The Discovering strand will help you develop the skills you need to find subject specific information easily. This is useful if you are reading to prepare for a lecture or seminar, need to find resources for research, or want to go beyond your reading list resources for an assignment. Here you will find resources covering: how to use LibrarySearch, how to build effective search terms, how to use Boolean operators, and citation searching in LibrarySearch and databases.
The Evaluating strand will help you develop the skills you need to critically evaluate information so you're able to select reliable and appropriate information in your research and assignments. These skills are useful for helping identify fake news and misinformation, poor quality research and unreliable information. Content includes: podcasts on misinformation and filter bubbles, understanding and applying a framework for critical evaluation, and how to select the most suitable type of resources for different situations.
BoB is a viewing and off-air recording and media archive service which allows you to search for, watch and also record from a list of recorded channels. You can also create clips, search for programmes coming up, create playlists and share them with others.
BoB is only available in the UK.
A collection of performances and interviews of a number of classic and Shakespearean productions, including: live productions to watch in full or break down by scene, act or speech; interviews and documentaries featuring the cast and creative teams behind each production, as well as detailed study guides, authored by experts in the field.
A multi-disciplinary databases with access to more than 12 million academic journal articles, books, and primary sources in 75 disciplines, as well as over 3 million images.
Quick tips on searching JSTOR
A collection of over 330,000 works of English and American literature covering poetry, drama, and prose from the 8th to the 21st centuries, as well as thousands of critical articles, essays, biographies and encyclopedia entries.
Online Guide to Literature Online from ProQuest
Presents a virtual library of all of the Loeb Greek and Latin literature texts (covering: epic and lyric poetry; tragedy and comedy; history, travel, philosophy, and oratory; the great medical writers and mathematicians; Church Fathers & pagan culture).
How to use Loeb Classical Library
The New Oxford Shakespeare presents an entirely new consideration of all of Shakespeare's works, edited from first principles from the base-texts themselves, and drawing on the latest textual and theatrical scholarship.
Searching help
This archive consists of records of activities that took part during the International Workshop Festival (IWF) between 1994 and 2001. IWF was a unique festival in that it consisted (as its title suggests) of workshops rather than performances. But not just workshops: there were discussions, presentations and practical exchanges. Many of these workshops and exchanges were led by some of the acknowledged masters in the field of the performing arts. Historically, this is a snapshot of the performing arts in the mid- to late-1990s.
A multi-disciplinary databases with access to more than 12 million academic journal articles, books, and primary sources in 75 disciplines, as well as over 3 million images.
Quick tips on searching JSTOR
Gale Research Complete provides access to a variety of primary and secondary sources. From literary criticism and full text literary works to rare primary source content and news, this resource is packed full of information covering a variety of subjects. You can find details on what each database contains on the Gale menu page after you login, but here is a brief snapshot of what you can find:
Gale Virtual Reference Library
News sources (current and historical)
Gale Primary Sources, including several archival collections e.g. Holocaust sudies
A collection of over 330,000 works of English and American literature covering poetry, drama, and prose from the 8th to the 21st centuries, as well as thousands of critical articles, essays, biographies and encyclopedia entries.
Online Guide to Literature Online from ProQuest
A series of online research guides in a range of subjects including American Literature, British and Irish Literature, Cinema and Media Studies, Environmental Science, Victorian Literature,Geography, Classics and Philosophy. Each guide contains a series of articles introducing key topics, and lists recommended readings about each topic.
Video user guide (YouTube)
Oxford Handbooks in Literature bring together the world's leading scholars to discuss research and the latest thinking in a range of major topics in Literature.
How to use Oxford Handbooks Online
Over 300 humanities, arts, and social sciences journals from 60 scholarly publishers. Subjects covered include cinema, cultural studies, drama, history, literature, mathematics, modern languages, philosophy, politics, religion, and sociology.Most journals available online from 1995 or 1996 onwards
PDF guide to searching Project MUSE
Video Tutorials on using Project MUSE (YouTube)
This link opens in a new windowA comprehensive bibliography of Shakespeare-related scholarship and theatrical productions from 1960 onwards, covering books, articles, dissertations, theatrical productions, reviews, audiovisual materials, and electronic media.
PDF guide to using the World Shakespeare Bibliography Online
An online encyclopaedia of British film and television history, including hundreds of clips from the British Film Institute's National Archive as well as recorded interviews with TV and radio personalities. Alongside the clips themselves are contextual material such as posters and press books and information produced by experts in the field.
This website is now archived and no longer updated.
Introductory guides to using the range of BFI Screenonline resources
BoB is a viewing and off-air recording and media archive service which allows you to search for, watch and also record from a list of recorded channels. You can also create clips, search for programmes coming up, create playlists and share them with others.
BoB is only available in the UK.
Contains nearly three million images which are free to use for educational use.
Kanopy is an on-demand streaming video platform that offers films, documentaries and educational videos.
Part of the British Library's Archival Sound Recordings collection, the Theatre Archive Project contains over 300 interviews with theatregoers and practitioners on British theatre history 1945-1968
Archive of over 140,000 images from 300 different UK collections, free for use in education.
