Reed College Library: Philosophy

There are many handbooks, dictionaries, and encyclopedias that provide basic information. If you are not clear about your topic, try establishing its limits with a good definition and some introductory information. The following general sources can give you a quick overview or summary of a topic, and you can find other, more specialized resources in the Reference Room:

General Resources

The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy
Ref B41 .C35 1999
Does not contain articles on living philosophers. Includes an index of all names mentioned in the articles.

Dictionary of World Philosophy
Ref B41 .I26 2001
Global coverage including Africa, Asian, Latin American, Middle Eastern, Maori, and Native American philosophies. Bibliographies.

Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Ref & Oversize B41 .E5 1967
The standard encyclopedic work covering Western and Eastern philosophy, although it does have a bias towards Anglo-American philosophy. The copy in the Reference Room also has the one volume supplement published in 1996 which has articles with updates to the major areas of philosophy and articles on topics new emerged or not treated in the original volumes and biographies of newly prominent philosophers. 8 v. with supplement.

The Handbook of Western Philosophy
Ref B804 .H17 1988
A systemic survey of contemporary Anglo-American philosophical thought. Includes a glossary, a chronology of the history of philosophy from 1600 to 1960, and indexes.

International Directory of Philosophy and Philosophers
Ref B35 .I55 v.2001/2002

The Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy
Comprehensive in coverage. Other than primary sources mentioned in articles there are no bibliographies.

Philosophy: A Guide to the Reference Literature
Ref B72 .B95 1997
A comprehensive guide covering resources in philosophy including encyclopedias, dictionaries, indexes and bibliographies. Lists annotated resources for branches, schools and periods of philosophy as well individual philosophers.

Research Guide to Philosophy
Ref B52 .T5 1983
Includes bibliographic essays on specific chronological periods and philosophers and on different areas of philosophy. Over 3000 monographic resources are cited with annotations and evaluative comments.

Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Ref B51 .R68 1998 (10 v.)
A comprehensive encyclopedia. The online version can be browsed by philosophical themes, philosophies, historical periods, and religions. Fulltext entries can be searched by keyword, title, contributor, or bibliography.

Interdisciplinary Resources

Dictionary of Philosophy and Psychology
B41 .B18 1911
"Including many of the principal conceptions of ethics, logic, aesthetics, philosophy of religion, mental pathology, anthropology, biology, neurology, physiology, economics, political and social philosophy, philology, physical science, and education; and giving a terminology in English, French, German, and Italian written by many hands and edited by James Mark Baldwin." The first philosophy encyclopedia written in English. Useful for topics now out of date and the viewpoint of the beginning of the 20th century.

Key Ideas in Human Thought
Ref B41 .K48 1993
Around 2,500 "ideas", many of which are outside of philosophy proper but have been important in philosophical thought.

Specialized Areas Resources

A Companion to Aesthetics
BH56 .C65 1995 (Stacks)
Anglo-American in perspective. Includes bibliographies, cross-references and an index.

A Companion to Epistemology
BD161 .C637 1992 (Stacks)
Anglo-American in perspective with some attention to the Continental perspective. Includes bibliographies, cross-references and an index.

A Companion to Ethics
BJ1012 .C62 1993 (Stacks)
Survey articles on the subject of ethics. Slanted towards the Western tradition contains some articles on non-Western ethics.

A Companion to the Philosophy of Mind
BD418.3 .C62 1994 (Stacks)
Includes many first person ariticles contributed by contemporary Anglo-American philosophers. Bibliographies at the end of articles.

Dictionary of Philosophy
B41 .F5513 1984b (Stacks)
Translation of the 4^th edition of Filosofskii slovar'. An encyclopedic dictionary covering Western and Eastern philosophy with a Marxist bias.

Encyclopedia of Ethics, 2nd ed.
Ref BJ63 .E45 2001
More than 400 articles primarily written by an prominent thinkers on philosophical ethics. The focus chiefly Western. All articles include bibliographies. 3 v.

