Search and find

How to search?

Here are some useful tips on how to get started with your search:

• Consider what you are looking for. Find some keywords suitable for your research question, and consider different synonyms and combinations of search words.
• What kind of sources are you looking for? Books, journal articles, newspapers? This will help you choose the most relevant databases. Oria is a good starting point and useful tool throughout the process, as it will include both print and digital books, journals, theses and more.
• Learn different search techniques:

Truncate: you can expand a search by adding asterisks to the base of a word. A search for cultur* will include culture, cultural, cultured etc.

Phrase search: Search for words in a given order by using quotation marks, for instance “global warming”.
If your search results are too extensive, you can limit the search by combining several search words. Are your results too limited, you should consider being more general in your search terms. It is all about trial and error.

Where to search?

Books and e-books:

You will find both print and digital books in Oria. Print books that are not available at your own library can be ordered in, either from one of the other NLA libraries, or from a different academic library.

The library has access to thousands of e-books! Most of them through the database Ebsco, read more about downloading e-books here. Note that you have to be on the NLA campus when you create your personal account.

E-books can unfortunately not be ordered in from other libraries.

Journals and journal articles:

All of the journals the library subscribes to can be found in Oria. Here you will find information about which volumes the library has access to, and in the case of electronic journals, you will find a link to the journal itself.

If you are looking for articles on a certain subjects, we recommend starting with a search in Oria. You will find most of what the library has here. You can also search directly in databases specialised in your field.

Theses

Master theses written by NLA students are available through NLA Brage. You can find theses from other institutions by searching in Oria and limit the search by resource type. You can also search in Nora, where you will find open access publications from universities and university colleges in Norway.

Dictionaries and encyclopaedias

Ordnett gives you access to dictionaries in Norwegian, English, Spanish, German and French, in addition to an economic English-Norwegian dictionary.

You can find print dictionaries and encyclopaedias by searching Oria.