Scholarly sources are:
Books/book chapters | Scholarly journal articles |
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Library Search | Databases | Google Scholar | |
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Description |
Cross searches big part of library holdings Lots of source types Single Google-style search box |
Often focused on a specific subject area Usually one or two source types (especially scholarly articles) Multiple search boxes |
Just like Google, but brings back scholarly books and articles |
Pros |
Will bring back sources on any topic. Basic search interface less intimidating Default is stuff we own (especially online) |
Scholarly focus More control of your search Smaller pool of results |
Familiar Natural language searching (can put in a sentence/question in the search box) |
Cons |
Too many results Requires multiple searches |
Have to know which one(s) to use for different topics Multiple search boxes can be tricky to use We don’t own everything that comes up |
Have to set Google Scholar up to work with the library or will hit pay walls Reliability (predatory journals, self-published work) |