HIST 294 Seminar on Historical Method: Research Techniques

What are tertiary sources?

Tertiary sources, sometimes called "reference sources" summarize, list, or distill the broad cultural knowledge about a topic. Examples of tertiary sources can include (but aren't limited to) encyclopedias (like Wikipedia), dictionaries, bibliographies, indexes, directories, and some textbooks. 

Why use tertiary sources?

• Answering factual questions about a topic (What year was Kennedy elected? Who was the Pope during the reign of Isabella I of Castile? During what years was the Laddar published?)
• Find search terms
• Find sources
• Identify the important people, groups, places, events, concepts associated with a topic
• Gain enough contextual knowledge about a topic to search for and evaluate sources successfully
• Identify the types of sub-topics and major conclusions you can expect to find in secondary literature

Search For Tertiary (Reference) Sources in Search@UW

1. Search using terms that describe your topic in Search@UW (the library catalog). Click the magnifying glass icon to the right to search.
2. After your search results load, look at the filter options on the left side of the page. Go to the "Resource Type" filter, and click on "Show More"
3. Click on "Reference Entries." This will limit your search results to tertiary sources, including encyclopedia articles/entries. 
4. Click on the title of the reference article/entry you'd like to read. Look under "View Online" for the database link for the tertiary source.
   
   Important: the database link may take you to the landing page for the entire tertiary source, not the specific article/entry you need. In this case, locate the entry alphabetically by title, search the text of the book, or use the page numbers of the article to navigate to your reference entry.

Find Tertiary (Reference) Sources

Library Databases

Scholarly Online Encyclopedias