How To Locate Magazine Articles

Indexes analyze the contents of periodicals. There are several indexes, both in print and electronic formats. Below are the indexes that historians find most helpful, arranged chronically.

20th Century

Academic Search provides access to journal articles in most academic areas of study. It includes full-text coverage for over 1,530 journals from 1990 to the present and abstracts/indexing of nearly 3,000 journals from 1984 to the present.

Access: The Supplementary Index to Periodicals indexes magazines not presently indexed in Reader's Guide to Periodical Literature, including city and regional magazines. *Located in SML, Reference, Index Case AI3 A23 (LC)

Alternative Press Index (1969 - present) is widely regarded as the leading guide to the alternative press in North America. Citations are drawn from roughly 250 alternative, radical, and left publications, that report and analyze the practices and theories of cultural, economic, political, and social change. API indexes such important periodicals as: Cineaste, Environmental Action, Socialist Review, and Women's Review of Books. 90% of the publications indexed in API are unique; you won't find them indexed in the Reader's Guide to Periodical Literature or the Social Sciences Index. Approximately 17,000 new records (some with abstracts) are added each year.
Major topics include: African-American Studies, ethnic & racial studies, feminism, gay/lesbian studies, community organizing, ecology, labor studies, social theory, socialism, alternative organizations, anarchism, prisons, indigenous people's rights, internationalism.

Ethnic NewsWatch is a full-text collection of the newspapers, magazines and journals of the ethnic, minority and native press. The collection of articles, editorials, columns, and reviews provide a broad diversity of perspectives and viewpoints. Free text searching and complete indexing are available in English and Spanish language. A history file goes as far back as the 1960's.

Nation Digital Archive contains every issue of The Nation from July 1865 through 1999.

Periodicals Contents Index is an electronic index to the contents of thousands of periodicals in the humanities and social sciences, from their first issues to 1995. Every article is indexed. PCI Web currently indexes over eleven million journal articles in 3,536 journals. The scope is international, including journals in English, French, German, Italian, Spanish and other Western languages.

Readers' Guide Abstracts Full Text offers comprehensive indexing and abstracting of some 375 of the most popular general interest periodicals published in the United States and Canada since 1890, plus the full text of over 120 of those periodicals from 1994 - present. They cover news, current events, and all subject areas, including business, fashion, politics, crafts, food, education, sports, history, and science.

19th Century

American Periodical Series Index This full-text-/full-image resource contains 1000 magazines published between 1741 and 1900. Titles include Benjamin Franklin's General Magazine, the first American professional journals, and several consumer magazines still in publication, such as Vanity Fair, Harper's, and Ladies' Home Journal. The search interface allows you to search the complete text, including tables of contents, by boolean and keyword operators. Articles are linked to the corresponding page images, downloadable in PDF format.

Harper's Magazine Online provides access to the full-text Harper's Magazine. It covers 1850 to the present.

HarpWeek: The Civil War Era and Reconstruction is a searchable full-text database of all the pages of Harper's Weekly (1857-1877).

Niles Register is a cumulative index of the Weekly Register, Niles' Weekly Register, and Niles' National Register from 1811-1849. *Located in the SML, CD-ROM Reference Center

The Nineteenth Century Masterfile contains several electronic indexes to pre-1920 periodical literature, including Poole’s Index to Periodical Literature (1802-1906). *The print version of Poole’s is located in SML, Reference, Index Case A13 P656 1963

Periodicals Contents Index is an electronic index to the contents of thousands of periodicals in the humanities and social sciences, from their first issues to 1995. Every article is indexed. PCI Web currently indexes over eleven million journal articles in 3,536 journals. The scope is international, including journals in English, French, German, Italian, Spanish and other Western languages.

18th Century

American Periodical Series Index This full-text-/full-image resource contains 1000 magazines published between 1741 and 1900. Titles include Benjamin Franklin's General Magazine, the first American professional journals, and several consumer magazines still in publication, such as Vanity Fair, Harper's, and Ladies' Home Journal. The search interface allows you to search the complete text, including tables of contents, by boolean and keyword operators. Articles are linked to the corresponding page images, downloadable in PDF format.

Periodicals Contents Index is an electronic index to the contents of thousands of periodicals in the humanities and social sciences, from their first issues to 1995. Every article is indexed. PCI Web currently indexes over eleven million journal articles in 3,536 journals. The scope is international, including journals in English, French, German, Italian, Spanish and other Western languages.

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Send questions or comments to Nancy M. Godleski, Kaplanoff Librarian for American History.
Web page maintained by Amy Shapiro. Last updated April 23, 2003.