Magazines as Primary Sources
Magazines are similar to newspapers. Popular
magazines (news, fashion, sports, etc.) provide a good feel for the
period. Unlike newspapers, there is are databases and printed indexes to help you identify specific
articles on topics. Since most magazines are national in scope, there
is limited coverage of local topics. In addition to the articles, the illustrations and advertisements that are imbedded in magazines are useful primary sources especially for the study of consumerism, gender roles, material culture, history of technology, and popular culture.
Selected Magazines
This selective list provides a glimpse into the wide range of magazines available at the UW Libraries.
Finding Older Magazine Articles
The UW Libraries has backfiles (some in print, others on microfilm) of many major American popular magazines such as Ladies Home Journal and Reader's Digest
and selective holdings for other countries. Most of the following databases are not fulltext, instead they are indexes to article citations (article title, magazine name, volume, date and pages) that can be used to identify magazine articles written on a topic or by a particular author. A few of the databases include fulltext.
Using Google to Find Magazine Articles
Google has begun an effort to digitize backfiles of magazines. They have not publicized a list of digitized magazines but it includes Life, Billboard, Ebony, Jet, New York Magazine, Popular Mechanics and the gossip tabloid, Weekly World News plus others. New magazines appear to be added periodically. To search for these magazine articles, use the Advanced search option in Google Books and follow this search example.
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