LibGuides: English: Databases

What are databases?

Library databases are online resources you can search to find reliable information from trusted sources. Databases can be general or subject specific and can include a wide range of content including full text journal articles, ebooks, reports, abstracts, conference proceedings etc.

Library Search is a database of databases and allows you to search the content of most databases in one go.

The databases listed below are databases which are particularly relevant to your subject.

Check this link for a list of all individual databases bought by the library.

Databases

English Literature

ProQuest One Literature This link opens in a new window
ProQuest One Literature (formerly known as the Literature Online or LION database) contains 3 million literature citations from thousands of journals, monographs, dissertations, and more than 500,00 primary works. These primary texts include works of poetry, prose and drama from the 8th century to the present day.
The database provides access to more than 1,200 full text journals, with oldest articles dating back to 1850. It also includes audio and video content through its Poets on Screen recordings of poets reading their own and others' work and the Shakespeare Audio Plays collection.
ProQuest One Literature is comprised of different literary collections, including early English and American works. The database also includes collections that focus on Black, Latin American and South/Southeast Asian literature and writers.
Please click on the following online guide for more ProQuest One Literature information and support.

Arts and Performing Arts

Performing Arts Periodicals Database This link opens in a new window
Performing Arts Periodicals Database indexes around 400 scholarly and trade journals, magazines, books, and newspapers covering theater, dance, film, television, stagecraft, broadcast arts, storytelling, and more. It draws from both current files and selected backfiles to 1864 and 134 publications are included in full text.
International Bibliography of Theatre and Dance with Full Text This link opens in a new window
A full text database covering theatre and drama. Plus additional full text available for more than 100 books and monographs.
Includes the following key journals: Canadian Theatre Review, Dance Chronicle, Dance Teacher, Modern Drama, PAJ: A Journal of Performance and Art, Research in Dance Education, Research in Drama Education, Studies in Theatre and Performance, TDR: The Drama Review, Theater, and many more
Art Full Text (H.W. Wilson) This link opens in a new window
Art Full Text is a comprehensive online resource for art information featuring full-text articles from more than 300 periodicals dating back to 1995, high-quality indexing and abstracting of over 600 periodicals dating as far back as 1984, including 280 peer-reviewed journals, as well as indexing and abstracting of over 13,000 art dissertations. Indexing of almost 200,000 art reproductions provides examples of styles and art movements, including works by emerging artists. The database covers fine, decorative and commercial art, folk art, photography, film, and architecture, and also includes a database-specific thesaurus.
Bloomsbury Drama Online Library This link opens in a new window
Drama Online introduces new writers alongside the most iconic names in playwriting history, providing contextual and critical background through scholarly works and practical guides.

Education

Education Research Complete This link opens in a new window
Covers scholarly research and information relating to all areas of education. Topics covered include all levels of education and all educational specialties as well as areas of curriculum instruction, administration, policy, funding, and related social issues. Provides indexing and abstracts for more than 2,150 journals, as well as full text for nearly 1,200 journals, for more than 500 books, and for numerous education-related conference papers.
ERIC (IES) This link opens in a new window
Provides access to the bibliographic database of the United States Education Resources Information Center.
Records cover journal articles and non-journal documents, with some full text, and the archive dates from 1966.
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (ODNB) This link opens in a new window
The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (ODNB) includes over 60,000 biographies, 72 million words, 11,000 portraits of significant, influential or notorious figures who shaped British history.

Academic Search Premier This link opens in a new window
EBSCO's Academic Search Premier is a multi-disciplinary database that provides active full text for more than 3,100 journals, including active full text for nearly 2,750 peer-reviewed titles.
Black Lives Matter learning resource (Exact Editions) This link opens in a new window
A freely available Black Lives Matter online learning resource, featuring a rich collection of handpicked articles from the digital archives of over 50 different publications.
JSTOR Arts and Sciences III This link opens in a new window
An archive of full text scholarly journals focussing on the subject areas of performing arts, architecture, art, education, women's studies, film studies, language and literature, linguistics, and music.

Please note current issues of journals are not included.
ProQuest Central This link opens in a new window
ProQuest Central is the largest single periodical resource available, bringing together complete databases across all major subject areas, including Business, Health and Medical, Language and Literature, Social Sciences, Education, Science and Technology, as well as core titles in the Performing and Visual Arts, History, Religion, Philosophy, and includes thousands of full-text newspapers from around the world.
Taylor and Francis Online This link opens in a new window
This platform provides online access to over 2,000 full text journals across many different subject areas, including Literature, History, Sociology and Social Policy, Criminology, Mathematics, Environmental Science and Sustainability, Physical Science and Information Science.
African Diaspora, 1860-Present This link opens in a new window
Essential for understanding Black history and culture, this online resource allows scholars to discover the migrations, communities, and ideologies of the African Diaspora through the voices of people of African descent.

This collection includes never-before digitised primary source documents, including personal papers, organisational papers, journals, newsletters, court documents, letters, and ephemera. The collection has a number of key partners like The National Archives and Records Administration (US), National Archives at Kew (UK), Royal Anthropological Institute, and Senate House Library (University of London).

Lexis+ UK Newspapers This link opens in a new window
To access UK national and regional newspapers through the Lexis+ platform, click on the Content tab from the Lexis+ homepage and then select Newspapers.

Please note: LexisNexis terms and conditions do not permit the uploading of Lexis content into third party applications, including artificial intelligence technologies such as large language models and generative AI (e.g. ChatGPT, Bing, Google Bard and Harvey).
ProQuest Central This link opens in a new window
ProQuest Central is the largest single periodical resource available, bringing together complete databases across all major subject areas, including Business, Health and Medical, Language and Literature, Social Sciences, Education, Science and Technology, as well as core titles in the Performing and Visual Arts, History, Religion, Philosophy, and includes thousands of full-text newspapers from around the world.

Early English Books Online (EEBO via ProQuest) This link opens in a new window
EEBO features page images of almost every work printed in the British Isles and North America, as well as works in English printed elsewhere from 1470-1700. From the first book printed in English through to the ages of Spenser, Shakespeare and of the English Civil War, EEBO's content draws on authoritative and respected short-title catalogues of the period and features a substantial number of text transcriptions specifically created for the product.
British Library Newspapers This link opens in a new window
Newspapers selected from the British Library's collections, including the Leicester Chronicle, from 1840-1900.
Europeana Collections This link opens in a new window
Explore hundreds of thousands of artworks, artefacts, films, music and newspapers from European museums, galleries, libraries and archives.
ProQuest Historical Newspapers: The Guardian (1821-2003) and The Observer (1791-2003) This link opens in a new window
ProQuest's Historical Newspapers provides genealogists, researchers and scholars with online, easily-searchable first-hand accounts and unparalleled coverage of the politics, society and events of the time.
Times Digital Archive (1785-2019) This link opens in a new window
Access to full text of The Times newspaper from 1785 to 2019.
19th Century UK Periodicals This link opens in a new window
Collection of 100 periodicals covering British life in the 19th century. This is a multi-part series covering the events, lives, values and themes that shaped the 19th century world. Series I on New Readerships provides access to close to 100 periodicals for the study of British life in the 19th century - from women to sports and leisure, and from children to humour.

Oxford English Dictionary (OED) This link opens in a new window
A guide to the meaning, pronunciation, usage and history of words from across the English-speaking world.