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HIST 294 Seminar on Historical Method: Research Techniques

This guide supports the assignments and activities of Amanda Seligman's History 294 class offered Spring 2025

Searching for Schoarly Articles Links and Tutorials

Databases for secondary History literature

Searching America: History and Life

This video demonstrates how to conduct a search in the database America: History and Life. The techniques in this video will also work for the world history database, Historical AbstractsNote: these databases will look a little different from the video, but the advanced search still works. 

Full-text Browser Extension (LibKey Nomad)

LibKey Nomad is a browser extension that makes off-campus searching easier. While searching online/outside of library databases, you can quickly access articles and ebooks provided by the library.

Install LibKey Nomad
  • Install the LibKey Nomad extension on your browser 
  • Search for and select University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee from the list of institutions
    • The LibKey Nomad icon will appear in the top right of your browser window
  • Start your search
    • When you are on a page where you can download an article, the LibKey Nomad button will appear in the bottom left of your browser

Watch the video below to learn how to add and use the LibKey Nomad Browser Extension

Finding full-text sources in Databases

Searching library databses, you'll encounter lots of abstracts. Abstracts are summary records for articles, but they do not contain the full content of a source. This video demonstrates how to use the "Get It" to get to the full-text article from an abstract record. 

Learn to spot book reviews in your search results

Scholarly journals contain more than peer reviewed articles, they also contain reviews of scholarly books. Many students accidently download book reviews thinking they are articles. This video demonstrates how to recognize a book review and differentiate it from an article.