Bienvenue!
Because you're more than likely to be using articles & other electronic resources for your research, this page is the best place to start with your research. You'll find links to French-language-specific databases, databases that cover a wide range of areas of study (multidisciplinary), some databases that are discipline-specific & likely to have materials you can use, & some other links that I think can be useful, depending on what your research focuses on.
Multidisciplinary Resources
Covering a broad range of subjects and topics for numerous disciplines, these resources are a good place to start your research.
- Academic Search CompleteScholarly, multidisciplinary database containing more than 6,100 full-text journals, and indexing/abstracts for more than 10,100 journals.
- Google ScholarGoogle Scholar is a freely accessible web search engine that indexes the full text or metadata of scholarly literature across an array of publishing formats and disciplines.
- ProQuest Research LibraryAbstracts and full text for scholarly journals, trade publications, magazines, and newspapers. Covers the arts, business, children, education, general interest, health, humanities, international, law, military, multicultural, psychology, sciences, social sciences, and women's studies.
Recommended Resources
FRENCH LANGUAGE RESOURCES
- Persee: Portail de revues scientifiques et sciences humaines et socialesA digital full-text collection of french language scholarly journals. Researchers can browse journals by title, by discipline or perform specific searches across all Persee contents.
- CAIRN InfoIn association with the Bibliotheque Nationale de France, CAIRN Info provides full-text access to select journals, encyclopedias, magazines and country information.
- OpenEdition JournalsCenter for open electronic publishing (in French) that covers the full contents of 287 journals and 15 book series.
- Gallica: Bibliotheque NumeriqueAn online full-text collection of books, manuscripts, journals, images, maps, sound recordings and musical scores.
- EruditIn consultation with the Universite de Montreal and the Universite Laval, erudit offers the full text of French language journal articles, books, dissertations and other documents.
- INED: Institut National d'Études DémographiquesA list of journals related to demographic and population studies from many different countries, including France and other Francophone countries. Some journals will be in French; others in English. Full-text access to each journal is dependent on individual titles.
- Sites de Periodiques et de Livres GratuitsAn extensive list of free resources from the Universite de Sherbrooke
Recommended Resources
SUBJECT SPECIFIC RESOURCES
- Historical Abstracts This link opens in a new windowBest database for world history. Lists scholarly articles from history journals. Allows you to search by journal name. Each article is summarized. Covers the history of civilization (excluding the United States and Canada) from 1450 to the present.
- MEDLINE with Full Text This link opens in a new windowAuthoritative medical information on medicine, nursing, dentistry, veterinary medicine, the health care system, pre-clinical sciences, and much more. Created by the National Library of Medicine, MEDLINE uses MeSH (Medical Subject Headings) indexing with tree, tree hierarchy, subheadings and explosion capabilities to search citations from over 4,800 current biomedical journals.
- MLA International Bibliography This link opens in a new windowMLA International Bibliography offers a detailed bibliography of journal articles, books and dissertations. Produced by the Modern Language Association, the electronic version of the bibliography dates back to the 1920s and contains over 2.2 million citations from more than 4,400 journals & series and 1,000 book publishers. The indexed materials coverage is international and includes almost 60 titles from J-STOR’s language and literature collection as well as links to full text.
- Sociological Abstracts Contains scholarly works in sociology and related disciplines. Provides citations and summaries for articles, dissertations, books and association papers in sociology and related disciplines.
- Worldwide Political Science AbstractsIndexes and abstracts journal articles in political science and its complementary fields, including international relations, law, and public administration / policy.
Updated monthly.
French Government & Other Sources of Quality Information
https://www.gouvernement.fr/toute-l-actualite: Le Gouvernement français
https://www.education.gouv.fr: L’Education nationale
https://www.economie.gouv.fr: Ministère de l’économie, des finances, et de la relance
https://www.culture.gouv.fr/Sites-thematiques/Musees/Les-musees-en-France/Les-musees-de-France/Le-reseau-des-musees-de-France: Musées nationaux
https://www.rmngp.fr: Musées nationaux
https://www.credoc.fr: Centre de recherche pour l’étude et l’observation des conditions de vie
https://www.ined.fr/fr/: Institut national d’études démographiques
https://www.insee.fr/fr/accueil: Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques
https://www.inserm.fr: Institut national de la santé et de la recherche médicale
https://www.ifop.com: Institut français d’opinion publique
French Media
https://www.francetvinfo.fr/replay-jt/france-2/20-heures/: Journal télévisé (8h, 13h et 20h)
https://www.lefigaro.fr: Le Figaro (droite, centre droit; plus ancien journal, fondé en 1826)
https://www.lemonde.fr: Le Monde
https://www.humanite.fr: L’Humanité (Communiste)
https://www.liberation.fr: Libération (Socialiste)
https://www.la-croix.com: La Croix (Catholique)
https://www.leparisien.fr: Le Parisien
https://www.ouest-france.fr: Ouest-France
https://www.nouvelobs.com: Le Nouvel Observateur
https://www.lepoint.fr: Le Point (comme Time)
https://www.loisirs-magazine.fr: Loisirs magazine
https://www.lecanardenchaine.fr: (satirique)
http://www.charliehebdo.fr: Charlie Hebdo
Background Research on a Country
In many research scenarios involving societal, historical, political or artistic issues related to a particular country, students will want to get to know that country first and weave that knowledge into the specific topic of interest.
An entire library guide has been devoted to research resources targeting country backgrounds. Please refer to the following guide at a starting point.
French Linguistics
- Ethnologue This link opens in a new windowConveniently find, read about, and research the world's 7,097 known living languages.
- LexilogosThis link will take you into the French-language section of Lexilogos, where you can find a plethora of online dictionaries in a wide variety of languages, dialects, & patois. Additionally, it contains links to Atlas sites, a virtual planetarium, an assortment of clickable maps, & assorted image and photo collections.
Non-Scholarly Resources
- French Magazines OnlineDiscover French-language magazines available online.
- French Canadian WritersFind biographies, bibliographies, research papers, and selected links to a select list of French Canadian writers.
Help With Citations
Depending on the focus of study within French/Francophone Studies, students will want to refer to the citation style guide that is appropriate for their academic field (e.g., MLA for language and literature, Turabian for history, ASA for sociology).
- Citing SourcesA guide to several citation styles.
