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ENG 255: Women in Literature

Keywords & Themes

Here's some keywords to use in your searches. Remember to use terms that will narrow your search!

  • A.S. Byatt
  • African literature
  • Agatha Christie
  • Alice Walker
  • Alison Bechdel
  • Amy Tan
  • Anaïs Nin 
  • Angela Carter 
  • Anna Luisa
  • Anne Brontë 
  • Anne Frank
  • Anne Rice
  • Anne Tyler
  • Arundhati Roy
  • Audre Lorde
  • Barbara Cartland
  • Beth Morgan
  • Betty Friedan
  • Carmen Martín Gaite
  • Charlotte Brontë 
  • Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
  • Clarissa Pinkola
  • Danielle Steel
  • Debbie Macomber
  • Diana Gabaldon 
  • Donna Tartt 
  • Edith Wharton
  • Edna St. Vincent Millay
  • Feminism
  • Feminism in literature
  • Feminist theory
  • Gertude Stein
  • Harper Lee 
  • Harriet Beecher Stowe
  • Hilary Mantel
  • Ida B. Wells
  • Identity (Philosophical concept) in literature
  • Intersectionality (Sociology)
  • Jackie Collins
  • Jane Austen
  • Jean Rhys
  • Jojo Moyes
  • Judy Blume
  • Julia Álvarez,
  • Kate Chopin
  • Kristin Hannah
  • L. M. Montgomery
  • Lesbian feminist theory
  • Lesbianism in literature
  • Leslie Marmon Silko
  • Louisa May Alcott
  • Madeleine L’Engle 
  • Margaret Atwood
  • Marjane Satrapi
  • Mary Higgins Clark
  • Mary Karr
  • Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
  • Maxine Hong Kingston
  • Maya Angelou
  • Muriel Spark
  • Natalie Goldberg
  • Nora Roberts
  • Octavia E. Butler
  • Rachel Carson
  • Rebecca Harding Davis
  • Roxane Gay
  • Sandra Cisneros
  • S.E. Hinton
  • Sexuality
  • Sheryl Sandberg 
  • Shirley Jackson
  • Suffragette 
  • Sylvia Plath
  • Toni Morrison
  • Ursula K. Le Guin
  • Queer theory
  • Valeria Luiselli
  • Virginia Woolf 
  • Willa Cather
  • Womanism
  • Women, Black, in literature
  • Women's studies 
  • Yaa Gyasi 
  • Zadie Smith
  • Zora Neale Hurston 

Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary Sources

What the difference between a primary, secondary, and tertiary source?

  • Primary sources are created as close to the original event or phenomenon as it is possible to be. For example, a photograph or video of an event is a primary source. Data from an experiment is a primary source.
  • Secondary sources are one step removed from that. Secondary sources are based on or about the primary sources. For example, articles and books in which authors interpret data from another research team's experiment or archival footage of an event are usually considered secondary sources.
  • Tertiary sources are one further step removed from that. Tertiary sources summarize or synthesize the research in secondary sources. For example, textbooks and reference books are tertiary sources (Text in this section is from Suny Empire College's guide: Research Skills Tutorial).

Why is this important?

  • For your research assignments, you are asked to find primary, secondary, and tertiary sources. You'll need to be able to recognize the difference between all three. Remember primary sources are about the event. Secondary sources analyze the event and interpret another author's work. Tertiary sources summarize events from other authors after the event has occurred. 

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