkultura, Segnocinema, and Kinetoscopio. Subject coverage includes film & television theory.

Film Literature Index, 1976-2001.
Contains approximately 700,000 citations articles, reviews and book reviews on film, television, and video. Search the citations or browse by subject headings, browse by person names, browse by production titles, or browse by corporate names.

Historical Abstracts (1964+).
Covers world history (excluding North America, covered by America: History & Life) from 1450 to the present. For the medieval period, see International Medieval Bibliography and ITER (below)

Humanities Full Text. (1984+).
Indexes more than 600 scholarly journals in art, literature, music, philosophy, and history, with full-text for roughly 240 journals. Less comprehensive in its coverage of literature than MLA, but useful in interdisciplinary research-and more frequently updated. As of August 2009, the Humanities Index Retrospective adds coverage back to 1907.

ITER: Gateway To the Renaissance
Covers published materials pertaining to the Middle Ages and Renaissance (400-1700). As of July 2009, the database includes indexing of articles from 1710 journals (some dating back to 1784), indexing of selected essays from 8650 collections, and citations to 108,000 monographs, and a total of 1,070,000 bibliographic records.

International Medieval Bibliography (1967+).
More than 300,000 citations from 4500 journals and 5000 collections. All subjects relating to the Middle Ages are included, within the date range 400 1500 AD. Geographical areas include Europe, the Middle East and North Africa.

Periodicals Index Online/Archive Online
Provides access to the contents pages of over 5500 journals from their inception to 1995. It contains separate records for over fifteen million journal articles with over 1,000,000 entries added every year. It also provides the full-image of articles in of 450 journals (as of July 2008).

Readers' Guide Full Text. (1983+ with selected full-text from 1994+).
Provides access to popular magazines, including titles like Atlantic Monthly, Harpers, New York Review of Books, and New Yorker. Readers' Guide Retrospective (1890-1982), added to our resources in August 2009, provides an additional one hundred years of bibliographic coverage.

Victorian Studies Bibliography (1991+).

• Section 1 lists both enumerative bibliographies relating to the period and studies of printing, publishing, libraries, and book production.
• Section 2 lists documents, general histories, and studies in historiography.
• Section 3 (subdivided into six parts) lists titles on Victorian economics, education, politics, religion, science, and social environment.
• Section 4 lists references to all arts except literature, including studies of architecture, household arts, landscape, music, painting, the performing arts, photography, and sculpture.
• Section 5 focuses exclusively on literature, literary history, and the development of literary forms.
• Section 6 lists individual authors, first citing significant new editions of their works and then listing critical and biographical studies; journals devoted to individual authors are enumerated in this section in single, extended entries, but reviews appearing in their pages are listed under the title of the book reviewed.

Web of Science (1985+)
An index to 8000 peer-reviewed journals, including (despite the title) the arts and humanities. The most notable feature of this index is that it allows one to trace who has cited an article, as well as searching by author and keyword.

World Shakespeare Bibliography.
The most comprehensive record of Shakespeare-related scholarship and theatrical productions published or produced worldwide between 1961 and 2008, with more than 117,000 annotated entries.

Black Literature, 1827-1940, Index.
Indexes a major collection of African-American periodicals, from 1827 to 1940. A CD-ROM index that must be used on site in Alexander Library.

Index to English Literary Periodicals, 1681-1914.
An ongoing project that will ultimately provide complete indexing of an important collection of 341 journals on microfilm. A CD-ROM index that must be used on site in Alexander Library.

Annual Bibliography of Victorian Studies. (1976+).
Interdisciplinary coverage of Britain during the Victorian era.
ALEXANDER REF Z2019.A641.
(Robeson has 5 year cumulations, 1970-1994 at ROBESON REF DA550.C582).

Index to Black Periodicals. (1950+).
Covers roughly 40 scholarly and popular titles. Selective, but of some use.
ALEXANDER REF AI3.O4
(Also Dana, Douglass, Kilmer, & Robeson).

Year's Work in Modern Language Studies. (1995+).
Similar to Year's Work in English Studies in format, but devoted to non-English language literatures. Very useful for those involved in comparative studies. Back issues (only) available online through Periodicals Index Online/Archive Online (1930-1995).
ALEXANDER REF PB1.Y39.