CMLT 2610H Multicultural Black Diaspora Literature (O'Neill): Doing Research

Reference sources can help you find basic information about writers as well as provide historical and cultural context for the works you are reading.

Scholarly (Academic) Sources

Multi-Search is a combined search of around 130 GALILEO databases including literature, history, film, arts, philosophy, sociology, and more. Results will include all types of sources such as academic journals, magazines, some newspapers, books, and more. If you are getting too many irrelevant results from Multi-Search, try searching a more focused database such as the MLA International Bibliography which covers only literary criticism and language studies.

JSTOR and Project Muse are collections of full-text scholarly journals that let you search through the articles themselves. Coverage usually begins with the journal's first issue. JSTOR's "rolling wall" means that some journals don't include the past 3-5 years  -- important to know when researching recently-published books like The Nickel Boys.

More databases used by literature scholars are in the subject guides for Comparative, American, and English Literature.

Database Search Tips

• Use the asterisk as truncation/wildcard at the end of a term: postcolonial* or identit*
• Use OR in between synonyms: environment* OR ecolog*
• Some databases like Multi-Search account for British/American spelling differences like labor or labour; others like JSTOR do not.
• To search through the full text of articles and ebooks in Multi-Search, go to Advanced Search and choose "Also search within the full text"

News Sources

Global Newsstream is useful for finding reviews of more recent authors. It includes nearly 2,000 news sources; although primarily U.S. it does include some international papers. Coverage for some papers begins in 1980, and most of these papers are not in Multi-Search.

Access World News provides full-text of newspapers from around the world. Use the 'World' filter to bring up a list of continents and countries. Coverage for foreign papers goes back anywhere from a few years to the early 2000s, and most of these papers are not in Multi-Search.

Due to the slower timeframe of book publishing, keep in mind that you won't find much (if any) criticism on recent literary works. 

GIL-Find: GIL-Find is the UGA Libraries' catalog for locating books, ebooks, and media in the Main Library, Science Library, and Special Collections.

• Request print books from other libraries in the University System of Georgia (see GIL Express instructions). 
• Request books from UGA's collections and pick them up at a campus library see Book Retrieval instructions).
• Check books out for a month, and they will be renewed automatically twice if nobody else has placed a hold on them. See what you have checked out in your account.

Films: GIL-Find will list DVDs you can check out from the basement Media Department as well as streaming documentaries and films from the Films on Demand database. Kanopy is another database with streaming films. 

The GALILEO subject guides for African Studies and African-American Studies link to databases covering newspapers, history research journals, biographies, and more.