Welcome to West Chester University Libraries' philosophy research page. Philosophy research can be more challenging than many other areas. Philosophy is a very broad area of study, which makes it hard for all but the largest university libraries to collect/buy access to a majority of the books and journal articles published each year. Therefore, on the Finding Articles and Finding Books pages, you will find advice related not only to how to use WCU's resources, but also outside resources such as Google Scholar and other library's catalogs to find sources, and how to get those sources for free through interlibrary loan.
One way to begin research on many philosophy topics is to consult a philosophy subject encyclopedias. Subject encyclopedias give you the basic background to a subject, often explain how your subject connects to others, provide you with terminology to use in your searches, and uasually have bibliographies that list major works on the subject. In the right-hand column, the top box allows you to search the library's online Philosophy encyclopedias. The lower box lists a few examples of encyclopedias in our print reference collection. Visit the reference area to find many more.
