THEATER R1B: Characterization: Race, Gender, and Identity

Doe, Main Stacks, Moffitt Library Floorplans

jdorner@library.berkeley.edu (Jennifer Dorner) — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 11:10:12 -0700

Looking for a location or call number in Doe, Main Stacks or Moffitt? Try the floorplans, or ask for assistance!

Off-campus Access to Library Resources

jdorner@library.berkeley.edu (Jennifer Dorner) — Sun, 22 Jul 2012 11:51:25 -0700

Before you can access Library resources from off campus make sure you have configured your computer with proxy server settings.

After you make a one-time change in your web browser settings, the proxy server will ask you to log in with a CalNet ID or Library PIN when you click on the link to a licensed resource.

Campus Library Map

jdorner@library.berkeley.edu (Jennifer Dorner) — Wed, 23 Jan 2013 10:42:45 -0800

Click on the image below to see a larger interactive version of the campus library map.

You can also view/download a PDF map of library locations. For library contact information and building addresses, visit our directory.

Defining Your Research Topic

jdorner@library.berkeley.edu (Jennifer Dorner) — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 11:09:38 -0700

Choose a topic.

It is important that your topic is neither too broad...
Example: ...
... or too narrow.
Example: ...

Define and deconstruct your topic. Plan your search.

Write your research topic as a question, subject idea or thesis statement.
Example: ...
List the main concepts.
Example: ...
List key words, phrases and synonyms to search.
Example: ...
Remember to include alternate spellings.
Example: ...

What is Peer Review?

jdorner@library.berkeley.edu (Jennifer Dorner) — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 11:50:05 -0700

Your instructor may want you to use "peer reviewed" articles as sources for your paper. Or you may be asked to find "academic," "scholarly," or "refereed" articles. What do these terms mean?

Let's start with the terms academic and scholarly, which are synonyms. An academic or scholarly journal is one intended for a specialized or expert audience. Journals like this exist in the sciences, social sciences, and humanities. Examples include Nature, Journal of Sociology, and Journal of American Studies. Scholarly/academic journals exist to help scholars communicate their latest research and ideas to each other; they are written "by experts for experts."

Most scholarly/academic journals are peer reviewed; another synonym for peer reviewed is refereed. Before an article is published in a peer-reviewed journal, it's evaluated for quality and significance by several specialists in the same field, who are "peers" of the author. The article may go through several revisions before it finally reaches publication.

Magazines like Time or Scientific American, newspapers, (most) books, government documents, and websites are not peer-reviewed, though they may be thoroughly edited and fact-checked. Articles in scholarly journals (in printed format or online) usually ARE peer-reviewed.

How can you tell if an article is both scholarly and peer-reviewed?

Background Sources

jdorner@library.berkeley.edu (Jennifer Dorner) — Sun, 22 Jul 2012 11:40:51 -0700

Critical companion to William Shakespeare: a literary reference to his life and work

Dictionary of Shakespeare

Encyclopedia of the Renaissance

The major Shakespearean tragedies; a critical bibliography

The essential Shakespeare: an annotated bibliography of major modern studies

Hamlet: an annotated bibliography of Shakespeare Studies 1604-1998

William Shakespeare's Hamlet: a sourcebook

What is This? Reading Citations...

jdorner@library.berkeley.edu (Jennifer Dorner) — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 16:09:04 -0800

Finding a citation in a bibliography (online or in print) is a great way to find more resources on your topic.

However, you have to be able to read the citation in order to find the item in the UCB Library.

The most common citations are for books, articles, and book chapters. Can you tell which citation below is for a book? For a chapter? For an article?

Orbe, Mark P. "Representations of Race in Reality TV: Watch and Discuss." Critical Studies in Media Communication 25.4 (2008): 345-352.

Winters, Loretta I., and Herman L. DeBose. New Faces in a Changing America: Multiracial Identity in the 21st Century. Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications Inc., 2003.

