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Reference Books (Print and Electronic)
- Credo Reference This link opens in a new windowOver 700 reference books covering a variety of disciplines and including foreign language dictionaries. Includes a concept map, which provides related subjects and noted personalities to assist beginning research.
- Johns Hopkins Guide to Literary Theory and Criticism / REFERENCE PN 81.J554 2005
- Oxford English Dictionary This link opens in a new windowSearchable version of the 20-volume set. Defines and identifies earliest known examples of words in written English.
Article Databases
Article Databases: Ranked by Relevance
= Emmanuel Faculty, Staff & Students only
= Emmanuel Faculty, Staff & Students only- Ebsco search for English/LiteratureSearch across the following databases:
- Academic Search Premier
- MLA International Bibliography
Offers detailed bibliography of journal articles, books, dissertations. Produced by the Modern Language Association and coverage dates back to the 1920s. - Humanities International Complete
Features are literary critique content and inclusion of original works of poetry, short fiction, photography, illustrations, and artwork. This database was originally funded by a gift from the Emmanuel College Class of 2006.
- JSTOR This link opens in a new windowA total of more than 900 full-text scholarly journal titles in an online archive beginning with the first issue of each title. The archive includes nine JSTOR Arts and Sciences Collections.
- In JSTOR, there is usually a time lag in full-text content. Use JSTOR in conjunction with our current online databases and print holdings.
- Since results may contain articles that are not peer reviewed, search for the journal title using the A-Z Journals by Title list to verify the journal's peer-reviewed status.
- Project MUSE This link opens in a new windowAll journal titles in Project MUSE are peer reviewed, scholarly titles. Project MUSE covers the fields of literature and criticism, history, the visual and performing arts, cultural studies, education, political science, gender studies, economics, and many others.
- Literature Online This link opens in a new windowTexts of over 355,000 literary works with searchable, full-text criticism and reference resources for the study of literature in English. Literature Online also provides searchable indexes of literary criticism, including ABELL (Annual Bibliography of English Language and Literature) and the full text of over 330 literature journals
- Gale Literature Resource Center - LRC This link opens in a new windowFind up-to-date biographical information, overviews, full-text literary criticism and reviews on more than 130,000 writers in all disciplines, from all time periods and from around the world. The optional MLA International Bibliography module adds citations for hundreds of thousands of books, articles and dissertations from 1926 to the present, linked to full text where available.
- Google Scholar This link opens in a new window
- Click on the Full-Text@Emmanuel at the right of articles or the more option below the item record.
- Search for the journal title using the A-Z Journals by Title list to verify the journals peer-reviewed status.
Relevant Course Guides
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Literary criticism overview
Literary Criticism “is the overall term for studies concerned with defining, classifying, analyzing, interpreting, and evaluating works of literature” (Abrams, 1993, p. 39).
Works of literary criticism may focus on:
- an individual author,
- a group of authors, a genre,
- a time frame or historical period,
- an individual work (e.g. a poem, novel, short story, etc.),
- or a particular literary theory.
Works Cited
Abrams, Meyer Howard. A Glossary of Literary Terms. 6th ed., Harcourt Brace Jovanovich College Publishers, 1993.