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Philosophy: Books

This guide suggests resources and strategies for research on topics in philosophy.

Books

Books can provide you with an overview, background, and major theories in depth.

Finding books by different authors will often allow you to have many different points of view about the same subject.

Search for books in Millikin Library Discovery.

Book Reviews

Books on Philosophy

Browse the following areas of the library's stacks (third floor) in the following call number ranges:

B       Philosophy in General
BC    Logic
BD    Speculative Philosophy
BH    Aesthetics
BJ     Ethics

For a more complete description of the 'B' call numbers, visit the Library of Congress Catalog Directory.

Browse by Subject in the Online Catalog

Sometimes one of the best ways to find books on your topic is to do some subject browsing in Millikin Library Discovery.

There are two ways to do this easily:

Option #1

  • Do a keyword search for your topic and find a book that is good for your research.
  • Click on the title of the book so that you can the full record of information about it.
  • Navigate to the "Details" section of the page and look for the "Subject" section.
  • This list of the subjects describes the content of the book. If one of these subject headings looks useful for your topic, click on it.
  • Once you click on one of the topics, Millikin Library Discovery will do a new search to show you all of the items that have that topic listed.

Option #2

  • Choose the "Advanced Search" link next to the search box at the top of the page.
  • Change the "Any field" drop down to "Subject" and enter your subject.
  • Click "Search." This brings up the list off books categorized for that subject.

Subject Headings to Use as Search Terms

  • aesthetics
  • ethics
  • logic
  • metaphysics
  • ontology
  • philosophy
  • philosophers
  • semantics

You can also do a search for the philosopher's name (last name, first name), a country (philosophers, French) or a philosophical period (philosophy, Modern).