Library Guides: A Guide to Geography Research: Journal articles

Start your search in a multidisciplinary database

Geography is an incredibly multidisciplinary field, so start your search in a multidisciplinary database, then try a few more databases from the lists below that suit your topic.

Web of Science Core Collection (WOS)
Provides multidisciplinary coverage of high-impact scholarly literature in the sciences, social sciences, arts, and humanities. Use the unique Cited References Search to find articles that cite an author or work -- this allows you to track citations forward in time. Content dates from 1900 - present. Includes Science Citation Index Expanded, Social Sciences Citation Index, Arts & Humanities Citation Index, and Emerging Sources Citation Index.
Academic Search Complete
A full-text database designed to help students get started researching almost any topic. Sources include scholarly journal articles, popular magazines, newspapers, and more.
Google Scholar
Free search interface focused on finding scholarly literature -- including peer-reviewed papers, theses, books, preprints, abstracts and technical reports -- from all broad areas of research. Check out Google's search tips.

Environmental & earth sciences

Agricultural & Environmental Science Collection (ProQuest)
Includes ESPM (Environmental Sciences and Pollution Management); EIS (Environmental Impact Statements); TOXLINE; and AGRICOLA (a comprehensive agricultural research database from the USDA -- ProQuest's version of AGRICOLA provides convenient links to DU's full-text subscriptions when available). Sources include scholarly journals, trade journals, newspapers and magazines, conference proceedings, reports, monographs, books, and government publications.
GreenFILE
Database of articles focusing on human impacts on the environment, including global warming, green building, pollution, sustainable agriculture, renewable energy, recycling, and more.
ASFA: Aquatic Sciences and Fisheries Abstracts
Provides extensive coverage of the world's literature on marine, freshwater and brackish water environments. Topics of interest to geographers include aquaculture; aquatic pollution; conservation; climate change; environmental quality; fisheries; oil and gas resources; policy and legislation; recreation; aquatic disease vectors impacting human health; wastewater and sanitation; and water supply. Content dates from 1971 - present.
Includes the following databases that can be searched independently as needed:
• ASFA 1 -- Biological Sciences & Living Resources;
• ASFA 2 -- Ocean Technology, Policy & Non-Living Resources;
• ASFA 3 -- Aquatic Pollution & Environmental Quality;
• ASFA Aquaculture Abstracts;
• ASFA Marine Biotechnology Abstracts;
• Oceanic Abstracts
Georef (Engineering Village/Elsevier)
From a geographer's perspective, this database is best for physical geography, paleogeography, biogeography, and geographic information systems (GIS). GeoRef is the most comprehensive database in the geosciences. Covers the geology of North America from 1785 to the present, and the geology of the rest of the world from 1933 to the present. Contains references to geoscience journal articles, books, maps, conference papers, reports, and theses. Includes references to all publications of the U.S. Geological Survey.
Trial runs through July 31, 2019 -- help us decide which new GeoRef platform to choose.

Human & cultural studies

America: History and Life
Covers U.S. and Canadian history from prehistory to present. Includes historical geography, political geography, cultural geography, human geography, and other topics of interest to geographers. Allows you to search by time period (i.e. 1800-1849 or 1950-1970).
Historical Abstracts with Full Text
Covers world history (excluding the United States and Canada) from 1450-present. Includes historical geography, political geography, cultural geography, human geography, and other topics of interest to geographers. Allows you to search by time period (i.e. 1800-1849 or 1950-1970).
Anthropology Plus
Brings together Harvard University's Anthropological Literature and the United Kingdom's Anthropological Index (Royal Anthropological Institute) to provide comprehensive coverage of anthropological literature.
eHRAF World Cultures
A cross-cultural database that contains over 350,000 pages of information on all aspects of cultural and social life.
PsycINFO
The American Psychological Association's (APA) renowned resource for abstracts of scholarly journal articles, book chapters, books, and dissertations.
Also found as PsychInfo
SocINDEX with Full Text
Full-text database covering the broad spectrum of sociological study. The thesaurus includes subject terms such as population geography, human geography, rural geography, urban geography, economic geography, geography education, emigration & immigration, and internal migration. Includes extensive indexing for books, monographs, conference papers and other non-periodical content sources.
Sociology Collection
This collection provides access to Sociological Abstracts in combination with other databases covering the international literature in sociology and social services, along with related fields.

