scholarly journals on the internet


The scholarly journals covering English and American literature that make articles available to all users over the internet, for free, are described below. As far as we know, literaryhistory.com is the only internet site systematically indexing these free journal articles.

To create this page, literaryhistory.com has consulted lists of online journals provided by the MLA, scholars, and libraries. Some of these lists use the term "electronic journal" loosely, applying it to journals that do no more than show their table of contents on their web page. Also, many publications in such lists have moved into the library-subscription-based Muse system in recent months and are now inaccessible except through subscribed libraries. Our list of journals that provide access to free articles has been verified as of the update date, which is noted at the end of this page.

The best of these journals are refereed, make their entire issue available online (rather than just a few selected articles), have deep archives of literary articles from previous issues, continue to publish today, and provide a search engine for all articles. None of the journals below meet all these criteria, but for meeting each criterion we have awarded a star.


*The Austen Quarterly http://facstaff.uww.edu/hipchene/JAusten/quarterly.htm is published by the American Society of Jane Austen Scholars, publishes full-text articles. 7/18/01 This journal has published five volumes online. Each volume has either only one full article or a few reviews. Literaryhistory.com has indexed all of these articles.

 

**Cahiers Elisabethains http://serinf2.univ-montp3.fr/CERRA/cahiers.html This journal publishes articles, in French or English, on the English Renaissance. 7/25/01 There are 15 volumes online currently, with 5-7 articles in each. Literaryhistory does not index this period.

**Cineaste http://www.cineaste.com/current/current.html Publishes articles on film, with two long feature articles available for free. Because the features change, it is not reasonable to index them.

 

***Comparative Literature and Culture http://clcwebjournal.lib.purdue.edu/clcwebhistory.html A peer-refereed journal published by Purdue University Press on comparative literature and culture. It was begun in 1999, is published online only, and all issues are accessible. A few articles pertain to authors indexed at literaryhistory.com, and we will index those.

 

***Connotations: A Journal for Critical Debate http://www.anglistik.uni-muenster.de/connotations/aboutcon.htm A refereed journal that publishes articles on literature in English from the Middle English period to the present. It posts selected articles from previous editions on its web page, and all articles from its current edition. 7/25/01: At http://www.anglistik.uni-muenster.de/connotations/shakespe.htm there are 16 articles on Shakespeare, and at http://www.anglistik.uni-muenster.de/connotations/aboutcon.htm there are 15 articles ranging over all periods. Literaryhistory.com has indexed the selected articles for authors that we cover.

 

****Early Modern Literary Studies http://www.humanities.ualberta.ca/emls/emlsjour.html a refereed scholarly journal covering the 16th and 17th centuries and electronic scholarship, with all articles from April 1995-present online. 7/18/01: This journal has published two or three volumes per year since 1995, plus three special issues. Each volume typically includes four or five full articles and eight to ten reviews. Literaryhistory.com does not index this period.

 

English Literature in Transition http://www.uncg.edu/eng/elt Although this journal rates a star for being peer-reviewed, we've subtracted its star to account for the fact that it is really not an electronic journal at all. At 8/20/01 it published online only excerpts from four volumes, which were only one-paragraph long reviews.

 

*Exemplaria: A Journal of Theory in Medieval and Renaissance Studies http://www.english.ufl.edu/exemplaria a refereed journal edited by R. Allen Shoaf. There are seven sample articles online from previous issues.

 

***(How)ever, http://www.scc.rutgers.edu/however a journal devoted to contemporary and modernist women's writing edited by Kathleen Frasier has posted all editions, from 1983 to 1992, online. How2, under editor Ann Vickery, is continuing the spirit of (How)ever at the same site with editions from 1999-2000 also online.

 

*Hypermedia Joyce Studies http://www.2street.com/hjs/contents.html This journal has an editorial board but has so far issued only one edition, in 1999, of five articles. It has a link to an archived edition, but the link doesn't work. 7/23/01: It is not clear if this Joyce project will continue. Literaryhistory.com has indexed all five articles.

 

**Journal of American Studies in Turkey http://www.bilkent.edu.tr/~jast/index.html Publishes multidisciplinary articles on American culture and literature. At 8/24/01 there were eight issues online, from 1995 through 1998. Issues contain five to ten full articles, and a similar number of reviews, half of which might be devoted to literature. Literaryhistory.com has catalogued this journal for the authors we cover. 

 

***The Journal of Beckett Studies http://www.english.fsu.edu/jobs/default.cfm A peer-reviewed journal edited by S.E. Gontarski, provides full-text of all articles in volumes 11 and 12 (1989) in PDF formal. 7/23/01: The editor is in the process of putting 11 additional issues online. Literaryhistory.com has indexed all currently available articles.

 

**Jouvert: A Journal of Postcolonial Studies http://social.chass.ncsu.edu/jouvert Published by the College of the Humanities and Social Sciences at North Carolina State University, Jouvert's articles address postcolonial theory, literature, history, arts, and politics. At 8/24/01 there were 12 issues online. Issues typically have six to seven full articles and three to four reviews. Literaryhistory.com has indexed articles for the authors we cover.

 

***Meta: Journal des Traducteurs (Translators' Journal) http://www.erudit.org/erudit/meta Articles in French and English on translation, from the University of Montreal Press. At 8/20/01 there were eight issues online with about 15 complete articles in each issue. Literaryhistory.com will not index these articles.

