Minimum requirements for a research-based paper #1 or #2:
• At least three sources other than the course textbooks, used non-trivially in the paper, of which at least two are from the library.
Minimum requirements for paper #3, that must be research-based:
• At least five sources other than the course textbooks, used
non-trivially in the paper, of which at least two are from the library.
• At least two library sources, used non-trivially in the paper,
that are scholarly books or articles; that is, they are scholarly secondary
sources.
Evaluating Web Sites - very good advice!!!
When looking for useful sources:
• Do not rely overly much on computer searches, web search engines,
and electronic databases!
They are quick, you often need not go to the library to
use them (although there are a good
many CD ROM databases in the library that are not on line),
but they are far from magical tools
that will solve your research problems. Internet
sources: use them and benefit from them, but
do not limit yourself to them!
• So, what else should you rely on?
» Browse the shelves. For instance,
use Voyàge to find where (there may be several places) the
call numbers for, say, Faulkner
books or Plato books are concentrated and go to those
sections of the shelves, and flip
through interesting-looking books. Or, pull out a handful of
possibly interesting books and
take them to one of the study tables and flip through them there,
where it's easier to take notes.
» Use intelligent flipping-through-books.
You probably don't have time to read a book, but
you can look at tables of contents
for chapter topics. Many books have an index in the
back; go to it and look for specific
topics, such as Drusilla Hawk, Chickamauga, etc.
Or read through the introduction
which often gives an overview of what the book is about.
» Look for anthologies when browsing,
because they usually have relatively short articles by
different authors on a variety
of related topics.
» Pay special attention to the
bibliographies and footnotes/endnotes in books and articles. You
often find many articles somewhat
related to your interest, but you just don't have time
to begin to find them and
look through them to see which ones are really useful. You need
some hints about
which are more likely to be useful sources! Well, people who have
written books and articles know
a good bit more about the Civil War, Faulkner, Bierce, or
Plato than you do; so, the sources
that they list in their footnotes and bibliographies are likely
to be interesting and important
ones. If you find the same source listed in several different
bibliographies or footnotes, it
is more likely that it is a significant source that has interesting
and important things to say.
• Do not consult just one source on a topic or issue,
even if it is a very useful one! For any
interesting or significant topic or issue, you can pretty
well be sure that different sources will
present different, sometimes even inconsistent perspectives
or interpretations. Good research
involves finding out about the different perspectives,
so that you can use your own judgment
in figuring out what approach to take.
• A good rule of thumb is that for every source you find that is really
useful, you can expect to have
to look over (that is, read or at least skim) four or
five sources that turn out to be not very useful!
• Browse around in periodicals on the shelves as you would books.
If you find something listed
in a Faulkner journal or the Mississippi Quarterly and
EKU has that periodical, then go to the
shelves and thumb through several years of issues.
This is the way you often find the best stuff!
• There are a number of other useful indexes available in the library
reference room for those
who really want to get serious about digging out sources.
You can go to the reference desk
and ask about them. However, for papers in HON 102,
the other stuff above is probably
sufficient.