Use article databases to find journals articles (as well as dissertations, book chapters, and other resources) on a specific topic. In some cases, you will be able to link directly from the article database to the full text of the article. If you are unable to link directly to the article from within the article database, then search for the title of the journal (not the author or title of the article) in:

If the journal is available online, then you will find it there.

If the journal is not available online, or the specific issue you need is not available online, then:

You will check to see we have the journal in print format. Search for the title of the journal in:

If the journal article is available neither online, nor in print, then submit a request for the article using:

"Article databases" includes both bibliographic databases (databases that contain records or citations to journal articles) as well as full-text sources. Some bibliographic include some full text.

There are many article databases you can use to find scholarly articles on historical topics. These can yield secondary or primary sources, depending on how you have formulated your research topic. You may need to search several databases and indexes to find a range of articles on your topic. A comprehensive search may include both print and online indexes.

The two main article databases for history are:

America: History & Life and Historical Abstracts are both bibliographic databases: which means that when you search these databases, you are searching records that describe articles, but not the actual articles themselves. Searching these databases is similar to searching in the Online Catalog, in that it's important to take advantage of the subject headings offered. Use the Subject Browser in these databases to select your subject term(s) by clicking on the open book icon to the right of the search box. You can narrow your search by adding a keyword or using more than one subject term. For example, in Historical Abstracts, select "popular culture" as a subject term using the Subject Browser, then narrow your search with a keyword, such as "music" or "Germany." Or search "hip hop" as a keyword (use quotation marks to designate exact phrase), then scan all the records retrieved. Your search results display as short records, which you can expand by clicking on "Expand Record" at the bottom of the record on the right. The full entry shows you an abstract or summary of the article. Click on the blue Discover icon to find out if the full text of the article is available online. If it is not, you will need to search the title of the journal in the UIUC online catalog to learn where the print copy of the journal is located in the Library.

The article databases in this section are bibliographic databases, meaning that when you search these databases, you are searching records (or citations) that describe articles (and other resources like books, book chapters, dissertations, etc.), but not the articles themselves. In a bibliographic database, you will want to take advantage of the subject index, if there is one.