What counts: newspaper articles, magazines, museum websites... credible sources but not scholarly. Random blogs do not count! Really take a look at who is producing the information and whether or not they've given you any reason to trust them.
Documentaries are often credible! Not scholarly, but credible. These would count towards your "internet sources" or "popular sources" in the first two assignments.
Streaming video source of classic cinema, indie films, and top documentaries.
Rather than browsing or even using the in-site search on any of the above, you can make Google work harder for you. Just name the site in your search to limit your results to that page! You can also limit to a particular domain, like only .edu sources, in the same way.
Try it below:
JSTOR and Project MUSE are exclusively scholarly -- but make sure you're not using anything labeled a "review' (i.e. a book review, which is a tertiary source and not what you're looking for). Back Matter and Front Matter can also be safely ignored.
Depending on what info you're trying to tackle, different subject-area databases may be helpful -- e.g. Van Gogh's well-known struggles with mental illness could warrant a trip into Psych & Behavioral Sciences Collection.
I've given a few starting points, but you may also want to explore the larger lists of databases for more options.
Be sure to look for the checkboxes for "full text" and "scholarly (peer-reviewed)" in these!
Access online library materials through the library databases!
To access the databases from off-campus, you will be prompted to enter your 14-digit library barcode or your LSC email/password.
Don't have a barcode but want one? Request a barcode number online.
Google Scholar is sort of like Google's version of our research databases in that it indexes scholarly content, making it easier to pick out than if you did a normal Google Search.
Pictured above are the first few results for the search "psychology children television." On the left are results from Google Scholar, and on the right, normal Google. You'll notice that the regular results include a section at the very top identifying some of the scholarly articles; clicking here will take you over to the Google Scholar results page.
Google Scholar | |
---|---|
757,000 results | 50,900,000 results (more!) |
Scholarly articles | "Popular" articles - news, blogs, magazines, etc |
Full-text may or may not be available | Full-text of web articles generally available |
They can be! Note that a scholarly book is not just any old nonfiction title, but they can be a little harder to distinguish sometimes.
You are not actually expected to read entire books for research! Wait, keep reading, this is important!
Generally speaking, for most of the research you're doing at this lower-division undergrad level, you're reading to get information on your topic with enough context to not misrepresent anything. It is natural to not read a book cover-to-cover in this context.
That said, you need to use books that you reasonably have access to the content of. So you didn't read them, but you could have, and you aren't just going off the summary from the publisher. Good news! There's all kinds of library e-book collections that allow you to do just that for free -- and you can even "search inside" to skip around to the most interesting parts.
Search for the name of the piece you’re researching (if it’s a famous one) and/or the artist’s name to find related ebooks. Relevant subject terms include:
You can search the library catalog (below) with keyword, title, author, etc -- pretty much like using Amazon. (The catalog also finds most of our e-books, but it's still a good idea to search those collections directly.)
You are on a bit of a deadline, so you want to be sure you can get a book your want on time!
If you really want a book and don't have time to wait for it, call the library that has a copy, ask them to verify it's there, and they'll usually pull the book for you, just like placing a hold through the catalog. Then drive over to that library to get it -- but definitely call before committing to the drive!
Not sure if you have a library account or what your PIN is? Contact our front desk at uplibrary-circ@lonestar.edu.