Understand Your Topic

Example:
I need to write a paper on women in the theater during the Renaissance

1. Break your topic down into its component parts or concepts:
   1. Women
   2. Theater
   3. Renaissance
   
   
2. Identify keywords for each concept:
   1. WOMEN: women, woman, feminist, feminism, féminisme...
   2. THEATER: theater, theatre, drama, comedy, comédie, tragedy, tragédie, stage...
   3. RENAISSANCE: renaissance, 16th century, 15th century, C16, 1500-1600, ...
   
   
3. Ask any additional questions to clarify your task:
   • Women on the stage? Women as playwrites?
   • What country / region will I focus on?
   • What type of theater? comedy? tragedy? etc.
   • etc.

Know What Types of Materials You Need

• What types of sources do I need? primary sources? secondary sources? books? scholarly articles? news articles? etc.
• How many sources do I need?
• How long will my paper be?
• Do my sources have to be in English? French?
• How recent must my sources be?
• etc...

Choose Appropriate Databases to Search In

• For books: search in library catalogs
• For scholarly articles: search in scholarly periodical indexes
• For news articles: search in a news / periodical index
• For dissertations: search in a dissertation index
• etc.
  
  
• BEWARE: pay attention to the scope & functionality of the databases/indexes you are considering
  • What type of materials does it cover?
  • Materials from what years?
  • Materials in what languages?
  • What countries / time periods / genres / etc. does it cover?
  • Search terms in what languages?
  • Search options?
  
  
• For assistance choosing a database or searching successfully, contact Jennifer Vinopal.

Some Recommended Databases

• BobCat, Bobst Library's Catalog
  
  
• RLIN, Union Catalog of Research Libraries
  
  
• Links to many other library catalogs

• Modern Language Association Bibliography: Index to articles in scholarly journals about language and literature. Note: no full text.
  1. For simple Keyword searching, use basic search
  2. For more search options, use advanced search
  3. Example: keyword search for "saint-exupery and prince" or "saint-exupery and war"
  4. Check BobCat to see if Bobst owns the source
  
  
• FRANCIS: An index to multilingual, multidisciplinary information in the humanities, social sciences, economics, religion, the history of art, and literature from 1984 to the present. Note: No full text. To connect:
  
  
  1. select "change files" on left-hand menu
  2. click on "target" next to "Francis"
  3. select "simple search" or "advanced search" on left-hand menu
  4. Note: you can search in french or english
  5. Example: "advanced search" for keyword "women" and keyword "theater"
  6. Check BobCat to see if Bobst owns the source
  
  
• Other Humanities online indexes at Bobst
  Examples:
  • International Index to Film Periodicals for Contemporary French cinema and society (keywords: "cinema and society")
  • Historical Abstracts for citations to scholarly history journals (some in French)
    

• Lexis-Nexis: Newspaper, Magazine, and Journal index. Some full-text.
  
  
• L'Actualité Dans la Presse: Produced by the Bibliothèque Centre Pompidou. Contains "articles sur l’actualité culturelle et sociale internationale issus du dépouillement sélectif d’une centaine de journaux français." Citations only.