Dancing on Heaven's Door Research Paper, Page 5

Using Electronic Databases

One advantage of going to San José State is that the King Library makes an excellent array of databases available to students and faculty. From the menu on the left side of the King Library home page, click on Articles and Databases. This provides you with a list of data bases that you can use to find scholarly articles about your topic. Some of the databases that I would recommend are:

• Academic Search Premier
• AnthroSource
• Bibliography of Asian Studies
• CountryWatch
• Daily Life Online
• Encyclopædia Britannica
• Ethnic Newswatch
• JSTOR
• Project MUSE and
• World Geography

Notice that most of these databases say “SJSU only.” You must have a library card and a pin code to access this information.

Let's start with Academic Search Premier. This is an EBSCO Host database. I chose “Basic Search” and typed in “witchcraft" and "Africa". I found 168 articles. Many of the entries say "abstract only" which means that I cannot read the whole article on line. The sixth article looks interesting and is available in full text, PDF format. If you cannot download a PDF article, you need to install Adobe Acrobat Reader. It is free and you will use it often.

I decide that I would like to read “The Psychology of Bewitchment” by Ivey, Gavin; Myers, and Tertia. When I am filling out my data collection sheet, I notice that this article is in the South African Journal of Psychology and that it has been cited thirty-one times in other works, so I know it will be a scholarly article. I click on “PDF Full Text,” and I have my article.

Proceed to page 6.