Literary and film criticism can be found in journals and books. When searching the library databases (or other resources), common search terms include:
Tip: Always use “quotation marks” around titles, authors, and other search terms that involve multiple words (such as “Pride and Prejudice” or “industrial revolution”).
Most databases also provide options for limiting your search by:
Includes author biographies, literature overviews, criticisms, audio interviews, and reviews. Searchable by author, title, genre, and literary movement.
Using the advanced search option allows you to utilize multiple search terms and narrow the search.
Other limiters include limiting to peer-reviewed journals and limiting by content type ("Literature Criticism").
Gale Literature Resource Center divides your search results into categories.
There are also filtering options available on the right.
Peer-reviewed sources are labelled on the search results page.
Multidisciplinary database (covering most subjects) including scholarly journals, magazines, newspapers, and other sources.
Journal articles, indexing, and abstracts related to communication, mass media, and related fields of study.
Literary and film criticism can be found in multiple EBSCO databases, but Academic Search Premier is likely your best bet. Communication & Mass Media Complete may also include relevant sources, especially for films.
Using the advanced search option in Academic Search Premier, scroll down to the "Document Type" options and select Literary Criticism.
In the left column, limit your search results by "Source Type". Most literary criticism will be found in Academic Journals.
Subject terms are the database's "official" keywords. These can be added by searching the thesaurus ("Subject Terms" at the top of the page) or as a category in the left column on the search results page. Try adding one of these to your search:
Journals in multiple arts (art, music, theatre, dance) and humanities (history, literature, philosophy, cultural studies) disciplines.
Searches multiple databases (covering most subjects) for sources including scholarly journals, dissertations, magazines, newspapers, eBooks, and more.
Multidisciplinary subject coverage from scholarly, trade, and consumer publications.
Use the "Thesaurus" (found on the advanced search page) to select subject terms, or copy one of these to add to your search string:
At the top of the page, click "Publications" to be brought to the publication search page. Under "publication subject", select Literature. You can then browse or search for specific journals.
Using the left column, limit your search results by Source Type. Most literary and film criticism will be in scholarly sources: Scholarly Journals, Books, or Dissertations & Theses.
Search over 600 full text reference books for your topic. It also has article links to library databases (such as ProQuest and EBSCO).
Includes language and subject dictionaries, general reference books, subject-specific reference books, timelines, quotations, and overview pages.
Reference databases are not as likely to have literary or film criticism content, but they can be useful for: