Research Guides: English Language & Literature: Start Your Literary Research

Welcome & Quick Start

Welcome! This guide is designed to help you find and use resources for literary research.

Use the menu on the left-hand side to navigate this guide.

If you are new to conducting research:
Consider reviewing the Starting Your Research tutorial to learn the phases and processes of doing research.

Start your research with these key resources:

MLA International Bibliography This link opens in a new window
This is the most important database for research in literature. It indexes scholarly articles, books, book chapters, dissertations, and conference papers that focus on literary research.
Language: English, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Russian, etc.
Keywords: Modern Language Association
Oxford English Dictionary This link opens in a new window
Why search here? The dictionary of record for the English language, including the origins, etymology, and both historical and modern meanings of words.
Content type: Dictionary entries
Includes interactive features, Word of the Day, commentaries on words by authors and editors, as well as the Oxford Historical Thesaurus.
Language: English

To locate or browse novels and other works of literature from Britain and America in the Claremont Colleges Library (CCL):

We use the Library of Congress Classification System to organize physical books in the library:
- English language: PE (Multi-Tier Stacks 1)
- English literature from Great Britain and commonwealth countries: call numbers start with the letters PR (Multi-Tier Stacks 5 & 6)
- American literature: call numbers start with the letters PS (Multi-Tier Stacks 6 & 7)

Arts and Humanities Librarian

Andrea Ketterer

she/her/hers

Email Me

Contact:

Research, Teaching, & User Services
The Claremont Colleges Library

909 607-8626

Subjects: Creative Studies, Dance, English, Media Studies, Music, Theatre, Writing & Rhetoric