ENG 338B: Dr. Harding | The Contemporary British Novel: Web Sources

URL: https://libguides.cmich.edu/ENG338BHarding

Google Search Strategies

Examples of Domains

Domains are portions of a URL

  • .edu
  • .org
  • .com
  • .gov
  • .uk
  • .ac.uk (academic institutions in the United Kingdom)

You can limit your search to a specific domain or webpage using the site: followed directly by the site or domain you would like to search.

Example Search

Imagine you want to find an website about the immigrant identity in the United Kingdom.

site:.ac.uk "immigrant identity"

This search will return only results published on websites with a .ac.uk domain name that include the phrase "immigrant identity"

Deep Web Searching

Not everything available on the internet will show up in Google search results. For example, your emails and medical records don't show up on Google (which is a good thing!). Similarly, the digital contents of libraries, museums and archives are not always going to show up in Google results. You will often need to go to the institutions webpage and search within the collection there.

Here are some search strategies for finding libraries, archives, ect. that you can search.

Search Formula

Institution Type + Topic (broad)

Sample Institution Types Sample Topic Keywords
  • Library
  • Museum
  • Archive
  • Gallery
  • Britain
  • Windrush generation
  • British LGBTQ+
  • British Immigration
  • British Feminism
  • WWI OR World War I OR the Great War

Example Searches

Imagine you are looking for information about the Windrush generation. Specifically you are looking for primary sources like you would find in an archive. You might Google the following keywords:

Archive Windrush

You may want to include a wider variety of institutions in your search. In that case you can use boolean operators and parenthesis to construct a broader search.

(library OR museum OR gallery OR archive) Windrush

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