Politics in Film, Literature, & Theory

Need help with your research? Contact:

Martha Stevenson,
Reference Librarian
Phone: x3601
msteven@muhlenberg.edu

Reference Desk Hours:
Call or email to confirm
M 5-9 p.m.
T,Th 10 a.m.-12 p.m.
W,F 12-1 p.m.

Office hours (by appt.):
Call or email to arrange


A good place to start. . .

  Reference works

     generally. . .

The Dictionary of National Biography (Ref Collection 920 D5543) is a standard source for major figures in British history. The American National Biography (Ref Collection 920.073 A512n) is the standard for U.S. biography.

      for literary biography. . .

An excellent source for concise and scholarly biographical sketches of European authors (including prose writers such as Marx) from the 18th century to the present is the Dictionary of literary biography (Ref Collection 810.920 D554). Entries are scholarly. See also European writers (Ref Collection 809.20 E89w), though this source contains more literary criticism than biography.

For more contemporary figures like Joe Klein, see Contemporary Authors (Ref Collection 809.20 C761n). (NOTE: Many literary biography reference books are indexed for free online at Gale Literary Index (http://www.galenet.com/servlet/LitIndex).)

Literary biography is often divided by country of origin, and so literary biography of modern Europe may also be contained in such works as Reference Guide to Russian Literature (Ref Collection 891.703 C821r), Oxford Companion to German Literature (Ref Collection 830.3 G233o), Guide to French Literature (Ref Collection 840.3 L664g), and Dictionary of Italian Literature (Ref Collection 850.3 D554).

      heads of state. . .

Historic World Leaders (Ref Collection 920.02 H673w) focuses on kings and others heads of state throughout history.

      philosophers. . .

Leading participants in the history of ideas are described in standard sources like the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Ref Collection 103 R869e) and the New Dictionary of the History of Ideas (Ref Collection 903 N532d).

      film and filmmakers. . .

For information on films and filmmakers, see Film directors : a complete guide (Ref Collection 791.430233 S617m), International dictionary of films and filmmakers (Ref Collection 791.4303 I61d), and World film directors (Ref Collection 791.430233 W927f). Includes directors who directed from 1890-1985.

  Books
    Books can be found locally by searching the Trexler Library Catalog (http://www.muhlenberg.edu/library).

    hint: when looking for biographies on a famous person, try a SUBJECT search with the person's last name, for example "machiavelli" or "huxley" or, in the case of monarchs, "george iii" or louis xiv."

    It may be useful to also try a keyWORD search on a person's name, for example "machiavelli." This type of search will bring up both books and chapters/essays on the author and his work.

    To expand your book search considerably, try WorldCat. Go to the Trexler Library Home Page (http://www.muhlenberg.edu/library) - Find Books, Videos, Music - WorldCat. WorldCat is a powerful search tool for books on any subject.

    Use WorldCat in conjunction with Interlibrary Loan.
Articles
    Periodical databases pertaining to this subject area can be located by going to the Trexler Library Home Page (http://www.muhlenberg.edu/library) - Find Articles A-Z.

    Subscribed to by Muhlenberg College for a substantial fee, these databases can be accessed without restriction on campus, or from home by entering your name and college ID.

    NOTE: Not all databases are full text. Many of the best are indexes only, to be used in conjunction with the library's journal collection, with interlibrary loan, or possibly with another database. Such indexes (MLA, PsycInfo, Historical Abstracts, etc.) contain a depth of information and level of organization in their specialty areas unmatched by any other database or search engine.

     General indexes with full text

Academic Search Premier is a good starting place for journals, and includes the full text of about 4500 journals. Limit to "peer reviewed" to find only scholarly articles. Back issues of journals begin as early as 1975. Recent issues may not be included yet, due to publisher agreement.

JSTOR is a full text archival database of important scholarly journals. It is not a current issues databases. Typically there is a gap of 1-5 years between the most recent issue and the back issues available through JSTOR.

Similarly, Omnifile (WilsonWeb) includes extensive full text and a search can be restricted to "peer reviewed" to retrieve only scholarly articles. 

     Subject-specialty indexes

Try America History & Life for journal articles on American history. Not full text. Extensive in coverage. Useful for nitty-gritty historical detail.

Try Historical Abstracts for journal articles on European and all other non-U.S. history. Not full text. Extensive in coverage. Useful for nitty-gritty historical detail, coverage of subjects from medieval age to present.

MLA is the standard index for journal articles of literary criticism.

     Articles via interlibrary loan

Journal articles not found in Trexler Library can be ordered by following this path: Trexler Library Home Page (http://www.muhlenberg.edu/library) - Services & Forms - ILL. Then click on "Articles" in the left sidebar.

     Searching for a specific journal

To check to see if the library has access to the full text of a specific journal, whether online or in print, you will need to do a "Journal title" search in the library catalog.

  Web sites, web directories, and search engines
    One of the difficulties of using information retrieved through even the better search engines like Google (http://www.google.com) is identifying the source and thus the reliability of the data. One way to screen web sites for authority and reliability is to use a web directory rather than the a simple search engine. Web directories vary in restrictiveness, but all have some sort of rating system for site inclusion. One web directory that selects the best web sites on a variety of topics is Librarian's Index to the Internet (http://lii.org/).

    Such web directories point to such scholarly web sites as Philosophy Since the Enlightenment (http://www.philosopher.org.uk/), a project orchestrated by a former philosophy professor from the United Kingdom; and Online Literary Criticism (http://www.ipl.org/div/litcrit/) from the University of Michigan. Both offer authoritative biographical sketches.

  Style guides for composing a bibliography
    For tips on citing print and electronic sources in a bibliography according to the Chicago (Turabian) style or MLA style, follow the path Trexler Library Home Page (http://www.muhlenberg.edu/library) - Research Help - Citation Guides. 

    Also you can consult with Writing Analytically which can be found in the library on reserves at the reference desk (808.042 R816w).

Last Updated 8/28/07

This page authored by Kelly Cannon - Reference Librarian - Trexler Library