Unequaled Coverage of Key Subject Areas

Academic Search Ultimate offers access to resources cited in key subject indexes.  The combination of academic journals, magazines, periodicals, reports, books and videos meets the needs of scholars in virtually every discipline ranging from astronomy, anthropology, biomedicine, engineering, health, law and literacy to mathematics, pharmacology, women’s studies, zoology and more.

Search Academic Search Ultimate

Before you begin searching ASU, it is a good idea to create an account. This will help you keep track of your searches, save important records, and organize your research more effectively. 

To sign in to ASU, simply click on the "Sign In" link on the top right hand side of the interface. Once you have created your account, it is time to start searching. Finally, select the "Choose Databases" link next to "Academic Search Complete." This link is just above the search fields. This will enable you to include other Ebsco hosted databases to expand your search. Read through the descriptions associated with each database and select the additional relevant databases.

Once you have selected any additional databases that you would like to include in your search, it is time to get to work. In this case, I selected the MLA International Bibliography. After selecting the additional databases that you would like to include in your search, you will return to the main search page. Scrolling down the page, you will notice a variety of fields that you can use to refine your search. Input the appropriate information to find the type of information that you need.

I performed a search, using the keywords, "Rankine, Claudia" and "Lyric Poetry." I now have the option to analyze and refine my results in greater detail. I did not limit my results. So this search represents a rather broad search.

Learn to Use Facets

Using the facets provided by the MLA International Bibliography's platform can help you refine your search. Below the "Search Field," the database enables you to limit your search results in a variety of ways. 

Limits are tools that enable you to focus on certain types of materials for your search based on specific categories and characteristics.  Here are some of the most common ones you may use:

Exclude Dissertations: We strongly recommend that you check this box to exclude dissertations from your search: dissertations are tricky to use and best to leave out.

Limit by Publication Type: Use this to restrict your search to only one type of item such as Book, Book Article/Chapter, or Journal Article.

Limit by Language: Select "English" in this menu to limit your search to only English-language texts.

Limit by Peer Review: Check the box next to "Scholarly (Peer Reviewed) Journals" to search for only those items in scholarly journals.

Limit by Linked Full-Text: Check the box next to "Link Full-Text" to search for only items with full-text.

Limit by Publication Date: Type in the publication date limits for your search.

These facets also appear with a list of results.

The image below demonstrates how you can refine your results. Simply use the facets on the left side of your list of result to narrow down your results to more specific parameters. 

Examine Your Results

Your results will include citation records for journal articles, books, and book chapters. Journal articles may or may not be available in full text--if they are, then you will see HTML full-text and PDF full-text icons,  as seen in the above example. Citations for book chapters and books will not have full-text links, so to find them, click on the  button to search all Library holdings.

The above image represents a search for "Rankine, Claudia" and "Lyric Poetry." Analyze your results to see what articles, books reviews, or other information sources best match your research interests or learning needs. Once you have determined what item you would like, click on the link associated with it. Below, you should notice a record for an item of interest. The article is "The Atlantic Ocean Breaking on Our Heads: Claudia Rankine, Robert Lowell, and the Whiteness of the Lyric Subject." This article corresponds with our search terms.

More Search Tips

Using the Thesaurus

• At the top of the EBSCO interface, there are a variety of different tools. On the left, next to "New Search," is a link to MLA's thesaurus. Here you can search for Subject Terms used by the database. To begin, try entering words that might be related to your topic.

• You can specify the type of search you want to do by clicking on the buttons next to "terms begin with," "terms contain," or "relevancy ranked."

• Once you've clicked on a word or phrase, it will display Broader Terms, Narrower Terms, Related Terms, and Used For.

Using Subject Terms and General Subject Terms

• First, check the thesaurus to discover what words MLA uses to describe what you're interested in. You can use these terms to find other items that have also been assigned those words as subjects.

• If you're unable to find a heading in the thesaurus that matches your topic, try doing a keyword search. This will return many more results than a subject search, but not all will be related to what you're interested in.

• When you find an item that looks relevant, look to see what Subject Terms have been assigned to it.

• In addition to Subject Terms, MLA also breaks down each item into General Subject Terms. These include the subject literature, the period, the primary subject author, and the genre. In some cases, an item will have multiple sets of General Subject Terms, as in this example. You can use these General Subject terms in much the same way as the Subject Terms, to bring together all of the items that share that subject.

