General guidance
First, think about your subject. Are you searching for:
- a specific work?
- if so, is it a single
- song or an album (a collection of songs released as a longer work)?
- is it a recording or a video?
- who is the musician or recording artist or band who created the song or album?
- a specific musician or recording artist?
- a genre or style of music? For example,
- rap or hip-hop
- heavy metal
- is the genre more specific, e.g. death metal?
Use quotemarks to search phrases, for example, "99 problems"
Reflect on how specific your research focus will be.
- Use broader, more general search terms looking for books, e.g. the name of the performer only
- Use more specific search terms looking for articles in library databases or on the web
- if you don't find what you need, go more general in your search strategy
- just search the name of the performer!
Different disciplines! Writing about music comes from a variety of disciplines including sociology and philosophy. Think about how the person writing might approach the music differently because of their background.
For ENG1121, Unit 2: Finding Your Beat:
- articulate (write down) the theme (beat) you want to explore
- select keywords (subject words or phrases) for searching your theme, e.g.
- police brutality
- domestic violence
- depression
- joy
- black pride
- combine your keywords with the name of the performer OR the song / album when searching
- for example, Public Enemy and police brutality OR
- for example, "Luka" (Suzanne Vega) and domestic violence
- think about whether you're analyzing three works by a performer
- if so, it's best to research the performer by name
- are you analyzing lyrics? If so, add the word lyrics to your search when
- searching for articles or searching the Internet
- be flexible: the word lyrics may eliminate good sources
- remember that you should add and remove search terms depending on WHERE you are searching and WHAT you are searching
