Research Guides: MAA Library Template: Quick Links

Key Resources

MAA Databases

Abacus Data Repository This link opens in a new window
Abacus is UBC's collection of data sets, including public use microdata from Statistics Canada, public opinion polls, and geospatial data. Look here for Statistics Canada surveys and data.
ABI/INFORM Collection This link opens in a new window
ABI/INFORM Collection is a comprehensive business database, which contains journals, business periodicals, dissertations, and country-and industry-focused reports.
Academic Search Complete This link opens in a new window
A multi-disciplinary full-text database, with more than 5,500 full-text periodicals, including more than 4,600 peer-reviewed journals
Alternative Press Index (EBSCO) This link opens in a new window
Alternative Press Index (API) is a bibliographic database of journal, newspaper, and magazine articles from over 300 international alternative, radical, and left periodicals.
America History and Life This link opens in a new window
America: History & Life is the definitive index of literature covering the history and culture of the United States and Canada, from prehistory to the present. With indexing for 1,700 journals from 1964 to present, this database is without question the most important bibliographic reference tool for students and scholars of U.S. and Canadian history.
Anthropology Plus This link opens in a new window
Anthropology Plus provides extensive worldwide indexing of journal articles, reports, commentaries, review essays, obituaries, and articles in monographic series in the fields of social, cultural, physical, biological, and linguistic anthropology, ethnology, archaeology, folklore, material culture, and interdisciplinary studies.

Arcade: Catalog of the New York Art Resources Consortium
Provides a single search interface for the research libraries of three leading art museums in New York City: The Brooklyn Museum, The Frick Collection and The Museum of Modern Art.

Archivision This link opens in a new window
Archivision is a database of over 53,000 high quality, professionally photographed images of architecture, landscape architecture, urban planning, archaeology, and design searchable within LUNA Commons.
Art and Archaeology Technical Abstracts (AATA Online) This link opens in a new window
Covers restoration and preservation of artworks, material culture and archaeology.
Art Full Text This link opens in a new window
Indexes Art, Architecture, Landscape Architecture, and Urban Planning journals. Reproductions of works of art appearing in periodicals are also indexed.
Art Index Retrospective: 1929-1984 This link opens in a new window
Provides high-quality indexing of nearly 600 publications - many of which are peer-reviewed - and citations of over 25,000 book reviews. Coverage includes fine, decorative and commercial arts.
ARTbibliographies Modern This link opens in a new window
Provides full abstracts of journal articles, books, essays, exhibition catalogs, PhD dissertations, and exhibition reviews on all forms of modern and contemporary art
Artists in Canada This link opens in a new window
Union list of Canadian artists, giving biographical information and location of files of over 42,000 Canadian artists in 23 libraries and galleries across Canada.
Arts & Humanities Citation Index (Web of Science) This link opens in a new window
Multidisciplinary index. Can be used to determine where and how many times an article has been cited.
Artstor This link opens in a new window
ARTstor is a digital library of more than one million images licensed for educational use at UBC, covering the areas of art, architecture, the humanities and the social sciences.
Asia-Studies Full-text Online This link opens in a new window
Reports on business, government, economic, environmental and social issues in 55 countries in the Asia-Pacific region.
ASM Handbooks Online This link opens in a new window
Provides online access to the complete ASM Handbook series including the multi-volume ASM Engineering Materials Handbook and ASM Metals Handbook.
ATLA Religion Database with ATLASerials This link opens in a new window
Article index compiled by the American Theological Library Association, covering Biblical studies, world religions, church history, and religious perspectives on social issues.

ARTstor Shared Shelf Commons
Shared Shelf Commons is a free, open-access library of images. Search and browse collections with tools to zoom, print, export, and share images.

