Blog Posts
Start your search in Google Advanced Search (linked below) and search using your keywords, in quotes, Then add the word blog after the keywords.
Books
Use BANC, the library catalog, to find:
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- circulating books, which are print books that you can check out
- print books are organized by call #, which means when you find one on the shelf, the others located near it may be on the same topic
- ebooks, which you can access 24/7 and full-text search
- circulating books, which are print books that you can check out
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BANC Basic SearchHere's a link to the library catalog
Documentaries
Documentaries in Films on Demand:
- use quotes around your search terms, i.e. "noise pollution"
- has a built-in citation generator
- use the transcript if you want to directly quote the documentary
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Films on Demand This link opens in a new windowFilms On Demand is a Web-based digital video delivery service that allows you to view streaming videos from Films Media Group anytime, anywhere, 24/7! Choose from thousands of high-quality educational titles in dozens of subject areas.
Encylopedia Entries
Encylopedia entries in Gale Virtual Reference:
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Includes a built-in citation generator
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Great for providing brief summaries of the known information on any given topic
Often provides bibliographies (or works cited) that you can use to track down additional resources to use yourself
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Gale Virtual Reference Library This link opens in a new windowGale Virtual Reference Library offers a wide variety of full-text interdisciplinary content on virtually any subject area to support assignments, papers, projects, and presentations. Includes the Scribner Writers Series.
Popular Articles
To find popular news sources, make sure you limit your results to newspapers or magazines only. Below is a link where you can search for both!
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Academic Search Complete This link opens in a new windowAcademic Search Complete is the world's most valuable and comprehensive scholarly, multi-disciplinary full-text database, with more than 8,500 full-text periodicals, including more than 7,300 peer-reviewed journals
Primary Sources
Primary sources are documents, artifacts, or data created during the specific time period being studied. Oftentimes, documents from the first publication cycle – newspaper articles, letters, or research notes – are considered primary sources. Different academic disciplines have different definitions of what constitutes a primary source, which can make locating and identifying these sources a bit challenging.
Here are some examples of primary sources:
- Diaries or journals (published or unpublished)
- Letters, correspondence or other personal communications
- Public documents such as deeds, marriages license or certificates
- Newspapers and weekly newsmagazines (offering contemporaneous reporting of events)
- Radio and television transcripts and wire reports
- Speeches in print or audio formats
- Court cases
- Legislative reports, bills and laws
- Census data
- Government Documents
- Maps
- Art works such as paintings, prints or photographs
- Artifacts or specimens
- Interviews or oral histories
- Works of literature such as fiction, poetry or drama
- Statistics including opinion polls
- Sacred Scriptures
Statista is a great place to find primary sources in the form of statistics.
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Statista This link opens in a new windowStatista is an online statistics portal that provides access to data from market and opinion research institutions, as well as from business organizations and government institutions, such as the World Bank, the US Census Bureau, the Pew Research Center, and the IMF. Statista offers statistics and survey results in the form of bar charts and tables and includes, for example, data on advertising, consumer behavior, separate business fields, and governmental data.
Scholarly Articles
To find scholarly, peer-reviewed sources, make sure you limit your results to scholarly (peer-reviewed) only.
Also, if your search is not successful, here are some tips for potentially improving the results:
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try searching with only keywords, not whole sentences
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try searching again, using synonyms or related terms in addition to (or instead of) your original keywords.
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Academic Search Complete This link opens in a new windowAcademic Search Complete is the world's most valuable and comprehensive scholarly, multi-disciplinary full-text database, with more than 8,500 full-text periodicals, including more than 7,300 peer-reviewed journals.
