LibGuides: LIN 230 (Cabrera): Home

What are scholarly sources?

Scholarly sources are:

Written by experts in a particular field of study (most often by college professors with Ph.D.s)
Try to move the conversation around a topic forward in some way (vs summarizing something that is already known)
May present and analyze data that has been gathered (observation, survey, interviews, experiments, or other means)
But may also apply a theory or methodology to a particular topic or analyze primary sources

Two main types of scholarly sources
Books/book chapters	Scholarly journal articles
Often cover broader topics More likely to provide history/overview/background info May pull together/synthesize research published in journal articles Frequently a bit easier to read Okay to use individual chapters, rather than the whole book!	Usually 10-25 pages long Usually on very narrow, specific topics Where new, groundbreaking research is published Can use a lot of technical terminology and be hard to read

Library Search

I'm suggesting the Library Search tool (search box on the library home page), as the best starting point for most of your topics, for the following reasons.

Library Search will bring back books. Books can provide great background and history of topics that journal articles won't. For instance, if I was looking for sources on the history of a writing system or systems, I would look for a book.
Some of the topics (like attitudes toward sign languages and bilingualism) are studied within multiple disciplines. Library search will automatically cross search many databases to bring back a wide variety of perspectives.

Databases for articles

Searching an individual database can help reduce the number of results you get and help to find journal articles on written from specific disciplinary perspectives. The ones listed below are ones that are likely to include articles related to linguistics.

Linguistics and Language Behavior Abstracts This link opens in a new window
This database focuses on linguistics. While it is especially strong on topics related to the structure of languages, it also covers linguistics very broadly from social, educational, cognitive, and developmental perspectives.
Note: We get this database from a different vendor than most of the others on this list. This means it looks a bit different and can't be cross-searched with the others, but essentially it works the same!
ComDisDome This link opens in a new window
This database for communication disorders would be a good one to search for anyone interested in language pathologies.
Education Source This link opens in a new window
Great for topics on teaching or learning languages in school.
PsycINFO This link opens in a new window
If you are interested in cognition and language development, you must search this database! It will also be a go-to database if your topic touches on mental health or happiness/life satisfaction.
SocINDEX with Full Text This link opens in a new window
Sociology covers a wide array of topics about all aspects of society. It might be useful for topics related to sociolinguistics.

This is not a comprehensive list of our databases! If none of these match up with your topics well, please email me your topic and I can advise on databases for other subject areas!

Article interlibrary loan through a database

Step 1: First identify an article that we don't have full text

Step 2: Once in ILLiad, check to see if the autofill worked correctly.

Step 3: Then scroll down to submit the request.

Step 4: When the article arrives, you will get an email. Log back into ILLiad to download the PDF.