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Central American and Transborder Studies

Welcome to the Central American Studies Subject Guide. Use the left navigation links to learn about the kinds of Central American Studies resources available to CSUN students and faculty.

Developing a Search Strategy

  • Make broad topics more focused
  • Topical focus makes research manageable
  • Your keywords should reflect the intersection of multiple topics 
Diagram depicting the intersection of three topics
Example: 
  • Broad Topics = Media, Violence, Children
  • Narrower Topic = Violence in the media
  • Focused Topic = Media violence and children
 
The intersection of your broad topics is your research focus. When searched together, these terms will yield more relevant results. 

Create a List of Similar Terms

From your broad topics, build a vocabulary of similar or related search terms you can substitute if needed when searching online...

  • media: television, film, music
  • violence: violation, offense, crime
  • children: teens, adolescents

These are your search terms you will use to locate information resources. Consult a thesaurus to add synonyms to these terms, if necessary.

Keywords for Central American Studies

Before you begin your search, compile a list of potential keywords (search terms) related to your topic. "In the last few years, there has been a growing number of what are called “keywords” texts. These texts invite scholars to contribute definitions to emerging vocabularies in particular disciplines and can be used somewhat like glossaries. New York University Press has published eight books in its Keywords Series in the last few years."

For more information read, Metadata Justice: At the Intersection of Social Justice and Cataloging (Association of College and Research Libraries, 2019)
The Central American diaspora in the United States is made up of the following countries which can be used as keywords in a search. This is a short list to use in your searches and by no means represents all keywords for Central American Studies.

  • Belize = Belice
  • Belizean = Beliceño, -a
  • Costa Rica = República de Costa Rica
  • Costa Rican = Costarricense  (or, Ticos)
  • El Salvador = República de El Salvador
  • Salvadorans =  Salvadoreño, -a
  • Guatemala = República de Guatemala
  • Guatemalan = Guatemalteco
  • Honduras = República de Honduras
  • Honduran = Hondureño, -a (or Catracho(a))
  • Nicaragua = República de Nicaragua
  • Nicaraguan = Nicaragüense
  • Panama = República de Panamá
  • Panamanian = Panameño, -a

Use this list of country names and demonyms to find sources related to Central American and Central Americans in the United States.

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