State your topic:

_________________________________________________________________________

This exercise is designed to give you experience in selecting appropriate periodical databases, interpreting periodical citations, determining whether or not the library has the periodicals, and writing bibliographic entries.  You will need a handy copy of the MLA style manual.

Remember:  You should be looking for scholarly articles that may be used to support your thesis statement.
 

• Locate at least six periodical articles pertaining to your topic.

• Use more than one database.  If you do not know which databases to use, ask one of the friendly reference librarians for assistance.
• Use the College of Charleston Library Serials Holdings List or the Consortium Serial List to see if the periodical is available either in the library or the Charleston area.  In addition, determine the format of the journal (microfilm, microfiche, bound hard copy).
• Make sure that you actually find the periodical-- they could be misshelved or at the bindery.
• On a piece of paper, give the following information for each of the articles you locate:
• The title of the database you used to locate the article,
• The subject words or search term under which the article entry was found,
• A bibliographic citation for the article (use the MLA style manual),
• The format of the journal in which you found the article (microfilm, microfiche, or bound hard copy).