VADS’ images cover the broad range of the visual arts including applied arts, architecture, design, fashion, fine art, and media. Everything from impressionist paintings to wartime posters, fashion photography to ceramics and furniture is available for use, organised by collection and also fully searchable.
The full contents of Vogue magazine (US edition) in full color page image, from the first issue in 1892 to the present, with monthly updates for new issues.
A digital archive of over 100,000 pages of letters written over a span of 300 years, as well as biographies and an extensive annotated bibliography of the sources in the database.
Searching help for this resource
A unique archive of almost every play submitted for licence between 1737 and 1824, and hundreds of documents that provide social context for the plays.
Digitized copies of printed ephemera, offering unique insights into the changing nature of everyday life in Britain in the eighteenth, nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, including Nineteenth-Century Entertainment, the Booktrade, Popular Prints, Crimes, Murders and Executions, and Advertising.
Contains colour digital images of rare books, ephemera, maps and other materials relating to 18th, 19th and early 20th century London.
How to use London low life: A short video tutorial
The National Theatre's archive contains technical photographs, costume designs, rehearsal and production photographs, production drawings and more. It is viewable by appointment, but the catalogue can be searched online.
This link opens in a new windowPrimary sources related to the British arts in the 19th Century, from playbills and scripts to operas and complete scores. This unparalleled collection provides a detailed look at the state of the British art world with manuscripts and compositions, personal letters, annotated programs, meeting minutes, and financial records, offering an unmatched glimpse into the inner workings of the arts world and life in Victorian Britain.
Discover manuscripts written or compiled by women in the British Isles during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Produced in association with the Perdita Project based at the University of Warwick and Nottingham Trent University, the project seeks to rediscover early modern women authors who were “lost” because their writing exists only in manuscript form.
Showcases rare and unique prompt books from the world-famous Folger Shakespeare Library. These prompt books tell the story of Shakespeare’s plays as they were performed in theatres throughout Great Britain, the United States and internationally, between the seventeenth and twentieth centuries.
Victorian Popular Culture is a portal comprised of four modules, inviting users into the darkened halls, small backrooms, big tops and travelling venues that hosted everything from spectacular shows and bawdy burlesque, to the world of magic, spiritualist séances, optical entertainments and the first moving pictures.
How to use Victorian popular culture: Online webinar
Business Source Complete (sometimes known as Ebsco) is a key resource for all business and management students, it is also useful for anyone interested in finance, accounting or marketing. In this resource you will find many journal articles and trade magazines including Harvard Business Review and The Economist. You can also find company profiles, industry reports and country reports.
Help Pages on Business Source Complete
Nexis provides access to a wide range of UK and international newspapers. It also includes a collection of in-depth company profiles and industry reports covering millions of public and private companies.
Statista provides data on over 80,000 topics covering agriculture, advertising, health, hospitality, consumer goods, and much more. The content is geared towards business and marketing statistical needs, with a focus on current (not historical) statistics.
The Theatres Trust provide databases of theatres nationwide, information on the history of theatres, and an image library of theatre interiors and exteriors.
Google Scholar searches for academic books and journals, and includes 'FindIt' links to the full text of books and articles which are available from the library
Search tips for Google Scholar
BoB is a viewing and off-air recording and media archive service which allows you to search for, watch and also record from a list of recorded channels. You can also create clips, search for programmes coming up, create playlists and share them with others.
BoB is only available in the UK.
Kanopy is an on-demand streaming video platform that offers films, documentaries and educational videos.
OneFile News is a full-text international newspaper resource that allows users to quickly search and compare news articles published worldwide.
A collection of historical archives (modern to present), newspapers and periodicals (17th to 19th centuries) including:
Archives Unbound
Daily Mail Historical Archive
The Economist Historical Archive
The Illustrated London News Historical Archive
Nineteenth Century UK Periodicals (Series 2, Empire)
Political Extremism and Radicalism
The Times Literary Supplement Historical Archive
Nexis provides access to a wide range of UK and international newspapers. It also includes a collection of in-depth company profiles and industry reports covering millions of public and private companies.
Regional Business News provides full-text regional business publications for the United States and Canadian provinces. You can search newspapers, magazines and other resources from different news sources.
The link below will help you find Royal Holloway PhD theses, UK theses through British Library's EThOS service and theses and dissertations from other countries through ProQuest.
The online academic edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica, including articles, biographies, images, videos and a world atlas. The 'Compare Countries' tool shows a range of facts and statistics for different countries.
The online version of the OED including over 500,000 definitions, together with etymological analysis and variant spellings. Traces the development of English from 1150 AD to the present.
Video tutorial on using the Oxford English Dictionary
This link opens in a new windowOver 100 general reference works, language dictionaries and subject dictionaries covering languages, science and medicine, humanities, social sciences and business.
A series of online research guides in a range of subjects including American Literature, British and Irish Literature, Cinema and Media Studies, Environmental Science, Victorian Literature,Geography, Classics and Philosophy. Each guide contains a series of articles introducing key topics, and lists recommended readings about each topic.
Video user guide (YouTube)
Through this link you will find more information about accessing Senate House's physical and online resources, as well as information about accessing libraries at other institutions.
