RELS 141: Contemporary Christian Morality (Linder): Scholarly Sources

Craft Your Keywords:

Any research process begins by figuring out how to search. But, where to begin? 

BRAINSTORM
     

Spend a few minutes thinking about what words could be used to describe the topic. Be as  specific as you can. 
For example, if you're researching the ethics of information use/misuse, try:
information, use, ethics

EXPAND

For each of the words you listed, think of other words or phrases you could use that mean the same thing.

For example, what are some other ways to talk about information use? Could you also search for terms like misuse, deception, etc.?

USE EXPERT SEARCH TRICKS!

Use AND and OR to make your search more or less specific! This will give you more sources to choose from.

When you use AND, a database will look for resources that use all of the words you entered.
For example: information AND use AND ethics will find sources including all 3 terms

Use OR between words that mean the same or similar things, or that you are equally interested in.
For example: by searching for (use OR misuse) AND information AND ethics, you will find sources that talk about either information use or information misuse, both in the context of ethics. 

Searching the Catalog:

You can search for books and ebooks at Holy Cross using CrossSearch, the main search box on our website: 

CrossSearch is the Libraries' multi-search "discovery" tool. CrossSearch searches a cross-section of journal articles, newspapers, CDs, images, and many other types of resources available through the libraries. It is also our main library catalog -- the tool you use to find books, journals, films, and other items physically located in the library, as well electronic versions of those items. 

To leave out individual articles and focus on things like books and films, you can use the Catalog Only limit in CrossSearch. 

Watch our video tutorial 📺 to learn more about CrossSearch. If you're not a CrossSearch fan, you can also use the Library Catalog to find books. 

Try searching for books using a very basic keyword search. Books tend to be on broad topics, so the terms you search with should be broad, too! Once you've found a few books that look interesting to you, you can use clues from the books to help you find other books. For example.... 

• Call Numbers. Books on similar subjects are in similar areas of the library. For example, if you search for books on medical ethics, you would see pretty quickly that many books have call numbers in the R700s. This means you can easily go to that section of the library and look through the books in person! 
   
• Vocabulary. Check the records in the library catalog for vocabulary in the tables of contents, titles, descriptions or other information that you might use for future searches. 
   
• Subjects. Every book in our catalog is marked with at least 1 "tag" that tells you what the book is mostly about, and links together other books on that same topic. You can click on the tags to find a list of all other books using that tag. 

Finding Your Way in the Library:

At Holy Cross, we organize our books using a system called Library of Congress Classification or LCC. LCC is based on the subject of the books. Each letter represents a specific subject. Each subject is broken down into more specific letter sections, each of which is further broken down into number ranges for specific topics. Most call numbers have additional  numbers and letters on the end of them, which are used to give each book a unique spot on the library shelves. 

Generally: 

• Reference Books are in the Main Reading Room. These books must stay in the library.
• Books whose numbers begin with letters A through G are on the Mezzanine level (1 floor down from the Main Reading Room).
• Books whose numbers begin with N or TR are in the Visual Arts Wing on the main level. 
• Books whose numbers begin with letters H through Z are mostly on the Ground (bottom) level.
• Books whose numbers begin with M are in the Music Library in Brooks Hall.
• Books whose numbers begin with Q, R, S or T are in the Science Library in Swords Hall.

The Stacks Guide handout attached below has more information about how the stacks are organized, and the best places for you to look. 

You can also watch our video tutorial  to learn more about how call numbers work. Or, check out the Library of Congress Classification Outline for a detailed breakdown of our call number system. 

Book Chapters:

Did you know that the Libraries have more than one kind of book in our collections? When we think of books, we are usually thinking of what's called a monograph (a single intellectual work in one volume -- so, a single topic, likely one overall argument, etc.) Chapters in monographs can certainly be helpful to understanding your topic, but you may also want to look at edited collections. Edited collections (also sometimes called anthologies) contain a collection of essays around a topic or idea, typically curated by one or more scholars in the field. Edited collections are valuable for their ability to bring together different takes on and aspects of a topic in a particular volume where they can be read together, but the chapters or essays also stand as their own intellectual works. 

Locating book chapters that you may want to read can take a little more time. Here are some creative ways that you might find book chapters: 

• CrossSearch -- some, but not all, of our books have tables of contents in the catalog that you can check. To look specifically for edited collections, add "edited" to your search terms! 
• Google Books typically have limited previews, but if you can see enough to locate a helpful chapter, we can get you a copy; 
• Similarly, Amazon.com previews; 
• Google Scholar sometimes includes citations for book chapters (and searches across Google Books); 
• Databases (some, but not all, include book chapter citations specifically; Atla Religion is one). 
• Citations in bibliographies of articles, e-books, or other books that you may have checked out.

Using Databases to Find Articles: 

Research Databases are tools designed to help you search the scholarly (and other) articles and resources available to you through the Holy Cross Libraries.  Article databases are like very long bibliographies of articles that might interest you -- some that are available physically at Holy Cross, some available online, and some that we have to borrow from other libraries. 

Why use the Libraries instead of Google? There are lots of reasons, but the simplest is this: the information in our tools would mostly be behind paywalls if you tried to find it on Google. Information that we have paid for is more likely to be high-quality and from credible sources (although there are always exceptions). In short, good information is rarely free! 

Suggested Databases: