Dacus Library: Dance: More Search Tips

Syntax: getting the most from search engines

Use of "AND" and "OR": Use of "and" combines two important concepts. Using "or" brings up items containing either of the search terms.

Search software note: in Encore software ("Quick Search"), search dance AND musical; in classic catalog (more powerful software, the "and" can be lower-case letters)

Examples:

1. To find fewer: narrow the search with “and” 2. To find more: broaden the search with “or”
Example keyword searches:

“Modern and dance*”

“Martha Graham OR modern danc**”.

keyword vs. subject searching: which option to choose and why

Keyword searching vs. subject searching: From the library's homepage, type any search term and you have a keyword search. This is helpful for certain words meaning very specific things. "Choreography" is an example of a keyword that is not used in other ways. "Dance" means dance, but it also appears in expressions that have nothing to do with dance: Some of the results include the word "dance" but are actually about non-dance topics (for example, the physics book Dance of the photons. A subject search for Dance eliminates such non-dance books from the search results.

Dance* as subject search leaves out non-dance items where "dance" is part of an expression in the title (for example, in a title like "the dance of international diplomacy" is not about dance) (* picks up dance, dances, dancer, etc)
Dancer* as keyword search (* picks up dancer, dancers)

The Meaning of * (Wildcard)

* picks up any character after the end of the typed-in term. Very useful for words with many variants. For example danc* brings up dance, dances, dancing, dancer, dancers, dancer's, dancers', and more variants that may be on a library items' descriptions.

Geography of Dance

World Dance:

For contents, also search for individual countries on the continent. For example:

for Africa, search Senegal, Congo, Morocco, etc -> for more countries, see this map of Africa
for Europe, search Austria, Russia, Germany, etc -> for more countries, see this map of Europe
for Asia, search China, Japan, etc -> for more countries, see this map of Asia

For more dances by region, see Geography of Dance.

Dance types - search terms

See the DANT 298 tab for additional ideas.