Encyclopedia of Indian Philosophies: Bibliography
B131 .P67 1983 (Stacks)
Over 13,000 entries covering books and articles indexed by name, title and topic. The library has the additional volumes covering specialized topics in Indian philosophy that are cataloged with separate call numbers. Check the catalog.

Glossary of Epistemology/Philosophy of Science
Ref BD150 .F47 1993
Brief entries on concepts, leading thinkers and core ideas in these two fields.

Guide to Buddhist Philosophy
B162 .I53 1985 (Stacks)
Annotated bibliography of mostly English books, articles, and dissertations.

Guide to Indian Philosophy
Ref B5131 .P68 1988
Annotated bibliography of mostly English books and articles from the 20^th century.

Handbook of Metaphysics and Ontology
Ref BD111 .H225 1991
Almost 500 hundred articles that cover the historical figures, concepts and the logical and mathematical tools of metaphysics reflecting both the Continental and Anglo-American perspectives. 2 v.

Handbook of Philosophical Logic:
V. 1. Elements of Classical Logic
BC71 .H36 1983 (Stacks)
V. 2. Extensions of Classical Logic
BC71 .E98 1984 (Stacks)
Systematic overview of the essential areas of philosophical logic.

A History of Women Philosophers:
V. 1. Ancient Women Philosophers, 600 B.C. - 500 A.D.
B105.W6 A53 1987 (Stacks)
V. 2. Medieval, Renaissance and Enlightenment Women Philosophers, A.D. 500 - 1600
Ref B105 .W6 M39 1989
V. 3. Modern Women Philosophers, 1600 - 1900
Ref B105.W6 M63 1991
V. 4. Contemporary Women Philosophers: 1900 - Today
Ref B105.W6 C66 1995
Essays on individual women philosophers. Includes overviews, bibliographies and timeline of the women philosophers showing chronological overlap with contemporary male philosophers.

Philosophy of Religion: An Annotated Bibliography of Twentieth-century Writings in English
BL51 .W34 1978 (Stacks)
Over 1100 entries grouped in categories.

Women Philosophers: A Bio-critical Source Book
Ref B105.W6 K47 1989
Has overview, bibliographies and name index. Includes an alphabetical table of women philosophers with countries dates and disciplines.

Specialized Period Resources

Ancient

Greek Philosophical Terms; A Historical Lexicon
Ref B49 .P4
Includes an English-Greek index and textual citation to Greek philosophers.

Plato and Socrates: A Comprehensive Bibliography, 1958 - 1973
Ref PA4290.A5 M33 1978
About 4000 items divided in separate section for each philosopher and topically subdivided. An author index.

Socrates: An Annotated Bibliography
Ref B317 .N38 1988
Divided into broad subject divisions. An author index.

Medieval

The Cambridge History of Later Greek and Early Medieval Philosophy
B171 .A79 (Stacks)

The Cambridge History of Later Medieval Philosophy: From the Rediscovery of Aristotle to the Disintegration of Scholasticism, 1100 - 1600
B721 .C35 1982 (Stacks)

Renaissance

The Cambridge History of Renaissance Philosophy
B775 .C25 1988 (Stacks)
"Discusses the background and advancement of Renaissance philosophy, metaphysics, psychology, and related fields." Name and subject indexes.

Modern

Bibliographia Cartesiana, A Critical Guide to the Descartes Literature, 1880 - 1960
B1873 .S43 1964 (Stacks)

The Blackwell Companion to the Enlightenment
Ref CB411 .B57 1991
Provides strong coverage to the philosophical thought of the period although it covers much more. Articles on both the major philosophers of the time as well as many of the less familiar. There are articles on many of the important philosophical topics of the time.

20th Century

Encyclopædia of Religion and Ethics
Ref BL31 .E4
Although this encyclopedia is out of date for current developments, its extensive articles are a valuable resource for late 19^th and early 20^th century thought and literature. 13 v. (1908-1922)

Wittgenstein: A Bibliographical Guide
B3376 .W564 1990
Annotated. Indexes of proper names and reviews of Wittgenstein writings.

