How to Find a Journal Article
- Roll Tide Research - Generating Keywords and Developing a Search StrategyThis interactive tutorial demonstrates how to take a research question and develop that into useful keywords for a broader database searching strategy.
- Roll Tide Research - Searching 101This online module is a collection of videos that will introduce you to basic concepts and techniques used for finding resources using Scout, the Libraries discovery tool, as well as some of our other tools for finding resources.
- ILLInterlibrary Loan (ILL) provides free access to materials needed for coursework and research not available in the UA Libraries. If an item is not available at the University of Alabama libraries, you may request it through ILLiad, our InterLibrary Loan system. Visit the libraries' ILLiad page and login with your myBama username and password to make a request.
Searching in Scout
- Scout This link opens in a new window
The University of Alabama's discovery service, searching content from hundreds of electronic databases, print resources from our library catalog, ebooks, videos, news and more.
Multidisciplinary Databases
If you're looking for scholarly journal articles across subject areas, the following databases are your best bet.
- Academic Search Premier This link opens in a new window
Multi-disciplinary database; articles from journals and other publications. coves business, education. history, literature, medicine, philosophy, politics, and technology.
- Google Scholar This link opens in a new window
Google Scholar is a freely available scholarly search engine that allows you to search across many disciplines and sources: peer-reviewed papers, theses, books, abstracts and articles – from academic publishers, professional societies, preprint repositories, universities and other scholarly organizations.
- JSTOR This link opens in a new window
Images of the full text of many scholarly titles in a range of subject areas, including literature, biological sciences, economics, finance, and statistics. Search the archive or pull up a specific article.
- Project MUSE This link opens in a new window
Project MUSE provides full-text access scholarly journals in the humanities and social sciences. The database is a collaboration between Johns Hopkins University and other university presses and not-for-profit publishers. Also included are the UPCC collections in Asian and Pacific Studies, and Poetry, Fiction and Creative Non-Fiction.
Subject Databases
If you're looking for scholarly journal articles from a specific subject area, these databases are your best bet.
- L'Année Philologique This link opens in a new window
L’Année philologique, published by the Société Internationale de Bibliographie Classique, is a specialized bibliographic database of scholarly works relating to all aspects of Ancient Greek and Roman civilizations .The database includes all volumes of the annual index, beginning with Volume I published in 1928.
- ATLA Religion Database with ATLASerials This link opens in a new window
ATLA Religion Database with ATLASerials is the full text version of the ATLA Religion Database. This database provides a collection of major religious and theology journals selected by religion scholars in the United States.
- MLA International Bibliography with Full Text This link opens in a new window
Consists of bibliographic records pertaining to literature, language, linguistics, and folklore, and includes coverage from 1963 to the present. Provides access to scholarly research in journals and series, and covers relevant monographs, working papers, proceedings, bibliographies, and other formats.
- Philosopher's Index This link opens in a new windowWeb-based version of printed Philosophers' Index with abstracts covering scholarly research in the fifteen fields of philosophy, published in journals and books since 1940. The database cites works in English, Spanish, German, French, Italian, Russian, Chinese and Japanese.
Evaluating Journals
Want to know if the journal you're looking at is influential? Check out these advanced resources for comprehensive data on literature and social science journals.
- MLA Directory of Periodicals This link opens in a new window
Contains information on the journals and series on the MLA bibliography's Master List of Periodicals. The entries include editorial contact information, as well as frequency, circulation, subscription prices and submission guidelines. Provides statistics on number of articles and book reviews published and submitted each year.
- Journal Citation Reports This link opens in a new window
A comprehensive resource that allows users to evaluate and compare journals using citation data drawn from scholarly and technical journals. It is the only source of citation data on journals, and includes virtually all areas of science, technology, and social sciences.
- Ulrichsweb: Ulrich's International Periodicals Directory This link opens in a new windowUlrich's International Periodicals Directory provides data on regularly published and irregularly issued serials since 1979. This reference provides purchasing and contact information (conventional and electronic) for publishers in various countries.