Economics, development, & urban studies

EconLit
The world's foremost source of references to economic literature.
Business Source Complete
Contains premium content of peer-reviewed, business related journals. Provides detailed company information for more than 1.1 million of the world's largest public and private companies.
HUD User
Contains over 10,000 abstract citations to research reports, articles, books, monographs, and data sources in housing policy, building technology, economic development, urban planning, and a host of other relevant fields.
Compendex (EI)
The most comprehensive engineering database. Coverage includes civil engineering, urban planning, sustainable development, and other issues of potential interest to geographers. Sources include articles, conference proceedings, technical reports, and more. Content dates from 1970 - present.

Health & education

PubMed (includes MEDLINE)
The most comprehensive medical database. This resource covers medicine, dentistry, nursing, physical therapy, biomedical research, clinical practice, administration, policy issues, and health care services. This public version provides a Clinical Queries search interface. In addition to MEDLINE, PubMed includes articles that are waiting to be processed for MEDLINE, as well as extra life sciences journals and ebooks not included in MEDLINE.
ERIC (ProQuest)
The Educational Resource Information Center is sponsored by the U.S. Department of Education to provide extensive access to education-related literature.

Politics, law, and criminal justice

Politics in America
The ultimate insider's guide to politics with authoritative information on each member of Congress and the district he or she represents.
Political Handbook of the World
Combines comprehensive country and intergovernmental organization profiles from the print edition with a convenient, user-friendly database that organizes the content with a number of browses.
Worldwide Political Science Abstracts
Provides abstracts and indexing of the international literature of political science and international relations, along with complementary fields, including international law and public administration/policy.
HeinOnline
Provides full-text online access to all legal journals, rare and out-of-print collections and all back issues of indexed legal journals into a searchable electronic format.
ProQuest Congressional
Offers access to congressional publications dealing with the wide variety of topics addressed by Congress.
Criminal Justice Abstracts with Full Text
CJA indexes more than 550 national and international journals, covering subject areas including criminology, criminal justice, criminal law and procedure, corrections and prisons, police and policing, criminal investigation, forensic sciences and investigation, history of crime, substance abuse and addiction, probation, and parole.
National Criminal Justice Reference Service (NCJRS)
Features abstracts from more than 160,000 publications on criminal justice, including Federal, state, and local government reports, books, research reports, journal articles, and unpublished research. Also includes some full-text of federal government documents.

Migration

Because migration is such a multi-faceted topic, journals that cover migration are found in many different databases. Here are your best bets for finding articles on migration. Depending on your topic, other databases listed above might also be relevant for your search.

Add a few keywords relevant to your research to this basic search string:

(migrants OR migration OR immigrat* OR emigrat*) AND ...

Academic Search Complete
Designed for academic institutions, this database by Ebscohost provides complete coverage of multidisciplinary, full-text academic journals.
America: History and Life
Covers U.S. and Canadian history from prehistory to present. Includes historical geography, political geography, cultural geography, human geography, and other topics of interest to geographers. Allows you to search by time period (i.e. 1800-1849 or 1950-1970).
SocINDEX with Full Text
Contains full text for 344 "core" coverage journals in sociology, its sub-disciplines, and related fields dating back to 1895, and 129 "priority" coverage journals.
Sociology Collection
Part of Social Science Premium Collection, this collection provides access to Sociological Abstracts in combination with other databases covering the international literature in sociology and social services, along with related fields.
Web of Science Core Collection (WOS)
Provides multidisciplinary coverage of high-impact scholarly literature in the sciences, social sciences, arts, and humanities. Use the unique Cited References Search to find articles that cite an author or work -- this allows you to track citations forward in time. Content dates from 1900 - present. Includes Science Citation Index Expanded, Social Sciences Citation Index, Arts & Humanities Citation Index, and Emerging Sources Citation Index.
Worldwide Political Science Abstracts
Provides abstracts and indexing of the international literature of political science and international relations, along with complementary fields, including international law and public administration/policy.

Where are the top journals about migration indexed?

Like many interdisciplinary topics, the top journals for migration are scattered across different databases, which is why we recommend you search multiple databases.

Two important migration journals didn't fit in the table, because they're each solely indexed by a unique database:

Diaspora, Indigenous, and Minority Education: studies of migration, integration, equity, and cultural survival is only indexed in ERIC (Education Resources Information Center)
Immigration and Nationality Law Review is only indexed in Hein Online (a legal database)

University of Denver

University Libraries

Research Guides

A Guide to Geography Research

What's an article database?