The electronic databases available through the Brooklyn Law School Library present a variety of options for locating articles in law reviews, legal journals, and other periodicals. This guide provides instructions on how to locate articles using Westlaw and Lexis, as well as other databases available at Brooklyn Law School. Click on the sub-tabs above, or the links below to view different sections.
Journal Indexes are an excellent alternative to full-text searching when you want to find articles on a particular subject. By using an index, you can limit your search results to a specific subject area. Full-text keyword searching on the other hand will include articles that contain your keywords, regardless of the subject of the article. For example, let's say you want to write a paper on the use of litigation to mitigate the effects of climate change. You can do a full-text search in Westlaw or Lexis using the keywords climate change, litigation, and environment. This will retrieve all articles that contain these terms, whether or not the article itself actually discusses the subject of climate change litigation. Or, you can use an index and retrieve articles by subject - you may choose the subject "climate change" in a legal periodical index and retrieve all articles assigned the subject tag "climate change." You may even choose sub-topics to narrow your results further.
To use an index, click on the subtab under Law Reviews & Journals for "Legal Periodical Indexes". This will bring you to a list of the most commonly used legal periodical indexes.