scholarly resources

scholarly resources

Writing Right for National Writing Day and Beyond

Writing Right for National Writing Day and Beyond

, , Library Resources, Matt Dilworth
October 20th is National Writing Day, and there’s no better place to get started than the library. Whether you’re interested in getting a start writing your next research paper, composing your own short story, or reading the work of others, we have plenty of tools available to help. Want to get started writing fiction? Try the MLA International Bibliography. Click on ‘MLA Directory of Periodicals’ at the top and search by title or keyword – it offers detailed information on over 7,000 journals, including editorial contact information, submission guidelines, as well as information on circulation, acceptance rate, and costs. Or take a look at ebooks in a databases like Ebrary, which includes titles like Creative Writer’s Survival Guide: Advice from … Continued
Communications Questions

Communications Questions

, , , Library Resources, Matt Dilworth, Research
This summer, we have been exploring in-depth research for each of IU East’s major fields of study, and this week we conclude with communications. The general techniques that we covered in the first week will serve you well here, too, but there is plenty more available. For most research questions you might have, you will want to start with a general communications database. The best choices are Communication & Mass Media Complete or ProQuest Telecommunications, which are easy to use and offer a lot of full text. For e-book sources, try the Media Studies section of OxRef or eBrary. And if you are interested in a journalism perspective, Newspaper Source and ProQuest News and Newspapers are great choices (the latter … Continued
Science Questions

Science Questions

, , , Library Resources, Matt Dilworth, Research
This summer, we’ve been looking at how to do insightful, quality research at IU East.  And while there are great general sources and techniques available that benefit any researcher, each discipline has its own special sources and quirks.  This week, we’ll look at the natural sciences.  If you’ve been following these columns, you’ll notice that there is some overlap with mathematics, since math is in many ways the ‘language’ of science.  People who are good at science often first studied math. Science is an incredibly broad topic, and which scientific discipline you are interested will affect your searching.  For example, finding current material (books and articles published in the last few years) is vitally important in most topics of biology … Continued
Psychology Questions

Psychology Questions

, , , Library Resources, Matt Dilworth, Research
This week, in our ongoing series on how to do research in the major disciplines at IU East, we will look at psychology.  Psychology courses can have a lot of potential research topics – you might be looking for a theorist, a type of treatment, historical issues in psychology, or approach from a mental health perspective. Most types of psychology research are well supported by the general techniques we explored at the beginning of this series.  Several databases are tailored for this, including PsycINFO and ProQuest Psychology.  If you are interested in a historical topic, a database like JSTOR may also be of value.  All of our other psychology-related databases can be found here. So, for example, if we were … Continued
Starting to Research

Starting to Research

, Matt Dilworth, Research
Whether you’ve been a student for a long time or are just getting started, knowing how to do good research can be a challenge.  You’re probably great at finding movie times with Google, browsing Wikipedia for quick information, and maybe you even do your shopping or banking online.  So you know that you’re good with a computer.  But what about the next step?  In your classes, you’re often told that you can only use ‘scholarly’ sources, and professors reject web pages.  How do you distinguish what the scholarly sources are, and where to find them?  And how do you use them? IU East subscribes to a lot of high quality sources that are ideal to use in your academic work.  … Continued