Periodicals Index Online (PIO), Periodicals Archive Online (PAO), and British Periodicals Online are now available at the Temple University Libraries from theAll Databases list. These are superb additions for arts, humanities, and social science students and researchers. Coming from Proquest, the three databases are all related. Periodicals Index Online (formerly known as Periodicals Contents Index, or PCI) is the primary database because in addition to its own content it indexes and provides links to Periodicals Archive Online (formerly known as PCI Full Text) and British Periodicals Online.
Periodicals Index Online is a growing database that currently provides access to over 16 million articles from 5000 journals in over 40 languages going back as far as 1665. Every journal or magazine indexed by PIO starts from volume 1 issue 1 so there are no gaps in coverage. The PIO interface is available in English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish. When you search PIO, you are also searching PAO and the British Periodicals Index. PIO also provides links toProject Muse and JSTOR journals.
Periodicals Archive Online provides full-text access to 450 journals and magazines from 1665 to 1995 as well as 160 from British Periodicals Online. In all, PAO provides over 1.8 million full-text articles plus the full-text content from British Periodicals Online. As with PIO, there are links to Project MUSE and JSTOR journals.
British Periodicals Online can be searched separately. It comes in two modules. Module I is currently available and module II will add an additional 300 journals and magazines in the latter half of 2007. Here is a description of it from the website:
“British Periodicals traces the development and growth of the periodical press in Britain from its origins in the seventeenth century through to the Victorian ‘age of periodicals’ and beyond. On completion this unique digital archive will consist of almost 500 periodical runs published from the 1680s to the 1930s, comprising six million keyword-searchable pages and forming an unrivalled record of more than two centuries of British history and culture.”
Here are a few sample articles to pique your interest:
ATROCITIES OF BONAPARTE, IN 1797, Anti-Gallican: or Standard of British loyalty, religion and liberty , 1:12 (1804:Dec.) p.457
A Conjecture concerning the Peopling of AMERICA, Arminian Magazine consisting of extracts and original treatises on universal redemption, 13 (1790:Nov.) p.599
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN ON THE USE OF OIL AT SEA, Chambers’s journal of popular literature, science and arts, 934 (1881:Nov.) p.752
DANIEL DERONDA, Harper’s New Monthly Magazine, 52 (1875:Dec.-1876:May) p.425
Germany and Austria, Current History (New York), 22:4 (1925:July) p.653
Israel’s Place in America Hispana, Contemporary Jewish Record, 6:1 (1943:Feb.) p.5
If you do any research in the humanities and social sciences, you should get to know these databases very well. For students, they will help to save time and get better grades. For faculty and researchers, they will broaden the scope of your research and reduce searching time.
—Fred Rowland