ARTS & Art History: Find Articles

Keywords are the words you put into a database's search box for results.

Keywords are important because databases simply look for articles where your keywords show up. You want enough keywords to find a relevant article, but not so many that the database gets confused.

To come up with keywords, write down your topic's big idea terms. Don't think about the question you want answered, think about the words that would show up in your ideal article. Then do a search in one of our databases, write down other words keep coming up, and add them to your list.

This is a trial and error process, so give yourself some time and don't give up!