Online sources:

Britannica Online
The electronic version of the classic reference work. You can either search for terms or browse the alphabetical list of entries.

Credo Reference.
Over 200 reference titles covering a wide range of subjects. Includes full text, images, sound files, maps and more. You may find it helpful to browse the available titles.

Literature Resource Center.
Use the Author search or the Advanced search. Provides personal data, career highlights, lists of writings, and works in progress on authors. The individuals included range from newspaper and television reporters to editors and columnists to novelists, screenwriters, and literary theorists. In addition to biographical information, includes material from the Dictionary of Literary Biography series, Nineteenth-Century Literature Criticism, Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism, and more.

Sources in print in the library:

Dictionary of American History. 10 vols.
Ref. E174 .D52 2003

The Oxford Companion to United States History. Paul S. Boyer et al, eds.
Ref. E174 .O94 2001

The American Years. 2 vols.
Ref. E174.5 q.G753 2003

Encyclopedia of American Social History. 3 vols.    Mary Kupiec Cayton, Elliot J. Goru, and Peter W. Williams, eds.
Ref. HN57 .E58 1993

The Harper Handbook to Literature. Northrop Frye, Sheridan Baker, George Perkins; with a chronology of literature and world events by Barbara M. Perkins.
Ref. PN41 .F75 1985

The Johns Hopkins Guide to Literary Theory & Criticism. Michael Groden and Martin Kreiswirth, eds.
Ref. PN81 .J554 2005

Encyclopedia of Contemporary Literary Theory: Approaches, Scholars, Terms. Irene R. Makaryk, general editor and compiler.
Ref. PN81 .E63 1993

Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism. 1978- .
Ref. PN94 .T83

The Bloomsbury Guide to Women's Literature. Clare Buck, ed.
Ref. PN471 .B57 1992

Benét's Reader's Encyclopedia of American Literature. George Perkins, Barbara Perkins, and Phillip Leininger, eds.
Ref. PS21 .R4 1991

The Chronology of American Literature: America's Literary Achievements from the Colonial Era to Modern Times. Daniel S. Burt, ed.
Ref. PS94 q.C48 2004

American Writers; A Collection of Literary Biographies. 8 vols.     Leonard Unger, ed.
Ref. PS129 .A55

American Women Writers: A Critical Reference Guide from Colonial Times to the Present.   5 vols.    Lina Mainiero, ed.
Ref. PS147 .A4

African American Authors, 1745-1945: Bio-Bibliographical Critical Sourcebook. Emmanuel S. Nelson, ed.
Ref. PS153.N5 A32 2000

African-American Writers: A Dictionary. Shari Dorantes Hatch and Michael R. Strickland, eds.
Ref. PS153.N5 A3444 2000

Afro-American Writers before the Harlem Renaissance. Trudier Harris, ed.
Ref. PS221 q.D5 v.50

Afro-American Writers from the Harlem Renaissance to 1940. Trudier Harris, ed.
Ref. PS221 q.D5 v.51

Oxford companion volumes:

• The Oxford Companion to American Literature.    William Andrews, Frances Smith Foster, and Trudier Smith, eds.     PS21 .H3 1995
• The Oxford Companion to Women's Writing in the United States.     Cathy N. Davidson et al, eds.     Ref. PS147 .O94 1995
• The Oxford Companion to African American Literature.     James D. Hart.    Ref. PS153.N5 O96 1997 and online from NetLibrary

American National Biography. 24 vols.
The standard reference for biographical information on people in American history.
Ref. CT213 .A68 1999

Biography and Genealogy Master Index.
"A comprehensive index to nearly 12 million biographical sketches in more than 2700 volumes and editions of current and retrospective reference books, covering both contemporary and historical figures throughout the world." Available electronically for Lawrence campus researchers.

Literature Resource Center
Use the Author search or the Advanced search. The title search doesn't always find everything you might want to see. In addition to biographical information, includes material from Contemporary Authors, the Dictionary of Literary Biography series, Nineteenth-Century Literary Criticism, Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism, and more.

To find biographical books about a certain person, search in LUCIA for the person using the Subject begins with option. Browse through the subject headings to find the subheading which corresponds to your specific interests. Again, be alert when searching non-western names or names of rulers, as you may need to use varying forms of these names. Many times, LUCIA has cross-references for these.

For autobiographical books by and about a certain person, search in LUCIA for persons as Author. Be sure to consult the library's guide on Biographical Information for further ideas and information.

One way to locate documents from the era is to use the Guided Search, which allows you to look for titles published during a particular date range. Another strategy is to search for books that consist of particular types of historial material, for example, to find the phrase "world war" and include any of the following terms using the Subject Keywords option. Try these:

• sources
• diaries
• documents
• memoirs

To find documents from the era from magazines, journals, and newspapers, try the following.

