Research as Genealogy

You can start from a source you've already found! Here's how.

  • Mine the bibliography and footnotes. Search for the titles of books and articles you find there in HOLLIS. 
    • Why? Ideas have origins and ancestors in the scholarly work that’s come before.  
  • Search for the author’s name in HOLLIS (or in the database in which you found your first lead). 
    • Why? Academics often write on the same - or closely related - topics more than once.
  • Re-search the title of a book you’ve already found in HOLLIS.
    • Why? Glancing at all of the descriptive information might help you broaden, refine, or reframe your search vocabulary. 
  • Re-search the title of an article you’ve found (in HOLLIS or the journal database where you discovered it). 
    • Why? You may see links to related or recommended reading.
  • Use Google Scholar to see who cited a book or article. 
    • Why? Google does a good job of tracing the descendants of ideas and research forward in time. 

Excerpted and slightly modified from Five Common Strategies for Generating Leads From What You Have Already (PDF), by Sue Gilroy