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Assembling a Working Bibliography |
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During your exploratory research, you begin to assemble a working bibliography for your paper. This working bibliography will be the basis for your works-cited list, which will include all the sources you cite in your paper.
I. Close-up: Assembling a Working Bibliography1. As you record bibliographic information for your sources, include the following information: A. Book author(s); 01. Title (underlined or in italics); 02. call number (for future reference); 03. city of publication; 04. publisher; 05. date of publication; 06. brief evaluation B. Article 01. Author(s); 02. title of article (in quotation marks); 03. title of journal (underlined or in italics); 04. volume number; 05. date; 06. inclusive page numbers; 07. URL (if applicable); 08. date downloaded (if applicable); 09. brief evaluation II. As you read each potential source, keep track of them by recording full and accurate bibliographic information in a computer file. Come see me and I will help you set up a computer file on the school’s computer network. 1. Another way is to record this information on individual index cards. A. When keeping track of this information, your goal should be to write what you think is important and why. 01. The trick is to do this with the fewest number of words. a. Here is where Vocabulary becomes important. ' I can help, if you thirst to learn. 2. Keep records of interviews (including telephone and email interviews), meetings, lectures, films, and electronic sources as well as books and articles. A. For each source, include not only basic identifying details—such as 01. the date of an interview, 02. the call number of a library book, 03. the URL of an Internet source and the date you downloaded it, 04. or the author of an article accessed from a database. 05. Also add a brief evaluation that includes comments about the kind of information the source contains, the amount of information offered, its relevance to your topic (and, perhaps, its limitations). a. http://kirsznermandell.wadsworth.com III. Computer Tip: Assembling a Working Bibliography 1. Various computer software programs can make it easy for you to compile your working bibliography electronically. A. Come see me and I will show you how to manage this information. IV. Monitor the quality and relevance of all the materials you examine. 1. You must read the information you find, this is key. If you do not read what you find, you are wasting your time. A. Do not collect a large number of sources first and assess their usefulness later. 01. When you find the “perfect” article, read it right then, whether it is a book, magazine, or website. a. Learn to skim through paragraphs looking for the kind of information you need. ' Skim each source in this way: ê Carefully read the first paragraph. ê Carefully read the last paragraph. ê Read the first sentence of each paragraph. B. Resist the temptation to check out every book that mentions your subject. 01. Learn to Discern a. When you are researching a topic, for example the freshman assignment to learn about the Great Depression, read first an overview of the topic. ' Here is where you will be able to use an Encyclopedia. ê Encyclopedias are not allowed as a bibliographic source, but they are useful when you want broad knowledge of a subject. b. Do not photocopy or print page after page of articles you have not read. ' . We are READING and MAKING NOTES about what we have read. V. Exercise 1. Freshmen A. Learn something about the Great Depression. Consult an encyclopedia and generate a list of ten (10) sub-topics. 2. Sophomores A. Learn about Jim Crow Laws. B. Find and read a short story by a black, southern writer. 3. Juniors A. Learn something about the Roaring Twenties. B. Learn about Prohibition. C. Learn about the Agrarian Era. D. Learn about the transition to the Industrial Age.. 4. Seniors A. How do authors use setting to reinforce theme? B. Is Utopia possible? C. To what extent will humans go to attain power? D. 5. English B A. To be announced |
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