Get What You Need

Now that we have a list of results, it's time to analyze them and determine which articles or other forms of scholarship best match our research needs. After finding an article that appears to correspond with your research question, click on the link to the open the record for the particular article. The article is "The Atlantic Ocean Breaking on Our Heads: Claudia Rankine, Robert Lowell, and the Whiteness of the Lyric Subject." This article corresponds with our search terms.

Analyze the Record

Now that we discovered an article that could be interesting, we need to get a little more information. 

• Who is the author and what are their credentials?
• What is the name of the journal and how can you tell that it is scholarly?
• Are there any additional search terms or keywords in the record that you could use to refine your research?

Full-Text Access

In the case of this item, we can access the full text by clicking on the "Linked Full Text" option. If you need the full text of a citation that isn't available in the database, click on the Discover button icon to search all Library holdings for its location in another database and/or in the Library catalog. Doing so will enable you determine if you can access the full text of the article.

About ProQuest One Literature:

Developed in collaboration with faculty, scholars and librarians, this user-friendly, discipline-specific database provides an immersive destination to discover and analyze stories, essays, plays and criticism. ProQuest One Literature is ideal for literature students and scholars, and relevant across a spectrum of subject areas and disciplines.

Proquest One Literature Includes:

• Primary Texts – including poetry, prose and drama from all over the world, by the most influential and studied authors as well as the works of lesser known or now forgotten literary figures.
• Criticism – covering both contemporary and historical criticism.
• Reference Works – offering companions and reference resources providing context to authors and works.
• Full Text Journals - covering all aspects of literary studies.
• Audio and Video – containing performances, author interviews.
• Ebooks - providing in-depth critical analysis of primary works, and author biographies.
• Dissertations - offering scholarly output on literary topics with rich reference citations.

Basic Search:

Basic Search is a simple way to find what you are looking for in ProQuest One Literature. Basic Search searches across all content within the database. You can also click the buttons for Criticism, Primary Texts, Author Pages, Reference Works, Audio & Video, or Dissertations or Book reviews to focus your search to a specific content type. 

If you’re searching for scholarly articles, reviews, books, and dissertations, select criticism. If you’re searching for original literary works, select primary texts. You can also search for specific author pages and reference works rather than browsing the carousels below.

Basic Search Example:

If you are interested in the Beat Generation, a basic search might look like this. One Literature’s auto-complete feature can help you select appropriate terms. If you are interested in learning about the topic more broadly, you might select the topic page on the right, which provides an overview, relevant authors, recommended reference works and more.

You can also use One Literature’s autocomplete feature to search for the Beat Generation as a subject.

Refine Search:

Our subject search for the Beat Generation returned more than one thousand results. The results are helpfully broken down into criticism, primary texts, and secondary sources. Criticism is primarily literature focused, while secondary sources are often interdisciplinary.

To reduce the number of materials we need to sift through, we can modify our search. You can use the side bar on the left-hand side of the page to limit by content type, publication date, title, language, and more. You can also click “Modify Search” at the top of the page if you’d like to further refine your search terms.

After some searching, I decide to narrow my search results to include only works where the subject is the Beat Generation AND Jack Kerouac.

Analyze Results and Access Content:

Our modified search for the Beat Generation and Jack Kerouac yielded 172 results. Now that we have a list of results, it's time to analyze them and determine which results best match our research needs.

After finding an article that appears to correspond with your research question, click on the link to the open the record for the particular article. In this instance, I selected the article, “Fleeing the City.” On the righthand side, you can see that the full text of this article is available.

Now that we discovered an article that could be interesting, we need to get a little more information. 

• Who is the author and what are their credentials?
• What is the name of the journal and how can you tell that it is scholarly?
• Are there any additional search terms or keywords in the record that you could use to refine your research?

After answering these questions and reading the abstract, you may decide that you’d like to read the full-text of this article. Through Proquest One Literature, you can often read the full text on the web page. If you prefer a different format, you can download the PDF at the top of the page. You can also cite, print, and email the content.

The Destination for Literary Research

Gale Literature Resource Center is Gale’s most current, comprehensive, and reliable online literature resource, offering the broadest and most representative range of authors and their works, including a deep collection of full-text critical and literary analysis for literary studies. The resource provides researchers with literary resources to support their literary responses, literary analysis, and thesis statements through a diversity of scholars and critics that ensure all views and interpretations are represented.

Researchers can find up-to-date analysis, biographical information, overviews, full-text literary criticism, and reviews on more than 130,000 writers in all disciplines, from all time periods, and from around the world. Gale Literature Resource Center brings together materials that support interdisciplinary approaches, information literacy, and the development of critical thinking skills. Researchers with a literature, history, arts, gender studies, or cultural studies focus can use this resource to analyze authors and works throughout time.