Avery Index to Architectural Periodicals This link opens in a new window
Covers the subjects of architecture, landscape architecture, city planning, historic preservation, and interior design and decoration.
Benezit Dictionary of Artists This link opens in a new window
With nearly 170,000 entries on artists from antiquity to the present day and featuring regular updates, Benezit is one of the most comprehensive and definitive resources on artists in the English language.
Berg Fashion Library This link opens in a new window
Currently unavailable--we are in the process of renewing our subscription to this database. Please use printed 10-volume Encyclopedia of World Dress and Fashion at GT507 .E54 2010 (located in reference).
Bibliography of Asian Studies This link opens in a new window
Contains nearly 800,000 records on all subjects (especially in the humanities and the social sciences) pertaining to East, Southeast, and South Asia published worldwide from 1971 to the present.
Bibliography of Indigenous Peoples in North America This link opens in a new window
Covers history and culture of Native North Americans; over 80,000 records. Stronger in older ethnological studies than it is in current political studies. The bibliography originated with work by George Murdock.
Bibliography of the History of Art (BHA) and Répertoire de la litterature de l'art (RILA) This link opens in a new window
Covers western art from late antiquity (4th century A.D.) to 2007. Coverage of contemporary art includes critical and theoretical publications.
British Columbia Newspaper Index This link opens in a new window
Focuses primarily on British Columbia political, social and economic issues.
British Columbia Periodical Index This link opens in a new window
Articles selectively indexed from major British Columbia magazines.
Business Source Ultimate This link opens in a new window
Provides journal articles and other materials relating to business, management, economics, banking, finance, and accounting.
CAB Direct (CAB Abstracts & Global Health) This link opens in a new window
International coverage of articles in agriculture, forestry, global health, human nutrition, animal health, natural resources management and conservation.
Canadian Newsstream This link opens in a new window
Offers the full text of over 230 Canadian newspapers from Canada's leading publishers, including The Globe and Mail. This full text database includes the complete available electronic backfile for most newspapers.
Canadian Business & Current Affairs (CBCA) This link opens in a new window
Includes journals, magazines and newspapers published in Canada in the fields of business, current events, education and general reference.
Canadian Census Analyser This link opens in a new window
Canadian Census Analyser features census profiles for multiple levels of geography as far back as 1961, online analysis of public use microdata files 1971- , and postal code conversion files 1996-
Compendex Engineering Village This link opens in a new window
Produced by Engineering Information, Inc., COMPENDEX, covers the engineering field, including related specialties and technologies.

Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA)
Founded in Montreal in 1979 by Phyllis Lambert the CCA Holds one of the world’s foremost international research collections of publications, conceptual studies, drawings, plans, models, prints, photographs, related artefacts and ephemera, archives and oral histories of individual architects. To search the collection visit: http://www.cca.qc.ca/en/search

DAAI: Design and Applied Arts Index This link opens in a new window
Articles, news items, and reviews published in design and applied arts periodicals from 1973 onwards. Information on designers, craftspeople, studios, workshops, firms etc.
Digital Dictionary of Buddhism This link opens in a new window
Contains terms from Chinese, Japanese and Korean Buddhism. The dictionary is fully searchable, and the site also includes browsable indices, presentations about the dictionary, and details of contributors.
Dyabola This link opens in a new window
Provides citations to books, articles, and essays on classical, early Christian, Byzantine, early Medieval, and ancient Middle Eastern antiquities, art, and archaeology.

Canadian Research Index
Canadian federal, provincial, territorial, regional, and local government publications; all titles are filmed and available in the Microlog microfiche collection, Koerner Library Microforms (floor 2).

EconLit This link opens in a new window
Core literature on global economics produced by the American Economic Association that includes scholarly topics in economics, business and public management.
CANSIM (CANadian Socioeconomic Information Management) Database (Statistics Canada) This link opens in a new window
CANSIM is a comprehensive database from Statistics Canada containing more than 52 million numeric time series covering a wide variety of social and economic indicators.
eHRAF World Cultures This link opens in a new window
A full-text, fully-indexed cultural database. It focuses on mostly pre-industrial cultures from around the world, and on North American immigrant groups.

City of Vancouver Archives
The City of Vancouver Archives acquires a variety of records that document the city's history - including photographs, architectural drawings and plans. Their online database provides some scanned materials.

