The Reference Department of the Lorette Wilmot Library at Nazareth College

How to find a book by KEYWORD using the WebPAC

To view the KEYWORD menu, please click here. (The KEYWORD search menu will open in a new window.)

The keyword search menu can be very useful when

• you don't know all of the words in a title
• you don't know, or can't find a Library of Congress subject heading that fits your topic
• your topic consists of more than one concept, and you want to combine multiple concepts in one search
• you are not sure of the spelling of a word or name, or you want to search for variations - e.g., theatre or theater - or plurals
• and/or, you want to be able to limit your search results by - for example - publication date or location in the Library

A Sample Keyword Search

Let us say, for example, that your professor recommends that you read Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America, by Barbara Ehrenreich, but you find yourself in the Library without the piece of paper your professor gave you with the title of the book and the author's name.

You do remember that the title has something to do with "getting by", and that the author's first name may be "Barbara". Here is an example of how you might retrieve that book using the Keyword search:

Type the WORD(S) you want, then click Submit Search.

getting by AND Barbara

(Click on the link in the box to see the results of this search - the WebPAC will open in a new window.)

Your search, as shown above, has two components - "getting by" from the title (which the WebPAC searches as a phrase) and "Barbara" from the author's name - linked by the word AND. In this context, the AND is a special command known as a Boolean operator. AND insures that both components are included in whatever search results are retrieved from the WebPAC.

What happens if you leave out the AND?

Type the WORD(S) you want, then click Submit Search.

getting by Barbara

(Click on the link in the box to see the results of this search - the WebPAC will open in a new window.)

The WebPAC first tries to search "getting by Barbara" as an exact phrase. When the WebPAC is unable to locate the exact phrase "getting by Barbara", it next retrieves any work that contains the three words anywhere, in any order in its WebPAC record. A keyword may appear in the title of a book, in the contents, or as part of an author's name (including the author of an essay in an anthology).

Update in progress jsb August 12, 2004