Writing and research

By

Daniel Gonzalez

Noel Feliciano

Alberto Roman

Keyshla Rosario

Juan Diego Rojas

Adam Rivera

Writing and Research

1. NO quality control.

2. NOT organized.

3. Sources are harder to identify.

4. It doesn't have trained professional librarians ready to assist you in your search.

http://www.tnstate.edu/library/publicservices/library_vs_internet.aspx

Convenience on the internet

Does we really need to pick a side?

Internet vs. Library

chronology [krəˈnɒlədʒɪ]

n pl -gies

1. the determination of the proper sequence of past events

2. the arrangement of dates, events, etc., in order of occurrence

3. a table or list of events arranged in order of occurrence

chronologist n.

Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 199.8, 2000, 2003

Chronology:

MORE IS MORE!

It’s not less.

1. Enough information.

2. Varied sources.

3. Verify the quality of the information.

(quality info. Is that which the legitimacy can be measured and which fits the research parameters)

What to look for.

For best results and time efficiency. (mostly in the library)

Controlling the Language.

1. Specifying and adding more detail.

2. String of terms.

3. Exact phrases.

To generate more relevant hits.

For the Web:

1. Library of congress subject headings (LCSH):

Index terms ( 4 vol. book “Red Book” or http://authorities.loc.gov/)

2. Library of Congress (LOC): Keywords and relevant LOC terms that come up in the results.

The library.

http://authorities.loc.gov/

3. Boolean Connectors: AND, OR and NOT.

(places like, Internet Public Library, http://ipl.org)

Christmas AND Special NOT the Grinch.

Library And Web

George BooleBorn 2 November 1815

Died 8 December 1864

Lincoln, Lincolnshire,

England

Searching for information over the Internet

Authoritative Sources

Primary vs. Secondary sourcePrimary source Secondary source

Objective subject Subjective Subject

Objective subject vs. Subjective Subject

Journal vs. Magazine articles

Not all books are alike

Always keep your purpose in mind.

Favor governmental and educational sources over commercial ones.

Favor authored documents over those without authors.

Evaluating online sources

Favor web pages that have been recently updated.

Favor web sources that document their claims.

Evaluating online sources (cont.)

If it DOES have an author:

•Peer reviewed? Yes/No

•Government? Yes/No

•Educational organization? School or nonprofit? Yes/No

•Author provides credentials? Find them? Yes/No

•Author published elsewhere? Yes/No

Basic Info. Reliability

If it DOESN’T have an author:

Government or educational group? Yes/No

Peer reviewed journal or e-zine? Yes/No

Nonprofit with education mission? Yes/No

Special interest but still useful? Yes/No

Content reasonable? Yes/No

Basic Info. Reliability

Working Knowledge equips you

to sustain a 1 minute dinner

conversation on your topic.

Focused knowledge is enough

for you to make a 15-20 minutes

presentation to the class.

Difference Between Working Knowledge & Focused Knowledge

What is Focused Knowledge?

Should I use this article? Is it

useful for my paper?

• Consider the following

for your thesis:

• Are you suspending

judgments?

• Are you testing

Assumptions?

• What are you arguing?

Thesis

Is one of the unifying aspects

of a paper. It summarizes the

main point of the paper and

points toward it’s

development.

You are going to collect a lot

of material on your

research. It will be a lot

easier for you if you record

what you find.

Bibliography

Bibliography: Basic Style

Bibliography: Working Style

Bibliography: Evaluative

The campus library remains as your most important source of information.

Finding sources is relatively easy.

SEARCHING LIBRARY DATABASES FOR BOOKS AND ARTICLES

There are two systemas for classifying books: The Dewey Decimal and the Library of Congress System.

You are most familiar with the Library of Congress system.

Its likely that you won’t find any books by either searching physically or using the online catalog directly.

FINDING BOOKS

Most college libraries have a wonderful low- or no- cost service to students called interlibrary loan.

CHECKING BIBLIOGRAPHIES

Databases provide a way to search for articles on particular subjects in magazines or journals.

There are two kinds of article databases: general subject databases and specialized databases.

Article databases

General subject databases are multidisciplinary and you can search for popular magazines, newspaper and some scholarly journals.

General subject databases

This databases are subject specific that will let you find many more relevant scholarly article for you research question.

Specialized databases

When searching for information on the Internet you have to be efficient and know how to get fewer, more focused and better-quality results.

The most popular search engine is Google but its important to always ir other search engines like Yahoo!, Bing, Ask and others to get different results.

Advance internet research technique

There are also metasearch tools that you can use to search various search engines at the same time. The disadvantage is that the metasearch skims off the top results and you wont get of the other related topics.


Finally there are specialized search engines or vertical search engines in which you can search for specific subject such as education, politics psychology and others.
