Use the Library website to find journal articles

Begin your search at the library homepage.

From the LibrarySearch box, you can find books, journals, and other resources in our library catalogue in addition to searching for articles across multiple databases.

In the LibrarySearch box, type in the keywords relevant to your research topic. 

For example, if your topic is about the Catholic ran residential schools in Canada, you can enter the keywords:

Catholic residential schools Canada

You will get a list of results such as Articles, Books, Reviews, and more! To find scholarly articles, underneath Filter your results select "Peer-reviewed articles" under Show Only and select "APPLY FILTERS" when prompted.

Narrow down your list to get better articles

Some searches give you get hundreds of results. Use the filters in the left hand sidebar to narrow down your list of sources. You can filter your search results by Subject, Publication Date, and Language.

You can also narrow down your search results by adding different keywords. If you are looking for a specific phrase or multi-word term, use quotation marks (" ") around the term.

For our example, if you wanted to find the times where resources use the term residential schools, put the phrase in quotes:"residential schools". This will make sure only resources that have the term "residential schools" in their title, subject, description or other parts of their record on the library website.

Identifying book reviews

While searching for journal articles, you may come across book reviews. Book reviews serve various purposes, such as giving you an overview of what a book you may want to use is about, or examining, from the book reviewers' perspective, the potential academic value of a resource. Examine the citation for the article to distinguish between journal articles and book reviews. 

Book reviews

• "Review" may be a subject heading in the search results
• The author of the review and the author of the book are sometimes both indicated
• The book publisher information may be included in the title
• Books reviews are often short (only a couple pages)

In the example below, you can see this is a book review as it indicates the book author's name, title, and publisher. The page numbers also indicate it's only 1 page long, suggesting it is a book review.

​

Why should you use subject specific databases?

• The library catalogue may produce too many search results
• You want to search for more specific time periods

Recommended Subject Specific Databases

Use the Library website to find books

In the library homepage search box, type in the keywords relevant to your research topic. When searching for books, remember to use simple, broad keywords.

From the list of results, underneath Filter your results on the left sidebar select Books under Format and select APPLY FILTERS when prompted to see the the library catalogue search results.  

Narrow down your list of books

You can refine your search with various filters on the left sidebar, such as Library, Subject, Publication Date, and Language.

If you just want to see ebooks, you can also click on the Online checkbox at the top of the page underneath show only. 

When choosing books or articles for your paper, consider the following:

• Are they relevant to your topic, and the argument that you wish to make?
• Are they current? Some of your sources should reflect current research.
• Are they substantial? Beware of an article that is only a couple of pages.
• Are they scholarly? Distinguish between popular and scholarly sources 

Scholarly journal articles report on original research by experts in a particular academic discipline. Often they go through a peer-review process, which means that they are evaluated by reputable scholars in the field before they are published. 

Criteria for evaluating scholarly journals

RADAR (Rationale, Authority, Date, Accuracy, and Relevance)

Another helpful way to evaluate the credibility of a information source is through the framework RADAR (Rationale, Authority, Date, Accuracy, and Relevance). See the guide for using RADAR for more detailed guidelines about how to evaluate the quality and usefulness of an information source for your research

Adapted from: Mandalios, J. (2013). RADAR: An approach for helping students evaluate Internet sources. Journal of Information Science, 39(4), 470–478,

A primary source is a document that was created at the time of the event or subject you've chosen to study, or by people who were observers of, or participants in that event or topic

More information:

• What kinds of things can be primary sources?

Think about what kinds of primary sources might be related to your topic:

Four ways to find primary sources:

1. Start with what you already have to uncover references to primary sources. Consult your:

• class notes
• course readings
• bibliographies of your textbook, journal articles, or other secondary sources
• historical encyclopedias

They can also help you identify relevant historical figures, authors, or keywords for searching library database

2. Use the library catalogue to find books and other materials

Combine keywords for different kinds of primary sources with keywords for your topic to find them in the library catalogue.

Examples:

reformation sources

world war 1942 correspondence

national socialism documents

Primary source keywords:

3. Use reliable online primary source collections

4. Use one of the specialized libraries at U of T, such as the Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, or one of our special collections.​

Images

See the Image and Visual Resource Collections guide for comprehensive links to image and visual resource databases. 

Oral History

Oral history may be in manuscript, print, microform, audio, or video format. It may be identified through a variety of tools throughout this guide, using relevant keywords.

For example, to find oral histories in the library catalogue, add the most relevant keyword to the end of your search:

• oral history
• oral histories
• testimonies
• interview

Recommended Resources

See the Biography & autobiography guide for comprehensive links and resources for memoirs, biographies, and autobiographies

• Why and how we cite sources in academic writing 

  • This guide includes links to many helpful online tutorials, style guides, and related documents to help you understand citation practice, and build correct citations for your bibliography

Style Guides

• Chicago Manual of Style (CMOS) - 18th Edition

  The comprehensive and most commonly-used citation style for History, updated in 2024. U of T login allows for access to the CMOS Quick Citation Guide and the overall Contents. 

Should you require earlier editions of the CMOS, please see:

• Chicago Formatting and Style (16th ed.) from Excelsior

• Chicago-Style Citation Quick Guide (17th ed.)

  Online subscription to Chicago Manual of Style, UTORid login required

Books from the Library

• The Chicago Manual of Style, 16th Ed. by University of Chicago Staff (Editor)

• The Chicago manual of style online by University of Chicago Press

How do I get the full text?

• Make sure you've chosen a journal article - only journal articles link to the full-text: Doublecheck that you're not trying to link to an article in a book.
• WORKAROUND if the link to a journal article doesn't work or if the search for your specific article doesn't bring up the article:
  • Search the journal title in the library catalogue. Find the online version of the journal - it has [Electronic resource] beside the title.
  • Often, more than one subscription is listed. Choose the one with the right date to cover your article.
  • Then find the volume and issue that holds your article.
• It's possible the Library does not have your article  - our collection is enormous but we still don't have everything. The Library can get things for you from other libraries through inter-library loan
• You can always check with a librarian. Contact the Library through chat, email or in-person.

This guide is currently maintained by Jesse Carliner. Please email any broken links, comments, or other suggestions to jesse.carliner@utoronto.ca.

• Winter 2025 update: Johanna Hill, Access/Information Services specialist
• Winter 2023 update: Samantha Zani, TALInt student