I. SEARCH THE LIBRARY CATALOG AND BEYOND
You will be using two kinds of library resources for your research on Borderlands literature and film:
Primary Sources:
the films, essays and novels themselves, other films and writings by the authors and directors, interviews, government reports, and also newspaper and trade journal articles published around the same time that the films and texts first appeared.
Secondary Sources:
academic studies and other sorts of critical analyses
Both primary and secondary sources can be found by using the UW Libraries Homepage.

A. Search the UW Libraries Catalog to locate books and films. Simple keyword searching, searching by title or author (the director is considered the "author" of a film) and Library of Congress Subject Headings (the hotlinks found at the bottom of every catalog record) can all work to your advantage.

Keyword searching; just a few examples:
Alejandro González Iñárritu (7 hits)
Borderlands and literature (50 hits)
Borderlands and Mexico (83 hits)
Ciudad Juárez (62 hits)
Ciudad Juárez and violence (8 hits)
Lourdes Portillo (19 hits)
Mexican American literature and border (47 hits)
Mexican border (619 hits)
"Mexican border" (105 hits)
Mexican Borderlands (88 hits)
Mexican films (262 hits)
Mexican movies (23 hits)
Mexico and border (575 hits)
Mexico and borderlands (83 hits)
"Mexico border" (150 hits)
Mexico and films and border (39 hits)
Sergio Arau (1 hit)

To refine your keyword search, look toward the bottom of any of the catalog records you have already found, and utilize the Library of Congress Subject Headings. Click and you will retrieve a more focused group of hits.

LC Subject Headings; some examples:
Arau, Sergio (1 hit)
Ciudad Juárez (62 hits)
González Iñárritu, Alejandro (5 hits)
Illegal Aliens--Mexican American Border Region (12 hits)
Immigrants--Mexican American Border Region (2 hits)
Mexican-American Border Region in Literature (29 hits)
Mexican-American Border Region in motion pictures (2 hits)
Motion pictures--Mexico (17) [note: this subject heading retrieves only print titles, not films. To find a list of all the films in the library that have something to do with Mexico, do a keyword search on "Mexico" and then modify search by limiting to publication type Video, Slides, Media]
Motion pictures--Mexico--History (3 hits)
Portillo, Lourdes (1 hit searched as subject heading; 12 hits searched as Author)
Serial murders--Mexico--Ciudad Juárez (49)
Welles, Orson (49 entries including all sub-headings)
Women--Crimes against--Mexico--Chihuahua State (1 hit)

You can also search known titles and find additional subject headings. For instance, a search of "Devil's Highway", produces about five LC Subject Headings, including Human Smuggling-- Mexican American Border Region which in turn links to five additional potential resources, including a U.S. Joint Congressional Hearing.

B. Search the UW Libraries catalog and beyond. This search engine integrates our own library holdings with many other library holdings in the area and across the nation and around the globe. It also includes some article citations. Here are results of a few sample searches:
Alejandro González Iñárritu (113 hits) [note: to the left of the hits is a menu by format, designating "articles," materials authored by González Iñárritu, visual formats, books, etc.]
ciudad juárez and violence (37 hits)
Mexico and borderlands and crime (10 hits)

II. SUBJECT PAGES
The Resources by Subject section lists links to helpful pages emphasizing primarily those databases that are the most effective and useful to a particular academic discipline.

A. Cinema Studies

B. Comparative Literature

C. Latin American Studies

D.News

III. LIBRARY DATABASES

Go to the UW Libraries Online Catalog and click on the link Articles and Research Databases. Use the alphabet bar or the query box (if you know the actual name of a database)to find a variety of specialized online search resources. Some of these databases are listed below.

A.Citation Indexes
Citation indexes tell where articles on particular topics have been published. Now, many citation indexes have the additional advantage of being able to link to the full texts of those articles.

FIAF (The International Filmarchive Database)
One of the key citation indexes to international film journal articles and much more.
Sample search: "Touch of Evil" brings up 58 hits. The first citation looks interesting but is not online (too old, 1975) and the UWLibraries does not hold in print. Request this article through the UW Interlibrary Loan service.
Citation #6 is from Cinema Journal looks interesting. Click on the purple Check UW Holdings Box and the link to fulltext in JStor is provided.
Citation #9 looks interesting, an article from The Journal of Popular Film and Television which turns out to be available fulltext in Proquest's AltNews.

HAPI ONLINE: The Database of Latin American Journal Articles
This database is adding more fulltext resources but is primarily a citation database
HAPI ONLINE is an excellent source of social history and some cultural articles in Spanish and Portuguese as well as English and Spanish. For example, a search on ciudad juárez and murder returns 13 hits, most in Spanish. For such a sensational subject, HAPI is a good source for articles giving Mexican perspectives. Prisma is a subset of HAPI and has some full texts of the articles found in HAPI in fulltext (see below).
REMINDER: If the database does not provide the full text article, and the UW Holdings purple box can't find holdings, please try searching the UW Libraries Online Catalog itself by title of the journal.
REMINDER: For articles in journals not found in the UWLibraries or Summit, use Interlibrary Loan. Be sure to record accurate citation information. Interlibrary loan can usually obtain articles within about a week so start your research early in the quarter.

Human Rights Film Directory
Find reviews of human rights documentaries and feature films available through the UW Libraries. Do a simple keyword search, or click on Advanced Search for a well defined search strategy. Only some films have been entered into this directory.

B.Full Text Article Databases, also accessed via the link Articles and Research Databases.

Ethnic Newswatch
A good source of searchable full text news articles in Spanish language newspapers (as well as English language publications), including La Opinion, an important Los Angeles-based Hispanic paper. Includes magazine and wire service articles as well.

Google Scholar
A subset of Google, this database includes academic sources and repositories.

JSTOR
JSTOR is a full text scholarly articles database. This database is an excellent source of English language materials. It has deep full text backfiles of hundreds of journals. It does not have the most current issues of most journals. See Project Muse (below) for more recently published articles. However, keep in mind that the publishing cycle for scholarly articles is slower than newspaper or popular media publication. The research takes time, the articles are usually reviewed by other experts in the field, and academic journals often run behind on their publishing schedule.

Literature Online Provides keyword access to over 200 full-text literature journals and other important literary and film criticism sources. Strongest in English language works.

Literature Resource Center
This database is a combination of several large constructed literary resources that pull together a great number of sources, both original literary texts and criticism, biographical information, MLA bibliographies, reviews, etc.

Prisma: publicaciones y revistas sociales y humanísticas
This resource is a subset of HAPI and provides fulltext for some of the articles found in HAPI. A good database to start and identify articles with a Mexican perspective. Many of the texts are in Spanish.

Project Muse
Similar to JSTOR, but concentrates on more recently published articles.

IV. ADDITIONAL SUGGESTIONS

Cineteca Nacional

Handbook of Latin American Studies
An ongoing bibliography of published sources focusing on Latin America, selected and annotated by scholars. Published annually, the bibliography alternates ever year between the Social Sciences and the Humanities.

Immigration Links from Walking the Line
Emphasizes the work of non-profit human rights groups; includes sources on immigration issues.

Latino Stories Resources on Devil's Highway
Excellent collection of primary and secondary sources on many aspects of the book.

Mexican Migrant Project
This joint project between the and Princeton University has as its primary goal the collection of high quality data on the characteristics and behavior of both documented and undocumented Mexican migrants to the United States.

The Minuteman Civil Defense Corps
This webpage, The National Citizens Neighborhood Watch - Securing the American Border provides a good exercise in critical thinking.

Internet Movie Data Base

Lexis Nexis Academic Provides keyword searching to newspaper articles, limited international coverage.

Access World News Provides keyword searching of over one thousand international newspapers.

The Mexican Film Resource Page Too much here to even begin to try to describe!