LibGuides: INS 490 Senior Seminar: Secondary & Academic Resources

Getting Started

To get started with your senior seminar research project, familiarize yourself with the available research tools listed below.

Tip! Develop a list of topic related keywords so that you can effectively run a variety of keyword search strategies in the following:

WorldCat
Search for print books, e-books, peer-reviewed full-text scholarly articles, statistics, and more with the library’s discovery tool.
Library Databases
Providing access to articles from a variety of journals in a variety of disciplines, learn which databases are best suited for your research: database subject list.
Google Scholar
Search for scholarly articles available from the AUS Library as well as other institutions at Google Scholar.
Google Books
Search for full-text ebooks and excerpts made available from Google Books.

WorldCat Discovery

Search for print books, e-books, peer-reviewed full-text scholarly articles, statistics, and more with the library’s discovery tool.

You can limit your results by format including print, ebook, full-text peer-reviewed articles, DVDs, and more. Results can also be limited to date ranges, too.

A useful way to browse the library books in a subject area is by using a call number. In WorldCat, type nu: then the call number prefix for your subject area, and select enter. You'll receive a list of results based on that call number search.

Library Databases

To get access to articles from a variety of journals in a variety of disciplines, discover which library databases are best suited for your research.

Start with a few of the recommended databases for this course.

