Citation Resources
The most often used citation styles are below.
Chicago Manual of Style Online
MLA Formatting and Style Guide at Purdue's Online Writing Lab
Organize your sources using Zotero.
Talk to a librarian now!
Finding Sources
Also known as "Scholarly Articles,", "Peer-Reviewed Articles," or "Academic Articles," these are:
- Written and reviewed by scholars and provide new research, analysis, or information about a specific topic.
- "Review" means the article is approved by other experts before publication
- Usually focused on a narrow subject or a single case study
- Intended for an academic audience
Why You Should Use Them:
- Information is based on research and expertise
- Information is detailed and focused on a narrow topic
- The peer-review process (mostly) insures that the information is accurate
- They add to a growing understanding of a topic by contributing new ideas
Find Composition and Literature Articles:
- Arts & Humanities Database This link opens in a new windowFeatures hundreds of titles covering Art, Architecture, Design, History, Philosophy, Music, Literature, Theatre and Cultural Studies.
- Project Muse This link opens in a new windowIs a leading provider of digital humanities and social science content for the scholarly community. Includes books and journals.
- MLA International Bibliography This link opens in a new windowIndex to scholarly research pertaining to literature, language, linguistics, and folklore, 1963-present.
- ABC-CLIO eBook Collection This link opens in a new windowTopics covered include literary criticism, American history and culture, geography and world cultures, military history, popular culture, race and ethnicity, religion, science, security studies, the arts, women's studies, and world history.
- African-American Poetry This link opens in a new windowPoems written by African-American poets in the late 18th and 19th centuries, 1750-1900.
- American Poetry This link opens in a new windowAmerican poems from the Colonial Period to the early 20th century, 1600-1900.
- ComPileInventory of publications in writing studies, including post-secondary composition, rhetoric, technical writing, ESL, and discourse analysis.
- Early English Books Online This link opens in a new windowDigital images of books printed in England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and British North America and works in English printed elsewhere from 1473-1700.
- Faber Poetry Library This link opens in a new windowPoems by 50 of the most influential poets of the 20th century.
- Gale Literary Index This link opens in a new windowIt combines and cross-references over 165,000 author names, including pseudonyms and variant names, and listings for over 215,000 titles into one source
- Literary Reference Center Plus This link opens in a new windowRelevant information on thousands of authors and their works across literary disciplines and timeframes.
- Literature Resource Center This link opens in a new windowComprehensive and reliable online literature database. Contemporary Authors, Contemporary Authors New Revisions, Dictionary of Literary Biography, Contemporary Literary Criticism and other Gale sources.
- Oxford English Dictionary This link opens in a new windowComprehensive dictionary of the English language.
- Twentieth Century African-American Poetry This link opens in a new windowPoems by 62 of the most important and influential African-American poets of the Twentieth century.
- Twentieth Century English Poetry This link opens in a new windowPoems by English poets of the Twentieth century.
Other Useful Databaes for English:
- Academic Search Complete This link opens in a new windowScholarly full-text journals and peer-reviewed journals covering a wide range of subjects. 1975 to present.
- JSTOR This link opens in a new windowJSTOR is a digital library of academic journals, books, and primary sources. Coverage includes history, economics, political science, demography, mathematics, humanities and social sciences. Some current issues are available now.
- ProQuest Databases This link opens in a new windowA title list of the ProQuest databases that Elon has access to.
Indexes, abstracts and full-text for journals, magazines and newspapers - Arts & Humanities Citation Index This link opens in a new windowIndex of arts and humanities journals. With link to full text journal articles.
All Databases:
Books written by scholars are a good source of information for many topics.
Why You Should Use Them:
- Written on a broad subject
- Easier to read than journal articles, and written for a broad audience
- Often undergo a peer-review process
- May contain a collection of chapters written by different authors
- Contain less recent information, due to the lengthy publication process
Remember: you may only need to read one chapter of a scholarly book!
Find Books:
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Search Belk Library's online system to find both library materials and articles in our databases. Use the search box below to do a basic search on library materials and databases.
Interlibrary Loan:
- Interlibrary LoanIf we don't have the book, chapter or article you need, you can request it here!
Videos and images are available through databaes and online streaming platforms in the library's database collection.
Find Videos & Images:
- Academic Video Online (AVON) This link opens in a new windowOver 68,000 titles spanning a wide range of subjects: anthropology, business, counseling, film, health, history, music, and more. AVON includes a variety of video material with curricular relevance: documentaries, interviews, feature films, performances, news programs and newsreels, demonstrations, and raw footage.
- Artstor This link opens in a new windowMore than 2.5 million images related to art, art history, architecture, painting, photography, and visual and material culture.
- Credo This link opens in a new windowCredo is an easy-to-use tool for starting research. Gather background information on your topic from hundreds of full-text encyclopedias, dictionaries, quotations, and subject-specific titles, as well as 500,000+ images and audio files and over 1,000 videos.
- Docuseek This link opens in a new windowDocuseek streams essential independent, social-issue and environmental films to colleges and universities, providing exclusive access to content from renowned leaders in documentary film distribution, including Bullfrog, Icarus, and First Run Features. NOTE: Films will only be available by faculty/staff request. Click here to order a Docuseek video that we don't have access to already.
- Drama Online This link opens in a new windowDrama Online is a unique online resource published by Bloomsbury Publishing, of over 1,000 full-text plays and 100+ related reference works.
- Films on Demand Video Collection This link opens in a new windowThousands of high quality videos on business & economics, health & medicine, humanities & social sciences, and science & mathematics, as well as travel and fitness programming, home and how-to videos, indie films, and popular music performances. Includes Oscar, Emmy and Peabody award winning documentaries, interviews, instructional and vocational training videos, historical speeches and newsreels.
- Kanopy Streaming Video This link opens in a new windowFor off campus access, please sign in with your Elon username and password.
Large collection of video documentaries and movies from many producers covering many subjects; pop culture, nursing, public health, lgbt issues, social sciences, sciences, political science and events, the arts, global studies, education, etc. NOTE: Kanopy has changed to mediated access and films will only be available by faculty/staff request. Click here to order Kanopy Streaming Videos that we don't have access to already. - Learning On Demand This link opens in a new windowLearning On Demand is a curated repository of educational videos produced by Elon University faculty, staff, and students.