Research help

For Library research help, please contact Moninder Lalli, Librarian for Gender, Sexuality, and Women's Studies by email moninder_lalli@sfu.ca or Ask a librarian.

Essay  

Start Your Research Here - This page gives you an overview of the research process, or in other words how to find materials for your essay.

Selected encyclopedias

• Battleground: women, gender, and sexuality
• Bloomsbury handbook of 21st-century feminist theory
• Encyclopedia of race and racism
• The Oxford encyclopedia of Islam and women
• Palgrave Handbook of Intersectionality in Public Policy
• Routledge international handbook of colorism
• Routledge international handbook of critical disability studies
• Routledge International Handbook of Race, Class and Gender
• Sage eReference

Journal articles

Searching the "Databases for a discipline" is a great strategy to view articles that have been written within the scholarly journals of that discipline.  For help, refer to the How to find journal articles, What is a scholarly journal?, Finding articles: Advanced search techniques [video 3:13 mins]

If full-text of article is not available from within the database, click on the "Get@SFU" link to find it or to initiate an inter-library loan request.

• Women's Studies International
• Academic Search Premier - Multidisciplinary index to academic & popular journals.
• Sociological Abstracts - theoretical and applied sociology, social science, and policy science.
• Social Sciences Full Text
• Bibliography of Native North Americans -
• CBCA Complete - Canada's reference and current events - scholarly journal articles, trade publications, dissertations, books, newspapers and magazines.
• Canadian Electronic Library from desLibris Access to Canadian e-books, health and public policy documents. Use the Advanced search to select CEL (ebrary) collection = Canadian Public Policy

Find books

The Library Catalogue provides access to books, journal articles, videos, government documents and much more.  To limit the search results to "books", use the filter (left-hand column in search results) to "resource type" of "books."

Library Catalogue search guide

Search the SFU Library Catalogue, either the Basic or the Advanced search

Note: In the searches below, search results have been limited to "Online Resources only" and "Resource type" of "Books". You can further limit by using "Subject" (left-hand column)

• Marx* AND (race OR class OR gender) AND theor*
• (anti-racis* OR "critical race") AND theor*
• race AND class AND gender AND canad*
• women AND (race OR racis*) AND canad*
• (crip* OR disabl* OR disabilit*) AND (race OR class OR gender)
• ("immigrant women" OR "women of color" OR "visible minority women") AND (employ* OR econ* OR soci*) AND canad*
• women AND domestic AND (labor OR labour) AND canad*
• (women OR gender)  AND intersection* AND (race OR class) AND canad*
• women AND (crip* OR disabilit*) AND canad*
• (government* OR policy OR policies) AND [your topic] AND canad*

Combine different concepts using AND
Combine same concepts using OR
Use quotation marks to search for a phrase
Use brackets for synonyms
Use asterisk (*) for different endings of words

Use pulldown menu and select, "Source Types" as "Books"

Note:  For Catalogue Search, when combining concepts, use CAPITAL letters ( "OR", "AND")

Selected books

• Anti-racist feminism : critical race and gender studies
• Born Out of Place Migrant Mothers and the Politics of International Labor
• Canada's colour coded labour market : the gap for racialized workers
• Constructing danger : the mis/respresentation of crime in the news
• Critical Race Theory (Third Edition): An Introduction
• Educating from Marx: Race, Gender, and Learning
• Exiting poverty : does sex matter?
• Employment equity in Canada : the legacy of the Abella report
• Futures of feminism
• Gender norms and intersectionality : connecting race, class & gender
• Inequality : classic readings in race, class, and gender
• Living the edges : a disabled women's reader
• Politics of everybody: feminism, queer theory, and marxism at the intersection
• Race & well-being : the lives, hopes, and activism of African Canadians
• Racialized bodies, disabling worlds storied lives of immigrant Muslim women
• Refugees Are (Not) Welcome Here : The Paradox of Protection in Canada
• Speaking truth to power : a reader on Canadian women's inequality
• Theories of Race and Ethnicity: Contemporary Debates and Perspectives
• Theorizing anti-racism : linkages in Marxism and critical race theories [print]
• The transgender studies reader / edited by Susan Stryker and Stephen Whittle
• Underserved communities and digital discourse : getting voices heard
• Vertical mosaic : an analysis of social class and power in Canada
• Women's lived experiences of the gender gap : gender inequalities from multiple global perspectives 

Find books using subject headings

Browse Search the Library Catalogue with the following subject headings.

Abelism/Disabilities

• Women with disabilities

Indigenous women

• Indigenous women -- Canada

Media

• Journalism -- Canada -- Objectivity
• Mass media and minorities
• Mass media and ethnic relations
• Mass media and race relations
• Mass media and women

Poverty / Equality

• Equality -- Canada
• Homeless Women -- Canada
• Marginality, Social -- Canada
• Poor - Canada
• Poor Women -- Canada
• Poverty -- Canada
• Social classes -- Canada

Visible Minorities

• Black Canadian Women
• Blacks -- Canada
• Canada -- Race relations
• Emigration and immigration -- Government policy -- Canada
• Immigrant women
• Indigenous Women - Canada
• Native Women - Canada
• Minority women -- Canada
• Race Discrimination -- Canada
• Sex Discrimination Against Women
• Racism -- Canada
• Women - Immigrants - Canada
• Women - Black - Canada

Work

• Discrimination in employment -- Canada
• Household Employees
• Women -- Household Employees
• Women -- Alien Labor Legal Status Laws Etc -- Canada
• Women - Employment - Canada

Women's rights

• Equality -- Government policy -- Canada
• Feminism -- Canada
• Sex discrimination -- Canada
• Sex discrimination against women -- Canada
• Women -- Government policy -- Canada
• Women -- Social conditions
• Women -- Violence against -- Canada
• Women's Rights - Canada
• Women Suffrage -- Canada

Government Information

British Columbia

Canada

International

Associations and Organizations

• BC Federation of Labour
• Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives - use the search box to find "immigrant"
• Canadian Labour Congress

Feminist theory website

• Feminist Theory Website - "provides research materials" - fields within feminism; national and ethnic feminisms; Individual feminists 

Library guides

• Library Research Skills [interactive tutorial]
• Popular versus scholarly sources [video]
• What is a scholarly, peer-reviewed journal?
• What is plagiarism? [guide]
• Evaluating sources
• How to Write an Annotated Bibliography
• Referencing and citation management software  For help, please contact us at citation-managers@sfu.ca
• More Tutorials

Presentation skills

• Resources on developing your participation skills
• Resources to help you improve your presentation skills

Writing help

See the Student Learning Commons for expert and friendly help with academic writing, learning, and study strategies.