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University Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Religious Studies 235: History of Religion in America: Diversity, Discord, Dialogue

Course guide.

Introduction

On this page are sources of ready-information for questions like, what was  A.J. Tomlinson's role in forming the Church of God Prophecy

Use also to confirm information you find in places like Wikipedia: these sources tend to be perceived as more credible, so you can cite them in a paper with confidence.

Finally, reference sources often include bibliographies, making them profitable places to begin a research project.

Three online reference collections that students often find useful are Gale Virtual Reference Library and Credo Reference.

Guides and Bibliogaphies

3. Encyclopedias and Dictionaries

Encyclopedias attempt to summarize the state of knowledge in a field of inquiry. A good encyclopedia can be a valuable starting point for your research. There are dozens and dozens of good encyclopedias and dictionaries for religious studies--below is a sample of some we think will be relevant for this class, but don't hesitate to ask if you're looking for a work with a different emphasis.

4. Directories, Statistics, Atlases

5. Biographies

2 good online sources for biographical information are Biography and Geneaology Master Index, and Biography in Context. Below we've listed some sources that are specific to American religious history.