SEARCHING
Search Relevancy
Results for Quick Search and Advanced Search are weighted. The appearance
of the search term or terms in the title of the article is weighted most
highly, followed by its appearance in the title of the book from which
the article is taken, its appearance in the indexing terms used to classify
the content, and the number of times the term (or terms) appears in the
article itself. In other words, if the term appears in the title of the
article it will appear higher on the list of results than an article that
contains the same term only in the body of the article.
Quick Search
The Quick Search option available at the top left of nearly every
page in The African American Experience allows you to type in
a few keywords and view the results. Please note that multiple search
terms will be joined together with Boolean ANDs, and that surrounding
your search terms with quotation marks will only return results for
that exact phrase. For example, a quick search for “Duke Ellington” (with
quotes around it) will return all content containing both “Duke” AND “Ellington” in
that exact order somewhere within the title, body, or indexing metadata.
A number of very common “stop words” will be ignored by the
quick search, including: an, and, any, by, for, from, if, it, its, not,
of, on, or, same, than, the, there, to, which, in.
Since this option is potentially a simple and broad search, it is recommended
that users with specific searches or specific results in mind use the
advanced search page, where results can be more powerfully controlled.
Advanced Search: Keyword Search
The Keyword Search option works much like a standard screen of
major search engines, with some minor differences. For the keyword search
only, all Boolean operators except wildcards will be removed in order
to build the most reliable query. Instead of Boolean operators, use
each text box as specified:
All of these words...: accepts a space-separated list of keywords. All
words must be found in an entry for it to be returned.
and this exact phrase...: accepts a single phrase. The phrase must be
found in an entry exactly as you type it for it to be returned. This is
joined to the "All of these words..." box, if it contains text,
with a Boolean AND.
and any of these words...: accepts a space-separated list of keywords.
If any of the words are found in an entry, it will be returned. This is
joined to the "All of these words..." and the "and this
exact phrase..." boxes, if they contain text, with a Boolean AND.
and none of these words: accepts a space-separated list of keywords.
If any of the words are found in an entry, it will NOT be returned. This
is joined to the "All of these words...," the "and this
exact phrase...," and "and any of these words..." boxes,
if they contain text, with a Boolean AND.
Generally speaking, the more boxes you use, the more specific your query
will be and the fewer results you'll see.
^ back to top
Advanced Search: Boolean Search
The Boolean search option offers much more powerful search capabilities
than the keyword search, including the operators defined below. Those
who choose to use this option must write their query using the specified
Boolean terms. For convenience, a drop-down menu with all the available
options is provided. Selecting terms will automatically insert them
into the query.
Search Operators
The search operators that our advanced search engine understands are:
- and (AND or +)
- or (OR or |)
- not (NOT or -)
- adjacency (ADJ# -- replace the # with a number)
- near (NEAR# -- replace the # with a number)
- frequency (># -- replace the # with a number)
- operator priority (parentheses)
- single character wildcard (?)
- multiple character wildcard (*)
Adjacency and Near Operators
When used, the adjacency operator specifies the order in which
terms must appear and how far apart those terms can be. For example,
a result for the search "slave ADJ3 (narrative OR interview)," an
entry must contain “slave … narrative” or “slave … interview” no
more than three words apart and in that order to be returned. An entry
only with “narrative … slave” will not be returned.
The near operator disregards the order of terms and looks instead only
for the distance between them.
^ back to top
Advanced Search: Search Filters
Also available on the advanced search page are four checkboxes that
allows you to filter your searches by the type of content you are interested
in: articles, images, primary documents, or external resources
(such as selected web sites outside of AAE). Please note that you may
select more than one checkbox, and that searches default to returning
all types of content.
Search Results: Sort Options
Results can be filtered by the five general types of content in the database by clicking the appropriate tab:
- All (default): All types of content.
- Articles: These could either be chapters from a book, entries from an
encyclopedia, articles from reference book, or an excerpted section from any
of these.
- Primary Documents: Pulled from the thousands and thousands of slave narratives,
speeches, manuscripts, court cases, and other primary source material in the
database.
- Images: Since all images in the database have been indexed and tagged
with keyword terms, they can be searched just like any other piece of content.
- Other Resources: Includes relevant Web links, audio files,
bibliographic
entries, and other material.
- Timeline: Entries from the chronology.
^ back to top
Search Results: Search within Results
If the results of your search are not exactly what you wanted,
or if a search for a common term results in too many hits, you might
find it helpful to refine your results by searching within them. On
your search results page, simply go to the “Quick Search” box,
type in your additional search terms, check the “Search within
Results” box, and “Go.” For example, a quick search
for “Malcolm X” may return hundreds of results, but if you
enter “Nation of Islam” in the search box and search within
the results, you will get a much smaller and more specific hit list.
Case Sensitivity, Special Characters, and Stemming
Searching is not case-sensitive. Searches for “Nation of Islam,” “nation
of islam,” and “NATION OF ISLAM” return the same results
in the same order. Modified characters, such as “á” or “è,” can
be typed into the search boxes simply as “a” or “e.” Words
can be stemmed using the single character wildcard, ?, or the multiple-character
wildcard, *, as described above.
^ back to top
Multiple Search Windows
The search implementation for The African American Experience is based on browser sessions, which is one of the primary reasons why
cookies must be accepted. If a user opens more than one browser window
and searches are conducted in them, the most recent search overwrites
all others. To avoid any confusion, it is recommended that users launch
only one browser window to use this product.
Quick Search vs. Advanced Search
The quick search option is available on nearly every page of
The African American Experience. It is built for ease of use
and flexibility in that it can accept a simple list of keywords. Since
many users prefer simply to enter a string of keywords and view the
results, Quick Search will take this list and
build a Boolean AND query with the terms. For example, if you
type “literature
of the harlem renaissance,” the query will actually be “Find
all entries that have the words ‘literature’ and ‘harlem’ and ‘renaissance’ in
them.” Many users will find these results perfectly acceptable.
Another, possibly better, way to conduct this search is to use the advanced
search page. A slightly different set of results can be viewed by typing “literature” in
the keyword search section, and attaching “harlem renaissance” in
the “and this exact phrase…” box below it. For broad
searches in particular, the difference between a simple quick search and
a more pointed advanced search can be significant.
This example demonstrates the use of exact phrase searching. If, on the
advanced search page, in the “and this exact phrase…” box
you type “Harlem Renaissance” and in the “and any of
these words…” box you type “literature poet* drama,” your
query in plain English will be “Find all entries that have the exact
phrase ‘Harlem Renaissance’ along with any of the terms ‘literature,’ ‘poet,’ ‘poets,’ ‘poetry,’ or ‘drama.’”
^ back to top