Search the Literature Resource Center

It is important to define terms that will help you get the best results. As you can see, you can input each of your search terms into its own search box. This enables you to use the database in order to find materials related to your search terms. The search depicted below will produce results related to "Faulkner, William."

There are several ways that you can search through the Literature Resource Center:

Person – by or about: Searches for items by or about a particular person.

Name of work: Search for materials about a particular work.

Keywords: Search for key terms in article/book title, abstract, subjects and first fifty words of the text.  

All text: This option will search for the words anywhere in a document. Note: If you're looking for a famous quotation, enclose the quotation in "quotation marks" so that the database treats it as a phrase.

Advanced Search

Performing an Advanced Search allows you to refine your search. Use Boolean operators to craft searches that match your interests, or use the platform's facets to limit your search.

Person Search and Works Search

The Person Search and Works Search allow you to conduct highly focused searches:  The Person Search will search by nationality, literary movement, genre, or place and time of death.  This search is best used for finding all materials on a known author like Sherman Alexie or a grouping of authors, such as Native American short story writers. The Works Search, like the Person Search, allows you to search by type of work, the author's nationality, the publication year, or the original language.  But remember that this database is NOT exhaustive.

Ordering Your Results

Unless you specify otherwise, the LRC will search multiple content types and arrange your results by Relevance in these divided categories:

• Literature Criticism
• Biographies
• Topic and Work Overviews
• Reviews & News
• Primary Sources/Literary Works
• Multimedia

Click on each tab to see the results in these categories. You can change the way your results are ranked, by clicking on the "Sort By" drop-down menu to choose Relevance, Publication Date, or Document Title.

Other Ways to Narrow Your Results

If you have too many results, use the right sidebar to narrow your results further. The white search bar at the top of the sidebar allows you to search again within your results. Alternatively, below the search bar is a list of linked Subjects: Click on a link to see the smaller set of results that match this subject. You can further specify the subject you're looking for by selecting results for Person, Name of Work, Author, Publication Title, or Document Type.

Topic Finder

Topic Finder takes the titles, subjects, and approximately the first 100 words from a subset of your top results and feeds them into an algorithm. Keywords shown in the graphics are those found most often in the text with your search term. This handy tool may help you to discover topics for research papers or introduce you to a variety of texts that are related to your search. 

As you can see, Literature Resource Center provides access to a wide variety of information, including biographies and multi-media. Select the type of information that you need to refine your inquiry. In this instance, I limited my results to biographical content. However, you should decide what type of information best meets your research or learning need.

Get What You Need

Now that we have a list of results, it's time to analyze them and determine which articles or other forms of scholarship best match our research needs. After finding an article that appears to correspond with your research question, click on the link to the open the record for the particular article. In this instance, I selected the Literature Resource Center's biography of William Faulkner. This is a helpful result if you would like more information about Faulkner's life, examine his works, or would like to access a bibliography of relevant scholarship.

Search Literature Criticism

Are you looking for information about a particular topic, literary figure, or text? If so, you can use Literature Criticism. To perform a basic search, simply type in the search term in the search bar.

Advanced Search

Performing an Advanced Search allows you to refine your search. Use Boolean operators to craft searches that match your interests, or use the platform's facets to limit your search.

Topic Finder

Topic Finder takes the titles, subjects, and approximately the first 100 words from a subset of your top results and feeds them into an algorithm. Keywords shown in the graphics are those found most often in the text with your search term. This handy tool may help you to discover topics for research papers or introduce you to a variety of texts that are related to your search. 

Now that you have entered a search, examine your results to see what items most closely match your research and learning needs. For example, Literature Criticism identifies nearly 1500 results related to William Faulkner. In addition, the resource provides topics associated with the author. These topics can be of broader interest and direct you to significant areas of inquiry.

Get What You Need

Now that we have a list of results, it's time to analyze them and determine which articles or other forms of scholarship best match our research needs. After finding an article that appears to correspond with your research question, click on the link to the open the record for the particular article. In this instance, I selected "William Faulkner: The Novelist as Oral Narrator."

Once you have selected an entry, simply click on the appropriate link to open the record and the item. 

As you can tell, this is an abridged version of the longer article. We can use the UIUC Easy Search or a database (See "Databases to Get You Started") to locate the full length article.

Click on the link to the article in order to access it.