These databases and books can help provide context for the historical events, movement, or popular culture stereotype you are researching.
They are just a sampling of what K-State Libraries offers. If you need to research a different topic, visit our complete list of databases.
1. Collect keywords that concisely describe the topics you are researching. We do this to increase our chances of finding relevant articles, even if the researcher is using different terms from those used in the books or your class discussions.
Start narrow with the person, object, or event from the book. Then add the categories to which they may belong.
Example: Packard --> car
Once you have categories, add synonyms.
Example: Car = automobile = sedan
2. Read the bibliographies and references. Whether on Wikipedia or in an academic journal article, find out what sources the author consulted. These could be relevant to your research, too.
When you find a title that looks relevant, paste the title (just the title) into Search It to see if K-State Libraries owns it. If we do not, we can try to get a copy for you from another library through Interlibrary Loan.
3. Plan to research, write, research, write. Writing and research feed and inform each other. Be sure to plan time to do both, several times.
4. Ask a librarian - we can help you at the planning stage and when you get stuck. We can help you via chat, email, or Zoom. You can talk to me, your librarian, or talk to trained library student employee through our Peer Consultations.
Publication Dates Covered: 1964 - present Simultaneous users: 6 Paid for by K-State Libraries
Indexes and abstracts for approximately 1,800 journals in the field of United States and Canadian history. Full-text coverage for more than 280 journals and more than 80 books. Contains citations and links to book and media reviews. Can search by time period.
HeinOnline is a premier online database containing more than 160 million pages and 200,000 titles of historical and government documents in a fully searchable, image-based format. HeinOnline bridges an important research gap by providing comprehensive coverage from inception of more than 2,600 law-related periodicals. In addition to its vast collection of academic journals, HeinOnline contains the entire Congressional Record, Federal Register, and Code of Federal Regulations, complete coverage of the U.S. Reports back to 1754, and entire databases dedicated to treaties, constitutions, case law, world trials, classic treatises, international trade, foreign relations, U.S. Presidents, and much more.
These databases cover a lot of different subjects, especially in the humanities and social sciences. They are helpful when you're topic could be studied by a number of different disciplines.
Paid for by K-State Libraries
Provides a combined search for Ethnic NewsWatch and Ethnic NewsWatch History which feature newspapers, magazines, and journals from ethnic and minority presses; GenderWatch which features historical and current perspectives of gender roles; and Alt-PressWatch which showcases some of the nation’s most respected and cited grassroots publications. Searches can be narrowed to peer-reviewed publications.
Paid for by K-State Libraries
A full-text collection of journals ranging from history to business to literature to science and mathematics. Coverage begins with the first issue of a title, but the most recent three to five years of each title are usually not available. The full article text is searchable. Images are available for searching as well.
These sources provide facts and numbers on a variety of topics, from census data to major legislative issues to career data.
Publication Dates Covered: 1923 - present Paid for by K-State Libraries
Single-themed reports on current issues from Congressional Quarterly Press dating back to 1923. Topics include social trends, health concerns, the economy, education, and technology. Reports provide overview, background, pro/con arguments, chronologies, current situation, and bibliographies of additional sources.
News sources can be primary or secondary sources.
Primary sources: If the article was written at the time of the event you are researching and includes interviews, photos, or reporting from eye-witnesses, it is a primary sources.
Secondary sources: If the article describes a the event in the past, indicating that most of the activity related to that event has ended, it is probably a secondary source.
Sometimes an article can be both, as when an article describes events happening today and then describes events in the past or events leading up to this one. Another tricky example is an article written at the time of an event but focuses on insight from experts instead of witnesses. Consider how you are using the article and what part is most important to your research.
Paid for by the State Library of Kansas
US Newsstream enables users to search current U.S. news content, as well as archives that stretch back into the 1980s. It features top newspapers, wires, broadcast transcripts, blogs, and news sites in full-text format. US Newsstream provides key national and regional news sources from the U.S. and includes exclusive and preferred access to top titles, including The New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe, Newsday, and Chicago Tribune. US Newsstream is a subset of Global Newsstream.
Publication Dates Covered: 1851-2021 Paid for by K-State Libraries
Digitized version of The New York Times since its first issue in 1851. Search the full text of articles to find articles on a wide variety of topics. Full name of the database is ProQuest Historical Newspapers: The New York Times with Index.
Paid for by K-State Libraries
Contains more than 1,000 full-text newspapers, television and radio news transcripts, videos, and podcasts from around the world.
Paid for by K-State Libraries
Part of Oxford Music Online, the Encyclopedia of Popular Music covers all popular musical genres spanning from 1900 to the present day, including artist bibliographies and discographies.
Publication Dates Covered: 1926 - present Paid for by K-State Libraries
This is the largest and most comprehensive database for literary criticism in all languages. Also covers folklore, linguistics, and film studies. Includes journal and book articles, books, and dissertations. Does not index book reviews in literary journals.
Publication Dates Covered: 1976 - present Paid for by K-State Libraries
Articles and reviews published in academic journals and popular magazines on all aspects of music including styles such as classical, jazz, popular, folk, and world music, and the fields of musicology, ethnomusicology, theory, applied and professional topics, music education, and the music industry.
You can find print and ebooks through K-State Libraries on almost any topic. Below are a sampling of the kinds of books you might find that are relevant.
Use the Search It box on the Libraries' home page and enter keywords related to your topic. Or, you can go to the main Search It page.
You can locate more books that introduce you to a topic by searching for your topic and terms like: encyclopedia, handbook, or dictionary.
You can limit your search results using the options that will appear on the left side of the screen on your Search It results page. Options include Resource Type (you can choose book or journal article) or date.
Do you have to read the whole book? Possibly not. You might find the information you need in a specific chapter or, in the case of the scholarly encyclopedias, an entry.
Many of your topics involve important, or landmark, law cases. K-State owns books that provide overviews of these cases, including a series from the University Press of Kansas known as the Landmark Law Cases and American Society Series. If you follow this link to Search It, you will see about 70 titles from that collection; scroll through to see if your case is included. Most of these books are available in Hale, unless they are checked out.
I've also included a sample of titles below.
Want to know what resources professors recommend to each other when teaching topics related to race and/or injustice? Search the internet for a "hashtag syllabus." In each case, the "hashtag" is usually the most common hashtag associated with a movement or event.
A hashtag syllabus does not exist for every movement or event. BUT, you may be surprised by the resources you do find, even if they aren't exactly syllabi.