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The Research Process

Creating a Working Bibliography » Identifying and Locating Sources » Evaluating Sources » Taking Notes

Regardless of when you begin your research, the process will involve four tasks:

• creating and maintaining a working bibliography;
  
  
• identifying and locating potentially useful secondary sources;
  
  
• evaluating the credibility of sources;
  
  
• taking notes.

Creating a Working Bibliography

A working bibliography lists all the sources that you might use in your research essay. It is a "working" document in two ways. For one thing, it will change throughout the research process—expanding each time you add a potentially useful source and contracting when you omit sources that turn out to be less relevant than you anticipated. Also, once you have written your essay, your working bibliography will evolve one last time, becoming your list of works cited. For another thing, you can use your bibliography to organize and keep track of your research "work." To this end, some researchers divide the bibliography into three parts: (1) sources that they need to locate, (2) sources that they have located and think they will use, and (3) sources that they have located but think they probably won’t use. (Keeping track of "rejects" ensures, first, that you won’t have to start from scratch if you later change your mind; second, that you won’t forget that you’ve already located and rejected a source if you come across another reference to it.)

Because you will need to update your bibliography regularly and because it will ultimately become the kernel of your list of works cited, you should consider using a computer. In that case, you’ll need to print a copy or take your laptop along each time you head to the library. However, some researchers find it helpful to also or instead use notecards, creating a separate card for each source. You can then physically separate cards dedicated to sources to be located, sources already located, and "rejected" sources. Just in case your cards get mixed up, however, you should also always note the status of the source on the card (by writing at the top "find," "located," or "rejected").

Regardless of the format you use, your record for each source should include all the information you will need in order both to locate the source and to cite it in your essay. Helpful location information might include the library in which it’s found (if you’re using multiple libraries), the section of the library in which it’s held (e.g., "Reference," "Stacks"), and its call number. As for citation or publication information, it’s tempting to ignore this until the very end of the writing process, and some writers do. But if you give in to that temptation, you will, at best, create much more work for yourself down the road. At worst, you’ll find yourself unable to use a great source in your essay because you can’t relocate the necessary information about it. To avoid these fates, note down all facts you will need for a works cited entry (see The List of Works Cited). Finally, consider noting where you first discovered each source, just in case you later need to double-check citation information or to remind yourself why you considered a source potentially useful or authoritative. (Though you can use abbreviations, make sure they’re ones you’ll recognize later.)

Here are two sample entries from the working bibliography of a student researching Adrienne Rich’s poetry. Each entry includes all the required citation information, as well as notes on where the student discovered the source and where it is located.

Sample Working Bibliography Entries

Boyers, Robert. "On Adrienne Rich: Intelligence and Will." Salmagundi 22–23 (Spring–
      Summer 1973): 132–48. Source: DLB 5. Loc.: UNLV LASR AS30.S33

Martin, Wendy. American Triptych: Anne Bradstreet, Emily Dickinson, Adrienne Rich.
      U of North Carolina P, 1984. Source: LRC/CLC. UNLV Stacks PS310.F45 M3 1984

Once you locate a source, double-check the accuracy and thoroughness of your citation information and update your working bibliography. (Notice, for example, that this student will need to check American Triptych to find out the city where it was published and then add this information to her bibliography.)

Identifying and Locating Sources

Regardless of your author, text, or topic, you will almost certainly find a wealth of sources to consult. Your first impulse may be to head straight for the library catalog. But the conversation about literature occurs in periodicals as well as books, and not all contributions to that conversation are equally credible or relevant. For all these reasons, consider starting with one of the reference works or bibliographies described in this section. Then you can head to the catalog armed with a clear sense of what you’re looking for.

Once you find one good secondary source, you can use its bibliography to refine your own. Checking the footnotes and bibliographies of several (especially recent) sources will give you a good sense of what other sources are available and which ones experts consider the most significant.

REFERENCE WORKS

Your library will contain many reference works that can be helpful starting points, and some may be accessible via the library’s Web page. Here are six especially useful ones.

Literature Resource Center (LRC)

One online source to which your library may subscribe is Gale’s Literature Resource Center. Designed with undergraduate researchers in mind, it’s an excellent place to start. Here you can access and search:

• all the material in two of the reference works described below (Dictionary of Literary Biography and Contemporary Authors) and in both Merriam-Webster’s Encyclopedia of Literature and Gale’s For Students series (Novels for Students, Literature of Developing Nations for Students, etc.);
  
  
• much (though not all) of the material contained in Gale’s Literary Criticism series (another of the reference works described below);
  
  
• selected full-text critical essays (or articles) from more than 250 literary journals.

Depending upon your library’s subscription arrangement, LRC may also give you access to the MLA Bibliography (from 1963) and/or to the Twayne’s Authors series (both described below).

You can search the database in numerous ways, but you should probably start with an author search. Results will appear as a list of sources divided into four files: Biographies; Literary Criticism, Articles, and Work Overviews; Bibliographies (of works by and about the author); Additional Resources (such as author-focused Web sites). You can access each file or list by simply clicking on the appropriate tab. (There will be a good deal of overlap among the files.) You can then click any item on the list in order to open and read it. Once an item is open, you can also print or e-mail it by clicking on the appropriate icons and following the directions.

