Journal articles are available in various formats: digital, print and microfilm, depending on the title and the Library's holdings. At Brooklyn College, many journals such as "Latin American Music Review" are available both digitally and in print; journals such as 'Music Therapy Today" are available only digitally; journals such as "Guitar Player" are available only in print; "Rolling Stone" is available both in print and microfilm. There are even historical journals such as "Lyre Bird" that the Library has on microfilm only.

OneSearch is the catalog of the City University system, comprised of more than twenty Libraries, including Brooklyn College. As part of the Brooklyn College community, you have access to many resources within the entire CUNY Library system.

There is a tab on the Library's homepage for "Journals," which should be used to find the holdings of all journals, whether in print, electronic versions, or microfilm, that the Library has. On the 2nd Floor, in the Music Library, bound print journals are arranged by title on the open shelves and unbound issues of journals are requested at the Music Service desk.

Finding articles within journals involves using many indexes and databases, choosing which are appropriate for a particular topic and then deciding which specific words/terms are best for finding relevant material. Not all search terms work for all the databases. You have to be creative in determining which terms yield the best results.

When doing research, it is often best to start with very specific search terms and if that does not bring satisfactory results the subject search should be broadened. This is the "open your umbrella" approach to research, a tried and true method. Something else to remember is that variant word spellings can affect searches and several options might have to be used.

• Example: Your topic is "protest songs of the Vietnam War." That might be broadened to use the term "music" instead of "songs."
• Example: "Vietnam" or "Viet Nam"; "Showboat" or "Show Boat"