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Online Reference Tools
These online encyclopedias and companions are useful for getting started with performance-related topics. Many of them contain bibliographies for further reading. See other pages on this guide to search for books, articles, and more.
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Cambridge Companions Online This link opens in a new windowIncludes Companions to Literature and Classics, Companions to Music, and Companions to Philosophy, Religion, and Culture.
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Cambridge Histories Online This link opens in a new windowFull-text access to the complete 250-plus volumes of Cambridge Histories reference series. Provides political, economic, and social history, philosophy, and literature of selected countries and subjects. Continually updated with new volumes taken from the print series as soon as they become available.
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Gale E-Books (formerly Gale Virtual Reference Library) This link opens in a new windowFull text online reference books, covering a number of topics in the arts and humanities.
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Gale Literature Resource Center This link opens in a new windowBiographies, bibliographies, and critical analysis of authors from every age and literary discipline. Covers more than 120,000 novelists, poets, essayists, journalists, and other writers. Combines the core Gale Group literary databases: Contemporary Authors, Contemporary Literary Criticism, and Dictionary of Literary Biography. Complements Literature Criticism Online.
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Oxford Bibliographies Online This link opens in a new window
Annotated bibliographies for topics in multiple disciplines of the arts, humanities, social sciences, and sciences. Combines encyclopedia-style introductions with expert recommendations of the most important reference works, books, journals, and primary sources on the topic. The UC system subscribes to a selected number of subject area modules from Oxford Bibliographies.
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Oxford Handbooks Online This link opens in a new windowOxford Handbooks, now a part of Oxford Academic, provide review articles which summarize and analyze current research and trends in a given discipline. UCLA subscribes to most Oxford Handbooks Online, excluding a few individual titles.
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Oxford Reference This link opens in a new window
Spans 25 different subject areas, bringing together digitized entries across Oxford University Press’s Dictionaries, Companions and Encyclopedias. UC subscription allows limited simultaneous users, so if you can't connect try again later. Please note: UCLA Library has access to a selected number of Oxford reference titles, and not the entire set.
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Routledge Handbooks Online This link opens in a new windowHandbooks covering a wide range of humanities, social sciences, psychology and some science topics, published by Routledge, Ashgate and other imprints. Some CRC Press handbooks can also be accessed via this particular site.
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Theatre in Context Collection This link opens in a new windowA reference source that covers multiple aspects of the international theater, including full text of major reference materials and records for individual plays, people, theaters, productions, and production companies. Also includes images, playbills, postcards, scrapbooks and other ephemera. Formerly titled North American Theatre Online.
Connecting from Off-Campus: VPN and Proxy Tutorials
The Library's online subscription resources can always be accessed from computers and wireless networks on campus. However, off-campus access is restricted to current UCLA, students, faculty, and staff who have set up their computer using one of the methods below. Click on the other tabs to see how four Bruins got their computers set up and ready to go for remote access!
If you need further assistance, you can contact UCLA Digital & Technology Solutions IT Support at (310) 267-4357 or help@it.ucla.edu. They provide 24/7 phone support.
- Virtual Private Networking (VPN)A program you can download and install, or use the built-in version on many computers or mobile devices. VPN software must be logged on manually before you access a restricted site, but works for all programs on your computer. It stays connected until you log off.
- UCLA Online Proxy ServerA simple browser setting which will automatically divert you to a UCLA logon page when you first access a restricted site.
VPN on Mac with Natalie
"I chose VPN for my mac because I need to be able to access the full text of articles on different browsers." - Natalie, Environmental Science
VPN on Windows with Michael
"I chose VPN because I like the security it provides and the control it gives me as a user to manually enable or disable it when I'm browsing online." - Michael, Public Affairs
VPN on Chromebook with Nadia
"I chose VPN because it is really simple to use!" - Nadia, Public Affairs
Proxy on Mac with Kate
"I chose Proxy because I prefer logging in through a web browser without having to download any software on my computer." - Kate, Ethnic Studies