Core Sociology Databases

Though journal articles covering issues of interest to sociologists and sociology students can be found in resources from virtually all subject areas, the databases below are often the best places to start for sociology courses and topics:

• SOCIndex: On EBSCO, the same platform as Academic Search Complete, but more focused on sociologial literature.
• Academic Search Complete: large, multidisciplinary and easy to use; includes lots of full-text articles.
• Sociological Abstracts: an authoritative well-indexed source that includes scholarly/academic sociology journals and topics.
• Google Scholar: a simple and powerful way to broadly search for scholarly articles, reports and books. If if you are a novice searcher, however, it may not be easy to decipher the list of results. For off-campus use set your Scholar Preferences or use the Concordia VPN.

Canada and Québec: News & Academic Sources

For news, magazine and journal articles of Canadian origin or covering Canadian subjects (but not necessarily academic or anthropological material) start with these general sources:

• ProQuest Combined Canadian: indexes a wide variety of Canadian sources, from newspapers, transcripts and newsletters, to academic journals and theses.
• Canadian Periodical Index (CPI-Q): newspapers, magazines, journals.
• Factiva: Full text of international newspapers (including Canadian), transcripts and newswires (license for only one user at a time).
• Canadian Newstand: full-text access to Canadian daily newspapers including the Gazette.

En français

• Eureka.cc: full text access to English and French language Québec & Canadian newspapers , magazines, newswires, blogs and broadcast transcripts.
• Érudit: academic journal articles, theses, books and book chapters - mostly from Québec.
• Repère: magazine and academic journal articles, mostly from Québec. No full text.

Related Subject Databases & Research Guides

Below is a sampling of additional useful sources for sociology research:

Multi-subject databases:

• Francis: international scope, though mostly English and French.
• Alternative Press Index: citations to articles from non-mainstream sources. Topics include feminism, ecology, gay and lesbian, indigenous, minorities, anarchism.
• Web of Science: includes social sciences, humanities, arts. Offers citation searching.
• Social Sciences Abstracts and Humanities Abstracts

NOTE: See also Anthropology Databases

Specialized databases:

• Anthropology Plus
• Gender Studies Database
• First Nations Periodical Index
• Index Islamicus
• Bibliography of Asian Studies
• Handbook of Latin American Studies and HAPI Online

NOTE: See also First Peoples Studies and Research Guides in all other subject areas.

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Statistics & Government Information

The sources below can be good starting points for locating local and international statistics, government and country information.

• Statistics and DLI (mainly for Faculty)
• [From the Business Reseach Guide]: Demographic Data and Market & Consumer Data
• International: Country Profiles & Reports & UNdata
• Government Publications and Law & Crime

NOTE: If none of these sources fit the bill or if you have trouble using them, contact me for more suggestions.

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Background: Encyclopedias & Review Journals

REVIEW or SURVEY journals try to give an overview of a topic or research area, and provide long lists of references. Here are two to try:

• Annual Review of Sociology: Note that your searches here will by default include Annual Reviews in multiple subject areas, not just Sociology.
• Sociology Compass

ENCYCLOPEDIAS can provide that all-important background and context for research papers. Here is a sampling:

• Blackwell Encyclopedia of Sociology (2007, with updates): Often the very best place to start for your paper.
• Encyclopedia of Gender and Society (2009)
• International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences (2004)
• Gale Virtual Reference Library and Oxford Reference Online search multiple subject encyclopedias simultaneously.
• International Encyclopedia of Men and Masculinities (2007)
• International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences (2008)
• Encyclopedia of Race and Racism (2008)
• Encyclopedia of Food and Culture (2003)

NOTE: there are many more encyclopedias, reviews or other reference sources (online and in print) that may be appropriate, depending on your topic -- See our Online Reference: Encyclopedias guide or contact me for help.

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DISSERTATIONS AND THESES

• ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Full Text: Over two million doctoral dissertations and masters theses (90% from North America) published since 1861, although most of the full text starts from 1997.

NOTE: See also Concordia University Libraries' guide on How to find theses.

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Accessing the texts your searches revealed

When using library research tools (as well as Google) or in examining bibliographies from encyclopedias and other sources, you will sometimes come across citations to texts or documents that you would like to access as a Concordia student, either online or in the library.

To find out if you can access the text of any source, you must first determine whether it is a book, book chapter or journal article. If you can't tell, get help from one of our Ask a Librarian services.

TO ACCESS BOOKS & BOOK CHAPTERS:

• Just use the Title tab in CLUES to look for the name of the BOOK (not the book chapter).
• You can also use the Author tab in CLUES to look for the LAST name of the AUTHOR or EDITOR of the book (not of the book chapter).

TO ACCESS JOURNAL ARTICLES:

First look for the name of the JOURNAL (not the article title):

• ONLINE: Via our E-journals search box and then select the year, volume and issue that you need.
  
  
• or IN PRINT: Enter the journal title in CLUES and then go to the Webster Periodicals section on the 3rd floor of the library to get the year, volume and issue that you need. Or use our Article Delivery Service, described below

STILL NOT SURE: CITATION INCOMPLETE OR UNCLEAR?

1. Try using Google, Google Scholar or Google Books to find out more and get a complete citation or reference.
   
   
2. You can then look up the citation via the methods above for BOOKS and JOURNAL ARTICLES - though you may even get lucky and directly find the text you need online.

**TIP: In Google you can always use quotation marks ("") around the titles you are seeking for quicker and more precise retrieval.

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