Finding Letters to the Editor in Factiva

Last week, a patron was interested in using Factiva to track down letters to the editor about immigration reform issues. The procedure is a bit quirky, so I pass on steps to you.

To set this limit, you should:

1. enter your search term(s).

2. Click on the Subject category.

3. Click on the subcategory Content Types.

4. Click on the up arrow next to "Letters" to add the code to your search. Just be sure you have inserted an "and" as well; without a Boolean operator, the query can't be processed logically.

Then, before you run the search:

5. Scroll down the page. By default, Factiva is set to "Exclude" three categories of information: republished news;recurring pricing and market data; and obituaries, sports, calendars. Uncheck the boxes. Unless you do so, you will get a "no results" message.