Interlibrary Loan
Items Not Owned by Emory
Articles and books not available through Emory libraries can be requested through ILLiad. These items will be requested for you, free of charge, from other libraries in the state, the country, and the rest of the world. Requests may take anywhere from a few days to two weeks depending on the item's demand and the shipping method.
Library Search (Catalog)
Emory Libraries' Library Search system is the primary tool for searching Emory Libraries' catalog and select databases including books, e-books, videos, articles, and some digital media.
Search Tips for Library Search
- Library Search assumes you are searching for all the words individually–unless “OR,” "AND" or “NOT” appear between words and phrases.
- Put quotation marks around a phrase (e.g. “cloning humans”)– or Library Search will search for them as individual words.
- By default, Library Search searches all the types of items that the Emory Libraries hold, but you can select a particular type of item to search for –books, journals, images, video, audio, scores, etc.– using the “All Items” dropdown next to the search box.
- Use the "Combined" tab to include journal articles in your search.
Broadening and Narrowing Your Search
AND, OR, NOT (known as Boolean Operators) are used to connect and define the relationship between your search terms. Use uppercase letters for Boolean operators within searches.
AND
Narrows the search by telling Library Search to search for all records with both keywords or phrases.
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- college AND "social mobility"–will only find records with both words/phrases.
OR
Broadens the search to include records with either keyword/phrase, or both.
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- college OR "higher education"
NOT
Narrows your search. Tells database to search the first word but exclude the second word.
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- cloning NOT sheep
Wildcard characters
Use a question mark to perform a single character wildcard search.
- wom?n -- will find records containing the words “woman”, “women” and “womyn”.
Use an asterisk to perform a multiple character wildcard search.
- cultur* -- will find records containing “culture”, “cultural”, “culturally”, etc.
Group terms within a search
Use parentheses to group terms within a search.
- shakespeare AND (tragedy OR sonnet) -- will find records with the words “Shakespeare” and either “tragedy” or “sonnet”.