The Articles & Books search, found on the library's homepage, is a library resource that searches multiple databases at once, as well as the library catalog. This is a good general search for finding different source types, although results will primarily be books and articles. When you enter your search terms, Articles & Books will automatically put it in parentheses; it's just a default feature.
You can complete a basic search in Articles & Books on the library's homepage. Articles & Books should be automatically selected from the dropdown, but you can double-check by clicking on the maroon dropdown. Enter your search terms in a single line and click Go to get your results.
Articles & Books also has an advanced search, which you can access by clicking on the Advanced Search link to the right of the simple search bar. The advanced search enables you to further customize your search strategy, use Boolean Operators to define the relationships between your search terms, and target specific material types and date ranges.
You can use filters (found on the right side of your results page) to further narrow and customize your search. These options include Availability, Material Type, Date, and more. You can expand each section to see more options.
Library databases are another great place to search for information. Databases allow you to search a collection of resources electronically, and they contain different types of resources (e.g., articles, books, images, videos, etc.). Not all databases will provide the full text of a resource, in which case look for the Find It button to check other databases or request the item through interlibrary loan.
Many databases are subject-specific, meaning that they contain information from and about a particular discipline. You can use the All subjects drop-down menu to filter the databases by specific subject areas. For JOUR 3095, the Journalism and Communication databases are particularly useful.
While looking for information, you will likely encounter relevant sources that the UMD library doesn't have in its collection. There are two options for requesting materials that UMD doesn’t have locally: Get It and Interlibrary Loan.
Get It allows you to request physical materials held by other University of Minnesota libraries. Below is an example of how an item available via Get It might appear in Articles & Books results:
This encyclopedia isn't available locally at UMD, but you can see that it's available at a library on the Twin Cities campus. You can request physical materials from other U of M libraries to be held at a pickup location of your choice or have them mailed to you. Get It is a different process than Interlibrary Loan and typically requires a shorter wait time, so use Get It (when available) as your first choice.
Click on the green Get It link to fill out and submit your request:
Interlibrary Loan allows you to request items from libraries around the world. Below is an example of how an item available via Interlibrary Loan might appear in Articles & Books results:
This book isn't part of UMD's collection, but you can see that it's available at other libraries. Click on the title to open the item record, which includes useful access information.
Physical materials requested through Interlibrary Loan usually arrive within 5-10 business days, and digital materials (like book chapters and articles) are emailed to you typically within 24 hours, and often even sooner. Some materials will let you choose if you'd like a physical or digital copy, while others (like articles) will only be available in one format. Determine which format makes more sense for your information need and click the corresponding blue Request button to fill out and submit your request:
Below is an example of a catalog or item record for the book Entertaining Ethics: Lessons in Media Ethics from Popular Culture. The top of the record includes a snapshot of the item, in this case the book's title, authors, publication date and location, and a link to the item records for each individual chapter of the book. It also includes access information; this book is physically available in UMD's library, but if it weren't, you could view request options and/or links for online access.
Scrolling down past additional access information, the item record's Cite or Share section includes helpful tools like a permanent link to the record, the ability to email the record to yourself or others, and example citations if the most popular citation styles. You should always manually double-check the provided citations before using them, as they're not always accurate.
Below the Cite or Share section is Details, which includes more detailed information about the item, such as a summary, table of contents, and subject terms (which can be used for subject linking searching). This is a great place to look for additional keywords and an opportunity to review the item and determine its relevance before accessing it.
