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JMC:3175:0exw Gender & Mass Media: Finding Scholarly/Academic Research

Guide content supports the teaching and research goals of multiple departments on campus. Content represents a non-exhaustive selection of essential resources and tools for engaging a wide range of backgrounds and viewpoints.

Finding Scholarly/Academic Research

The best place to start your research is InfoHawk+, UI's online library catalog. InfoHawk+ will provide resources for your research with broad results and can be filtered in a variety of ways. If you have problems getting useful results from InfoHawk+, please reach out to your librarian, Andrea Anderson.

Scholarly or academic sources provide an interpretation or new information on a topic, are usually reviewed by peer experts in the field, and provide a list of sources used by the author. Don't forget to utilize the bibliographies and citations from resources that you find. If a scholar is writing about a topic that interests you, consult the resources that they used. That's part of the reason there are citations! 

Databases

Certain databases cover a wide range of topics and disciplines and may be a great place to start. Searching for your selected company in Nexis Uni will get you to news articles and coverage.

Other databases cover a variety of subjects, not just news. These may be more detailed than an InfoHawk+ search for your coursework-based analysis:

Business databases are useful in locating industry-specific information on companies and organizations, the latest news and public reports, and compiled information on industries like advertising, motion pictures, or television. 

Can't I just Google it?

To find your artifact to analyze and company information for this assignment, yes, you can Google it! You will also need scholarly articles - this course guide will help make you more comfortable with doing your non-Google research.

Google is a familiar tool but there are other options that will make collegiate-level research much easier (and instructor-approved!). This infographic charts the pros and cons of Google, Google Scholar, and library databases. Each one is useful in its own way.

Infographic of Google, Google Scholar, and databases

Created by McMaster University Library. Used under Creative Commons license. Original found at https://library.mcmaster.ca/research/how-library-stuff-works.

Evaluating Sources for Credibility

NC State University Libraries (https://www.lib.ncsu.edu/videos/evaluating-sources-for-credibility). Credits: Anne Burke: Project Lead, Storyboards; Lisa Becksford: Script, Editing; Daria Dorafshar: Graphics and Animation; Andreas Orphanides: Editing, Audio Production, Technical Infrastructure; Josephine McRobbie: Narration.

License

license for creative commons

This video is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 United States license.

InfoHawk+ Articles

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