Locating Books

To locate books, look in the online library catalog. If you know the author or editor, search Author, last name first. To search by Title, you must know the first few words of the title, but you do not have to know the complete title. To search successfully by Subject, you must use subject terms from the Library of Congress Subject Headings. These can be found in large red books directly behind the Reference Desk.

If you cannot find a particular subject, try a keyword search. Once you locate some appropriate book titles, make note of the subject headings assigned to them. You can then do a subject search on those headings to locate more books. Alternatively, you can check the stacks for other books with similar call numbers.

To search for books in the Summit system, access the library catalog as usual, and select button "Search in Summit" above the record. If you find books in Summit which are not owned by Reed, you can request the books directly from the catalog. You will need to enter your barcode number (it is on the back of your Reed ID card). You will be notified when the book arrives. The borrowing period is three weeks with one renewal allowed.

Finding Journal Articles and Essays

Indexes (sometimes called databases) allow you to search the contents of periodicals to identify articles on your topic. Some indexes are inter-disciplinary, and some focus on a particular subject area. Some contain fulltext or links to fulltext from other sources. Many include citations for books, dissertations, and conference papers as well as journal articles.

After you find a citation for an article, you will need to check the Print & Electronic Journal page to see if Reed subscribes to the journal and if we have the particular issue.

If the article you are looking for is not available at Reed, you can request it from Interlibrary loan (periodicals cannot be borrowed from Summit).

Academic Search Premier (1975 - present)
A multi-disciplinary database containing fulltext for nearly 4,000 scholarly publications. In addition to the fulltext, the database offers indexing and abstracts for nearly 7.700 journals.

L'Année Philologique
Ref PA3001 .A56
The international index to scholarship in classics. You may need a copy of the print version (available from 1914 - present) to find the list of journal title abbreviations used in the entries online. Entries in English, French, German, Italian, and other languages.

Arts & Humanities Citation Index (1975 - present)
As part of the "Web of Science" (along with the Social Sciences Citation Index and the Science Citation Index). The three indexes may be searched singly or together. Enables searching of references cited in books and journal articles, as well as subject, author, and title searching.

ATLA Religion (1949-present)
A comprehensive database that supports religious and theological scholarship. Contains links to some fulltext journal articles

Bibliographie de la Philosophie = Bibliography of Philosophy (1954 - 1993)
B77 .B52 (Stacks)
An international bibliography of books providing abstracts in the original language of the item along with French or English translations.

Essay and General Literature Index (1985 - present)
Ref AI3 .E78
Use this database to find essays and articles contained in collections (i.e. books) of essays and miscellaneous works published in the United States, Great Britain, and Canada. Print is available from 1900 - 1998.

JSTOR
Searchable electronic archive of the fulltext of journals. Coverage is from journal's first date of publication to three to five years before the present date.

Periodicals Index Online (Coverage varies)
An electronic index to the contents of thousands of periodicals in the humanities and social sciences, from their first issues to 1993. Every article is indexed. Easy to search for book reviews.

Philosopher's Index (1940 - present)
Indexing and abstracts from books and journals of philosophy and related interdisciplinary fields published throughout the Western World since 1967. Coverage from 1940 for U.S. materials.

The Philosopher's Index: A Retrospective Index to Non-U.S. English Language Publications from 1940
Ref B72 .P473 1980
Covers books published outside of the United States between 1940 - 1976 and articles between 1940 - 1966.

Selected Web Resources

CogPrints - Philosophy
Bibliography from the Cognitive Sciences E-print Archive with abstracts. Browseable and searchable.

Paideia Project
An archive of papers from the Twentieth World Congress of Philosophy (1998).

Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
A dynamic encyclopedia with each entry maintained and kept up-to-date by an expert or group of experts in the field.

Writing Guides

MLA Style Manual and Guide to Scholarly Publishing, 2^nd ed.
Ref PN147 .G444 1998

Library

Research Guide for Philosophy

Contact: Jennie McKee , Access Services Librarian

Getting Started