From The Peopling of New York City
Contents |
Source Study #3: Review of Literature on Chosen Ethnic Community
Source Study #3 is an exercise in using library resources to review the available literature on your ethnic community, and then selecting from the available materials to generate a bibliography of those materials.
Objectives
1. To learn how to conduct literature searches using a variety of library-provided resources (especially WorldCat, Academic Search Complete, Project Muse, Jstor, and Ethnic Newswatch).
2. To learn how to find reviews of book-length works and abstracts of articles which will allow you to focus on the most significant available information about your community.
3. To learn how to access materials through available resources.
4. To provide a bibliography and a thumbnail sketch of the scope of the literature and its lacks.
The Process
1. Conduct a literature search for your community. This means that you will have to think about the kind of information you wish to find (and which disciplinarily-based search tools would be most efficient to use). For our purposes, you will concentrate on five main resources:
A. WorldCat
B. Academic Search Complete
C. Project Muse
D. Jstor
E. Ethnic Newswatch
2. One of the first steps to efficient searching is to identify the LOC Subject Headings (the “descriptors”) for your topic. You will use WorldCat to generate a list of five Subject Headings under which your materials can be searched. Choose specific headings which get you manageable results (say, under 200 results). List them (you will later submit this list).
3. Keywords are also useful for searching. Generate a list of ten keyword searches, and indicate ways that the search can be limited to provide better results.
4. With these tools in hand, you can now begin a search of the literature. We will discuss in class what limits you will place on your research in order to produce a focused bibliography.
5. Generate a bibliography of what you think to be ten representative scholarly sources which address your community. Ideally, these will address the community in Staten Island, in New York City, or in the U.S., in that order of preference.
6. Generate a list of five subject headings, ten keywords, and a bibliography of ten representative scholarly sources which address your community BEFORE immigration. This means that you are looking at the history and experience in the home community before that community came to Staten Island.
The Assignment
What you will hand in as “Source Study #3":
You working group will submit (jointly) your results from 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6. For each bibliographical entry, indicate where the material is located and how you would be able to access it.
In addition, based on what you have found, give a one-page overview of your group’s experience both in the U.S. and before emigration from their home country. What seem to you to be the “gaps” in the existing literature?