Close
Close
Legal journals (sometimes referred to as periodicals) typically contain articles, comments on recent legal developments, notes of new cases, book reviews and professional news.
The majority of the journals we subscribe to are available online, although older volumes of some titles are only available in print. The few titles which we do not have access to online are shelved in alphabetical order at the back of the Law Library.
You can search for individual journal titles and journal articles in Explore. You can also search or browse a comprehensive list of online journals available at UCL.
Used to disseminate scholarly information that relates to a particular academic discipline. They are aimed at researchers and are often peer-reviewed, which means that articles are evaluated by experts in the field before publication to ensure the information in them is accurate and well presented. An example of an academic journal is the Harvard Law Review.
Generally printed on glossy paper (but can also be available online), they are aimed at a more general audience than academic journals and can include opinions and news items too. An example of a magazine is the New Law Journal.
Published on a daily basis, the focus of these is on news items. They can include a section on education, but are wide in scope. An example of a newspaper is The Guardian.
Usually published by a special group, learned society or professional organisation and aimed at people working in a specific industry. An example of a trade publication is the Law Society Gazette.
The following databases are useful for searching for journal articles on a specific subject and identifying where you can find them online:
If you're using one of our databases to find journal articles, you might not be able to read the article within the database itself. If you see the Findit@UCL icon, click on it to link to the full-text
Sometimes you will see a link to the publisher's site. Unless the article is open access, you might find that you can't reach the full-text.
Clicking on the Findit@UCL link instead will link you to the full-text via UCL's subscription access, if available.
If you're using Google Scholar you can set up the Library Links feature so that it will display a findit@UCL link to help show you which articles are available via UCL subscriptions.
If you know the title of the article you need, you can enter it directly in the Explore search box. If UCL Libraries have an electronic subscription to the journal in which the article is published, this will appear in your results list and you can download the full-text following the instructions provided. The same applies if you're looking for a journal article using one of the many article-specific UCL Databases.
Check out our Explore guide to find out more about how to use Explore for your research.
UCL has an amazing collection of e-resources, but no library can have full-text access to everything. If you identify a piece of information that would be beneficial to your research, the library will try and source a copy for you via the Inter Library Loans service.You can make a request by logging into UCL Explore and then clicking on the three dots 'show more' menu to access the Inter Library Loan Request form.
