To find books and government documents in USA Libraries' collections, use SOUTHcat: USA Libraries' Catalog.
- Catalog tips and tricks:
- Keyword searches – use quotation marks to hold phrases together ("criminal justice")
- Truncation – use ? after the root of a word to find all its variants (social worker?, finds social worker and social workers)
- Browse the Subject(s) field in records to find the right words for searches. (Example: Try doing a keyword search for "criminal justice" gender, then look at the subject(s) field in several records. You’ll see that one of the subject term is "Female offenders --United States.." Click the subject heading to find more records with this subject.)
- Revise and refine your searches.
- Watch for repeating call numbers and browse stacks in that area.
- Pay attention to the Location and Status fields. You will need this information to locate the item in the library.