Fine, Michelle, and Adrienne Asch. “Disability Beyond Stigma: Social Interaction, Discrimination, and Activism.” The Culture and Psychology reader. Eds. Goldberger, Nancy Rule; Veroff, Jody Bennet New York: New York University Press. 1995. 536-558

Where's the PDF?

jdorner@library.berkeley.edu (Jennifer Dorner) — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 10:36:24 -0700

Many article databases contain information about articles (citations or abstracts), not the entire text of the article. Once you've used an article database to find articles on your topic, you may need to use this button: in order to locate and read the full text of the article. The UC-eLinks button appears in nearly all the databases available from the UCB Library website.

UC-eLinks will link you to the online full text of an article if UCB has paid for online access; otherwise, UC-eLinks will help you locate a print copy on the shelf in the library. If UCB doesn't own the article in print or online format, UC-eLinks can also help you order a copy from another library.

For more information, watch this video tutorial (about 4 min.)

You can also set up UC-eLinks to work with Google Scholar. For more information, watch this video tutorial (about 2 min.)

Databases for Film Studies

jdorner@library.berkeley.edu (Jennifer Dorner) — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 11:08:55 -0700

The MLA Bibliography can also be a good source for film criticism, particularly for films that were adapted from novels.

Literature Article Databases

jdorner@library.berkeley.edu (Jennifer Dorner) — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 11:29:39 -0700

General Article Databases

jdorner@library.berkeley.edu (Jennifer Dorner) — Sun, 22 Jul 2012 11:17:25 -0700

Now that you know the types of articles you need, you can choose a database, also known as a periodical index, to find them. Databases are collections of thousands of articles organized by subject. The Libraries have hundreds of databases covering every academic discipline. Some are multi-disciplinary, covering a broad range of subjects and including popular and scholarly sources, and others are subject-specific, and include scholarly and specialized articles. A complete list is available at Find Articles.

The following multi-disciplinary databases are good places to start your research:

Film and Video in OskiCat

jdorner@library.berkeley.edu (Jennifer Dorner) — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 11:10:39 -0700

You can use the Media Resource Center's website to browse for films on your research topic, or you can use OskiCat to find films and videos in the UC Berkeley Libraries. Enter your search terms in the "Keyword" box, like this:

social protest california

Use the "Entire Collection" pulldown menu to restrict your search to "Films/Videos/Slides." Your search results may include online video as well as items in the Media Resources Center collection, or elsewhere in the campus libraries.

Searching Library Catalogs

jdorner@library.berkeley.edu (Jennifer Dorner) — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 11:46:44 -0700

Use OskiCat to locate materials related to your topic, including books, government publications, and audio and video recordings, in the libraries of UC Berkeley. OskiCat will show you the location and availability of the items that we own.

Using OskiCat (but not Melvyl) you can also renew your books online, look up course reserve materials by course number or instructor name, and place holds on items that other library users have already checked out.

Use Melvyl to locate materials related to your topic located at other campuses in the UC system, or worldwide. You can use the Request button to request an item from another library, if we don't own it.

Using Melvyl (but not OskiCat) you can find articles as well as books, easily format a citation for copying into a bibliography, and see images of book covers, when available. Melvyl will also show you the location and availablity of items that we own.

Melvyl has changed as of January 2012, and now includes many more articles. Detailed Melvyl help.

Using call numbers to find books

jdorner@library.berkeley.edu (Jennifer Dorner) — Sun, 22 Jul 2012 11:55:57 -0700

Books and journals are arranged on our shelves according to the Library of Congress (LC) classification system. Each is assigned a unique call number based on its subject matter and other characteristics. Items on the same subject will often be grouped together.

Each call number consists of several elements. For example, consider:

TK
7881.6
M29
1993

The FIRST line, TK, is based on the broad subject of the book. Within Class T for technology, TK represents electrical engineering.

The SECOND line, 7881.6, defines the subject matter more finely. When looking for the book, read this as a whole number with a decimal component. In this example, TK7881.6 represents magnetic recording (a subdivision of TK— electrical engineering).

The THIRD line, M29, usually indicates author, but may also represent a further subject subdivision, geographic area, etc. There may also be a fourth line, formatted the same way. When looking for the book, read the numeric component as if it were preceded by a decimal point. In the example above, the numeric part of M29 should be read as ".29" (and the call number TK7881.6 M29 comes before TK7881.6 M4).

