LibGuides: Religious Studies: Articles & Databases

Finding Scholarly Articles, Dissertations, and Theses

These databases are available from the University Libraries Databases page:

Academic Search Complete This link opens in a new window
1965-present, semi-scholarly database provides full text and abstracts from over 8000 journals.
Description: Good database for most research topics and contains lots of full text, peer reviewed articles. More than 18,000 of the journal titles indexed are peer reviewed and almost all of the full text is. Provides searchable cited references for more than 1,000 journal titles so you can easily see what sources a given article cites.
Time Period: 1911 to present
Sources: Indexes nearly 18,000 journals and magazine and provides full text for more than 8,700.
Subject Headings: Art & Architecture, Business, Education, English & Linguistics, General, Health, History, Humanities, Law, Music, News, Philosophy & Religion, Psychology, Science, Social Sciences, Technology
Scholarly or Popular: Semi-scholarly
Primary Materials: Abstracts, Case Studies, Citations, Conference Papers, Images, Journal Articles, Magazine Articles, News, Other, Reviews
Information Included: Abstracts,Full Text,Citations
FindIt@BALL STATE: Yes
Print Equivalent: None
Publisher: EBSCO
Updates: Daily
Number of Simultaneous Users: Unlimited
Dissertations and Theses Global This link opens in a new window
1861 to date. An index to all U.S. dissertations accepted at accredited institutions since 1861.
Description: A key source for discovering doctoral dissertations and master's theses in all fields from around the world. Some 250,000 new dissertations from leading academic institutions are added to the database each year, many with full text and/ or a free 24 page preview. This includes some from Ball State University, others can be found in Cardinal Scholar. The full text may be purchased for most dissertations added since 1997.
Note: Dissertations and theses from other institutions can be obtained at a discount through our Interlibrary Loan department. Contact them for details at (765) 285-1324.

Time Period: 17th century to present
Sources: Indexes nearly 5 million dissertations and theses and includes the full text of 3 million.
Subject Headings: Art & Architecture, Business, Education, English & Linguistics, General, Health, History, Humanities, Law, Music, Philosophy & Religion, Psychology, Science, Social Sciences, Technology (Dissertations and Theses)
Scholarly or Popular: Scholarly
Primary Materials: Abstracts, Citations, Dissertation and Theses
Information Included: Abstracts, Citations
FindIt@BALL STATE: Yes
Print Equivalent: None
Publisher: ProQuest
Updates: Monthly
Number of Simultaneous Users: Unlimited
JSTOR This link opens in a new window
Scholarly database provides historic full text access to over 140 important journals in Religious Studies. Often does not contain the most recent years of a journal.
Description: JSTOR allows you to search across approximately 2,000 journal titles from more than 50 disciplines. It contains complete backfiles of scholarly journals starting with the first issues, many of which date back from the 1800s. Although the majority of titles do not have the most recent 3 to 5 years available in full text, there are some which have the current issues available.

Note: Additional content has been permanently added to JSTOR, including archived journal collections and primary resources. Searches performed using the databases page link will include results from the additional sources, as will the link above.

Time Period: 19th century to present
Sources: Provides the full text for approximately 2,000 journals.
Subject Headings: Art & Architecture, Business, Education, English & Linguistics, General, Health, History, Humanities, Law, Mobile, Music, Philosophy & Religion, Psychology, Science, Social Sciences, Technology
Scholarly or Popular: Scholarly
Primary Materials: Citations, Journal Articles, Reviews
Information Included: Full Text, Citations
FindIt@BALL STATE: No
Print Equivalent: None
Publisher: JSTOR
Updates: Daily
Number of Simultaneous Users: Unlimited
Philosopher's Index This link opens in a new window
Covers over 680 scholarly journals as well as books and conference proceedings on the topic of philosophy.
Description: Philosophers Index is a key database to philosophy and related disciplines.
Time Period: 1940's to present
Sources: Indexes more than 1,500 journals.
Subject Headings: History, Humanities, Mobile, Philosophy & Religion (Philosophy)
Scholarly or Popular: Scholarly
Primary Materials: Journal articles, books, conference proceedings
Information Included: Citations and abstracts
FindIt@BALL STATE: No
Print Equivalent: None
Publisher: Philosopher Information Center
Updates: Quarterly
Number of Simultaneous Users: Unlimited
Religion and Philosophy Collection This link opens in a new window
Religion and Philosophy Collection provides access to scholarly journals and magazines related to an array of topics connected with religion, church history, and philosophy; including ethics, logic, and epistemology.
Description: Religion and Philosophy Collection provides access to scholarly journals and magazines related to an array of topics connected with religion, church history, and philosophy; including ethics, logic, and epistemology.
Time Period: 1960's to present
Sources: Indexes more than 260 journals and magazines, 222 of which are peer-reviewed, and 207 are in full text.
Subject Headings: Philosophy and Religion
Scholarly or Popular: Scholarly
Primary Materials: Journal Articles, Magazine Articles
Information Included: Full Text, Citations, Abstracts
Print Equivalent: None
FindIt@BALL STATE: Yes
Publisher: EBSCO
Updates: Daily
Number of Simultaneous Users: Unlimited

