Databases
- Black Freedom Struggle This link opens in a new windowPrimary sources. Approximately 1,600 documents focused on six different phases of Black Freedom: Slavery and the Abolitionist Movement (1790-1860), The Civil War and the Reconstruction Era (1861-1877), Jim Crow Era from 1878 to the Great Depression (1878-1932), The New Deal and World War II (1933-1945), The Civil Rights and Black Power Movements (1946-1975), The Contemporary Era (1976-2000)
- EBSCO Exploring Race in Society This link opens in a new windowThis free research database offers essential content covering important issues related to race in society today. Essays, articles, reports and other reliable sources provide an in-depth look at the history of race and provide critical context for learning more about topics associated with race, ethnicity, diversity and inclusiveness.
- HeinOnline Social Justice This link opens in a new windowAccess to databases from HeinOnline's Social Justice Suite, free to HeinOnline Core subscribers and any interested organizations. Civil Rights and Social Justice, Open Society Justice Initiative, Gun Regulation and Legislation in America, Slavery in America and the World: History, Culture & Law, LGBTQ+ Rights.
- Slavery in America and the World: History, Culture & Law This link opens in a new windowFree database from HeinOnline.
NOTE: The database is free, but not all content is. Scholarly (Law Journal Library) journal articles are not available to us via this interface. Go to Google Scholar with any journal article citations that you may be interested in reading to check for availability there.
- JSTOR This link opens in a new windowJSTOR is a digital library of academic journals, books, and primary sources. The library has subscription access directly at JSTOR to a few journal titles. Some of the links will also redirect to Project Muse. Search EBSCOhost MLA International Bibliography, too, for Cressman Library access to certain other JSTOR journals. Beyond that, independent researchers are able to register for a free JSTOR account, because most--but, not all--articles are available to Read Online with a personal account. Up to 6 articles per month. Personal JSTOR accounts are available for independent researchers, or individuals who are not affiliated with a school, organization, or library.
- GALE Literature Search This link opens in a new windowCross search the Gale Artemis Literary Sources : Gale Virtual Reference Library, Dictionary Literary Biography Complete, Literature Resource Center, and Something about the Author
- MLA Directory of Periodicals This link opens in a new windowMLA Directory of Periodicals, from the Modern Language Association (MLA), provides detailed information on over 6,000 journals and book series that cover literature, literary theory, dramatic arts, folklore, language, linguistics, pedagogy, rhetoric and composition, and the history of printing and publishing.
- MLA International Bibliography This link opens in a new windowThe MLA International Bibliography, from the Modern Language Association (MLA), is an essential tool for research in all aspects of modern languages and literature. Available as a searchable online database of more than 2.8 million records and constantly updated by scholars in the field.
- Oxford English Dictionary This link opens in a new windowThe OED is the definitive record of the English language, featuring 600,000 words, 3 million quotations, and over 1,000 years of English.
- Civil Rights Digital LibraryThe Civil Rights Digital Library Initiative represents one of the most ambitious and comprehensive efforts to date to deliver educational content on the Civil Rights Movement via the Web.
- Dictionary of Archives TerminologyThe Dictionary of Archives Terminology is the foremost reference on the archival lexicon.
Entries draw primarily from the professional literature in the United States and Canada. - Documenting the American South (DocSouth)Documenting the American South (DocSouth), a digital publishing initiative sponsored by the University Library at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, provides access to digitized primary materials that offer Southern perspectives on American history and culture. It supplies teachers, students, and researchers at every educational level with a wide array of titles they can use for reference, studying, teaching, and research.
- Umbra SearchUmbra Search celebrates the vital efforts of the individuals and institutions that have helped to preserve and make accessible online hundreds of thousands of pieces of African American history and culture, and we pay homage to the Umbra Society of the early 1960s, a renegade group of Black writers and poets who helped create the Black Arts Movement.
- Voices from the GapsUniversity of Minnesota professors Toni McNaron (English) and Carol Miller (American Studies and American Indian Studies) founded VG/Voices from the Gaps in 1996 to uncover, highlight, and share the works of marginalized artists, predominately women writers of color living and working in North America.
- The Electronic Encyclopedia of Chicagoby the Chicago Historical Society
Journals
- African American reviewAfrican American Review is a scholarly aggregation of insightful essays on African American literature, theatre, film, the visual arts, and culture; interviews; poetry; fiction; and book reviews.
- African RenaissanceAfrican studies; Regional and area studies
- Afro-Americans in New York Life and HistoryAfro-Americans in New York Life and History is an interdisciplinary scholarly journal that is published twice per year by the Afro-American Historical Association of the Niagara Frontier, Inc.
- CallalooCallaloo, the premier journal of literature, art, and culture of the African Diaspora, publishes original work by and about writers and visual artists of African descent worldwide.
- Contributions in black studies: a journal of African and Afro-American studiesCIBS was a Five College collaboration of Africana Studies scholars at UMass Amherst, Hampshire, Mount Holyoke, Amherst, and Smith Colleges. that lasted over two decades.
- The CrisisThe Crisis is the official publication of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). It features African American commentary on current affairs. In the past, it has also featured African American literature prominently, and was one of the major magazines of the Harlem Renaissance.
