Perspectives on Inquiry: Library resources

Creating the "Drug Fiend": Drugs and Drug Policy in the USA

Instructor:   M. Sean Clancey, email:   msclance@mtu.edu

Librarian: Joan Goodbody: email; goodbody@mtu.edu: phone; 487-2698

 

MTU Library Catalog:

Use the catalog to find items that the library owns: Searchable by author, title, subject or keywords. Also after using an index to find a paper/article that you want, youll need to use this catalog to determine whether we have the journal that the article appeared in. Articles from journals we do not have or books we do not have can be ordered through Interlibrary Loan (ILL). Many of the databases now have a direct ILL link.

Reference resources:

The reference collection is a good place to begin exploring an unfamiliar subject. The encyclopedias and dictionaries found here can give you definitions of terms and background information on your subject. Along with help identifying specific issues within your broad subject area to explore in more detail.

CQ researcher (issues): H35 .E2. REF: This is a multi volume (by year) publication that is put out to help the members of congress and their staff understand public issues. The Index is available at: http://library.cqpress.com/researcher_index.pdf

War on Drugs (1993)

Drug Policy Debate (2000)

Note: Between the main topics Drug abuse, Drug industry and Drug traffic over 35 topics listed.

Encyclopedia of drugs and alcohol: HV5804 .E53 1995 REF

Taking sides. Clashing views on controversial social issues: HN59.2 .T35 1999 REF

Drugs from A to Z, a dictionary: HV5804 .L54 REF

The Merck index : an encyclopedia of chemicals, drugs, and biologicals: RS51 .M4 2001 REF

Basic & clinical pharmacology: RM301.28 .B311 2004 REF

 

E-Resources access to electronic indexes/abstracts, online books, e-journals and selected websites. From the E-Resource menu select listings by alphabet, topic or collection (e.g. FirstSearch or InfoTrac.) E-Resources are also searchable by name or keyword(s.) Use the index databases to locate journal articles, newspaper articles, or reviews on your topic. Some indexes or collections of indexes especially useful for research in this course include:

Databases:

FirstSearch: This database provides access to over 60 indexes. They include:

Worldcat, a comprehensive database for all types of material cataloged by OCLC member libraries. This does NOT index periodicals at the article level;

Wilson Select Plus, A full text database comprised of articles represented by selected citations from Readers' Guide Abstracts, Social Sciences Abstracts, Humanities Abstracts, General Science Abstracts, Education Abstracts, and Wilson Business Abstracts.

Infotrac: A comprehensive multi-index database including:

General Reference Center Gold (issues and philosophers): A general interest database that integrates a variety of sources in one easy-to-use interface. Use General Reference Center Gold to find articles from newspapers, reference books, and periodicals, many with full-text and images.

InfoTrac Custom 150 Full Text Newspapers:A collection of newspapers from around the Country and the World;

Expanded Academic ASAP:Gives access to arts and the humanities to social sciences, science and technology scholarly journals, news magazines, and newspapers - many with full text and images!;

LexisNexis:

Academicprovides full-text documents from over 5,600 news, business, legal, medical, and reference publications with a variety of flexible search options. 

Congressional provides a comprehensive online resource from Congressional hearings, public issues, legislation, history, and legal research.

Cambridge Scientific: CSA is a privately-owned information company that has been

publishing abstracts and indexes to scientific and technical research literature for over 30 years. It is a comprehensive science related multi-index database including:

MEDLINE : This service contains abstracts on biomedical literature. The database contains a broad range of medical topics. It is produced by the U.S. National Library of Medicine

Health and Safety Science Abstracts: This index provides a comprehensive, timely survey of recent work relating to public health, safety, and industrial hygiene.

JSTOR: is a searchable database containing scanned images of back issues of over 100 scholarly journals in a variety of academic disciplines. Titles currently available are from the fields of: African-American Studies, Anthropology, Asian Studies, Ecology, Economics, Education, Finance, History, Literature, Mathematics, Philosophy, Political Science, Population Studies, Sociology and Statistics.

Websites:

Evaluation of websites: http://www.library.cornell.edu/okuref/research/webeval.html - Cornell University Libraries Research Skills -One of the best sites on evaluating information found on the Internet.

Useful websites:

Firstgov.gov: www.firstgov.gov. This is the official government site that searches over 87 million sites. Can search for just federal, federal and a specific state, federal and all states, all states, or a specific state. Advanced search gives the most flexability.

American Memory: http://www.loc.gov/. This is the main page of the Library of Congress. Click on American Memory to get to the search page. American Memory is a gateway to rich primary source materials relating to the history and culture of the United States. The site offers more than 7 million digital items from more than 100 historical collections.

Schaffer Library: http://www.druglibrary.org/schaffer/index.htm Good source for information and history about substances. Recommended by the Dr. Clancey.

Medline Plus: http://medlineplus.gov/. MedlinePlus will direct you to information to help answer health questions. MedlinePlus brings together authoritative information from NLM, the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and other government agencies and health-related organizations.

Legal sites

http://www.law.cornell.edu/ - Legal information through a law school website. Designed especially for law students.

http://www.hg.org/ - Hieros Gamos, legal information including news, resources, etc., in over 50 languages.

http://www.oyez.org/oyez/frontpage - The OYEZ Project provides access to more than 2000 hours of Supreme Court audio. All audio in the Court recorded since 1995 is included in the project. Before 1995, the audio collection is selective.

For Assistance

For individual assistance or instruction from a librarian, visit or phone the Reference/Information Desk (487-2507), e-mail instrlib@mtu.edu,