Political Science Resource Guide
General guide to this discipline
Political Science Databases
- Annual Review of Political ScienceIdentifies the major contributions in political science each year
- Civil Rights and Social Justice (HeinOnline) This link opens in a new windowThis database covers civil rights in the United States as legal protections and definitions are expanded to cover more and more Americans. Containing hearings and committee prints, legislative histories on the landmark legislations, CRS and GAO reports, briefs from major Supreme Court cases, and publications from the Commission on Civil Rights, this database allows users to educate themselves on the ways our civil rights have been strengthened over time, as well as how these legal protections can go further still. The collection also includes a curated list of scholarly articles, a varied collection of books on many civil rights topics, and a list of prominent civil rights organizations.
- HeinOnline Academic This link opens in a new windowHeinOnline Academic covers over 300 years of information on political development and the complete history of the creation of government and legal systems around the world.
- JSTOR This link opens in a new windowA full text archive of scholarly journals covering many disciplines. DeWitt Library subscribes to a number of collections, and JSTOR also includes a number of Open Access collections as well.
- Politics Collection (ProQuest) This link opens in a new windowA collection of databases covering political science, including Worldwide Political Science Abstracts and Public Affairs Information Service, plus full-text journals and dissertations.
- Project MUSE This link opens in a new windowA journal collection of digital humanities and social sciences content.
- Wiley Online Library This link opens in a new windowA collection of over 1,600 full-text Wiley journals.
Off-Campus Access
Need to Search Away From Campus?
Accessing DeWitt Library materials from off campus is easy. Simply access our website as you normally would, and click on the resources you want. You will be prompted first for your NWC email, then your password. Enter your credentials and click the Sign in button; you should now be able to use resources as if you were on campus.
If you are having problems accessing a library resource, please contact Greta Grond at ggrond@nwciowa.edu or 712-707-7248.
Tips for Searching Databases
How to Get Started
- Define your topic. For this project, your instructions are to look at an issue through 3 different ideological viewpoints.
- Pick out 1 or 2 keywords or phrases that best describe the topic. Be sure to think about synonyms -- for example, gay marriage or same-sex marriage.
- Use the limiters in your database to help control the results -- use format, publication dates, document type, etc.
- Analyze the results.
- Keep going -- try other terms, other databases, etc.
Tips for Better Results
- Use AND, OR, NOT to better limit your results.
- Use quotation words to keep words in a phrase together -- for example, "federal reserve."
- Use wildcards to account for different variations on a word -- for example, wom*n will search for "woman" and "women".
- Expand your topic, if needed -- for example, "substance abuse" rather than "drug and alcohol abuse".
Newspapers
- New York Times This link opens in a new windowAmerica's most well-known national newspaper. Includes access to the TimesMachine, the online archives back to 1851.
- U.S. Newsstream (ProQuest) This link opens in a new windowUS Newsstream enables users to search current and extensive backfiles of U.S. news content and features top newspapers, wires, broadcast transcripts, blogs, and news sites in full-text format.
- Wall Street Journal This link opens in a new windowThe Wall Street Journal is a business-focused daily newspaper that also reports on national and international news. The largest circulating newspaper in the US, the WSJ is recognized for quality journalism and business insight.
- Washington Post This link opens in a new windowA national newspaper with a particular focus on American politics.