Middle Eastern Studies: Indexes & Databases
Modern Foreign Affairs
- Carter Administration and Foreign Affairs This link opens in a new windowMemos, letters, and other documentation from the Carter administration and earlier (1972-1981) pertaining to foreign policy.
- Confidential Print: Middle East, 1839-1969 This link opens in a new window"The Confidential Print series, issued by the British Government between c. 1820 and 1970, is a fundamental building block for political, social and economic research...This collection consists of the Confidential Print for the countries of the Levant and the Arabian peninsula, Iran, Turkey, Egypt and Sudan."
- Country Watch: Website of the World (CountryWatch) This link opens in a new windowContains detailed textual, data and graphic information for countries and regions. Topics include: country overviews, political history and conditions, economic status, investment overviews, social background, and environmental situation and issues.
- Foreign Broadcast Information Service Daily Reports (FBIS) This link opens in a new window"As the United States' principal historical record of political open source intelligence for more than half a century, the Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS) Daily Report is an indispensable source for insights into decades of turbulent world history."
- Foreign Office Files for the Middle East, 1971-1981 This link opens in a new window"This collection is an essential resource for understanding the events in the Middle East during the 1970s. It addresses the policies, economies, political relationships and significant events of every major Middle East power."
- Keesing's Record of World Events This link opens in a new window"Keesing's Online is the web-based version of Keesing's Record of World Events / Keesing's Contemporary Archives. It is the authoritative monthly digest of worldwide political, diplomatic and economic affairs. Published continuously since 1931, Keesing's is the standard for thorough, objective coverage of significant events for every country as well as the major international organizations."
- Middle East Online: Iraq, 1914-1974 This link opens in a new windowBritish government and diplomatic documents like dispatches, monthly and annual reports, minutes, official correspondence and other primary source documents from the Foreign Office in Iraq in the 20th century.
- The Middle East, its division into countries and the creation of Israel, 1879-1919 This link opens in a new windowThis database is divided into 4 volumes: 1) Foreign affairs and travel, 1888-1919; 2) Papers regarding the Sykes-Picot Agreement, the Zionist movement, and British policy in Islamic countries, 1914-1918; 3) Papers of Sir Mark Sykes formerly on display at Sledmere House, 1915-1917; and 4) Miscellaneous other papers.
- United Nations Treaty Reference Guide"This Reference Guide seeks to provide a basic - but not an exhaustive - overview of the key terms employed in the United Nations Treaty Collection, such as treaties, agreements, conventions, charters, protocols, declarations, memoranda of understanding, modus vivendi and exchange of notes. " A glossary of terms relating to treaty actions is also included.
- U.S. Declassified Documents Online This link opens in a new windowThese U.S. government documents are from presidential libraries, CIA, FBI and other agencies spanning the 20th and 21st century (Gale). Fondren Library owns access to the 2017 through 2023 online annual supplements.
- U.S. Intelligence on the Middle East, 1945-2009 This link opens in a new windowUS Intelligence on the Middle East "sheds light on the United States intelligence community’s spying and analytic efforts in the Arab world, including the Middle East, the Near East, and North Africa. It covers the time period from the end of World War II to the present day, up until the 2002-2003 Iraqi Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) assessments, the Global War on Terror, the Iraq War, and Iran’s nuclear program (Brill)."
Dissertations
- Dissertations and Theses This link opens in a new windowCitations for doctoral dissertations from 1861 to the present. Some master's theses are also available. The full texts of dissertations and theses added since 1997 (since 1918 for Rice theses) may be downloaded.
Religion
- ATLA Religion Database This link opens in a new window"The ATLA Religion Database is a comprehensive database designed to support religious and theological scholarship in graduate education and faculty research. The file contains citations from international titles and 13,000 multi-author works in and related to the field of religion."
- Index Islamicus This link opens in a new windowInternational bibliography of publications in European languages on Islam and the Muslim world.
- Islam in the Modern World, 1804-1918 This link opens in a new windowArticles and ebooks on Islam, including biographies of the prophet Muhammad; works comparing Christianity and Islam’s key theological and philosophical texts, including the Quran; relevant mystical and spiritual works; and texts surveying the history of Islam.
Historical Databases
- Early Arabic Printed Books from British Library, 1475-1900 This link opens in a new windowFull text searchable digital library that contains Arabic text from 1475-1900. Covers European translations of Arabic works and Arabic translations of European works, in science, social sciences, history, and literature.
- International Medieval Bibliography (IMB) This link opens in a new windowPublishing information on articles, book chapters, and other scholarly writings from on the medieval period, covering Europe and the Middle East and produced from 1981 onward. Topics include music, art, religion, history, classics, languages, rhetoric, and education. Provides links to either the full text where available at Fondren, or to request items through interlibrary loan.
- Iter: Gateway to the Middle Ages and Renaissance This link opens in a new windowBibliography comprised of secondary source material pertaining to the Middle Ages and renaissance (400-1700). Citations for books and journal material (articles, reviews, review articles, bibliographies, catalogues, abstracts and discographies) are included, as are citations for dissertation abstracts and essays in books (including entries in conference proceedings, Festschriften, encyclopedias, and exhibition catalogs).
- Kotobarabia: Arab Leaders, Historians and Philosophers Collection This link opens in a new windowCollection of works by important Arab writers in history, literature, science, and social theory. Includes works by the Four Imams of the Sunni Sect, the Al Azhar Modern Sheikhs, various authors of the Modern Arab Enlightenment, and rare works by the former Egyptian royal family.
- Kotobarabia: Modern Arab Renaissance Collection This link opens in a new windowBooks published from 1820 to 1914 from Egypt, Syria, and other regions of the Islamic World in the humanities and sciences.
- Making of the Modern World (the) This link opens in a new windowReports, letters, articles, and other historical documents on the history of economics in the West, with coverage of political science, history, sociology, and special collections on banking, finance, transportation and manufacturing.
- Historical Abstracts This link opens in a new windowIndex to resources on the history of the world from 1450 to the present, excluding the United States and Canada, which are covered in America: History and Life.
Anthropology and Sociology
- Anthropology Plus This link opens in a new windowScholarly literature and indexed titles in anthropology, archaeology, and related interdisciplinary research.
- Anthropological Index Online (AIO) This link opens in a new windowIndex of articles on all areas of anthropology from over 900 journals held in the Museum of Mankind Library in London.
- Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR) This link opens in a new windowDatasets and statistics related to social science and demographics. Since Rice is an ICPSR member institution, Rice students, faculty, and staff can register for a personal password and download information directly from ICPSR using a rice.edu email address.
- SocINDEX with Full Text This link opens in a new windowSocIndex (formerly Sociological Abstracts) covers 3,000 journals (and some books) in sociology, social planning/policy, and related subjects. It offers comprehensive coverage of sociology, encompassing all sub-disciplines and closely related areas of study.
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