Another means of searching is to count() matching elements:
>>> w.count("the")
2
If you just want to test for membership, you can use the in operator:
>>> 37 in [1, 78, 9, 37, 34, 53]
True
A non-membership with not in:
>>> 78 not in [1, 78, 9, 37, 34, 53]
False