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HIST 026: Wild, Wild West

Find Books

Search for Articles

Characteristics:

  • Cover numerous topics
  • May contain multiple types of sources (e.g. popular, trade, scholarly)
  • Audience = educated readership

Examples:

Characteristics:

  • Pertain to a particular discipline
  • Often contain scholarly sources, known as peer-reviewed articles
  • Articles are written and reviewed by experts in the field
  • Academic audience
  • Showcase original research

Examples:

Characteristics:

  • Written by columnists
  • Audience = general public
  • Full of images

Examples:

  • Sports Illustrated
  • Vogue

Characteristics:

  • Written by columnists, journalists, and/or reporters
  • Coverage = current events
  • Articles written at 8th grade reading level

Examples:

Peer Review

Peer review is part of the process of publishing an article in a scholarly journal. Scholars in a field evaluate each other's work to ensure that research is valid, significant, and original before it is published. This process is crucial for maintaining the integrity and quality of academic literature.

Search Techniques

Figure describing boolean search operators AND & OR, truncation using asterisks and wildcards, and phrase searching with quotation marks.

To narrow your search results try:

  • AND
  • Quotation marks

To expand your search results try:

  • OR
  • Truncation symbol, which may be an asterisk (*)