Secondary Sources
Secondary sources are articles, books, and other documents that interpret, summarize, or critique the evidence surrounding a historic event. They were not created by someone who experienced the event first-hand.
Locating Secondary Sources
A great place to start searching for secondary sources in USC Libraries' main database search. Develop keywords related to your historical topic to search academic databases for secondary sources. It is helpful to think of the who, what, when, and where of your historical research topic.
Who: "indigenous people", Q'eqchi'
What: discrimination, genocide
What: "Guatemalan Civil War"
When: 1960 - 2024
Where: Guatemala
Then, combine or exclude keywords using Boolean Operators to search for sources related to your topic. Boolean Operators include the words AND, OR, and NOT to make your search more precise.
ex: "Indigenous people" AND "water rights" AND Guatemala
Databases
- Google Scholar This link opens in a new windowFiltered Google Search finding scholarly journal articles, books, citations, and case law.
- JSTOR This link opens in a new windowA growing full text collection of core social science, humanities, and science journals and books.
