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The interior of the Mosque of Cordoba, Spain. This medieval Islamic mosque, which was converted to a Catholic cathedral, is also known as "La Mezquita." Photo: by Steven J. Dunlop from Nerstrand, MN [CC-BY-SA 3.0] via Wikimedia Commons
The interior of the Mosque of Cordoba, Spain. This medieval Islamic mosque, which was converted to a Catholic cathedral, is also known as “La Mezquita.”
Photo: by Steven J. Dunlop from Nerstrand, MN [CC-BY-SA 3.0] via Wikimedia Commons

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Laila Hussein
Middle East & North African Studies Librarian
Assistant Professor, University Library
lhoussei@illinois.edu

Subject (LibGuides) Guides

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New Middle East Books 

Below is a listing of some of the most prominent and well documented databases in the field. For more resources please visit our LIBGUIDE.

– Denotes that the resource is free and open access. To view links not followed by this open lock symbol on campus access or net id and password are required.

Syriaca

Syriac is a language which once flourished on the Mesopotamian plateau. A dialect of Aramaic, Syriac was widely used during much of the first millenium of the common era. Syriac speaking communities could be found in what today would be Turkey, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Iran, India, Central Asia, China, and Mongolia. Sources in Syriac hold immense value for increasing our historical understanding of the Mediterranean, the Middle East and Asia. In particular, Syriac sources document key moments in the development and interaction of Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and other religions of Late Antiquity.

ATLA Religion Database

The leading database for the comprehensive coverage of scholarly information within the field of religion. It covers such topics as Biblical Studies, World Religions, Church History, and religious perspectives on social issues.

Encyclopedia of Islam

The Encyclopedia of Islam presents information about the Islamic World from religion and history to politics and culture. It includes articles on Muslims of every age and land, on tribes and dynasties, on the crafts and sciences, on political and religious institutions, on the geography, ethnography of the various countries and on the history, typography and monuments of the major towns and cities.

Historical Abstracts

Indexes historical articles on historical topics from 1450 to the present. In addition to including the key historical journals from virtually every major country, Historical Abstracts includes a targeted selection of hundreds of journals in the social sciences and humanities that are of special interest to researchers and students of history.

Index Islamicus

Key international bibliography of publications in English and European languages on all aspects of Islam and the Muslim world from 1906 onwards until present day. Material cited (currently over 400,000 records) includes not only work written about the Middle East, but also about the other main Muslim areas of Asia and Africa, plus Muslim minorities elsewhere, and their history, beliefs, societies, cultures, languages and literatures. More than 3,000 journals are monitored for inclusion in the database, together with conference proceedings, monographs, multi-authored works and book reviews. Journals and books are indexed down to the article and chapter level.

Oxford Islamic Studies Online

Oxford Islamic Studies Online provides an excellent starting point for information on Islam. Users can search and browse by era, topic, and geographic region. This database also provides a comprehensive concordance of the Qur’an as well as primary sources and an extensive bibliography.

Oxford Online features several Islamic Studies products including the Oxford Islamic Studies Online database is part of the Oxford Bibliographies Online databases, which offer exclusive, authoritative research guides of Islamic Studies topics as well as other area studies and international relations topics. These research guides/bibliographies provide introductions to each topic area, and including guides to introductory works, textbooks, guidebooks, journals, reference works etc., and links to useful websites.

RAMBI: Index of articles on Jewish studies

Indexes scholarly articles covering Jewish studies and Israel. The writings may be in Hebrew, Yiddish, and European languages and mostly reflect the holdings of the Jewish National and University Library in Jerusalem.

Anthropology Plus

Identifies print materials in anthropology, archaeology, and related interdisciplinary research areas. Indexes entries at least two pages long in almost 900 journals and monographic series held in Harvard University’s Tozzer Library, including articles, reports, commentaries and obituaries. Coverage is from the late 19th century to the present.

AnthroSource

Identifies articles from American Anthropological Association publications including journals, newsletters and bulletins.