Academic Video Online This link opens in a new window
Academic Video Online provides documentaries, interviews, performances, news programs and newsreels, and more. Search for award-winning films including Academy, Emmy, and Peabody winners and access content from PBS, BBC, 60 MINUTES, National Geographic, Annenberg Learner, BroadwayHD, A+E Networks' HISTORY and more.
Encyclopaedia of Islam This link opens in a new window
Presents information on the "state of our knowledge of the Islamic World from religion and history to politics and culture." Includes articles on Muslims of every age and land, on tribes and dynasties, on the crafts and sciences, on political and religious institutions, on the geography, ethnography of the various countries and on the history, topography and monuments of the major towns and cities. Its scope encompasses the old Arabo-Islamic empire, the Islamic countries of Iran, Central Asia, the Indian sub-continent and Indonesia, the Ottoman Empire and all other Islamic countries.
Encyclopedia of Women and Islamic Cultures This link opens in a new window
The Encyclopedia of Women and Islamic Cultures Online is an interdisciplinary, trans-historical, and global reference work reflecting the very latest research on gender studies and the Islamic world. It aims to cover every topic for which there is significant research, examining these regions from the period just before the rise of Islam to the present.
Erudit This link opens in a new window
Érudit is a Canadian non-profit publisher that covers a wide range of disciplines within the human, social and natural sciences. They provide access to a large body of French and bilingual research, with a strong collection of Open Access journals. AUS subscribes to both Meta: Translators' Journal and TTR: Traduction, terminologie, rédaction.
Human Rights Watch This link opens in a new window
Human Rights Watch is a leading independent organization dedicated to defending and protecting human rights. Publishes the annual Human Rights Watch Annual Reports, as well as reports on specific regions, topics and human rights issues.
JSTOR This link opens in a new window
JSTOR is an online archive of core scholarly journals and books in a wide variety of disciplines. It provides full text articles in back issues of journals from the earliest issues to within a few years of current publication, as well as book chapters. Please note that the current volume of a journal is NOT available on JSTOR; the latest volume available on JSTOR is usually 3-5 years old.
New York Times Company This link opens in a new window
With award-winning journalism and commentary, including video, photos, infographics, podcasts and more, The New York Times has long been considered one of the world's most trusted news sources.
Users must create a personal account to access this resource. To create an account: 1. go to nytimes.com/grouppass (from on-campus) or nytimes.com/passes (from off-campus), 2. create a free account using your AUS email address 3. access NYTimes.com or the NYTimes app from anywhere. Users will need to renew their passes annually by following these steps.
Project Muse This link opens in a new window
Project MUSE is a leading provider of digital humanities and social science content for the scholarly community around the world. Access over 700 high quality, peer reviewed, interdisciplinary journals and over 5000 eBooks from 200+ leading publishers.
ProQuest Arts & Humanities Database This link opens in a new window
This database covers a variety of subjects: Art, Design, Archaeology, Anthropology, Classical Studies, Architecture, History, Philosophy, Geography, Modern Languages, Literature, Cultural Studies and Music. Titles include both scholarly peer-reviewed journals and selected trade and consumer titles relevant to applied arts and cultural studies.
ProQuest Asian & European Business Collection This link opens in a new window
This database provides information pertinent to the study of business and finance topics across Asia and Europe, including academic journals, newspapers, newswires, and magazines. Find information on companies, economies, markets, international trade, and overall business conditions and practices throughout these regions.
ProQuest Dissertations & Theses This link opens in a new window
PQDT offers access to 5 million citations to dissertations and theses from around the world from 1637 to the present day together with over 2.7 million available in full text. The database offers full text for most of the dissertations added since 1997 and strong retrospective full text coverage for older graduate works. Over 200,000 new dissertations and theses are added to the database each year.
ProQuest Middle East & Africa Database This link opens in a new window
This database provides ongoing full-text academic journals that are locally published by scholarly publishing organizations and educational institutions in many Middle Eastern and African countries. Major subject areas of study are represented, including business, science, technology, engineering, social sciences, education, and humanities.
ProQuest One Academic This link opens in a new window
ProQuest One Academic combines all four of ProQuest’s multidisciplinary products on the ProQuest platform (ProQuest Central, ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global, Academic Complete, and Academic Video Online).
ProQuest Political Science Database This link opens in a new window
Political Science Database gives users access to hundreds of leading political science, public policy, and international relations journals. It also includes thousands of recent full-text doctoral dissertations on political science topics, together with working papers, conference proceedings, country reports, policy papers and other sources.
ProQuest Religion Database This link opens in a new window
Religion Database provides a wide range of primarily full-text periodicals and other sources for diverse religious and spiritual studies, covering formal theological studies and commentary on topics of general interest from the perspectives of many worldwide religions.
ProQuest Social Science Database This link opens in a new window
Social Science Database offers indexing and full text for hundreds of academic journals, providing extensive coverage across a wide range of social science disciplines including Anthropology, Communication, Criminology, Economics, Education, Political Science, Psychology, Social Work, and Sociology.
ProQuest Sociology Database This link opens in a new window
Sociology Database covers the international literature of sociology and social work, including relevant titles from related fields such as social policy, social care, social services, social anthropology, gender studies, gerontology, social psychology and population studies. It includes hundreds of full-text scholarly journals, as well as dissertations and other sources.
ProQuest Turkey Database This link opens in a new window
This database includes ongoing full-text academic journals that are locally published in Turkey. The subjects cover major areas of study, including business, science, technology, engineering, social sciences, education, and humanities.
SIPRI Databases This link opens in a new window
The Stockhold International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) provides high-quality, up-to-date information about conflicts, arms transfers, military expenditure, international organizations, economic & social statistics. and chronologies. Contains: Facts on International Relations and Security Trends, SIPRI data on military expenditure, database on national export control systems, and Educational Module on Chemical and Biological Weapons (CBW) Non-proliferation.
US Census Bureau, International Programs This link opens in a new window
The U.S. Census Bureau conducts demographic, economic, and geographic studies of other countries and strengthens statistical development around the world through technical assistance, training, and software products.
World Bank DataBank This link opens in a new window
DataBank is an analysis and visualization tool that contains collections of time series data on a variety of topics including world development, country statistics, and other international indicators. You can create your own queries; generate tables, charts, and maps; and easily save, embed, and share them.

Google Scholar

Google Scholar
Google Scholar provides a simple way to broadly search for scholarly literature. From one place, you can search across many disciplines and sources: articles, theses, books, abstracts and court opinions, from academic publishers, professional societies, online repositories, universities and other web sites. Google Scholar helps you find relevant work across the world of scholarly research.
About Google Scholar
Learn more about searching Google Scholar
Effective Use of Google Scholar
Review this guide from the University of Illinois to learn how to search Google Scholar.

Google Books

Google Books
Search and browse for books online. Read book reviews and learn about similar books related to your topic.
Help using Google Books
Effective Use of Google Books
Review this guide from the University of Illinois to learn how to use Google Books.