Seminal articles -- also known as landmark or classic articles -- are sources that make a large impact within a discipline and are regularly referenced in current research. These articles presented new ideas when first published and influenced a major change in thinking within the discipline.
One way to find seminal articles is to see how many times the article has been cited. Seminal articles are important to the field and will generally be cited many times across a number of publications.
Seminal articles may also be:
Additional searches about an article can help you determine some of these other characteristics to provide helpful context, along with the number of times the article has been cited.
Depending on the discipline, the age of a seminal article may vary. In fast-moving fields like computer science, more recent articles may be considered seminal, while in the humanities, foundational works may date back decades.
Google Scholar is a great place to see how many times an article has been cited. Look below the abstract to see the number of times an article has been cited.
Search for the title of an article in Google Scholar to see how many times it has been cited. The more times it has been cited the more likely it is to be important in the field or discipline.
You might not have access to all articles you find on Google Scholar. If you want to find a specific article, use our guide on finding articles from citations: Find an Article From Citation
Look for small red arrows on the results page of OneSearch. These allow you to find articles that cite the article you are looking at:
After clicking on the arrows, you will see a list of articles in OneSearch citing the articles:
