Scholarly Journals are sometimes referred to as "academic" or "peer-reviewed." As college students, your professors will expect you to become familiar with the scholarly journals in your field. These publications generally:

• Are written by experts in their fields. The author's credentials such as their university affiliation should be on the article.
• Include a bibliography or works cited list.
• Include few if any advertisements.
• Have longer articles.
• Are published less frequently. Many scholarly journals are released quarterly.

Popular magazines generally:

• Are written by staff writers.
• Include more pictures and advertisements.
• Might mention sources, but do not include bibliographies.
• Are written for the general public.

Trade publications are a periodicals that are written for a profession audience with expertise in the field, but they do not include in depth articles with citations.

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Finding Database Articles:

Databases are available on campus and off. Not all articles are full-text.

• Communication & Mass Media Complete is a communication and mass-media articles index. It includes some full-text.

• Academic Search Premier is a general databases, and offers several educational articles, both in research journals and in popular magazines and newspapers.

• WilsonSelectPlus is similar in content to Academic Search Premier, but is entirely full-text.

If you see the "find full text" box, it does not mean that the article is full-text in that database. Click on the box to find out if the NPU or other Illinois libraries own the journal, or if it is full-text in another database. It will also allow you to click on interlibrary loan. Just fill in your information and we will contact you when your article arrives.

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Finding Print Journals:

The following is a partial list of Communication journals at North Park's library. Journals from 1990 - present are shelved on the east side of the first floor of the library. Older journals are in compact shelving on the west side of the lower level.

Communication Theory 2006 - present 1996 - present

Critical Studies in Media Communication 2000 - present

Journal of Communication 1980 - 1986; 1988 - present

Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly 1996 - present

The Journal of Communication Inquiry 2001 - present

Media, Culture & Society 1993 - present

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Finding Books :

To begin with, search the library catalog. (For help in searching the online catalog, see here.)

If the Brandel Library doesn't have the books that you want, search I-Share to see which other libraries might have them. Make sure that when you request these books, you use your library borrower ID (starts with 27012) in the form provided.