 

***The Medieval Review http://www.hti.umich.edu/t/tmr formerly the Bryn Mawr Medieval Review, has been publishing online reviews of current work in all areas of Medieval Studies since 1993. All reviews are available online and searchable. There is no paper version. As the editors note, "the electronic medium allows for very rapid publication of reviews, and provides a computer searchable archive of past reviews, both of which are of great utility to scholars and students around the world." 7/25/01 They are still going strong, with 90 reviews published in 2001. A search on Piers Plowman brought up 23 reviews, including one about a Piers Plowman electronic archive.

 

The Milton Review http://www.richmond.edu/~creamer/review.html Has reviews of books about the life or work of Milton. There are only four reviews, however, all apparently from 1998. 7/23/01 This journal seems to have ceased publishing. Literaryhistory.com does not index this period.

 

The Mowers' Tree: The Newsletter of the Cather Colloquium http://www.libfind.unl.edu/Cather/today/MowersTree/MowersTree.htm This publication had one edition in Spring 1999 with three critical articles. It is connected with the University of Nebraska but provides little other information about itself. Literaryhistory.com will index this publication.

 

***Persuasions, the Journal of the Jane Austen Society of North America http://www.jasna.org/pol01/toc.html is published biannually at the Jane Austen Society of North America site, http://www.jasna.org under editor Laurie Kaplan of Goucher College. Since summer 1999 it has published four editions of full-text articles, with approximately eight full articles per edition, and one additional journal, Occasional Papers, containing ten full text articles on film versions of Emma. Literaryhistory.com has only indexed the first volume, Vol 20.

 

****Postmodern Culture http://www.iath.virginia.edu/pmc/contents.all.html The journal Postmodern Culture, from the Johns Hopkins University Press, publishes articles on postmodern literature and interdisciplinary studies. It is one of the earliest journals to publish on the internet. Even though it is now available through the controlled-subscription Muse system, it also makes all its articles available for free in a text-only version. It provides access to 30 issues (at 8/21/01), each with about five full articles and frequently reviews as well. Literaryhistory.com will not index these articles because they are out of our scope.

 

**PSYART: A Hyperlink Journal for Psychological Study of the Arts http://www.clas.ufl.edu/ipsa/journal/#2000issue is associated with the Institute for Psychological Study of the Arts at the University of Florida, and publishes articles on psychology and the arts, specializing in the psychoanalytical study of literature. It is a peer-reviewed, online-only journal with a heavy emphasis on psychology, both in its articles and on its review board. (7/31/01) This journal has volumes from 1997-2001 online, with 6-12 articles per volume. Literaryhistory.com has indexed selected articles.

 

***Renaissance Forum, http://www.hull.ac.uk/renforum/back.htm#back a bi-annual refereed journal in early-modern English literary and historical scholarship, based at the University of Hull. (7/23/01) Available online from 1996-2000, about four articles in each issue plus reviews. Literaryhistory.com does not index this period.

 

***Rocky Mountain E-Review of Language and Literature http://rmmla.wsu.edu/ereview/issueindex.asp, a peer-reviewed journal published by the Rocky Mountain MLA, publishes critical articles on literature in English and foreign languages and on the profession. The e-journal is identical to the print journal, except that the most recent two volumes are available only to RMMLA members. At 8/21/01 there were six past volumes publicly available, each containing 3-4 full length critical articles and aproximately15 reviews, and the publication is active. Literaryhistory.com will index all articles for the authors we cover.

 

****Romanticism on the Net, http://www.ron.umontreal.ca a peer-reviewed scholarly journal on Romantic studies, with all articles from Feb. 1996-present online. 7/18/01 There are now 21 volumes of Romanticism on the Net available online. Each contains from 3 to 10 full articles, plus reviews. Literaryhistory.com has indexed Vols. 1-20 for the authors we cover.

 

*SRASP: Shakespeare and Renaissance Association Selected Papers http://www.marshall.edu/engsr/SR1997.html This journal, a publication of the West Virginia Shakespeare and Renaissance Association, published one issue online, in 1997, which contains four full articles and five reviews. Literaryhistory.com does not index this period.

 

***South Atlantic Review http://www.samla.org/review.htm A peer-reviewed publication of the South Atlantic Modern Language Association publishing scholarly and critical articles on literature, this journal currently publishes only its reviews online (8/21/01).

 

****Studies in Bibliography: Papers of the Bibliographical Society of the University of Virginia, http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/bsuva/sb Publishes articles on textual criticism and manuscript study for all periods of English and American literature. Volumes 1 through 50, from 1948 through 1997, are online. They are searchable, but as of 8/20/01 the search wasn't working properly. Literaryhistory.com will index articles for authors that we cover.

 

**Text Reviews http://www.msstate.edu/Archives/TEXT Transactions of the Society for Textual Scholarship, under editor Peter Shillingsburg at Mississippi State University, published two volumes of articles discussing textual matters, in 1995 and 1996, but the effort appears to now be abandoned.

 

**Victorian Poetry, a peer-reviewed scholarly journal edited by Hayden Ward, devoted to British and colonial poetics of the Victorian age. For 1997 and 1998, three volumes were published online (in PDF format) containing six to eight articles each plus reviews, along with two special editions in 1996. 7/23/01 The journal appears to have ceased publishing online. Literaryhistory.com has indexed all these articles for the authors we cover.

 

**William Carlos Williams Review http://www.en.utexas.edu/wcw/index2.html At 8/25/01, The William Carlos Williams Review has nine back issues and the current (1998) issue online in a semi-accessible state: you can read the first paragraph of the article, then purchase the issue. Three of the back issues are out of print, so the Review has generously published the entire contents online. All available articles will be indexed in literaryhistory.com.


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Updated 10/26/2001