UN 1001: Perspectives on Inquiry, Library Resources

Who Owns the Past?

Instructor: Timothy James Scarlett: email; scarlet@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. Index is in the front of the newest notebook. The Index is also available at: http://library.cqpress.com/researcher_index.pdf

American decades: E 169.12.A419 1995: This is a series that will give good basic information about each decade and gives a chronological listing of events in different categories for each decade.

American eras: E169.1 .A471979 1997: This is a series that will give good basic information about early eras in American History and a chronological listing of events in different categories.

Twentieth-century rhetorics and rhetoricians : critical studies and sources. P301 .T89 2000 REF

Encyclopedia of rhetoric and composition : communication from ancient times to the information age. PN172 .E53 1996 REF

Dictionary of the history of science. Q125 .D45 REF

The Oxford companion to the history of modern science. Q125 .O86 2003 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:

New York Times: provides full text of New York Times newspaper articles

published within the most recent 12 months.

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:

Academic provides 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.

 

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: Anthropology, Ecology, Economics, Education, Finance, History, 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.

 

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.

Government Science sources: http://www.science.gov. This is an excellent site which contains reliable information resources selected by respective government agencies as their best science information. Two major types of information are included: selected authoritative science Web sites; and databases of technical reports, journal articles, conference proceedings and other published materials.