Getting help:
Please feel free to seek out
my help with your research after our session. I LOVE to do
research. Here's how to get in touch with me:
You
can also get help 24 hours a day/7 days a week through the
Maryland AskUsNow chat reference service:
http://askusnow.info/
Finding books:
Find books in Blackwell Library using our
online library catalog
or
WorldCat Local. Books in our library are arranged using
Library of Congress Classification.
The books you can check out are located on the second floor of
the library. If you ever have trouble finding a book you want,
PLEASE ask for help at the Research Desk!
Books from other USMAI
Libraries
You can also borrow books from any of the USMAI affiliations by
selecting the "choose campus" link at the top of the catalog
page and then selecting "USMAI All Campuses." When you find a
book you want that is not in Blackwell, click the "request"
button and use your ID number to login. You can have the book
delivered to Blackwell within 3 or 4 days. Here is a
short tutorial about borrowing books from other USMAI
libraries.
Books from Interlibrary
Loan/Worldcat
Interlibrary Loan is a great tool that
allows you to borrow a book from libraries outside the USMAI
system. Before you submit a request, make sure that we don't
own the book here at SU or at one of the other USMAI
institutions. If not, you can submit a request through
ILL
Express.
You can also search
Worldcat, which is a huge catalog of materials from
libraries all over the world. If the book you want is in a
library, chances are pretty good you will find it in Worldcat!
If you find the book you want and you know it is not available
at SU or any USMAI campus, then you can click the Find It button
and then request the book through Interlibrary Loan. The
advantage of doing it this way is that you don't have to fill in
all the information about the book!
Click here to go to the
Interlibrary Loan webpage.
Watch this
short
tutorial on using Interlibrary Loan!
Finding
articles:
Consider the types of sources you will
need to support your research. This really depends a
lot on your individual topic, but it's likely that you will need some scholarly
journal articles. If you have
any questions about what makes an article scholarly, popular, or
even a third type source called a trade publication, check out
this handy
dandy chart.
NOTE: These links will work from off
campus, but you will be prompted to log in with the 14 digit
barcode from the back of your Gull Card.
MULTIDISCIPLINARY & NEWSPAPERS:
-
Academic Search Complete
- a multidisciplinary database from EBSCO with a mix of
scholarly and popular resources, a lot of full-text and Find
It links when there is no full-text available
-
JSTOR
-
scholarly full-text resources; the newest documents are 3-5
years old. This would be
great for history, religion, philosophy and literature
topics.
-
Lexis-Nexis Academic
- this database contains full-text world news, legal and
business information.
-
National Newspapers
- a collection of full-text major newspapers including
The New York Times and
Washington Post.
SUBJECT-SPECIFIC:
-
Communication & Mass Media Complete - an awesome
database that is all about Communication and Media studies.*
-
ERIC - Educational Resource
Information Center*
-
Health Source: Consumer Edition
-
Provides access to nearly 80 full text, consumer
health magazines on topics concerning medical sciences, food
sciences and nutrition, childcare, sports medicine and
general health.*
-
Humanities International Complete -
database covering the Humanities, so you know like
literature and stuff.*
-
Literature Resource Center -
Pulls together materials from many different print and
online sources, including scholarly journals, literary
reviews, reference books, authoritative websites, and more.
-
MLA International Bibliography
-
world literature. *
-
PsycINFO
- the gold standard database
for psychology and related fields. *
-
Social Sciences Abstracts
- articles
and citations for interdisciplinary fields such as
addiction studies, anthropology, corrections, economics,
gender studies, gerontology, minority studies, political
sciences, psychology, sociology, and more *
-
America: History and Life - covers North American
history, and, apparently life.*
*These EBSCO databases can
be searched simultaneously by checking them off in the "Choose
Databases" box on the main search screen in any EBSCO database.
This is where to click to get to
the Choose Databases box.
WHAT DOES THAT CUTE LITTLE FIND IT BUTTON DO, ANYWAY?
It's a bit like magic,
really. The Find It button does three things:
-
Looks in all of our
databases to see if the document you want is available
full-text in another of our databases. If so, it links you
to it!
-
Links you to the library
catalog when we have the item you want in print or
microform.
-
Links you to ILLiad
(interlibrary loan) so you can borrow the item from another
library if we don't have access electronically or in print.
The Find It button is YOUR
FRIEND!!! See it in action
here!
You can also use the Citation
Linker, another fabulously cool tool. It is useful when you
are reading an article and it cites another article that looks
like it would be super useful for your research. You plug in
the citation information for that article and can find out how
to access it, whether it be electronically, physically in the
library, or through Interlibrary Loan. It works the same way as
Find It, but you don't have to be in a database.
Learn more about the
Citation Linker!
Citing your
work:
Of course you want to make
sure you give proper credit to any source that you use to write
your papers, whether you directly quote or paraphrase.
This
guide helps students understand what plagiarism is and how
to avoid it.
My favorite citation website is the
Online Writing Lab
at Purdue.
