Your Librarian
2 North (Core) Rm. 2303
1970 Campus Drive
Evanston, IL 60208
Your Librarian
Liaison for American Studies, History, Jewish Studies, and Religious Studies
Interim Head, Research Services
Room 2624
2nd floor, east tower
1970 Campus Drive
Evanston, Illinois 60208-2300
phone: 847-467-1866
gmorse@northwestern.edu
For more library assistance please see the Library web site.
Selected Services
Gather background info / Focus your topic
The databases below compile encyclopedia sources from a variety of disciplines, and they can be a great way to consider how your topic has been studied from different angles.
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Gale eBooks This link opens in a new windowSearchable database of several hundred subject encyclopedias and other reference works across all subject areas. A search on "Genghis Khan" will return many results including several scholarly essays.
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Oxford Reference Online This link opens in a new windowOnline version of many Oxford University Press reference works, ranging from specialized dictionaries and companions to major reference works such as the Encyclopedia of Human Rights, the Oxford Encyclopedia of Food and Drink, the Oxford Encyclopedia of Latinos and Latinas in the United States, and the Oxford Encyclopedia of Economic History, among many others.
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Gale Literature Resource Center This link opens in a new windowProvides access to biographies, bibliographies, and critical analayses of authors from every age and literary discipline. Covers more than 120,000 novelists, essayist, poets, journalists, and other writers, with in-depth coverage of 2,500 of the most-studied authors. Includes links to: Dictionary of literary biography, Contemporary authors, Contemporary literary criticism, and more.
After you have an initial project idea, you can think deeper about the idea by developing a "Topic + Question + Significance" sentence. This formula came from Kate Turabian's Student's Guide to Writing College Papers. Turabian notes that you can use it plan and test your question, but do not incorporate this sentence directly into your paper (p. 13):
TOPIC: I am working on the topic of ______________________
QUESTION: because I want to find out____________________
SIGNIFICANCE: so that I can help others understand_________
Turabian, Kate L. Student's Guide to Writing College Papers. 4th edition. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 2010.
Remember: the shorter your final paper, the narrower your topic needs to be. Having trouble?
- Which specific subset of the topic you can focus on? Specific demographic groups, people, places, times
- Is there something about this topic that is not already addressed in scholarship?
- Is there a relationship you can explore
- cause/effect
- compare/contrast
- current/historical
- group/individual
- opinion/reason
- problem/solution