Course Research Guides
RELG 329: Theology, Pluralism, and Culture
Professor Pearson
Spring 2009
Getting Started
Use what you already have and know to start getting a sense of how scholars have discussed the topics and ideas relevant to your project.
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Book Reviews
Book reviews can be important not only for getting a sense of how a work was received, but for learning something about the larger context in which the work fits.
Review articles are extended reviews that talk about a group of books, sometimes published within a few years of one another, with a goal of saying something about the state of the field(s) that the books fall.Use the indexes listed below to find reviews of your work.
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Bibliographies and Notes
One of the best ways to find out more about the conversation on a topic, concept, or approach is by looking at the references and notes of work that is familiar to you. Scholars document their sources carefully to give the reader a picture of the work on which they are building. As such, their bibliographies function as a kind of index to the scholarly discussion.
Finding Additional Scholarship
Articles
Indexes provide an organized entry point to the periodical (and sometime monographic) literature. The indexes below are all electronic, in database format. Indexes are particularly useful for finding recent scholarship in a field as they are updated frequently.
**Carleton does not provide access to every title referenced in these indexes and abstracts; to determine Carleton's access to a particular periodical, check the Journals list. If we do not provide access to full text, take advantage of our InterLibraryLoan service.
Religious Studies
Area Studies (Global South and East)
- Africa Bib
- Bibliography of Asian Studies
- HAPI (Hispanic American Periodical Index)
- International Index to Black Periodicals
History
Philosophy
Multidisciplinary
Tips for searching:
- Search for authors who write on your topic, such as those on your reading list or on your syllabus.
- Look carefully at subject tags of relevant articles/books; incorporate these into your other searches.
- Use the limit and advanced search features of the database to focus your search if you're getting a large number of results or if the results you are getting don't make sense.
Books
Search BRIDGE to find books relevant to your research topic. A couple of important things to know about BRIDGE:
If you know the title of a book relevant to your topic, start with a title search in BRIDGE.
- When you find a book on your topic, examine its subject headings for relevance to your topic.
- Click on a hyperlinked subject heading to perform subject heading search and retrieve related books
Or, you can begin with a keyword search and enter words that describe your topic (names, places, events, etc.).
- Again, when you find a book on your topic, examine its subject headings for relevance to your topic.
- This strategy can be more difficult with theoretical topics
Perform a subject heading search in BRIDGE only if you know a valid Library of Congress subject heading.
- Here are a few headings you might find helpful. There are many others:
- Christianity and other religions--[fill in name of religion]
- Christianity and culture
- Church and social problems -- [country, or region]
- Syncretism (Religion)
- Theology, Doctrinal -- [country, or region]
- Women in Christianity -- [country, or region]
- Religion--Relations
Citation
Use Chicago Manual of Style to format your bibliography. We have it available online or in print (Ready Ref Z253 .U69 2003) Chicago Manual Quick Citation Guide
This Research Guide By:
Heather Tompkins- Reference and Instruction Librarian
- x7172
- htompkin@carleton.edu
- Library 467
