You can request materials from other libraries through Interlibrary Loan (ILL). As long as you have the citation information (author, title, date, publisher information), we can probably find it for you. To place an ILL request and learn more about how it works, click the link below.
The most commonly used operators are: AND, OR, and NOT. When used in all caps, search engines (Library Search, databases, and Google) recognize them as a specific function. These are best described by using Venn diagrams.
Click the tabs at the top of this box to learn more about each operator.
If you are researching social media but receive too many results about social media users or the social media site itself when you only want information on social media about the experience of influencers, you could use AND to make sure you only receive results with both terms in the item record.
If you are researching something with a name that varies depending on the context, you can use OR to make sure the system is searching all possible versions of that term. For example, some information on LGBTQ+ topics uses the term "LGBTQ" while "homosexual" is more commonly used in medical texts. If you want both, use OR to combine your terms.
If you are searching with a term that is part of a larger term not relevant to your research or that term is also used in a different field, you may need to use NOT to remove results. For example, if you are searching for the portrayal of witches in the media and use the term "witch," you may receive results about The Witcher, a book, video game, and Netflix series. To remove these results, use NOT.
To use NOT in Google searches, use - (minus sign).
Though some Advanced Search features of search engines allow you to have multiple search boxes with drop-down menus for Boolean Operators, you can use multiple operators in single line searches.
( ) Just like in math, parentheses are their own groupings. This part of the search is done before it is combined with any other part of the search.
" " Quotation marks make sure that two or more words are in that exact order or are found with that exact spelling.
* An asterisk functions as truncation. It can be used to find words with multiple endings. For example, teach* will search for teach, teacher, teachers, teaches, and teaching.
? A question mark functions as a wildcard. It can be used to find words where only one letter is changed. For example, wom?n will search for women, woman, womyn, and womxn. Another example is Latin? will search for Latina, Latino, Latinx, and Latine.
Both of the searches above will function the same even though they are written differently.
Sources can be described as primary, secondary, and tertiary. These categories describe how many layers of interpretation a source has.*
Click the tabs at the top of this box to learn about each layer of interpretation.
*Many sources will have a combination of primary and secondary source information. It is rare to find raw information without any interpretation accompanying it.
A primary source is raw information. This can look differently depending on the discipline. In the sciences, raw information could be a data set; in the humanities, raw information could be the piece of art, a manuscript, or sound recording; in the social science, raw information could be a diary, newspaper clippings of an event, or census data.
Primary sources contain the information that is the focus of your research.
While the databases listed below can be used to find primary sources for a variety of topics, some disciplines have specific collections. See a subject guide for more resources.
A digital collection of monographs, essays, articles, speeches, and interviews by leaders within the black community.
Gale Primary Sources provides an interactive research environment that allows researchers to cross-search Eighteenth Century Collections Online (ECCO), Nineteenth Century Collections Online (NCCO), the Times Digital Archive, the Times Literary Supplement Historical Archive, Sabin Americana, 1500-1926, Archives of Sexuality and Gender, Womens Studies Archive. Users can also discover and analyze content in new ways.
A collection of primary source exhibits for students and scholars of queer history and culture. The database uses "queer" in its most inclusive sense, to embrace topics that are gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender and includes work on sexual and gender formations that are queer but not necessarily LGBT. Each document collection in the database includes a critical introductory essay that helps explain the significance of the primary sources in historical terms and in relation to previous scholarship.
Secondary sources are interpretations of raw information. They may or may not contain the raw data. For example, an anthology of letters written by a historical figure can contain the primary source of photographs or transcriptions of the original letters and be accompanied by the secondary source of short essays that provide context for the letters. Most books and journal articles will fall into this category.
Secondary sources provide context for the information at the focus of your research.
While the databases listed below can be used to find secondary sources for a variety of topics, some disciplines have specific databases or collections. See a subject guide for more resources.
This is a multi-disciplinary, full-text database which includes 4,000 peer-reviewed journals and indexing and abstracts for more than 9,000 journals.
Tertiary sources are collections of interpretations (secondary sources). Like secondary sources, they may contain parts of primary sources but the purpose of a tertiary source is to give a broad overview of the scholarly conversations around a primary source. These are typically referred to as reference sources like dictionaries, encyclopedias, bibliographies, textbooks, handbooks, literature reviews, etc.
Use tertiary sources to start your research.
While the databases listed below can be used to find tertiary sources for a variety of topics, some disciplines have specific books or databases. See a subject guide for more resources.
More than 200 dictionaries, encyclopedias, language reference and subject reference works published by Oxford University Press. In addition to text, some sources include maps, illustrations, and Web links. Users can search one resource, a group of selected resources, or all of them at once. Regularly updated.
This subscription is limited to five simultaneous users. Please log out when finished.
Included in this database are the following titles:
Encyclopedia of the Enlightenment
Encyclopedia of the Middle Ages
The Oxford Classical Dictionary
The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium
The Oxford Dictionary of the Renaissance
The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Reformation
Full-text online from over 400 encyclopedias, dictionaries, and other reference books. Search a topic, build a concept map, or browse information sources organized by subject. Find text, images, sound files, sortable data tables and more.
Don't forget to check out our other Research Guides for advice on researching in other disciplines and what sources are recommended.
Google Scholar is best at understanding the synonyms and context of your keywords. Once you link it to WMU's Library, you can see what articles are accessible through our library databases. It does not have many search filters so it is more difficult to sort through results than in Library Search and databases. This guide will help you link your Google Scholar account to WMU's library resources.