English Literature
Whether you're a new student starting your first assignment, further on in your studies, or starting a research project, this page will help you find and use the best information for your subject. You will also find resources to help develop your academic, study and digital skills.
If you can’t find what you need here, please contact your Academic Support Team: library-SBS@salford.ac.uk
Key resources for English Literature students
Databases
Whilst Library Search is your starting point when researching a topic, sometimes it’s helpful to restrict your search to one of our specialist sources.
- Literature & Language Database (ProQuest) - A collection of literature and language databases.
- Literature Online - Is a fully integrated service that combines the texts of over 355,000 literary works with a vast library of key criticism and reference resources.
- Gale Literary Sources - Allows you to search across Gale's premier literary databases to discover and analyse content.
- MLA International Bibliography - Offers a detailed bibliography of journal articles, books and dissertations. Subjects consist of literature, language and linguistics, folklore, literary theory and criticism, and dramatic arts, as well as the historical aspects of printing and publishing.
- JSTOR - a great range of books and articles on all kind of topics including English Language.
- BBC Shakespeare Archive Resource - Contains programmes and photographs from the BBC's Shakespeare archive. It includes Shakespeare’s plays, poems and sonnets, documentaries, interviews and over a thousand stills of classic Shakespeare productions, as well as entertainment programmes referencing Shakespeare.
- Digital Theatre Plus - a great resource for video of theatre productions as well as interviews with performers, directors and others.
- Drama Online - Includes the scripts of some of the most studied modern and classic plays from a huge range of authors. Also included on the platform are almost 60 books providing analysis and criticism of some of these plays and playwrights.
- JISC Historical texts - Brings together four historically significant collections, with over 400,000 books published from the late 15th century through to the long 19th century.
- The Listener Historical Archive - Developed as the medium for reproducing broadcasts, The Listener (1929-1991) was the weekly newspaper published by the BBC.
- Times Literary Supplement Historical Archive - A rich research and teaching tool for students and scholars allowing them to trace the views of influential opinion makers, the response of their contemporaries, the controversies and debates of the day.
- Oxford Dictionary of National Biography - Includes over 60,000 biographies, 72 million words, 11,000 portraits of significant, influential or notorious figures from British history.
- Oxford Reference Online - A reference database which includes English and bilingual dictionaries, as well as subject dictionaries and reference books published by Oxford University Press.
- Box of Broadcasts - a huge collection of TV and radio programmes broadcast in the UK. Worth exploring for English literature. In addition, a number of programmes regularly discuss literature and the arts, so this can be an important source for reviews and critical opinion. Also a great source for films that have been broadcast on TV.
- Kanopy - another good source for films. Search or browse by topic amongst thousands of videos specifically curated for an academic audience
Books and Journals
The first place you should look is your reading list – you will find a link to this in your Blackboard modules. It lists all the core texts for your subject as recommended by your lecturers. All our other books and journals can be found in Library Search
LinkedIn Learning
LinkedIn Learning offers over 9,000 professionally produced online courses covering a wide range of technical, creative and professional skills.
Always use our institutional link to log in – you will need your University email address and password. The first time that you log in, you will be taken through a setup process to discover courses tailored to your interests.
Discover more in our video: Using LinkedIn Learning at Salford.
Newspapers
These are a great source for book reviews and comment on film, television and theatre productions.
Sources to try include Gale OneFile News and Newsstream. Check our Newspapers web page to see which papers we have access to.
Browse your Reading Lists

Your tutors select books, articles, videos and other resources for your reading lists and the Library buys them so you don't have to.
Find the lists for your modules in Blackboard, or in Library Search.
Referencing

APA 7th (Harvard) style is the main referencing style in use at the University. We've compiled an easy to follow list of guidebooks and examples to help you get to grips with complexities of referencing.
Newspapers

Newspapers are a valuable source of information. They provide insight into what interests and concerns people both now and in the past.
The Library provides some excellent newspaper sources that allow you to search simply and easily across many newspapers at once.
Dissertations and Theses

During the course of your studies, you may find that you need to search for dissertations or theses.
You can use Library Search to help you find them and there are a number of different ways to search, depending on what you want to find.
New English Literature Students
Book a one to one
If you’ve tried our eLearning and classroom sessions and need more help, you can request a one to one appointment for information finding, academic and writing or digital skills. Select your chosen time slot and book on through Advantage.
Book on a workshop
We offer a wide range of face-to-face skills training. If you need to improve your IT skills, learn how to find information for your assignments or improve your study skills this is a great place to start.
All workshops are bookable through Advantage by clicking on the workshop title. Where a session has no remaining spaces you can add yourself to the waiting list.
Preparing for Reassessment
Starts: 6 Jun 2023, 5:00 pmFinishes: 6 Jun 2023, 6:00 pmRemaining places: 50This workshop will provide help, support, and guidance for students undertaking reassessment.Preparing for Reassessment
Starts: 20 Jun 2023, 12:00 pmFinishes: 20 Jun 2023, 1:00 pmRemaining places: 49This workshop will provide help, support, and guidance for students undertaking reassessment.Returning to Learning [ONLINE]
Starts: 20 Jun 2023, 1:00 pmFinishes: 20 Jun 2023, 2:00 pmRemaining places: 30For students who have been out of education for some time
Microsoft Office Specialist (MOS) Exam session [Online]
Starts: 31 May 2023, 5:00 pmFinishes: 31 May 2023, 6:00 pmVenue: MOS Exam - Certiport exam providerRemaining places: 14This is an online EXAM SESSION for MOS certification. At the time of booking you must have scored over 70% in GMetrix's 'Testing' mode for your chosen application. Bookings not meeting this criteria will be cancelled.Microsoft Office Specialist (MOS) Exam session [Online]
Starts: 8 Jun 2023, 11:00 amFinishes: 8 Jun 2023, 12:00 pmVenue: MOS Exam - Certiport exam providerRemaining places: 13This is an online EXAM SESSION for MOS certification. At the time of booking you must have scored over 70% in GMetrix's 'Testing' mode for your chosen application. Bookings not meeting this criteria will be cancelled.Microsoft Office Specialist (MOS) Exam session [Online]
Starts: 14 Jun 2023, 5:00 pmFinishes: 14 Jun 2023, 6:00 pmVenue: MOS Exam - Certiport exam providerRemaining places: 14This is an online EXAM SESSION for MOS certification. At the time of booking you must have scored over 70% in GMetrix's 'Testing' mode for your chosen application. Bookings not meeting this criteria will be cancelled.
Preparing for Reassessment
Starts: 6 Jun 2023, 5:00 pmFinishes: 6 Jun 2023, 6:00 pmRemaining places: 50This workshop will provide help, support, and guidance for students undertaking reassessment.Preparing for Reassessment
Starts: 20 Jun 2023, 12:00 pmFinishes: 20 Jun 2023, 1:00 pmRemaining places: 49This workshop will provide help, support, and guidance for students undertaking reassessment.Finding information using Library Search [online]
Starts: 29 Jun 2023, 2:00 pmFinishes: 29 Jun 2023, 3:00 pmRemaining places: 40This online workshop is a live demo of how Library Search works and showcases what it can do to help you find good quality academic information at Salford.