Agricultural & Environmental Science Database (AESD) This link opens in a new window
This multidisciplinary database, provides unparalleled and comprehensive coverage of the environmental sciences. The database is made up of twelve subfiles that cover: Engineering, Technology, Life & Physical Sciences, and may be searched independently.
Geobase This link opens in a new window
A unique multidisciplinary database supplying bibliographic information and abstracts for human and physical geography, ecology, geology, oceanography, geomechanics, and development studies.
GeoRef This link opens in a new window
International research literature on geology and the geosciences.
Proquest Historical Newspapers: The Globe and Mail This link opens in a new window
Electronic full-page newspaper archive from June 1844 to 2011. In recent years, it is the Metro edition of which the National Edition is a subset. Coverage includes all the stories, plus thousands of images, advertisements, classifieds, political cartoons, births and deaths from the pages of Canada's national newspaper, dating back to the pre-confederation era.
GreenFILE This link opens in a new window
Focuses on the relationship between human beings and the environment, with articles on green issues, including green building, global warming, etc.
Grove Art Online This link opens in a new window
Grove Art Online is the foremost scholarly art encyclopedia covering both Western and non-Western art. First published as the Dictionary of Art, edited by Jane Turner, Grove Art encompasses all aspects of visual culture.
Habitat Exchange This link opens in a new window
An online venue for governments, NGOs, academics and civil society across the globe to share and discuss best practices, appropriate technologies, action plans and other tools relevant to the pursuit of ecologically sound and socially equitable urban development.
Elsevier ScienceDirect This link opens in a new window
Full text electronic journals covering the physical sciences, applied sciences, life sciences, social sciences, business & economics. Also includes reference works, book series, and handbooks.
Handbook of Latin American Studies This link opens in a new window
Covers the humanities and social sciences including anthropology, economics, geography, history, political science, women's studies, art, literature, music, and philosophy.
Historical Abstracts with Full Text This link opens in a new window
An exceptional resource that covers the history of the world (excluding the United States and Canada) focusing on the 15th century forward, including world history, military history, women's history, history of education, and more.
Humanities & Social Sciences Index Retrospective, 1907-1984 This link opens in a new window
Offers the ability to search a wide range of important journals in the humanities and social sciences as far back as 1907.
Index of Medieval Art This link opens in a new window
The largest existing database of medieval art, both image and text, from early apostolic times to 1400.
International Bibliography of Art (IBA) This link opens in a new window
The definitive resource for scholarly literature on Western art, IBA is the successor to the Bibliography of the History of Art (BHA).
International Bibliography of Theatre and Dance with Full Text This link opens in a new window
International Medieval Bibliography Online This link opens in a new window
Citations to articles in journals and miscellanies (collected essays, conference proceedings and Festschriften) covering all aspects of the European Middle Ages (c450-1500).
Iter: Gateway to the Middle Ages and Renaissance This link opens in a new window
Iter was created for the advancement of learning in the study and teaching of the Middle Ages and Renaissance (400-1700) through the development of online resources.
JSTOR Collection This link opens in a new window
The JSTOR database contains backfiles of 100+ journals from a variety of academic disciplines.

Growing Food Connections - Policy Database
a searchable collection of local public policies that explicitly support community food systems.

MLA International Bibliography (Modern Language Association) This link opens in a new window
Consists of bibliographic records pertaining to literature, language, linguistics, and folklore and includes coverage from 1926 to the present. The MLA International Bibliography provides access to scholarly research from 4,400 journals and series.
Oxford Art Online This link opens in a new window
Oxford Art Online is the access point for Grove Art Online, the Benezit Dictionary of Artists, the Concise Oxford Dictionary of Art Terms, the Encyclopedia of Aesthetics, and the Oxford Companion to Western Art.
PAIS Index This link opens in a new window
PAIS is an index to the literature of public policy, social policy, and the social sciences in general.
Patrologia Latina This link opens in a new window
The Patrologia Latina Database contains 221 volumes and represents a complete electronic version of the first edition of Jacques-Paul Migne's Patrologia Latina, covering 200 AD to 1216.
Project Muse This link opens in a new window
Provides online access to a comprehensive selection of prestigious humanities and social sciences journals.

IDRC (International Development Research Centre) Books
IDRC is a Canadian Crown corporation established by an act of Parliament in 1970 to help developing countries find solutions to their problems. They encourage and support researchers and innovators in those countries to find practical, long-term solutions to the social, economic, and environmental problems their societies face.

ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global This link opens in a new window
Includes nearly 3 million citations to dissertation and theses from 1743 to the present and over 1 million full-text dissertations available for downloading. International coverage but heavy North American emphasis.
Readers' Guide Retrospective, 1890-1982 This link opens in a new window
The most detailed account of U.S. culture and history you will find anywhere. Has become the ultimate index of subjects in the popular press, has earned the trust of researchers at all levels, and has been hailed by Library Journal as one of the 50 Best Reference Sources for the Millennium.

IIED (International Institute for Environment & Development) Publications
IIED is one of the world’s most influential international development and environment policy research organisations. Many of their publications offer free pdfs to dowload.

