Search Strategies Refresher - ENGL 2130 - Johnston - Spring 2025

Keywords - A Quick Guide

One Perfect Source?

One thing to keep in mind when you are doing research on your topic is that there is NO SUCH THING as a single perfect source that you will be able to cite to support your thesis. Researching and writing is a process of learning about your topic, thinking critically about what you've learned, and supporting your thesis through referencing a variety of sources.

8-)

Using smart search strategies will help you find appropriate sources more easily! This page will review those tips so you can apply them to your subject database searches!

Searching 101

THINK first, SEARCH later.

What kind of resource are you searching for? (Book? Video? Website? Academic article?) This tells you WHERE to search: Galileo, GIL, or in a web browser!
Are there other important things you need to consider?
- Something written by a specialist? Go for Peer Reviewed!
- Something written during a specifc time? Check out the date range!
What information are you searching for? This is where keywords come in. Make a list. Check it twice! (Don’t know anything about keywords? Watch that video right there! -->)

Always remember: KEYWORDS are critical!

Here's an example.

My topic is "Females have brought a positive element to the military."

My keywords in this topic are "female" and "military" and maybe something like "benefit".

My "related words" lists might look like this:

female	military	positive
woman (women)	soldier	benefit
girl	army	good

So I could mix and match - pick one word from each list and I could get great results from each search!

OR - if I wanted to be even more specific, I could make a phrase: <"Female soldier"> and then add a word from my third list: <benefit>. My full search would look like this: <"female soldier" benefit>

See how that works?