3. Secondary Sources for Historians
Scholarly Books vs. Scholarly Journal Articles
Scholarly books vs. scholarly articles[1]
| Aspect | Scholarly books | Scholarly articles |
|---|---|---|
| Focus | Broader — overview of a topic (in-depth analysis) with a broad historical perspective. | Narrower — detailed information on some particular aspect of a topic, but not much historical overview. |
| Quality control | Quality checked by editors (subject experts working for an academic publisher). | Quality checked during peer review process. |
| Currency | Less current — it takes a number of years to write, edit, and publish books, so they don’t cover the most recent developments. | More current — articles take less time to write and publish, so they cover new developments in a field of study sooner than books. |
| Length | Longer — most scholarly books average 200-300 pages. | Shorter — articles typically run from 10 to 30 pages. |
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- Tilburg University Library, "Scholarly Books vs. Scholarly Articles," InfoSkills @ TiU, last modified August 15, 2022, accessed August 15, 2022, https://libguides.uvt.nl/humanities/books-vs-articles. ↵