RIBA (Royal Institute of British Architects) Online Catalogue This link opens in a new window
Formerly the Architectural Publications Index, the British Architectural Library is the largest and most comprehensive resource in the United Kingdom for research and information on all aspects of architecture.
Social Sciences Citation Index (Web of Science Core Collection) This link opens in a new window
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Part of the Web of Science Citation Index, this database includes a wide range of interdisciplinary fields covered in a broad array of social sciences journals.
SpringerLink This link opens in a new window
A multidisciplinary database of full text publications published by Springer that includes titles on architecture and design. Formats include ejournals, reference works, monographic series, lecture notes, and ebooks, available on the SpringerLink platform.
Thesaurus Linguae Graecae : TLG This link opens in a new window
Literary texts written in Greek from Homer until the fall of Byzantium.
Theses Canada Portal This link opens in a new window
Indexes approximately 310,000 theses and dissertations on microform in Library and Archives Canada's collection. Of these approximately 90,000 are also available in fulltext.
Times Digital Archive This link opens in a new window
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An online, full-text facsimile of more than 200 years of The Times (London).
Access is also available to all residents within British Columbia via the Points to the Past Portal HERE.
TRID This link opens in a new window
TRID is the largest online bibliographic database of transportation research and includes U.S. government reports on transportation and Canadian research from the Canadian Surface Transportation Research Database.

UBC Newspapers & Serials
Provides on-line access to scanned copies of newspapers and other periodicals published at the University of British Columbia. These include the Alumni Association's Alumni Chronicle (and its successor, Trek), the student newspaper The Ubyssey, and the University's official news publication UBC Reports.

ULI Case Studies This link opens in a new window
Case studies from the Urban Land Institute which describe the development process; include photos, site plans, project data, and a report on the development process.
National Academies Press (NAP) This link opens in a new window
4000+ free ebooks on science, engineering, and health.
Vancouver Bibliography This link opens in a new window
A comprehensive listing of all materials on the subject of Vancouver. Lists over 20,000 items in many formats including books, manuscripts, maps, films, articles, microforms and others.
Outlook Online This link opens in a new window
Catalogue of the holdings of British Columbia's public, college, and institute libraries.
Web of Science Core Collection This link opens in a new window
Consists of three citation indexes: Science Citation Index, Social Sciences Citation Index, and Arts & Humanities Citation Index. Also includes cited reference searching and Journal Citation Reports.
World News Connection Archive This link opens in a new window
Offers an extensive array of translated and English-language news and information compiled from thousands of non-U.S. media sources.
WorldCat This link opens in a new window
OCLC catalog of books and other materials in libraries worldwide.
Sociology Collection This link opens in a new window
Includes Sociological Abstracts, Applied Social Sciences Index & Abstracts (ASSIA), and full text from the journals included in Sociology Database.
UNdata This link opens in a new window
Selected statistics from the entire UN system. Summary tables cover agriculture, population, industry, national accounts, energy, health, human development, trade, refugees, education, employment, and technology.
World Bank Data This link opens in a new window
Development-oriented statistics from the World Bank: social, economic, financial, natural resources, and environmental indicators for over 200 countries and 18 country groups, covering 1960 to the present.
OnArchitecture This link opens in a new window
An audiovisual database featuring the main trends in the field of architecture.

Biographical Dictionary of Architects in Canada (1800-1950)
Contains biographies of over 2,200 architects who lived and worked in Canada as well as those architects who resided in the United States, Britain and elsewhere, and for whom it is now possible to link their names with buildings constructed in Canada.

Eighteenth Century Collections Online This link opens in a new window
Includes English-language and foreign-language titles printed in Great Britain during the eighteenth century, along with works from the Americas.
Access is available to all residents within British Columbia via the Points to the Past Portal.
Eighteenth Century Journals: Portal to Newspapers and Periodicals c1685-1815 This link opens in a new window
Rare journals printed between c1685 and 1815, illuminating all aspects of eighteenth-century social, political and literary life.

Research Help - Vancouver

Music, Art & Architecture Library
I K Barber Learning Centre - Level 3
1961 East Mall
Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z1

Email: maa.library@ubc.ca
Phone: 604-822-3943

Library Research Help

This guide will help you find information including books, articles, standards, theses, images, data, web resources and more.

Need additional help? Please don't hesitate to contact us.

Music, Art & Architecture Library
I K Barber Learning Centre - Level 3
1961 East Mall
Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z1

Email: maa.library@ubc.ca
Phone: 604-822-3943

UBC Sites

Related Guides

Library Research Help

This guide will help you art related information including books, articles, standards, theses, images, data, web resources and more. Need additional help? Please don't hesitate to contact me.

Sara Ellis
Art Librarian
Music, Art & Architecture Library
I K Barber Learning Centre
#414 - 1961 East Mall
Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z1

Email: sara.ellis@ubc.ca
Phone: 604-827-3549