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AAS 3670: Social Justice in Sports (Lisa Shannon): Finding Articles

3 Ways to Get to Articles Databases

There are three ways that you can get to the library's databases,
from off-campus (as well as from on-campus):

  1. Use the Databases by Subject dropdown to find databases for a particular subject area
  2. Use the Databases by Name links if you know the name of the database you're looking for (i.e., Worldwide Political Science Abstracts is under "W" for "Worldwide")
  3. Use this research guide (or any of our other research guides!)

If you are off campus, when you click the name of a database, you will be asked for your Campus ID and password. After that, you'll have full access to the database*. But in order to get that access, the database has to identify you as GSU faculty/student/staff.

*There are a very few databases that you can't access this way and are only usable in the actual library building). These are clearly marked in the database listings as ON CAMPUS USE ONLY.

**You can also connect Google Scholar to our online article holdings. Click here for more information on setting up this option from off-campus.**

Using "Advanced Search" in Databases

Most databases have an Advanced Search option, which will let you search using multiple terms at once. For example:

An asterisk (*) is a truncation symbol that will bring up results using all the letters leading up to (or following) the * -- so, African American* will bring up both "African American" and "African Americans," and "Black*" will bring up "Black," "Blacks," "Blackness," and so on.

Those ORs mean that you're asking for articles that use any of the terms linked by the "ORs"

* * * * * 

A database's Advanced Search option will also let you limit your search in a number of ways, including:

  • Limit by year of publication (helpful if you need the most current scholarship/literature)
  • Limit to scholarly/peer-reviewed articles (this is often just a box you can check)
  • Limit by language (if you read a particular language or languages, you can select those; you can also limit your search to just items in English)

For example, here are some options that often appear in Advanced Search:

Different subject databases may have other options as well, but most of our databases have these as Advanced Search options.

* * * * *

One box that you SHOULD NOT CHECK is the "Full Text" box. Sounds backwards, I know, but here's why:

Many databases will give you only the citation for a particular article and not the full text.

But! We have lots of databases, and the article that you need may be in a different database.

If you find an article that you want, and it looks like we don't have full text, click the blue "Find It @ GSU" button. That button will point you to the article if it's held in another database, or will help you set up an Interlibrary Loan for the article.

If you check the "Full Text" box in a database, you're actually saying that you only want articles which that particular database has available in "full text." You're shutting off that "Find It @ GSU" option.

Databases to Start With

The first four databases listed here are probably your best bets for getting started. Since they are all provided to us by the same vendor (EBSCO), you can search across all four of them at the same time. To do this, go into any one of those databases and click on "Choose Databases" 

Then select other EBSCO databases that might be useful from the list that comes up,

All of the databases listed below are EBSCO databases! except for

  • Sociological Abstracts
  • GenderWatch
  • JSTOR

* * * * * * * * * *

Search Hints

   to search names as a phrase | ex: "Colin Kaepernick"


   as a wild card | ex: wom*n

AND between words or boxes to NARROW results | ex: media AND "Serena Williams"

OR between words or boxes to EXPAND results | ex: African America* OR Black*

Use the Power of Subject Searching

Most articles in databases are assigned one or more subject terms. These are standardized terms that bring together articles on the same topic  even if the keywords are different (think "Cassius Clay"* vs. "Muhammad Ali").

*note that there was a 19th-century boxer named Cassius M. Clay who was NOT Muhammad Ali...

When you find a good article, look at its subject terms in the article's record. Follow these to find other items about that topic. Or, combine the subject terms in a new search.

 

If you know that you are looking for books about a particular athlete or sport, you can try using that name or sport as a subject term, like this:

Adding "Vietnam" as a keyword will limit your search to items about Muhammad Ali (including films!) that mention "Vietnam" somewhere in the item's record -- could be in the title, in a summary or table of contents (if those are included), or as a subject term. 

 

Africana Studies Librarian / Humanities Instruction Librarian

Video #1: Getting Started with "Advanced Search"

This video includes:

How to complete a search in Academic Search Complete:

  • How to understand key parts of an article's record in Academic Search Complete
  • How to use subject terms for searching
  • What "author-supplied keywords" are
  • Why you should use both subject terms and keywords for searching
  • How to access articles using the "Find It @ GSU" button, including
    • How to place an Interlibrary Loan request using this button
    • How to use this button to locate other databases with that article

Video #2: Learning from Search Results

This video includes: 

How to complete a search in Academic Search Complete:

  • How to understand key parts of an article's record in Academic Search Complete
  • How to use subject terms for searching
  • What "author-supplied keywords" are
  • Why you should use both subject terms and keywords for searching
  • How to access articles using the "Find It @ GSU" button, including
    • How to place an Interlibrary Loan request using this button
    • How to use this button to locate other databases with that article

Video #3: Learning from Citations/References

This video includes:

  • How to look at references in an article to find more articles
  • How to use Advanced Discover to look up an article in a reference
  • What "Times cited in database means"
  • How to use Google Scholar to find articles that cite a particular article

Note: there was a recording glitch that resulted in a bit of extra video at the end and another glitch when Kaltura refused to edit out the last bit; captions will tell you when the instructional part has ended.

Getting the Full Article

1) First, look for a direct link to the article. "HTML Full Text" or "PDF Full Text" are the most common forms.
 
2) If you don't see one of these links, look for a  button in the article's record. Clicking this button will check for full text availability in GSU's other databases and also search the library's catalog to see if we have the journal in print or on microfilm. You will see one or more of the following results: 
 
Full text available at: [database name]
Means that electronic full text of the article is available from one or more of GSU Library's full text providers. Check the years available in each option to identify which option will work for you.
 
No full text available
If this link appears as the first option, then no electronic full text is available. However, the library may have a print or microfilm copy of the article: scroll down to the "Get It" section to see if there are print or microfilm options for this journal. If so, you will need to check the Recent Issues or Volumes Owned fields to see what volumes/issues are available.
 
Request via Interlibrary Loan (ILL)
If neither electronic nor print access* is available at GSU Library, you can click this link to begin the interlibrary loan process (sign in with your Campus ID and follow the prompts). This service is free for GSU students/employees. Articles requested via Interlibrary Loan are usually available within 24 hours -- check your gsu.edu email address for notification of availability.
 
You can also place an ILL request for book chapters or articles only available in the GSU Library's print periodicals collection. Click here for more information about our Desktop Delivery service.
 
Occasionally, people encounter problems trying to access articles from home using the "Find It @ GSU" button. Sometimes pop-up blockers prevent the "Find It" window from opening, so check your browser settings. 
 
Ask Jill for help if you can't find what you need!