- James Baldwin reviewLanguage & Literature, African American Studies, Area Studies, Humanities
- Langston Hughes ReviewCovers the writings of Langston Hughes, the first African American to make his living solely by his pen, writing fifty books, including poetry, drama, autobiography, history, fiction, prose comedy, juvenile literature, librettos, and black gospel song-plays.
- ObsidianAfrican literature; Literature and writing
- Obsidian II: Black Literature in ReviewProvides scholarly articles, fiction, poetry, and drama centered on the literatures of Africa and her Diaspora.
- Obsidian III: literature in the African diasporaProvides scholarly articles, fiction, poetry, and drama centered on the literatures of Africa and her Diaspora.
- Postcolonial TextPostcolonial Text is a refereed open access journal that publishes articles, book reviews, interviews, poetry and fiction on postcolonial, transnational, and indigenous themes.
- Research in African literaturesA quarterly journal devoted to worldwide African literary studies. Publishes research in English in the oral and written literatures of Africa, and also information about African publishing, announcements of interest to Africanists, and literary notes and queries. Includes reviews and review essays of current books and a forum for discussion of issues raised.
- American Literary HistoryThrough essays, position papers, and commentaries, along with reviews, interviews, and previously unpublished diaries, letters, and stories, American Literary History surveys the contested field of US culture four times a year. No other scholarly publication offers such a wide-ranging and provocative discussion of critical challenges. American Literary History has become the premier forum for a rich and varied criticism shaping the ways we have come to think about America and setting the agenda of American cultural studies.
- American LiteratureAmerican Literature has been regarded since its inception as the preeminent periodical in its field. Each issue contains articles covering the works of several American authors—from colonial to contemporary—as well as an extensive book review section; a “Brief Mention” section offering citations of new editions and reprints, collections, anthologies, and other professional books; and an “Announcements” section that keeps readers up-to-date on prizes, competitions, conferences, grants, and publishing opportunities.
- The Southern Literary JournalA semiannual scholarly journal devoted to the literary and intellectual life of the American South. Includes essays focused on southern writing from colonial times to the present. Includes literary criticism, historical studies, and thematic and interpretative analysis.
- The Southern QuarterlyCommitted to the interdisciplinary study of Southern culture through consideration of the arts including literature, folklore, anthropology, and history.
- The Southern ReviewA quarterly journal devoted to contemporary literature in the U.S. and abroad and to Southern culture and history. Content includes works of fiction, poetry, and excerpts from novels in progress, as well as critical essays, interviews, and book reviews.
- The American Poetry ReviewPresents a diverse array of contemporary poetry and literary prose; aims to expand the audience interested in poetry and literature, and to provide authors, especially poets, with a far-reaching forum in which to present their work.
- Atlanta ReviewA publication of poetry, fiction, art, interviews, parts-of-novels and creative non-fiction.
- Black Music Research Journal.Black Music Research Journal includes articles about the philosophy, aesthetics, history, and criticism of black music. BMRJ is an official journal of the Center for Black Music Research and is published by the University of Illinois Press.
- Black Renaissance/Renaissance NoireAn academic journal that publishes literature and art pertaining to contemporary Black concerns. Includes essays, poetry, fiction, photography, art, and reviews and commentary. Published three times a year in English, French and Spanish.
- Black sacred music : a journal of theomusicologyPublished from 1987 to 1995, Black Sacred Music sought to establish theomusicology—a theologically informed musicology—as a distinct discipline, incorporating methods from anthropology, sociology, psychology, and philosophy to examine the full range of black sacred music.
- Reconfigurations: A Journal for Poetics & PoetryRECONFIGURATIONS is a peer-reviewed international journal for poetics & poetry, creative & scholarly writing, innovative & traditional concerns with literary arts & cultural studies.
- Journal of Modern LiteratureA scholarly journal devoted to modern literature from all continents, covering the period from 1900 to the present. Emphasis is on archival studies, literary history, and literary culture contributed by scholars worldwide.
- The Kenyon ReviewInternational literary journal containing poetry, fiction, essays, and book reviews.
- Kirkus reviewsMagazine previewing over 5000 books each year, including adult fiction and nonfiction hardcovers and trade paperbacks, as well as children's and young adult titles.
- Modern fiction studiesMFS publishes scholarly essays that analyze the important aesthetic, cultural, political, and environmental developments currently shaping today’s academic and public conversations. A leading international literature and humanities journal, MFS focuses on the various modalities and uses of fiction in the broadest sense of the term—publishing material designed to speak to a wide audience of scholars, public intellectuals, and cultural practitioners working across diverse fields, regions, and venues.
- Modern Language ReviewArticles and reviews on medieval and modern European languages (French, Italian, Hispanic, German, Dutch, Scandinavian, Slavonic and Eastern European) and literatures (including English) for members of the Modern Humanities Research Association.
- Oral TraditionOral Tradition seeks to provide a comparative and interdisciplinary focus for studies in oral literature and related fields by publishing research and scholarship on the creation, transmission, and interpretation of all forms of oral traditional expression.