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English 202 - JY: Home

Research Tips

This guide will give you some tips for researching both authors and topics in Literature.

 

Reference Materials


The following are excellent resources for researching Authors, providing both biographical information and critical information.  They are all located in the Reference Collection (unless they are online), which is currently adjacent to the Research Help Desk.

Contemporary Authors (online)

The Dictionary of Literary Biography PN451  D54  Ref Collection

Various Gale Criticism Guides  (these are located nearby and range from the Meadieval to Contemporary) Ref Collection and include Contemporary Literary Criticism, Poetry Criticism, Short Story Criticism, Drama Criticism and many others.

Guides and Indexes in the Reference Collection including:

The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature (PS 153 N5 G73)

Native American Writing (PS 153 I52 N395)

LGBTQ Literature (PS 153 S39 E53)

American Nature Writers (PS 163 A6)

Critical Survey of Mystery & Detective Fiction (PN 3448 D4 C75)

Science Fiction Writers (PS 374 S35 S36)

& many many more

 

Books

For Topics search the catalog by Keyword or Subject.

Searching by keyword

 

For Authors search as either Author or Subject.  Searching by Author gets books by them, by Subject books about them.

 

Searching by subject

 

Repeating the search in Summit will allow you to borrow books that we don't own from other libraries we collaborate with.

 

 

Search using Summit

 

Journal Article Databases


The easiest way to locate journal articles in your subject area is to use article databases. Click the article databases tab and immediately search, or click Databases by Subject or Title to get more options.

Recommended Databases for Literature and Creative Writing are:

MLA (Modern Language Association Bibliography)

Academic Search Complete

JSTOR

 

For other subjects related to your research click the Article Databases tab.

Articles and Databases 

This will lead you to:

 

Name and subject

 

**One tip for searching contemporary authors in the Ebsco databases is to use the "Book Review" or "Interview" limiters.


The "Find It" links will let you locate the articles if they are not full-text in the database.

 

FindIt!

You may need to use ILLiad to order articles (or books) from other libraries.  It's a good idea to sign up for this free service.

 

ILLiad

 

And you can always ask for Help, either in person at the Research Help Desk, or use the Ask feature on the homepage, which enables you to contact us via phone, e-mail, sms, chat and twitter.

 

Ask us!