Contacts
Hilla Wait (Philosophy Subject Librarian)
tel: +44 (0)1865 276927 (Philosophy Library)
email: hilla.wait@bodleian.ox.ac.uk
Related LibGuides (online guides)
Searching the Libraries (via SOLO, Oxlip+ & ORA)
Guides to PCAS: printing, copying & scanning facilities in the Bodleian Libraries
Other links
WISER workshops (Workshops in Information Skills and Electronic Resources) - These workshops are aimed at researchers, academic staff, research students and librarians from across the University.
Research and Resources Guides - a wide range of research, resource and library guides are available from our LibGuides service.
Collection overview
Libraries & Reading Rooms: Principal collections
Library resources in Philosphy are provided at the Bodleian Library and the Philosophy Faculty Library.
The Bodleian Library is the University's largest library, holding the legal deposit collection of all UK copyright books and journals; its holdings exceed 6 million books. It also purchases extensively from outside the UK. The most frequently-used philosophy books are housed on open access in the Philosophy Reading Room in the Lower Reading Room, Old Bodleian Library. The extensive stacks house less-commonly-used books for order to reading-rooms.
The Bodleian's Ancient Philosophy open shelf material is located in the Lower Reading Room, Old Bodleian Library, and servPhilosophy of Religion in the Radcliffe Camera.
The Bodleian also provides extensive manuscript and incunable holdings, from ancient philosophy to the modern era. In the field of early modern philosophy, the Library's outstanding collection is that of John Locke (1632-1704). Also notable are two manuscript drafts of Wittgenstein's Tractatus logico-philosophicus, and papers from other modern philosophers such as A.J. Ayer, Isaiah Berlin, and R.G. Collingwood. For further information see Philosophy Holdings in the Bodleian Libraries.
The Philosophy Faculty Library is the main University provider for loans in philosophy, at both taught course and research-level, to undergraduates, graduate students and senior members. The Philosophy Library purchases almost all its holdings, and intentionally duplicates many books and journals also held in the reference collections in the Bodleian. It has a book stock of 27,000 volumes (15,000 titles); multiple copies are provided of frequently-used books.
The library also houses the Fowler collection of antiquarian logic books (in trust for the Wykeham Professor of Logic), and the Shadworth Hollway Hodgson collection of 19thC. Philosophy (on loan from Corpus Christi College). The library of Professor Sir A.J. Ayer is a recent donation, to be integrated with the existing collection.
Libraries & Reading Rooms: Associated collections
Philosophy of Science, Mathematics, Logic and Psychology are located in the Radcliffe Science Library. Philosophy of Law is located at the Bodleian Law Library.
For Oriental Philosophy, see the Oriental Institute.
Other subject libraries, for example: Theology, Social Studies, Modern Languages also hold material of interest to philosphers, as do the Sackler Library and the Taylor Institution.
Important eResources
Many electronic philosophy resources may be accessed through OxLIP+, which is accessible on any computer on the University network.
Oxford University e-Journals, Oxford's electronic journal management system, provides access to many online subscribed philosophy periodicals.
Oxford holdings are also linked to Philosopher's Index. There are extensive resources for online primary and secondary philosophy texts, for example, Perseus, Past Masters, Oxford Scholarship Online, Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
Loading...
