October 10 EXP-9D (Michelle and Mara)

Added by Abigail Cross, last edited by Abigail Cross on Mar 14, 2008 10:25

Step One - Plan your paper: Research Paper Navigator

Step Two - Set up RefWorks to organize and format your citations: more info

Step Three - Research

• Tufts Catalog

• AND, OR, NOT (Boolean Operators) and keyword versus subject searching

  • With each new database, check out the "help" or "search tips" file to find out how that database is best searched!

• Indexes

  • Academic OneFile (Find both academic and popular-press articles, updated frequently)
  • LexisNexis(good for finding book reviews and newspaper/magazine articles)
  • Index Islamicus (Find scholarly articles and books)
  • Ethnic NewsWatch (Find articles in newspapers and magazines from the alternative press)

• JSTOR is good for finding Full-Text immediately but usually does not have the most recent 5 (or more) years of research! Do NOT rely solely on JSTOR.

• Is a journal I've found scholarly/peer-reviewed/refereed? Check Ulrich's International Periodicals Directory here.

• The database only gives me a citation, or just an abstract. How do I find the full text?

  • Use , OR:
    look up the journal title (not the article title) by using the JOURNAL TITLE search option in the library catalog to find out if we own it electronically or in print. Be sure to check the range of dates we own before running to the shelves!

• What if we don't have the article at Tufts?

  • use ILLiad to request it from somewhere that does. It will be scanned in and emailed to your ILLiad account within a few days.

• Evaluating Web Sites

  • Use other Search Engines dedicated to more scholarly web sources.
  • Guidelines for evaluating a website's authority/bias

Return to the home page