Essay and General Literature Index. 1900 - 1994.
Indexes essays and articles in collections, anthologies, etc.
Reference Indexes

International Index. 1907-1965.
Indexes articles from scholarly journals.
Reference Indexes

New York Times. 1851-current.
Considered to be the American paper of record. The New York Times is on microfilm and on the web.
New York Times Index--Reference Indexes/Microform Area
New York Times (1851-2006)
Current issues available from many sources: see FindIt

Reader's Guide to Periodical Literature. 1900-1994.
Indexes articles from popular magazines.
Reference Indexes

To find items owned by the library, search LUCIA. Try a Subject begins with search, for example, american literature--20th century or american fiction--20th century or modernism. LUCIA will suggest related terms which can also be searched. You may want to consult the Library of Congress Subject Headings, or LCSH, a guide to the terms commonly used in catalogs like ours. The LCSH is a red multi-volume set; it can be found on top of the Ready Reference shelves behind the reference desk on the first floor of the library.

To combine terms for a different kind of search, try a Keyword Anywhere search. LUCIA will look for the terms you specify anywhere in the important areas of the cataloging records, and display a list of those records. You can search for phrases like "harlem renaissance" by using quotation marks around the phrase. You might want to try searching for some of the terms you find in the LCSH, or use the Subject Keyword search to target your keyword search to terms in the subject area of the records. Compare a Keyword Anywhere search for america* and modernis* with a Subject Keyword search for america* and modernis*. The asterisk acts as a truncation symbol and tells LUCIA to search for all records containing words starting with america (like America, American, Americans) and all the records containing words starting with modernis; modernist, modernism, and so on; the connecting operator and then tells LUCIA to display all the records containing all the variations of both terms.

Books are arranged on the library's shelves by Library of Congress Classification. This is a system which organizes materials by general subjects. Once you have a call number from searching LUCIA, see this guide to call number locations at Mudd and the library floor maps to find out where a book might be on the shelves.

Search LUCIA for materials in our library; try WorldCat to find materials beyond the Mudd. Make sure you've thoroughly searched our library before going to WorldCat. See a reference librarian if you need help.

The best index to use will depend on your topic. Be sure to check the Electronic Resources page for other options. Two of our resources, JSTOR and Project MUSE provide complete full text. In addition to the titles listed here, see also the list of databases for Humanities available from the library.

Essential: this should be among your starting points for finding advanced secondary materials.

MLA International Bibliography. 1963-
The leading source for the field of literary studies. Wide ranging index to just about anything of a scholarly nature related to literature and language.

General and Multidisciplinary Indexes: include citations and some full text of materials from a broad variety of fields including literature and history. Some include current news articles and reviews of productions.

Academic OneFile
A one-stop source for news and periodical articles on a wide range of topics. Includes full-text articles, many with images. 1980 - present; updated daily.

Academic Search Premier
Contains broad and specialized coverage of academic and general periodicals. One of many resources available from EBSCOhost, single Web source for multiple databases.

Once you have a citation for an article on your topic, try using the button or Citation Linker to see if that particular article is available. If you don't find it, you can submit a request for interlibrary loan (ILL) of a copy of the article: ILL takes about 7-10 days, so plan ahead. See the library's Interlibrary Loan page for more information.

Internet Resources for English
Selected by the librarians here at Lawrence.

Internet Resources for Gender Studies
Another list of sources selected by the librarians.

Voice of the Shuttle
One of the leading web pages for research in the humanities.

Of course, there are many more web resources available that might be useful in your research. You might want to try looking at sources that select the best of the Web, like these:

• Scout Report and the Scout Report Archives
• Infomine
• Librarian's Internet Index

Academic Citation and Writing
Style manuals of the humanities, physical sciences, and the social sciences in the Seeley G. Mudd Library.

Citing Electronic Documents
This page provides guidance on citing electronic documents and links to other guides, some on specific styles of documentation.

MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers.
The guide for any academic papers written in the literatures and languages.
RRef. LB2369 .G53 2003

While you will find material on your topic in resources for gender studies and literary studies, you may also want to consider searching for material from other fields, like art, art history, history, history of philosophy, and more. In addition to consulting catalogs and indexes, be sure to look at bibliographies supplied at the end of relevant articles, chapters, and books, and to search library catalogs for book-length bibliographies.

Remember that in any written work you produce your sources must be fully documented. It may help to look at the information on style before you start your research, so that you will have all the details required for documentation at hand when you need them. Then as you write, go back to the resources on style for details on the exact format of your citations.

The sources listed in this guide were chosen for the broad coverage they provide. Direct links are provided to Internet resources and searchable databases, as well as links to LUCIA, the library's online catalog. Be sure to check the library's Electronic Resources page regularly to see new databases and indexes; some of these will only be available to users on the Lawrence campus. Also, you may want to take a look at guides on related topics from the Library Research Guides page.

Evaluating the resources you find is an essential part of the research process. See this guide to hints on evaluation of books and articles and this guide to evaluating Internet resources.

As always, if you have any questions be sure to ask a Reference Librarian.

Ref. = Reference collection, first floor
RRef.= Ready Reference, shelved behind the reference desk
Periodicals = Level A
GovDoc = U.S. Government Documents, second floor
Reference Indexes = Alphabetically arranged at the end of the reference collection
Microform Area = Reading room east of the reference desk, near microform drawers
q. = Oversized books: interfiled in reference and M class scores; at end of classes in other collections