How do I limit search results to Poetry

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    • September 6, 2015 at 4:51 pm
    Regan
    Keymaster

    This question was posted by SPMarks in 2010.

    Thank you for making access to these newspapers possible! One question: I am researching the way in which deacons are presented in newspaper and magazine verse from 1880 to1900. I can use the search term “deacon,” which pulls up MANY references. Is there a way to restrict the results to show only poetry? The snippets on the results pages are too small for me to determine which are in prose and which are in verse, and so I need to click on every one–time-consuming, to say the least. I would appreciate your help. –Patricia

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    • September 6, 2015 at 4:52 pm
    Regan
    Keymaster

    Patricia: an intriguing question, how to find “types” or styles of writing… I began to think, yes, what if I were interested in just poetry? Or serialized fiction pieces? What if I were interested in limiting my search to editorials? Or content that was syndicated?

    The short answer is that there really isn’t a way to do it within the search tools offered by the web software we use for delivering the newspapers.

    Then I took a stab at some searches using single words like ‘poem’ and then more specific types of verse, like ‘ballad’ or ‘sonnet,’ and I had interested results, but not on point with what you are looking for. When I began combining these terms with ‘deacon’ in order to get a crossover, the results were still not accurate.

    Mary will follow up with a smarter and more in-depth answer, but I thought I’d take a 30-second crack at this…

    • This reply was modified 8 years, 7 months ago by Regan.
    • September 6, 2015 at 4:58 pm
    Regan
    Keymaster

    Patricia and Jim,

    I wouldn’t guarantee my answer being more technical than Jim’s but I’ll try! The items are tagged/classed with the date, what newspaper it is from, where it appears on the page – mostly technical information that helps the system function. The system searches the text of the article itself, then can limit based on those types.

    There is no other tagging or classifying done inside the system itself. In libraries we call this “metadata” or “information about things”. Think of it like your local public library’s catalog. In that computer system they including information like author, title, publisher, type of material (book, magazine, book on CD, DVD, etc.). Then they may also include keywords or subject headings like “mystery, western, romance” etc.

    In our system, we only have the ability (currently) to tag with the technical information: which newspaper is it from and what was the date. As the system only searches the text of the article itself, it would have to have “poetry” or “poem” or “verse” (or whatever keyword you are using) contained within the text of the article itself. From the poetry that I’ve found in there over the past few years, very rarely does it include any of that in the item itself. So when you’re looking for something like the “Sand Creek Massacre” you have to remember that it wasn’t called the “Sand Creek Massacre” at the time, and instead search using words like “indian fight” to find what you need.

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