Christian Studies Resources

This is a brief list of useful subject specific research sources available in Wesleyan's libraries and on the Internet. It is intended to provide a starting point for research in Christian Studies, sufficient for basic research needs. For more extensive research needs, you can ask for a personal research session with a librarian.

On the Internet (See note about Internet sources)
Web Indexes:  Meta Sites/Guides  
Selected Sites:  Full Text Online  

Reference Sources - For introductions to or summaries of topics

Call Numbers - Call Number locations for Christian Studies (in Reference and Stacks)

BL - Religion in general / Comparative religion

BM - Judaism (Including Judaism in Biblical times)

BR - Christianity in general, history of Christianity

BS - The Bible

BT-BV - Christian theology

BX - Christian denominations

Encyclopedias

Encyclopedia of Religion - BL 31 .E46 1987 - 16 volume encyclopedia covering all aspects of religion studies.

New Catholic Encyclopedia - BX 841 .N44 1967 - 18 volumes on the history and theology of the Catholic Church through the close of Vatican Council II.

Encyclopedia of World Methodism - BX 8211 .E5 - 2 volumes on all things Methodist. Includes an article on Wesleyan University, the first Methodist college.

Dictionaries

Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church - BR 95 .O8 1997 - Concise overview of the histories and theologies of the various branches of Christianity.

Guides/Summaries

New Interpreter's Bible - BS491.2.N484 1994 - 12 volumes of analysis and interpretation of the Bible, from a variety of perspectives.

Bibliographies

New Testament Abstracts - BS 410 .N35 - Index with descriptive abstracts for articles on NT studies from over 500 journals. Covers publications from 1956 to the present.

Maps/Atlases

Atlas of American Religion - BR 515 .N49 1999 - Covers the historical development and growth patterns of American religious organizations from 1776 to 1990.

Other

Bibles - BS 1-399 - Bibles in the original languages and in various translations.

Books

Catalogs

CTW Online Catalog - For books at Wesleyan, Conn College, or Trinity College.

WorldCat - For books not in the CTW Catalog (order by interlibrary loan)

Articles

Indexes & Databases - These indexes and databases are the ones most likely to be relevant to research in Christian Studies. See Indexes and Databases for a full list of available online databases.

Religion Database - Comprehensive index to scholarly articles in religious studies; produced by the American Theological Library Association.

Humanities Full Text - An index, with many abstracts and some full text articles, to scholarly sources in the humanities; covers articles published from 1984 to the present. (Paper indexes covering back to 1966 are available in the Olin Reference collection at AI3 .H84 and AI3 .S63)

Social Sciences Full Text - An index, with many abstracts and some full text articles, to scholarly sources in the social sciences; covers articles published from 1984 to the present. (Paper indexes covering back to 1966 are available in the Olin Reference collection at Z7161 .S654 and AI3 .S63)

Arts & Humanities Citation Index - Arts and Humanities Citation Index - Interdisciplinary indexes covering the journal literature of the social sciences and humanities. In addition to searching for authors, titles, and subjects of articles, these indexes allow searching for articles which have cited a particular publication, and to search for articles which share one or more cited sources in their bibliographies.

Expanded Academic ASAP - Index of nearly 3000 general interest magazines and academic journals; full text of articles are available for about the titles. Select the "refereed publications" option to limit a search to retrieve only articles in academic journals.

PCI Full Text - Periodicals Contents Index lists the tables of contents (with access to some full text articles) from social science and humanities journals from as far back as 1770 to recent issues.

Readers Guide Full Text - Provides citations and abstracts, and some full text, to articles covering a very wide variety of topics in popular journals. Covers articles published since 1984. (Paper indexes covering back to 1890 are available in the Olin Reference collection at AI3 .R48)

WWW Christian Studies Sources - Note: It is important to keep in mind that anyone can publish information on the Internet. You need to be very careful about evaluating and citing information found on the Web. Another good way of finding Christian Studies resources is to use a search engine or subject directory.

Internet Indexes

Meta Sites/Guides to christian studies Sites - These sites list, and often evaluate, web sites relevant to research in Christian Studies. See Indexes and Databases for a full list of available databases.

Christian Studies - Academic Info's index of Web sites related to Christianity and Christian studies

New Testament Gateway - Annotated directory of Internet resources related to the New Testament, maintained by a theology professor at University of Birmingham.

Christian Tradition - Index of Web sites on Christianity, maintained by the Religion Department at Rutgers University.

Selected Sites

Full Text Online

Bible Gateway - Searchable full text of the Bible in 10 different English translations and translations in many other languages.

Religion Online - Extensive collection of essays, books, and other writings on a variety of religious issues, primarily from a Christian perspective.

Christian Classics Ethereal Library - Writings from the history of the Christian tradition.

Research Tips

Types of Sources Developing a Topic Finding Background Info Searching Online Databases Finding Books Interpreting Call Numbers Finding Journal Articles Finding Audio/Video/Etc Finding Primary Sources Getting Stuff That Isn't Here Finding Internet Sources Evaluating Sources Found Citing Sources Used Wesleyan's Plagiarism Policy