Encyclopedias cover the entire range of human knowledge in brief. A search for a basic concept recalls every mention of that concept in the encyclopedia, indicating different contexts for it and some of the fields of study that have explored it.

Subject encyclopedias cover the knowledge base of a single discipline in brief. A search here can familiarize you with some of the different contexts within which your topic has been discussed in a discipline.

Periodical databases offer related keywords based on your topic, which will acquaint you with other terminology surrounding your topic. Full-text electronic versions of articles from magazines and journals that include your topic are made readily available to you. This will give you a chance to see what's being written on your topic in magazines like Time, Ms., or Scientific American, and journals like Communication Quarterly, Nature, or Harvard Law Review.

Topic Web sites

Encyclopedia Smithsonian, Maintained by the Smithsonian Institution

http://www.si.edu/Encyclopedia_SI/default.htm

Education Resource Information Center, ERIC Topic Thesaurus

http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/

Bartleby, Comprehensive public reference library

http://www.bartleby.com/

IPL, Internet Public Library

http://www.ipl.org/div/subject/