Skip to Main Content
Please note: Off-campus access to many library resources is temporarily unavailable. We apologize for the inconvenience.
Hope Library Guides

ENGL 373 Jane Austen & Popular Culture: Research Tips and Searching with Databases

Research tips

-Brainstorm different search terms that relate to your topic (try to think of broader concepts that relate to your topic, and more specific concepts that relate to your topic; surround your topic!)

-Don't forget to try multiple searches using different combinations of search terms AND try multiple searches in different places (different databases, catalogs, Internet, etc.)

-Try to get an understanding of the scholarly conversation relating to your topic that has already occurred, then figure out how you can add to that scholarly conversation.

-Keep a record of what search terms you use, and keep track of each source you are considering using. Keeping your research organized will save you time and effort!

 

Important Process for Research Success: Generating Keyword Process

  1. Write out your research question. For example: "How does exercise affect the mental health of college students?"
  2. Pull out the most important words from your research question. exercise, mental health, and college students.
  3. Think of synonyms for these keywords.  Exercise: workout, fitness. College students: university students, post-secondary students.
  4. Think of broader keywords. Mental health: well-being. Broader keywords are helpful if you aren't getting enough results.
  5. Think of narrower keywords. Mental health: anxiety. Narrower keywords are helpful if you're getting too many results.
  6. Start searching a library database or research tool with your keywords. Remember to try out different keyword combinations to get the best search results.
  7. Collect additional keywords as you search.

(https://library.louisville.edu/research-diy/keywords)

Searching with keywords and synonyms - IME 553 - Production Systems - LibGuides at Wichita State University

Link to All Hope College Databases

Recommended Databases

MLA Searching Options

Don't forget to utilize the different ways of searching MLA Bibliography!

 

Tips for Jstor

Jstor is an excellent full text archive of humanities, social science and business journals and includes a large number of history journals.

  • This is not an exhaustive collection, and it will not contain things published within the last 4 years.  
  • Remember, because you are searching the full text of the article, choose your keywords carefully to avoid getting irrelevant articles.  A plus side of this is JSTOR is good for searching for more obscure referenes to a topic.
  • To limit your searches further, select specific disciplines from the limiting list.

jstor subjects

  • To further control your search, use special search characters to increase the presence of certain important terms:
  • ^# after a word will request that that particular word be present a minimum of # number of times in the article (ex. irish^10 AND soldier^10)
  • ~# after two words in quotes will ask that those word be within # words of each other.  (ex.  "women* suffrage"~5)

Recommended Journals