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Plagiarism:  How to Avoid It (from Indiana University at Bloomington)

Citation Guides

Library Catalog 

Ask a Librarian Interactive "chat" with a Reference Librarian

FLIER: Set up an appointment for help with a Librarian

Interlibrary Loan/Document Delivery

Feinberg Library Home page

Boolean Searching
(from University at Albany Libraries) 

Web Search Engines

Evaluating Internet Resources
(from Milner Library at Illinois State U.) 

Primary vs. Secondary Sources (from Bowling Green State Libraries)

FL Home	PSU Home

COURSE RELATED RESEARCH INSTRUCTION

COM 101, Section A
Introduction to Public Speaking

Course Instructor: Elizabeth Bernat
Session Librarian: Debra Kimok
Session Date: September 13, 2002

Course Web page: http://mycourse.thomsonlearning.com

 Geographical Resources | Finding Articles | Article Databases | Newspapers  
  Biography Resources | Locating Speeches | Searching the Web | 
Poland Example |

Remember that you can always ask a Reference Librarian for help!

Geographical Resources
Find sources in Feinberg Library and on the Web that are specific to your country or region.  

In Feinberg Library | On the Web  

Geographical Resources in Feinberg Library

One way to find these is to search the Feinberg Library catalog using your country or region as  keyword.  You can also combine the name of your country or region with other keywords such as "culture," "business," "politics," "literature," "philosophy," "religion,, "history," etc.

If you plan enough in advance (at least two weeks), you  can also search the WorldCat database, which locates materials from around the world.  Through our free Interlibrary Loan service, you may borrow these materials for limited periods and they will be delivered right to our library.

Some examples of materials you may want to examine are:

The Country Studies series.  
These are handy reference books that provide background information on specific countries and groups of countries.  Although the call numbers for these books vary, they can all be found together in the Reference room.  Just ask the Reference Librarian to help you to find them.

Geographical Encyclopedias and Dictionaries.  
These are also found in the Reference Room.  Try a keyword search in the catalog for your country or region and encyclopedia.  You might also want to browse the shelves in the Reference Room that include materials about your country or region or about geography in general.  These kinds of Reference Books are an excellent way to discover topic possibilities.  If you don't know how to do this, you can always ask for help at the Reference Desk.

1993 International GIS Sourcebook
Ref. G 70.2 G5745 1993

Europa World Book (this is located at the Reference Desk)
Ref. Desk JN1 .E85 2001 v.1-2

Statistical Abstracts of the United States
Ref. Desk HA202 1999

Statistical Abstract of the World
Ref. Desk HA 155 .S73 1996

World Fact Book 2001
Ref. G 122 .U56a 2001

Geographical Resources on the Web

Countries of the World

Geographic Information/Maps

Finding Articles
  In Feinberg Library | At Other Libraries | Subject-Specific Article Databases   

To find journal articles on your topic, you will need to search in our subscription periodical databases.  

Subject-specific databases are the best place to start because they are focused more on specific subjects than the very general full-text ones such as IAC Searchbank [InfoTrac].  Be sure to read the database descriptions carefully before choosing one to search.

Finding Articles in Feinberg Library

Periodicals in Feinberg Library are kept in three areas on the third floor.  If your article is very current, it will most likely be in the Current Periodicals Room.  If it is a year or more old, it will be located in the Bound Periodicals or in Microfilm.  To determine where in the Library you can find your article, check the volume holdings for your periodical title in the library catalog.  Use the "advanced search" tab, so that you do a combined search.  In the first box, type the title of your journal (source) and select "title" from the drop-down menu to the left of the box.  In the next box, type the word "serial" and select "document type" from its corresponding drop-down menu.

Finding Articles at Other Libraries

When you locate a citation in a article database for periodicals that are not collected in Feinberg Library, you can use our free Interlibrary Loan  (ILL) service.  The articles will be sent directly to the address that you provide on the order form.  These forms are available online, or in paper form at the Reference Desk.  Additionally, certain FirstSearch article databases have an ILL feature built right in!  Interlibrary Loan delivery can take up to two weeks, so plan early.

If the journal that you need is not available in Feinberg Library, you might also want to try looking for your article in one of our full-text databases (these provide the entire text of many articles).  To do this, you should first look for your source title (not the article) in Journals A to Z.  This will help you to determine which full-text database indexes articles in your journal.  Once you know which database to use, do a title search using the article title this time.

If all else fails and you just must have your article right away, try searching for your journal title on the Internet, using www.google.com.  Some journals provide the full-text of their articles for free online, but many will only give you access to the tables of contents unless you subscribe for a fee.

Newspapers Online

Lexis-Nexis Academic
Through this Feinberg Library subscription database, you can locate the full-text of articles in newspapers from around the world.  

The next two Internet sources provide links to newspapers worldwide.

Newspapers.com

OnlineNewspapers.com

Biography Resources in Feinberg Library

| Biography Resources on the Web |