The YEAR of publication, such as 1993, may also be present. These file in chronological order and often indicate successive editions of a book. The call number may also have additional elements, such as volume numbers.

In using a call number to locate a book on the shelf, consider each element in turn before moving on to the next segment.

These call numbers are arranged as they should appear on the shelves. In each case, the element shown in boldface distinguishes the number from the preceding one:

Q
76
K26

QA
17
F75

QA
17.1
C98

TK
3
Z37

TK
29
M49

TK
29
M5
1997

TK
29
M5
2007

Citation Help

jdorner@library.berkeley.edu (Jennifer Dorner) — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 15:47:51 -0700

"Ethics, copyright laws, and courtesy to readers require authors to identify the sources of direct quotations and of any facts or opinions not generally known or easily checked."--

Chicago Manual of Style, 15th edition (Chicago: Chicago Univ. Press), p. 594

Why cite sources?
Whenever you quote or base your ideas on another person's work, you must document the source you used. Even when you do not quote directly from another work, if reading that source contributed to the ideas presented in your paper, you must give the authors proper credit.

Citations allow readers to locate and further explore the sources you consulted, show the depth and scope of your research, and give credit to authors for their ideas. Citations provide evidence for your arguments and add credibility to your work by demonstrating that you have sought out and considered a variety of resources. In written academic work, citing sources is standard practice and shows that you are responding to this person, agreeing with that person, and adding something of your own. Think of documenting your sources as providing a trail for your reader to follow to see the research you performed and discover what led you to your original contribution.

Citation Management Tools

jdorner@library.berkeley.edu (Jennifer Dorner) — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 11:06:11 -0700

Citation management tools help you manage your research, collect and cite sources, and create bibliographies in a variety of citation styles. Each one has its strengths and weaknesses, but any are easier than doing it by hand!

Zotero: A free plug-in that works exclusively with the Firefox browser: keeps copies of what you find on the web, permits tagging, notation, full text searching of your library of resources, works with Word, and has a free web backup service.
RefWorks - free for UC Berkeley users. It allows you to create your own database by importing references and using them for footnotes and bibliographies. Use the RefWorks New User Form to sign up.
EndNote: may be purchased from UC Berkeley's Software Central.

It's always good to double check the formatting -- sometimes the software doesn't get it quite right.

Citing Live Performances in MLA

jdorner@library.berkeley.edu (Jennifer Dorner) — Thu, 19 Jul 2012 11:07:12 -0700

In MLA, a solo performance is cited by the performer’s name, and can include a title or a descriptive word or phrase to identify the format.

Play Performance Format:

[Play author], [Play title]. [Location performed]. [Performance date].

That said, if you want to cite a performance by two or more people, a play production, or other published or recorded work, what you list first will depend largely on the aspect or element of the production you focus on. This is due to the collaborative nature of these tpyes of productions: even if you identify a director or writer, group performances do not carry individual authorship like a written text or image.

See more examples at the Yale College Writing Center Site.

How to Avoid Plagiarism

jdorner@library.berkeley.edu (Jennifer Dorner) — Wed, 25 Jul 2012 15:21:23 -0700

Plagiarism is a form of academic dishonesty, violating the Berkeley Campus Code of Student Conduct. The campus issues a guide to understanding plagiarism, which states:

"Plagiarism means using another's work without giving credit. You must put others' words in quotation marks and cite your source(s). Citation must also be given when using others' ideas, even when those ideas are paraphrased into your own words."

Plagiarism is a serious violation of academic and student conduct rules and is punishable with a failing grade and possibly more severe action.

In order to avoid plagiarism, you must give credit when

You use another person's ideas, opinions, or theories.
You use facts, statistics, graphics, drawings, music, etc., or any other type of information that does not comprise common knowledge.
You use quotations from another person's spoken or written word.
You paraphrase another person's spoken or written word.

This content is part of the Understanding Plagiarism tutorial created by the Indiana University School of Education.

Ask a Librarian 24/7 Chat

jdorner@library.berkeley.edu (Jennifer Dorner) — Sun, 22 Jul 2012 11:21:10 -0700