Doing Research

Workshop for HIST 50:
Healing in the Black Atlantic

Simon Elichko (they/he)

Social Sciences & Data Librarian

Christina Bush (she/her)
Research & Instruction Librarian

Survey results

What do you find challenging about finding sources?

Primary Document Analysis

Students must submit a proposal for their primary document analysis on Moodle by Monday, February 23. The proposal must consist of a description of the document, a tentative argument, and a bibliography of at least 3 secondary sources.

Final versions of primary document analyses are due on Moodle by Monday, March 30, 2026 at 5:00PM EST.

Anthology

Students are expected to assemble and submit a table of contents, introduction, and/or a conclusion to an anthology about the histories of health, healing, and Black life. Individually or in pairs, students will select a group of 6-8 readings to include in their anthology. Students may choose 1-3 readings from the syllabus and 4-7 outside readings. Students will submit a proposal on Moodle containing a list of their selected readings and a brief (50-250 word/less than one double-spaced page) description of their anthology’s theme by Monday, April 13.

Drafts of Anthologies are due on Moodle Monday, April 27, 2026. Students are required to meet with the course WAs about their first draft. Revised anthologies are due on Moodle by Friday, May 8, 2026.

Secondary Sources:
Books & Book Chapters

You'll often see chapters published in edited collections, for example:

Summers, Martin. “Diagnosing the Ailments of Black Citizenship: African American Physicians and the Politics of Mental Illness, 1895–1940.” In Precarious Prescriptions: Contested Histories of Race and Health in North America, edited by Martin Summers, Laurie B. Green, and John McKiernan-González, 91–114. University of Minnesota Press, 2014. http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5749/j.ctt6wr7rq.8.

Secondary Sources: Journal Articles

Explore scholarly journals in Browzine and Tripod

Example articles:

Tompkins, Kyla Wazana. ""Everything'Cept Eat Us": The Antebellum Black Body Portrayed as Edible Body." Callaloo 30.1 (2007): 201-224.

Sullivan, Mecca Jamilah. "Fat Mutha: Hip Hop's Queer Corpulent Poetics." Palimpsest: A Journal on Women, Gender, and the Black International 2.2 (2013): 200-213.

Exploring the historiography

Navigating the stacks

Citing sources

Subject headings

Reviews

Bibliographies

source: McMaster University Library

Books at the Libraries

Example call number:
HQ 1163 .H55 2022

← H = Social Sciences

Tutorial: How to find a book in McCabe

Getting books from the library

1. Pair up with a classmate
2. Take the paper slip with your book title and call number
3. Scan the QR code to open the tutorial on finding a book in McCabe
4. Do two things:
        • Use the call number to find your book on the shelf
        • Find a second book nearby that looks interesting
5. Bring both of your books back here with you

1. Go to Google Scholar: scholar.google.com

2. Search for one of the books you found on the shelf

3. Instead of clicking on the book, click "Cited by ___"

What can you do from here?

Some ways to narrow down results:

• ☑ Search within citing sources
• source:history OR source:historical
• source:compass OR source:reviews

Finding historical scholarship:
key questions to ask

• Who?  Who is this book about?
  Who wrote it? (Are they a historian?)
   
• When?  What time period does it focus on?
  When was it written?
   
• What?  What aspects of the topic are emphasized?
  What kind of sources did the author use?

1. Go to Tripod: swarthmore.edu/libraries

2. Search for your book's title to find its record in Tripod.     

• Choose the result for the book itself, not a book review
• If you see multiple matching titles, choose the physical / paper copy

3. Explore the subjects used to describe your book.

• Scroll down to Details section. Find the section labeled Subject.
• Click on a subject tag. What do you find (if anything)?  (e.g. African Americans -- Medical care)
• What happens if you remove the last term (or terms) from a multi-part subject?
  • e.g. Health and race -- Southern States -- History --> Health and race
• What happens if you change the subject search from "contains exact phrase" to "contains"?
  • e.g.  Subject contains exact phrase African Americans -- Diseases -- History -- 20th century
    -->  Subject contains African Americans -- Diseases -- History -- 20th century
     
• Try using Filters like Region and Subject to explore your Tripod results

Some books in Tripod are available to read online.

You can borrow physical books from the TriCo libraries. Generally you can keep them for the semester.

If you login to Tripod, you'll see the option: Request Physical Copy.

The book will be brought to the library front desk for you, usually the next day. Works for Swarthmore, Bryn Mawr, and Haverford books.

TriCo
Login to Tripod to request delivery (arrives 1-2 days)

  Swat          Haverford      Bryn Mawr

You can access materials from TriCo libraries and beyond

Useful tools for finding secondary sources:

Library catalogs

• Tripod   (books available from the TriCo Libraries)
• Worldcat  (books available from libraries in the US and beyond)

History-focused databases

• America History & Life   (journal articles about US history)
• Historical Abstracts   (journal articles about history beyond the US)
   

African American Studies Resources

• African American Studies Center
• Oxford Bibliographies

General academic databases

• JSTOR
• Project Muse

You can get links to databases and other resources for this class on the HIST 50 Research Guide.

Find a link to Research Guides in Tripod 
or on the Swarthmore Libaries site.
 

In Research Guides, search for the class (e.g. Healing Black Atlantic)

From the HIST 50 Research Guide,
go to the page Find Scholarly Books and Articles.

On the Find Scholarly Books and Articles page,

go to America, History and Life.

To access the database, click the yellow S.

Quakers slavery → 81 results

Time to explore

Get some practice navigating the secondary literature

Research Help & Advice

• Make an appointment with Christina
  • Email cbush1@swarthmore.edu
• Make an appointment with Simon
  • Email selichk1@swarthmore.edu
     

More options:

• Email librarian@swarthmore.edu and your question will reach the right person
• Use Tripod Chat