Writing 10 (Ruiz): Background Databases

Reference sources, like dictionaries, encyclopedias, and almanacs, provide you with background information and context on a topic. These resources are useful for finding definitions, histories, timelines, biographies, lists of readings, etc.

Examples

• Wikipedia is a general reference source.
• The World Book Encyclopedia is another example of a general reference source.
• The Encyclopedia of Race and Racism is an example of a specialized encyclopedia that focuses on a particular subject or discipline.

Here is an entry I found in the Credo Reference database about "Black power" from the Encyclopedia of American Studies that seems to relate to the relationship between black women and the black power movement. 

• "The black power movement was itself criticized for defining black liberation in masculinist terms and for its views of women and homosexuality." 
• The references at the end point to a potentially helpful book by Michele Wallace, Black Macho and the Myth of  the Superwoman. It's a book that "criticizes sexism in the black community and black nationalism in the 1960s."