Religious Studies
This is a guide for research in Religious Studies.
Macalester Archives and Special Collections
Macalester Archives contain records of the college including materials from student organizations such as Mac for Palestine, IfNotNow, Mac Christian Fellowship, Macalester Jewish Organization, and Macalester Muslim Student Association as well as college catalogs, the Mac Weekly and other student publications. There are also materials related to the Presbyterian history of the college.
Special Collections contain illuminated manuscripts in Latin and in Arabic among other materials of interest such as important rare bibles and works by Calvin. All materials are available to use by appointment.
Contact archives@macalester.edu to make an appointment.
Online Resources
- AM Explorer
Please note: access to AM Explorer expired on December 31, 2024. Access continues to the individual collections Leisure, Travel and Mass Culture, Sex & Sexuality, and Victorian Popular Culture.
- Digital Library of the Middle EastThe Digital Library of the Middle East (DLME) offers free and open access to the rich cultural legacy of the Middle East and North Africa by bringing together collections from a wide range of cultural heritage institutions. Developed by an engineering team from CLIR and Stanford Libraries, the platform federates and makes accessible data about collections from around the world.
- Digital Public Library of America This link opens in a new windowDPLA materials come from America’s libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural heritage institutions. All of these are freely available and include; photographs, books, maps, news footage, oral histories, personal letters, museum objects, artwork, government documents, etc.
- Digital ShikshapatriNo longer actively updated, Digital Shikshapatri provides online access to a treasure of the British Hindu cultural heritage that is held in Oxford's Bodleian Library. This fragile Sanskrit manuscript, called the Shikshapatri, was written by Shree Swaminarayan, founder of Swaminarayan Hinduism, and outlines moral and spiritual codes for everyday life.
- EuropeanaThis site allows you to search across the digital archives and holdings of many significant European galleries, archives, libraries, and museums, including Judaica Europeana, Bodleian Libraries, EuroPhoto, the Natural Europe Project, and Museo Galileo.
- HathiTrust Digital Library This link opens in a new window
A digital preservation repository that provides access to millions of digitized materials from libraries around the world. For enhanced access to materials, log into HathiTrust using your Macalester email credentials.
- World Digital LibraryContains primary source materials (books, manuscripts, maps, newspapers, journals, prints and photographs, sound recordings, and films) from around the world presented in a highly searchable manner.
- Dead Sea Scrolls Digital Library
The Leon Levy Dead Sea Scrolls Digital Library is a free online digitized virtual library of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Hundreds of manuscripts made up of thousands of fragments – discovered from 1947 and until the early 1960’s in the Judean Desert along the western shore of the Dead Sea – are now available to the public online through this project from the Israeli Antiquities Authority. - Papal Encyclicals OnlineIncludes individual pages for each Pope, encyclical’s English titles, eReader files, a search engine, pictures of medieval Papal documents, and other more minor details added to help in research, for the search of individual documents, and ease of navigation.
- Jewish Women's ArchiveDigital collections focused on the experiences of Jewish women over time. Includes primary source materials from the North American pioneer experience, as well as Jewish women's history in North America broadly.
Local Archives and Special Collections
- Upper Midwest Jewish Archives"The Upper Midwest Jewish Archives has materials illustrating the American Jewish experience from a Midwestern perspective, chronicling the activities of the local Jewish population in creating and supporting ethnic/religious communities and advocacy organizations, as well as their efforts to promote social welfare and social justice." --Web Site
- Church Records at the Minnesota Historical SocietyContains finding aides and records for a number of denominations in Minnesota, starting in the mid-1800s.
- Selected Hennepin County City DirectoriesDigitized images of the Edina City Directory, 1941-1977; Hopkins City Directory, 1942-1977; Minneapolis City Directory, 1859-1950; St. Louis Park City Directory, 1933-1977. City directories list residents with their occupations, places of employment and spouses. Local businesses are listed by name and subject category, and directories are searchable by name or address.
- St. Paul City DirectoriesCity directories for St. Paul are available at the George Latimer Central Library.
Online (1856 - 1922): included in Saint Paul Public Library Digital Collections
Microfiche (1856 - 1859): available at the George Latimer Central Library
Microfilm (1863 - 1935): available at the George Latimer Central Library
Print (1938 - present): available at the George Latimer Central Library - Minnesota Historical Society Library Guide to DirectoriesThe Minnesota Historical Society Library has an extensive collection of city directories, particularly for Minnesota, and other specialized directories as well. This guide will provide an introduction to the variety of directories that can be found at the MNHS Library.
The focus of a directory is to list/locate members of a group by a common residence or a common association. The city directory lists people who are residents of that area. Directories also group people by a common attribute – such as a profession or organizational membership.
A directory can be a useful resource for researching a family history or assisting in locating biographical information about an individual. City directories provide details as to the location/residence of a person in a particular place and time.