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POLS 202 Introduction to American Government & Politics: Find Constitutional Debate

This guide will help students research the landscape of current political legislation.

The Constitution

SEARCH TIPS

1. First, BEFORE YOU SEARCH, make sure you know how to IDENTIFY SCHOLARLY ARTICLES

2. Next, using different combinations of keywords about your topic, perform searches in the tools below

3. Finally, you will need to try several search tools on this page to find sources - this is a normal part of research!

POLS 202 Constitutional Debate Worksheet

The Constitution

Find Background Info and Debate

BACKGROUND INFO
DEBATES AND OPINIONS

Find Scholarly Articles (and more!)

The Holman Library One Search finds books, magazines, scholarly journals, newspapers and videos both online and on library shelves.
1. Click the link above to access the Holman Library One Search which searches for books, videos, journals and more.
 
2. Construct a search.  You will likely need perform at least a couple different searches with different search words
  • Click images to enlarge and see all examples below:

1. Add search words to the top search box.  If there are synonyms or related words to the concept, you have the option to add them with an "OR" on the same line. 2 Option:Use AND to narrow and focus your search 3. Option: Use quotation marks to search by phrases

3. Filter in the left column by show only = PEER-REVIEWED JOURNALS

filter by "show only" = peer-reviewed

4. Click "view online" to read the article:

6. The library has articles in different vendor "platforms," so the interfaces may look slightly different, but the strategies to manipulate the articles are similar:

 

6A. Manipulate the article - EBSCO platform

 

  • click image to enlarge:

  1. Read the abstract (summary) to determine if the article is relevant to your needs
  2. Click "full text" to read the entire article. Double check to make sure it meets the criteria for a scholarly "peer-reviewed" article
  3. "Subject terms" may be helpful for future searches that you perform
  4. Save a link to this article so you can access it later
  5. There is a database-generated citation, but they are occasionally incorrect.
  6. There are the pieces of info that you can use to create  a citation on your own
6B. Manipulate the article - PROQUEST platform

 

  • click image to enlarge:

 

  1. Read the abstract (summary) to determine if the article is relevant to your needs
  2. Click "full text" to read the entire article. Double check to make sure it meets the criteria for a scholarly "peer-reviewed" article
  3. "Subject terms" may be helpful for future searches that you perform
  4. Save a link to this article so you can access it later
  5. There is a database-generated citation, but they are occasionally incorrect.
  6. There are the pieces of info that you can use to create a citation on your own
You can search directly in Library Databases.  They often offer auto-complete of your search terms, giving you different ideas of how to search.
LEGAL SCHOLARSHIP THROUGH LIBRARY DATABASES
LEGAL SCHOLARSHIP THROUGH DIGITAL REPOSITORIES ON THE WEB

Find News

Recommended National News Websites

The New York Times
The Washington Post
The Los Angeles Times
The Christian Science Monitor

Recommended Journals and News Sources

Academic Journals:
Magazines

 

Political News Sources: