APU Databases
APU has close to 100 databases to assist you in your research. Most of these databases will help you find journal articles. However, there are many more types of content that you will discover in these databases, such as streaming music (Classical Music Library), electronic books (Ebrary and EBSCO Ebook Collection), art images (ARTstor), just to name a few.
To access the databases...
- Go to the library website and click "All Databases."
- For databases relevant to your class, click on the drop-down list of databases by subject or major, and then click on "Theology/Religion/Philosophy" or "Global Studies/Sociology."
Need help using ATLA Religion database? Take a look at the following guide:
Recommended Databases
The following databases will provide you with journal articles, book reviews, essays, and more. Take a look at some of the information in the box to the right for instructions on effective database searching. When searching in these databases, try using some of the search terms listed in the "Find Books" section of this guide.
- ATLA Religion Database with ATLAS PLUS This link opens in a new window
- Combines the premier index to journal articles, book reviews, and collections of essays in all fields of religion with ATLA's online collection of major religion and theology journals. Also includes content from the ATLA Catholic Periodical and Literature Index.
- About
- Religion Database This link opens in a new window
- Religion Database provides a wide range of primarily full-text periodicals and other sources for diverse religious and spiritual studies, covering formal theological studies and commentary on topics of general interest from the perspectives of many worldwide religions. As well as scholarly journals there are many titles from religious publishing bodies and nondenominational organizations. The resource reflects a wide spectrum of religious belief systems and supports the global study of religion.
Multi-Disciplinary Databases
The subject-specific databases listed in the section above are the best places to start searching for theological materials, but you will probably also benefit from searching in some of the multi-disciplinary databases. Here are a few that I would recommend:
- Academic Search Premier This link opens in a new window
- Provides full text for nearly 4,000 scholarly publications, including full text for more than 3,100 peer-reviewed journals in a wide variety of academic study and offers information dating as far back as 1975.
- About
- JSTOR Full Collection This link opens in a new window
- JSTOR contains digitized back runs of over six hundred core scholarly journals in the arts, humanities, and social sciences, some dating as far back as the 1600s. Includes all of JSTOR including the archive collections of JSTOR 1-15, Business IV, Ecology & Botany II, Hebrew Journals, Ireland, Jewish Studies, & Life Sciences. The thematic collections: Lives of Literature, Security Studies, & Sustainability. And the primary source collections: World Heritage Sites: Africa, Struggles for Freedom: Southern Africa, & Global Plants.
What's A Library Database?
Finding Scholarly Articles
As with finding news articles (see 'Finding News Articles' box on this page), in most databases you can limit your search to scholarly articles at the beginning of your search, or when you already have a results list.
Before you enter your search terms, look for a way to limit your search to only scholarly/peer-reviewed articles, as you see in the example below.
You might also be able to narrow your results list to only scholarly/peer-reviewed articles if you didn't do it at the beginning of your search (see example).
Finding Full Text Articles Online
There are usually a couple of scenarios in which you find yourself needing to know if APU Libraries can provide you with a particular journal article: 1) you found a journal article listed in a bibliography, or a syllabus, or elsewhere, and you'd really like to get it, or 2) you're searching in one of the many journal article databases, and you find an article in the results list that you want, but you don't see a full-text link. In the first case, a tool called 'Article Finder' will be helpful, and in the second case, the 'Full Text Finder' links will assist you.
Have a Particular Article You Want to Find? Use Article Finder!
When you want to know if APU Libraries can provide you with a particular journal article you have citation information for, Article Finder is the tool for you. Follow these steps:
- Go to the library website: http://www.apu.edu/library/
- Click on the 'Articles and Databases' tab, and then on the 'Article Finder' link (see graphic below).
- Type in at least the journal title (or ISSN), volume, issue and the article title, and click 'Search' or 'Go.' More information is good, too. If you have a DOI, no other information is necessary.
- If the article is available in full-text for you to read online, you will be taken to a page displaying linked options for full text availability for the article and you can follow the link(s) to your database of choice when any such options are displayed and then find the article. [Note: This functionality may change with our new library system in 2022.]
- If there are no full text listings, this means that it isn't available in any of our databases nor in our print holdings. You will see a form with most of the citation filled out. Fill out any other citation information if necessary, and submit the form. You will receive the article in your email within 2-10 business days if it's available from our partner libraries. See the interlibrary loan services section of the library website.
- If you are having problems using Article Finder, or if you're interested in simply checking to see if APU has a particular journal title, use the search box on the 'Journal Titles' tab. As opposed to Article Finder which takes complete citation information, Periodical Finder only requires the journal title to be inputted to check holdings. If we have that journal in our databases, you will see a "virtual shelf" listing of the volume numbers available and you can click on the volume link and then use "search within" to find the needed article.
Found a Great Article in a Database but No Full Text? Use Full Text Finder!
Before following the instructions below, note that not all of our databases will have Full Text Finder links (but most will).
- When you've performed a search in one of the journal article databases, and you have a list of results, you'll eventually start noticing that some results will have a full-text link (which means you can access the article online), and others have a Full Text Finder link (which means the database you're using does not provide access to the article online):
- Click on the Full Text Finder link. You will be taken to a page listing links to possible options for finding or requesting the full text of the article, including: Full Text - APU Licensed Resources (when it's available in any other databases) and ILL/Interlibrary Loan for APU patrons that has a link to a form so that you can request it via our ILL team - fill out any additional information, submit the form, and you should receive the article by email within 2-10 business days. Additional groups of Browse options by journal title, author or article can be found there as well that can be pursued to try to unearth full text, but the most useful are the above-mentioned APU Licensed Resources (which sometimes includes Open Access as well), ILL services or searching APU's catalog to determine if we have the journal (and the volume and issue needed) in our print collection and then go to the library and make a copy or scan of it.
