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Biblical Studies

Designed for Biblical studies students, this guide takes you through the Library’s resources to improve your research.
Interlibrary Loan (ILLiad)

Have you ever found a resource you wanted to use for a paper but Zondervan Library did not have it?

Interlibrary Loan is a great tool that allows you to request articles that Zondervan Library can borrow from other libraries.

The process is outlined below.

Request an Article
  1. Sign Up for an ILLiad Account
  2. Search for the specific Article in desired Database
    • Example using SocINDEX: Journal Title: Child: Care, Health & Development. Article Title: Exposure of children with developmental delay to social determinants of poor health: cross-sectional case record review study. Author: E. Emerson and P. Brigham. Date: March 2015. Volume 41, Issue 2, Pages 249-257.
    • DOI: 10.1111/cch.12144
  3. Check to see if it is in another Zondervan Library Database
    • Copy the journal abbreviation in Google or use the DOI to determine the exact title. Cut and paste this title into Journal Finder located on the main Zondervan Library page.
    • This verifies that we do not own the title in full text in another ZL database. This is an essential step that saves time.
    • If Zondervan Library owns or has access to the item in full text form it will not be delivered to you through your ILLiad account. The Interlibrary Loan department may inform you that we have access to it by email as a courtesy to you, but this is not guaranteed. You will ultimately have to redo a search.
  4. Send Request

NOTE!: You do not need or want to order an article directly from a publisher. Access to articles this way is very costly. Zondervan is usually able to obtain the item from a local college or university for free or in some cases we have accounts for purchasing on-demand articles. Let us find it for you, in most cases at a more reasonable cost that what Science Direct, Elsevier, or other publishers will charge.

DOIs (Digital Object Identifier)

 

It is a permanent identifier that will take you straight to a document no matter where it’s located on the Internet. When available they are usually part of the citation or on the main or first page of an article. APA recommends including DOIs whenever possible to provide a stable link to digitally retrieved articles.

Before you begin looking for a DOI for your article you should know: 

  1. Not all articles have a DOI number.
    • While the majority of articles published today do have DOI numbers, most older articles -more than two years old-- do not. Some publishers are adding DOIs to older articles.
    • DOIs may be hidden, but they are often visible uder the article vendor name if clicked.
    • All DOIs begin with 10, but the reference should start with http://doi.org./
  2. While some library databases provide the DOI number as part of the article's citation, this is not consistent across databases. 
    • When you have a DOI number you can use a DOI locator to link you to the article (sometimes in full text or sometimes just the citation.)
    • DOI Locators:
  3. For references from an online source with no DOI, include the homepage uRL for the journal, magazine, etc.