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HIST 210: Research Methods

Guide for HIST 210

ScholarSearch

Finding Articles

Drew has several powerful History databases. There are some good general purpose databases you can use, but to start, I strongly suggest Subject-Specific databases, which were designed specifically to help you find the best resources for your topic. Drew has a staggeringly-large collection of books and articles; don't settle for just any article about you topic - use these tools to find the best  article on your topic!

For US and Canadian History, start with America: History and Life, the premiere resource for US and Canadian History. 

For Non-US History, look at Historical Abstracts

In addition to being key-word searchable, they include Subject Headings and Abstracts, which makes it much easier to find the materials you're looking for.

Still having trouble finding articles? Check out our broader Humanities databases, including: JSTOR, Project Muse, and ScholarSearch

Finding [more] Articles through citations

Say you've found the perfect article. Great! How do find more like it? There are a few ways.

Read the bibliography. A peer-reviewed article will list all the articles it has built upon. Though these articles will be older, they will be useful.

See who has cited the article since it was published. If you search the title of the article in Google Scholar, you can see which recent works have cited it. Presumably, these works will be on the same topic.

Finally, when you find an article in our databases, you'll see Subject Terms. Use these to find similar articles. 

Getting to Full-text - "how to"

ScholarSearch - finding full-text

If you are searching in Scholar Search, you will see both books and articles.

Some databases have full text incorporated in them; almost all of our databases, however, are connected to "Find it @Drew" which will check all our electronic journal sources to see if an article is available.
If the articles are directly connected into the database, it will give you a direct link to the PDF or HTML or Linked full text; some items will be not in our collection and you'll be directed to request them through Interlibrary Loan.

For many, you'll need to click Find it @Drew to see whether it's available electronically:

Finding full text at Drew

When you click Find it @Drew you will be taken to a page that will offer you a list of links to the resource in our electronic journal holdings. (Sometimes we have a journal article via more than one database; that's why you see multiple links. Click one of the links to get to the full text:

Finding full-text at Drew

If we don't have access to the journal/article online, Find it @Drew will give you links

  • to look for it online as free, open access via Google Scholar
  • to request it through our Interlibrary Loan system (ILLiad)

NOTE: The first time you request an article or book via ILLiad (our InterLibraryLoan system), you  will  be asked to fill out a short form. It may take several days to receive an article via InterLibraryLoan;  books can take longer.

If you already have information about a specific article (author, journal or magazine title, title of the article, etc.), use Drew's Journal List Search.  Enter the title of the journal or magazine, and then drill down to the specific item you need.

Questions? Need Help? Email reference@drew.edu

Drew University Library, http://www.drew.edu/library