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University of Portland Clark Library

ENG 107: College Writing (Buck-Perry): Finding Scholarly Sources

Articles from journals

Finding Articles in Different Subject Areas

Library Database Searching Tips

1. Instead of searching for a topic statement or sentence, identify 2-3 key concepts of your topic.

Topic sentence: Should we send humans to Mars?

Key concepts:  humans and Mars

2. Library databases search for your words exactly as you enter them. Give yourself flexibility by using the asterisk. Enter the first several letters of the word that all of the different forms of the word that come to mind share, then use the asterisk to look for any additional letters.

Example:

human* will find: human, humans, humanity...

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