Searching for resources
When studying at Cambridge, your starting points for finding the material you need will be Heritage (Girton Library's catalogue) and iDiscover (the University-wide catalogue). For more information on how to get the most out of these tools, see our Library skills guides.
The libraries you are most likely to use regularly are Girton Library, the University Library, and the MMLL (Modern and Medieval Languages and Linguistics) Library. Within Girton Library, you will find our Linguistics resources in the Lower Library. Our other language resources are spread across the Library: you'll find French and German resources in the Upper Library, Spanish and Italian resources in the Lower Library, and other languages in the Extension. Dictionaries are shelved either with their respective language or in the Reference Bay. If you need something for your studies that we don't have, please feel free to recommend it for purchase.
You may also find it helpful to visit and use the Psychology Library, the Classics Faculty Library, and the English Faculty Library (which also houses the ASNC collection). There may be other libraries within Cambridge which stock useful resources: for a full list, see the libraries directory, where you can check each library for access guidelines. Search Spacefinder to find places to study outside of College.
Subject-specific resources
The Linguistics LibGuide contains many links to subject-related information and assistance, including a guide to referencing for MMLL students. You can also find and search for databases that might help you on the Databases A-Z LibGuide (please note that you will need to be logged in to your University account to access many of these). Some helpful resources for your subject include:
- Dictionary of Old English Web Corpus An online database consisting of at least one copy of every surviving Old English text. As such, the DOE Web Corpus represents over three million words of Old English and almost a million words of Latin, or almost five times the collected works of Shakespeare.
- Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics. Comprehensive encyclopedia of all things linguistic, containing articles, supplementary video and audio files, and language maps, as well as links to further reading.
- A Handbook of Varieties of English. Reference work covering the phonology, morphology and syntax of the English language worldwide.
- Indo-European Etymological Dictionaries. Reconstructed lexicons for Indo-European languages, with each entry accompanied by grammatical and etymological information, as well as bibliographical references. Can be searched by individual language/language branch or across the whole database.
- Linguistics and Language Behavior Abstracts (LLBA). Databases which indexes and provides abstracts for scholarly work across all areas of language and linguistics. LLBA adds around fourteen thousand new records each year, with coverage dating back to 1973.
- Literature Online (LION). Collection of primary texts, criticism and reference works covering poetry, drama and prose from the eighth century on. It also includes audio and video collections.
- Oxford English Dictionary Accepted authority on the evolution of the English language over the last millennium. It is an unsurpassed guide to the meaning, history, and pronunciation of over half a million words, both present and past, drawing its information on usage from an extensive range of sources.
- Oxford Bibliography of Linguistics. Guide to the field of linguistics with thorough bibliographical support. It aims to stay up-to-date and to provide students with an easy way to parse the various information-heavy areas of the subject.
- Routledge Handbooks Online - Linguistics. Collection of volumes on many different topics within linguistics, combining overviews of and introductions to a discipline with current thinking and cutting-edge research.
Help within college
Library staff can provide support and assistance. You can book an appointment with us or ask a question via library@girton.cam.ac.uk.
Page last updated: August 2026.