Databases for Latin American Studies

Use RefWorks with Library databases to organize your research, include citations in papers, and create bibliographies.

The following databases are good places to begin research on Latin American Studies topics.

Country Profiles
The Country Profiles summarize current economic and political events for each country. Produced by the Economist Intelligence Unit, each profile analyzes the major industrial sectors of each economy and includes maps and tables of key economic data for the past 5 years. There are links to EIU ViewsWire, which provides additional information on countries.
Country Reports
Annual reports on selected countries, providing background economic and political information. Produced by the Economist Intelligence Unit, the Country Reports provide analysis of current economic trends. There are links to EIU ViewsWire.
Academic OneFile
An online database which provides references and/or abstracts to articles from scholarly and general interest periodicals. It also provides the fulltext of many articles.
LexisNexis Academic
Contains the complete text of many major newspapers published in the United States since the 1970s. Included are the New York Times and the Washington Post. Magazines, newsletters, legal literature, and business sources also form part of the database. Several subfiles are available that may be searched individually, including Non-English Language News.
LexisNexis Statistical
A database comprised of statistical tables ("Tables Research Edition") and references to other statistical sources. Includes the Index to International Statistics.

Caribbean Literature
A searchable collection of literary works produced in the Caribbean region during the 19th and 20th centuries. Among the titles are numerous rare and hard-to-find works written in English, French, Spanish, Dutch, and various Creole languages.
Clase and Periodica
Index of Latin American journals in the sciences and humanities. Clase (1975-present) indexes documents published in Latin American journals specializing in the social sciences and humanities. Periodica (1978-present) covers journals specializing in science and technology. The database contains information from articles, essays, book reviews, monographs, conference proceedings, technical reports, interviews and brief notes.
HLAS Online: Handbook of Latin American Studies
A bibliography of scholarly works on Latin America published from 1935 to the present. Journal articles, conference papers, books and individual chapters from edited anthologies are indexed by HLAS Online. A print version of this publication, the Handbook of Latin American Studies, is also available.
Latin American Network Information Center
A comprehensive information service for Latin America on the Internet.

There are numerous discipline-specific databases that can be consulted when researching Latin American topics. The following are the ones most frequently consulted, but researchers should also consult the Library Databases page to determine whether there are other databases suitable for their given research topic. For example, researchers pursuing topics related to health care in Latin America could consult CINAHL, the Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature.

Columbia International Affairs Online (CIAO) (international affairs)
EconLit (economics)
EIU ViewsWire (Economist Intelligence Unit) (business, economics, and politics)
General BusinessFile ASAP (business and economics)
Historical Abstracts (world history, excluding the United States)
Literature Resource Center (literary biography and criticism)
MLA International Bibliography (literature)
National Trade Data Bank (via STAT-USA) (economics, trade and commerce)
PAIS International (foreign relations, public policy, international political movements, and political science in general)
Smithsonian Global Sound for Libraries (sound recordings)
Sociological Abstracts (international social movements, and sociology in general)
Teatro Español del Siglo de Oro (full-text dramatic works)

The following databases will also provide information on Latin America.

This page is maintained by Carol A. Rudisell, Reference Department.

Last modified: 10/21/09