LibGuides: Latina/o, Caribbean, &amp; Latin American Studies Subject Guide: Finding Secondary Sources

Secondary sources are works that analyze, interpret, or evaluate primary sources to answer a scholarly question or make a scholarly claim.

For academic work, secondary sources can include monographs, peer-reviewed articles in academic journals, and chapters in edited volumes.

A monograph is a book by a single author and published by an academic press. Monographs undergo an intensive peer-review process and cite sources using disciplinary conventions (for example MLA, Chicago, or APA).

Use the UConn Library catalog to find monographs:

Tip: You can use the filters on the right side of the results page to limit the "Resource Type" to "books." On a mobile device, you can access these options by tapping the image of the filter at the top of the screen.

Look at the "Details" for a book in the catalog to determine if a book is a monograph. Check the author information, the publisher information, and the notes information.

Is the book by a single author?

Is the book published by an academic press?

Tip: University presses are academic presses (for example, University of California Press or Duke University Press). There are also academic presses not associated with a university (for example, Palgrave MacMillan or Routledge). Iberoamericana / Vervuert an example of a prominent academic press for Spanish-language scholarship.

Does the book contain bibliographical references?

Tip: For some Spanish language titles published by presses outside of the information, information about bibliographical references may be listed under "Contents." For some eBooks, bibliographical information may not be listed in the library catalog. For these books, check the eBook to determine if the book has a bibliography and cites sources using disciplinary conventions (APA, MLA or Chicago).

If the book is by a single author, published by an academic press, and contains bibliographical references, it is a monograph.

A peer-reviewed article in an academic journal undergoes an intensive review process by other scholars who are experts about the topic of the article. These articles cite sources using disciplinary conventions (for example MLA, Chicago, or APA).

In the UConn Library catalog, peer-reviewed articles are marked with a special purple icon (an eye above a book).

Tip: Book reviews and review essays are often published in academic journals. These are useful for learning about sources but are not peer-reviewed articles.

More specialized databases are also good places to locate peer-reviewed journal articles. UConn has access to Academic Search Premier, JSTOR, Political Science Complete, and Project Muse.

Tip: HAPI (Hispanic American Periodicals Index) summarizes articles about Central America, South America, the Caribbean, Mexico, Brazil, and Hispanics and Latino/as in the United States. It is particularly useful for locating Spanish-language articles.

An edited volume is a book that has one or more editors and chapters or sections by different authors. Like a monograph, an edited volume is published by an academic press, undergoes a peer-review process, and cites sources using disciplinary conventions (for example MLA, Chicago, or APA).

Use the UConn Library catalog to find edited volumes.

Look at the "Details" for a book in the UConn Library catalog to determine if a book is an edited volume. Check the author information, the publisher information, and the notes information.

Tip: Edited volumes are cited differently than monographs. Instead of citing the whole book, cite the specific chapter in the book. For additional information, visit the Citing Sources page in this guide.