Secondary sources are scholarly materials created after an event or time period, and which offer discussion or analysis of that event or period of time. Secondary sources usually use primary sources to make an argument. For your purposes, secondary sources will likely take the form of single-topic nonfiction books (called monographs) or scholarly articles. You will use books and articles to understand the scholarship that has already been written about a topic. You will need to know what arguments have been made in order to make your own argument and counterargument, and be able to incorporate those arguments into your own analysis.
You should be able to identify 5-7 books as well as articles that are authoritative on your topic. You may need to use more secondary sources than this. However, 5-7 is a minimum as you consider your research process.
Here is a video that shows you how to search the Putnam Library catalog. Make the video full screen to see it better.
If you need help searching, check out the search tips below the video or on our "Research Tips" page.
Single-topic nonfiction books (called monographs) are especially helpful for reading a detailed account of events, learning about an event in historical context, finding both general and specific information about an event or person, reading a scholar’s arguments, and finding primary sources.
The books (monographs) you use:
You can access the Putnam Library Catalog here. Consult the search tips in the box to the left if you need help searching the catalog.
Journal articles are pieces of scholarly writing published in academic journals. They can vary in length, but are often the equivalent of a chapter in a monograph. Journal articles are especially helpful for finding information about a narrow topic, reading a scholar’s arguments, getting an overview of several scholars’ arguments about a topic, and finding more resources on a topic. Scholarly journal articles are peer-reviewed, make an argument, and cite their sources. JSTOR, Academic OneFile, and Academic Search Complete are three databases that prioritize scholarly articles.
Mainly academic journal articles on a broad variety of topics, but also thousands of high-quality primary sources.
Why search here? Good starting point for secondary source materials on a variety of topics including business, science, history, media and the arts.
What's included? Scholarly/journal articles, magazine articles, and videos and podcasts from news organizations
Why search here? Look here for secondary sources on a wide variety of topics, including science and technology, the humanities, the social sciences and more.
What's included? Scholarly/journal articles, academic conference processings, and over 100,000 news videos from the Associated Press.
You can also find scholarly journal articles in many of our other, more general databases. Look for the keywords "Academic Journals", "Peer-Reviewed Articles", or "Scholarly Articles".
Reference sources and topic guides for historical topics from the ancient world to the modern era.
Reference, secondary and primary resources about U.S. History.
Resources about the people, cultures, events, and societies that have formed the history of humanity.
We are able to borrow books and articles from other libraries. If you are looking for a book or article that we do not have, follow these steps:
For books:
For articles:
EBSCO Discovery Service allows you to search all of our databases at one time. It is a great tool, but is very powerful and will likely return many results, and so may be overwhelming. We recommend waiting to use it until you are familiar with your topic and you have an idea what you need to search for.