Guides: URBS 428: Research Seminar in 21st Century Urbanism: Secondary Sources

Journal articles, papers, & reports

Every research question will require different databases for the literature search, depending on the questions asked. In addition to general databases like Google Scholar, JSTOR, or Scopus, consider these specialized databases for the relevant field.

Sociological Abstracts
Covers sociology, case work, demographics, policy studies, political science, family studies, feminist studies, and social security programs.
ERIC (Education Information Resource Center) - ProQuest
Education journal articles and reports.
PAIS Index
Index of social and public policy literature, with a strong international coverage. Useful terms include "cities & towns," "urban conditions," "urban policy," and "redevelopment."
Urban Studies Abstracts
Bibliographic citations with abstracts describing scholarly literature in all aspects of urban studies.
Bibliographic citations with abstracts describing scholarly literature in all aspects of urban studies. Topics include trends in urbanization, urban history, architecture and urban design, housing and real estate, urban development and redevelopment, urban planning and land use, environment and resource conservation, transporation and communication, crime and law enforcement, urban economics, social services and public services, politics and government, urban fiscal and budgetary policy, and social issues.
PubMed
The database for all things medical; useful for public health. Use PennText buttons to link to full-text articles.
Agricultural & Environmental Science Database
This new expanded database explores all aspects of sustainable development, human population and demography topics, as well as societal issues involving natural resource management.
Social Services Abstracts
Indexing with abstracts for scholarly and professional journal literature in social work, human services, social welfare, social policy, and community development. Major areas of coverage include: crisis intervention, evaluation research, family welfare, gerontology, policy, planning, and forecasting, poverty and homelessness, social development, support groups and support networks, violence, abuse, and neglect, and welfare services, as well as professional issues and education in social work. Includes: Social Planning/Policy & Development Abstracts, SOPODA.
PolicyFile
Indexing with abstracts of U.S. and foreign domestic and international public policy research literature.

NTIS (National Technical Information Service)
Complete free registration, then search using the "search" tab on your account. You can download 10 reports per session with a free account.

Newspapers

Access World News (Newsbank)
Searchable fulltext of nearly 500 U.S. national, regional, and local newspapers, including the Philadelphia Inquirer and Philadelphia Daily News. Coverage for current issues with some backfiles extending to the late 1970s.

Nexis Uni
Access to full-text national and international newspapers , including the Philadelphia Inquirer.
Alt-Press Watch
Provides fulltext for U.S. alternative and independent newspapers, weeklies, magazines, and journals. Topics include the arts, media and popular culture, business and labor, literature and criticism, politics, government and public policy.

American Newspapers Research Guide

Books

Use the Franklin catalog to search Penn Libraries holdings.

To search libraries beyond Penn, search WorldCat.

To acquire books not held at Penn, use ILL, BorrowDirect, or EZBorrow.

Tips for Keyword Searching:

When searching for books in Franklin, it is important to think about how to phrase a search. Try to think of different words for your concept. For instance, information on prisons will also be found using the keyword "corrections". Without thinking of synonyms, you will arbitrarily limit your search results.

Use ? at the end of a word to allow for different word endings

Example: immigra? will find all records that include the words immigrants, immigrant, immigration etc.

Use quotation marks when you want two words together

Example: "new york?" or "african american?" will find all records including those phrases.

Use AND when you want both terms to appear in the record.

Example: immigra? AND "los angeles"

Use OR when you want either term

Example: black? OR "african american?"

If you want to find books about something, but you are not sure of subject headings, or if you want to find multiple subject headings, use the skey command. (subject keyword)

Example: skey philadelphia? -- will find books about Philadelphia, instead of books published IN Philadelphia.

Use parentheses to construct more complex searches.

Example: (mexican? or latino?) AND (california or "los angeles")

Remember: if you choose to do a subject search, you must use Library of Congress subject headings. Try a keyword search, and then select Full view to see the relevant subject headings.