Use keyword searching in classic GIL or GIL-Find AND in relevant databases. Brainstorm different keywords for your topic and see what happens.
Use Boolean searching (AND, OR, NOT) to expand or narrow your searches. (What's Boolean searching again? Learn more here.)
When you find a relevant item, click on the record and look for subject terms. Clicking on a subject term will bring up other related items.
Try your keywords and subject terms in other databases, and see what you find!
Subject headings and keywords that you've used to find books can also be used for searching in article databases!
Databases like America: History and Life and Historical Abstracts use subject headings to describe articles. Each record for an article will include links to subject terms (just like the library catalog).
JSTOR does not use subject headings. To find articles "about" a topic in JSTOR, try using the term in a "title" search.
You can also try searching by particular events, locations, organizations, or personal names. For example:
Click here for a full list of the secondary- and primary-source databases held by the GSU Library.
Many databases give you only a citation telling you where to find the article, not the article itself.
This button is often a shortcut to the full article text in another database:
Click the Find It @GSU button to open a window with links to the article you need.
If that fails, try searching for the journal title in GIL-Find, or use Interlibrary Loan (ILL) to request it from another library.
Lost? Stuck? Too many options? Ask a Librarian for help, or contact your History Librarian!