Finding News and Current Events Related to Religious Studies

These databases are available from the University Libraries Articles & Databases page:

Access World News This link opens in a new window
1977-present, popular database provides full text from over 1400 major U.S., regional, and international newspapers and magazines.
Description: Articles from 1,000's of newspapers around the world. Provides full text access to many local and regional newspapers in the U.S. Also contains magazine articles, transcripts, videos, and other sources.
Time Period: 1977 to present
Sources: Contains articles from 3,200 sources including newspapers, blogs, and magazines.
Subject Headings: General, News
Scholarly or Popular: Popular
Primary Materials: Audio, Citations, Magazine Articles, News, Reviews, Trade Publications, Transcripts, Videos
Information Included: Full Text,Citations
FindIt@BALL STATE: No
Print Equivalent: None
Publisher: NewsBank
Updates: Daily
Number of Simultaneous Users: Unlimited
Nexis Uni This link opens in a new window
semi-scholarly database provides full text frome more than 32,000 legal, news and business sources.
Description: Nexis Uni provides access to newspaper articles, magazine articles, and transcripts. It is also a key database for business and legal research, containing company reports, law journals, and statutes and cases from all 50 states. Also contains legal resources for Canada and the EU.
Time Period: 18th century to present
Sources: Searches more than 15,000 sources.
Subject Headings: Business, General, Law, News, Social Sciences
Scholarly or Popular: Semi-scholarly
Primary Materials: Abstracts, Citations, Journal Articles, Legal Materials, Magazine Articles, News, Reference Resources, Report, Transcripts
Information Included: Abstracts, Full Text, Citations
FindIt@BALL STATE: No
Print Equivalent: None
Publisher: Lexis Nexis
Updates: Daily
Number of Simultaneous Users: Unlimited
Newspaper Source Plus This link opens in a new window
1995-present, index to recent newspaper and TV or radio news reports. Full text and abstracts.
Description: Newspaper Source Plus indexes recent newspapers and TV or radio news reports. Includes the Christian Science Monitor, USA Today, New York Times, and many regional or local newspapers. Full text television & radio news transcripts are provided from CBS News, FOX News, NPR, etc.
Time Period: 1995-present (many newspapers only 2000-present)
Sources: Approximately 1,000 newspapers
Subject Headings: News
Scholarly or Popular: Popular
Primary Materials: News
Information Included: Abstracts,Full Text,Citations
FindIt@BALL STATE: Yes
Print Equivalent: None
Publisher: EBSCO
Updates: Daily
Number of Simultaneous Users: Unlimited

Find It @ Ball State: Helping you find the full text of the title you want

What's "Find It"?

When you' button with this text: "Find It @ Ball State" re using a database, and can't find a link to the full text of an article, look for a Find It @ Ball State button.

Find It helps you to search the Libraries' other databases and subscriptions to see if the full text is available through another resource.

If it is available, Find It provides a link to the text of the article.
If it cannot find the full-text, Find It provides a link to Interlibrary Loan so that you can request that we get a copy of the article from another library.

To use Find It, click on the red Find It @ Ball State button.

If we DO have full text access to the article, a page will be displayed with options for access under "Full Text Format Options." The typical options are:

PDF: the file format reflecting the formatting for a printed page
Link: taking you to the webpage version of the article

red arrow pointing to area with Full Text Format Options

If we do NOT have immediate full text access to the article, the OneSearch record for the article will be displayed.

Look under "Links" for "Request this item with InterLibrary Loan / ILLiad."
Click there, and log in with your Ball State username and password.
More information about placing an Interlibrary Loan request.

Links "Request the item with Interlibrary Loan / ILLiad"