Research Guides
CHSTU 255 A: Mexican Women: Past and Present: Search Strategy Tips
Monica C. Viharo Winter 2022 - Survey of women in Mexican society from Meso-American times to the 1940s.
Design Search Strategy
Your Assignment:
Develop a research project focusing on comparing and contrasting the lives of a contemporary Mexican woman (born after 1940) and a Mexican woman from the period covered in this class (e.g. the woman you researched for your Cajita project).
One of the more important processes in conducting research is designing a search strategy. You should use your search strategy when using library search tools/databases. The following are things to consider in designing your strategy:
- Analyze your topic
- It is important to clarify what you are interested in finding out about your topic; familiarize yourself with the key issues and context. Consider the political, cultural, social, economic, and religious systems/institutions that shape the lives and the periods in which the women you are writing about lived. Begin by creating a research question.
Your research question may evolve and change over time. Sometimes using a format to phrase your question helps: I’m researching _____ to investigate _____ in order to understand _____. This structure gives you a way to keep your question narrow, identifying just the area(s) that you are studying and helping your reader position the question within a field.
- You may need to find information in different kinds of sources
[ eBooks | Journals | Newspapers | Magazines | Media (images, video, sound recordings)] - You may need to use more than one library tool (database, etc.), instead of Google
[ Some examples: Sociological Abstract | Academic Search Complete | America: History & Life, HAPI ] - You may need to explore a subject over a period of time
[ For example: 5 years | 20 years | 1960s | 19th Century | 20th Century |Current ]
- It is important to clarify what you are interested in finding out about your topic; familiarize yourself with the key issues and context. Consider the political, cultural, social, economic, and religious systems/institutions that shape the lives and the periods in which the women you are writing about lived. Begin by creating a research question.
- Select Keywords
- Create a list of Related Terms. Another way to express this, is to create a list of synonyms for the important concepts in or associated with your topic. The key concepts in your Research Question will be important here.
- Narrower terms: (Good for limiting your search, excluding irrelevant information, or adding focus to your search)
- Population -gender (men, women), age (children/teens, adults, elderly), groups (artist, educators, clergy, politicians, ethnic/racial groups, etc.)
- Geography - towns, cities, states, countries, regions
- Time Period - current, decade, 21st Century, ancient
- Broader terms: (Allow you to explore the broader context of your topic. Good if you're having difficulty finding sources)
- Create a list of Related Terms. Another way to express this, is to create a list of synonyms for the important concepts in or associated with your topic. The key concepts in your Research Question will be important here.
- Create a Search Query
Many of our databases or search tools require that you use AND or OR to combine multiple terms/keywords in a search. See examples below:
- Latina AND identity (narrows your search, all the terms 'Latina and identity' must appear)
- Mexican American OR Chicano (broadens your search, one of the terms must appear. Good for use with synonyms.)
- identity AND (Mexican American OR Chicano) (combines connectors AND/OR together in a search)
- Use a technique called truncation with the * symbol to search additional forms of a word when using a search tool or database.
Example: politic* will also find politic, political, politically, politician, politicians, politics.
Chicano AND politic*Be aware that the truncation symbol may vary depending on the database (*,#,?,!) are the most common.