Archives Direct

Is a suite of collections sourced from the national Archives, KEW – the UK government’s official archive. Search the “Confidential Print: Middle East” tab for a wealth of resources pertaining to the regions. Materials cover such events as the Egyptian reforms of Muhammad Ali Pasha in the nineteenth century, the Middle East Conference of 1921, the Mandates for Palestine and Mesopotamia and the Suez Crisis in 1956, to the partition of Palestine, post-Suez Western foreign policy and the Arab-Israeli conflict.

CRL Official Gazettes Database

An official gazette is the legal newspaper of a country, or of an administrative part of a country, which publishes the text of new laws, decrees, regulations, treaties, legal notices, and court decisions. The laws published in official gazettes are primary law in the official source; publication in the gazette, in many cases, initiates jurisdiction. The text published is the authoritative version, and commonly, the only published version.

EBSCO Art Source

Offers full text plus abstracts and indexing of an international array of peer-selected publications. Areas covered include advertising art, antiques, archaeology, architecture and architectural history, computers in art, crafts, decorative arts, fashion design, folk art, graphic arts, industrial design, Interior design, landscape architecture, motion pictures, museology, non-Western art, painting, photography, pottery, sculpture, television, textiles, video.

Iraqi Academic Scientific Journals

IASJ is one platform where all scholarly journals published by the Iraqi universities and research institutions are indexed and discovered. All journals in IASJ are peer-reviewed and open access.

Periodicals Archive Online

Welcome to the information site for Periodicals Archive Online, an archive of hundreds of digitised journals published in the arts, humanities and social sciences.

Persian Language Databases at RISEST

Through RICeST researchers (faculty members, students of different fields, etc.) can access, Persian and non-Persian information databases.

Project MUSE

Project MUSE is a leading provider of digital humanities and social science content for the scholarly community.

Digital Dissertations

Provides subject, title, and author access to almost all American dissertations accepted at an accredited institution since 1861.

Religious and Theological Abstracts

This database allows you to search through hundreds of abstracts fro religion and theology journals. Call number 205 RELI.

Social Sciences Citation Index

Identifies journal articles and cited references in all social science disciplines. Social Science Citation Index is a multidisciplinary database covering journal literature of the social sciences.

Web of Science

Provides access to the Science citation index expanded from 1900 to the present, Social sciences citation index from 1956 to the present, and Arts & humanities citation index from 1975 to the present.

ONLINE NEWS SOURCES

U OF I  Library Newspaper Database

World News Connection (FBIS and JPRS)

Online access to nearly immediate full text English translations of current non-U.S. media sources.

Mideast Wire

English summaries, with links to original text as available, of news from 22 Arab countries, Iran, and the Arab media Diaspora.

Middle East Newspapers and News Sites

REFERENCE E-RESOURCES

Islam:

Judaism:

COUNTRY SPECIFIC E-RESOURCES

Egypt

Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt:

covers ancient Egyptian civilization, from the predynastic era to its eclipse in the seventh century CE. Topics covered include art, architecture, religion,language, literature, trade, politics, everyday social life and the culture of the court.

Iran

Iranian Oral History Project:

the personal accounts of 134 individuals who played major roles in or were eyewitnesses to important political events in Iran from the 1920s to the 1980s.

Iraq

Iraq Memory Foundation:

“the ultimate rationale behind the Iraq Memory Foundation (MF) is that the truth can help heal a society that has been politically and physically brutalized on a large scale.”

Iraq Research and Documentation Project (IRDP):

engaged in the collection and structuring of resources documenting the government, politics, and society of modern Iraq.

SELECTED INTERNET RESOURCES

Virtual Religion Index

A listing of links to information about Biblical Studies, Comparative Religion, Islamic Tradition, Judaic Studies, Christian Studies, and more.

Internet Islamic History Sourcebook

Links to major historical texts and documents in the history of Islam, covering the development of the religion from its beginnings, along with different religious traditions within Islam, maps, and general Internet sites about Islam.