Research Guides
Near East: Find Articles
Covers North Africa, the Arabian Peninsula, Turkey, east from the Levant throught Iran, and Central Asia, the languages of those regions, and Islam.
Contents on This Page
Starting Points
There are two databases in particular that are critical for the Middle East: the Encyclopaedia of Islam and Index Islamicus.
Due to the lack of comprehensive works on the Middle East, the Encyclopaedia of Islam is generally the starting point when researching a topic. Articles in the Encyclopaedia are written by leaders in the field and provide an overview of the state of each topic. They also provide a bibliography of the core works on that topic.
Index Islamicus is the only database that focusses 100% on the Middle East. It covers some, but not all Western language journals published in the U.S. and Europe, and some books.
- Encyclopaedia of Islam This link opens in a new window
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Major research tool for all topics relating to Islam; only 2nd & 3rd ed. online. 1st ed. print only.
Should work with: •Chrome 70 or higher, •Firefox 60.0.0 or higher •Safari 5.0.0 or higher, •Windows 10 Edge. It does not work well with Chrome. If it does not work, try a different browser. - Index Islamicus This link opens in a new window
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Bibliography of books and index of articles in periodicals on Islam and the Muslim world.
Main Databases with Content on the Near East
- Academic Search Complete This link opens in a new window
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A scholarly, multidisciplinary database providing indexing and abstracts for over 10,000 publications, including monographs, reports, conference proceedings, and others. Also includes full-text access to over 5,000 journals
- Africabib.orgHelpful for North Africa. Includes several databases specifically on African. One is an Index to over 415 English language journals that specialize in African studies.
- ATLA Religion Database with ATLASerials PLUS This link opens in a new window
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Full text databases. Use for articles on Islam, Judaism, etc. Includes citations on archaeology & antiquities, Bible, church history, human culture & society, missions & ecumenism, pastoral ministry, philosophy & ethics, religious studies, theology, world religions; coverage 1949-current.
- Foreign broadcast information service electronic index
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Index to the broadcasts of the Foreign Broadcast Information Service. Largely politics from 1945-1989. This is one place one can find information on Central Asia.
- Hathi Trust This link opens in a new window
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A shared digital repository for U.S. universities. It is still in the early stages of construction. For more recent books, it is similar to Google Books. For books in the public domain, including many books and journals in Arabic, Persian, and Ottoman Turkish, are available full text. - Index to Jewish Periodicals This link opens in a new window
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Indexes many English language periodicals not covered by Hebrew University's more research-oriented RAMBI. Broad coverage of the Middle East.
- Index TranslationumIndexes translations by source and target languages.
- International Medieval Bibliography This link opens in a new window
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Citation only database indexing primarily European journals on the Middle Ages.
- JSTOR
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Full text database covering back runs of journals usually up through three to five years before the current year.
- Gale Literature Resource Center This link opens in a new window
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Contains biographies of Arab authors. The specific works are part of the Dictionary of Literary Biography, vol. 311. Arabic literary culture, 500-925. Look in our catalog for the list of authors. Also vol. 346, 20th century Arabic writers.
- MENALIB Periodical ContentsThe only online index to Middle Eastern vernacular periodicals in languages other than Turkish.
- MLA International Bibliography This link opens in a new window
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Includes articles on literature, language and a little on culture for all areas/languages of the Middle East.
- PAIS International
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Citation plus abstract, political, social and public policy literature from thousands of periodicals, government documents, books, and other sources.
- Project Muse This link opens in a new window
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Full text database covering journals and books in the Humanities and Social Sciences. Strong in publications of University presses. - ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global This link opens in a new window
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Index to doctoral dissertations and selected masters theses from 1861 to the present; includes 2 million+ full text dissertations published since 1997.
- Rambi : Index of Articles on Jewish StudiesSelective bibliography of articles of scholarly value in the various fields of Jewish studies and in the study of Eretz Israel, in Hebrew, Yiddish, and European languages. Also includes plenty of articles on Islam, the Arab world and Arab history and civilization.
Additional Databases
These databases include information on parts of the Middle East, or are in the process of development and will gradually include more relevant information. They can be helpful, but are not a good place to start for every paper.
- African Journals Online (AJOL)Index to journals published in Africa.
- African studies abstracts onlineAlthough the emphasis is not on the Arab world, there are relevant articles, both on North Africa and on Islam in the rest of Africa.
- African Writers Series This link opens in a new window
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Again, coverage is predominantly for the non-Arab regions of Africa, but there is some coverage of North Africa. For each author there is a short biography and a small quantity of their writings in translation.
- Alphabetical List of Open Access Historical Newspapers and Other Periodicals in Middle East & Islamic StudiesLinks to full text journals from multiple countries.
- Bibliografia espanola sobre el Norte de AfricaSearchable bibliography on North Africa and al-Andalus, produced under the auspices of the Government of Andalusia.
- Bibliothèque St Étienne de Jérusalem - École Biblique et ArchéologiqueSpecialized library strong in Biblical studies and archaeology of the Middle East.
- Business Source Complete This link opens in a new window
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Magazines, newspapers and journals in all business disciplines.
- Database of Arabic Literature in Western LiteratureBibliographical database.
- DigiZeitschriften das deutsche digitale Zeitschriftenarchiv This link opens in a new window
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This is a full text database of German journals. It is still being built. So far it has journals on Egyptology and Coptology. It does have articles on Islam and the Middle East. Many are in German, but many are also in English. It can be searched in English as well as German. - EconLit This link opens in a new window
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Includes articles about economic situations in the Middle East.
- Electronic journals libraryContents are in many European languages. The value is in the full text access to smaller or older journals scanned at the University of Regensburg.
- ETHOS (Electronic THeses Online Service, i.e. UK theses)Database listing UK theses. There is a charge for downloading. If you are interested in a specific thesis, please see your librarian about how to borrow a copy.
- Feminae : medieval women and gender indexIndexes journal articles, book reviews, and essays in books about women, sexuality, and gender during the Middle Ages.
- HAL-SHS (Hyper Article en Ligne - Sciences de l'Homme et de la Société)Digital archive focusing on the Mediterranean.
- Historical Abstracts with Full Text This link opens in a new window
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This database will pick up articles from journals not specifically on the Middle East. Recently some French and Turkish journals have been added, although the number of articles this provides is relatively small.
- Mamluk Bibliography OnlineUniversity of Chicago project to compile bibliographies of all primary and secondary sources on the Mamluk Sultanate of Egypt and Syria.
- Web of Science This link opens in a new window
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Will provide some citations not found in other databases. It is packaged within Web of Science and so searches result in many scientific articles
- World biographical information system online
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Includes the Middle East. Entries are short, giving birth and death dates, profession(s), and references to articles about the person.
How do I use Google Scholar to search for UW materials?
Use Google Scholar to search specifically for materials held by the University of Washington. | Time - 01:38 | Transcript | Play Video