If your library doesn’t subscribe to LRC, consider starting with the printed reference works listed below. Because each is a multivolume work, you will need to consult its cumulative index to find out which volumes contain entries on your author. None of these series can keep up to the minute with the literary critical conversation about a particular author or work, and all offer only selective bibliographies. Such selectivity is both the greatest strength and the greatest limitation of these reference works.

Dictionary of Literary Biography (DLB)

One of the most important and authoritative reference works for students of literature, the Dictionary of Literary Biography covers primarily British and American authors, both living and dead. Each volume focuses on writers working in a particular genre and period. (Volume 152, 4th series, for example, covers American Novelists since World War II.) Written by a scholar in the field, each entry includes a photo or sketch of the author, a list of his or her publications, a bibliography of selected secondary sources, and an overview of the author’s life and work. The overviews are often very thorough, incorporating brief quotations from letters, interviews, reviews, and so on. You will find multiple entries on any major author, each focusing on a particular portion of his or her canon. The volume titles will give you a good sense of which entry will be most relevant to you. Entries on W. B. Yeats, for example, appear in volume 10, Modern British Dramatists, 1900–1945; volume 19, British Poets, 1880–1914; volume 98, Modern British Essayists, First Series; and volume 156, British Short-Fiction Writers, 1880–1914: The Romantic Tradition.

Contemporary Authors: A Biobibliographical Guide to Current Authors and Their Works (CA)
Gale’s Contemporary Authors focuses on twentieth-and twenty-first-century writers from around the world and in a range of fields (including the social and natural sciences). In terms of content, its entries closely resemble those in the DLB (see above). But CA entries tend to be much shorter.

Literary Criticism (LC)

Also published by Gale, the Literary Criticism series is, in effect, a series of series, each of which covers a particular historical period. (See below for individual series titles, as well as information about the periods covered by each one.) Each entry includes a very brief overview of the author’s life and work. (There is often overlap between these overviews and those in CA.) But there are two key differences between the LC series and both the DLB and CA. First, the LC series includes entries devoted entirely to some individual works, as well as entries on an author’s entire canon. (For example, Nineteenth-Century Literature Criticism contains both a general entry on Charlotte Bronte¨ and one devoted exclusively to Jane Eyre.) Second, the bulk of each entry is devoted to excerpts (often lengthy) from some of the most important reviews and literary criticism on an author and/or work, and coverage extends from the author’s day up to the time when the LC entry was written. Each entry concludes with a bibliography of additional secondary sources. The LC series will thus give a lot of guidance in identifying authoritative sources, as well as access to excerpts from sources that your library doesn’t own.

Here are the titles of the five series, along with information about the period each one covers. To identify the appropriate series, you will need to know the year in which your author died.

• Contemporary Literary Criticism (living authors and those who died from 1960 on)
  
  
• Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism (authors who died 1900–1959)
  
  
• Nineteenth-Century Literature Criticism (authors who died 1800–1899)
  
  
• Literature Criticism from 1400 to 1800 (authors [except Shakespeare] who died 1400–1799)
  
  
• Shakespearean Criticism

The Critical Heritage

For some major authors, you can find information and excerpts like those offered by LC within the individual volumes of the Critical Heritage series. Unlike the reference works described above, this series is a collection of discrete publications such as The Bronte¨s: The Critical Heritage. Each will be held not in the reference department, but in the section of the stacks devoted to scholarship on a specific author. You will thus need to search your library’s catalog to find it. These volumes are not regularly updated, so each will give a good sense of your author’s reception only up to the time it was published.

Twayne’s Authors

The Twayne’s Authors series incorporates three distinct series: Twayne’s United States Authors, Twayne’s English Authors, and Twayne’s World Authors. Each volume in each series is a distinct book focusing on one author and typically offering both biographical information and interpretation of major works. All aim to be generally accessible and introductory. (As the publishers themselves put it, "The intent of each volume in these series is to present a critical-analytical study of the works of the writer; to include biographical and historical material that may be necessary for understanding, appreciation, and critical appraisal of the writer; and to present all material in clear, concise English.") Yet because each volume is the work of an individual specialist, it represents that scholar’s particular point of view (or opinion), and volumes differ a good deal in terms of organization, approach, and level of difficulty.

Each volume will be held not in the reference department, but in the section of the stacks devoted to scholarship on a specific author. To find it, you will need to search the catalog.

MLA INTERNATIONAL BIBLIOGRAPHY

For much more thorough, up-to-date lists of secondary sources—especially periodical articles—you should consult scholarly bibliographies. In terms of literary criticism, the most comprehensive and useful general bibliography is The MLA International Bibliography of Books and Articles on the Modern Languages and Literatures. Since 1969, the MLA Bibliography has aimed to provide a comprehensive list of all scholarship published anywhere in the world on literature and modern languages, including books, dissertations, book chapters, and articles in over two thousand periodicals. Though it doesn’t quite live up to that aim, it comes closer than any other reference work. (The Bibliography in fact began in 1922 but initially included only American scholarship; international coverage began in 1956, but the range of publications remained limited until 1969.) Updated annually, the bibliography is available in print, CD-ROM, and online versions, so what the bibliography encompasses, how many years it covers, and how you use it will depend on the version you consult.

In the print version, each volume lists articles and books published in a specific year, so you should start with the most recent volume and then work your way backward through earlier volumes. Each volume is arranged by nationality or language, then by period, then by author and title.

The CD-ROM and online versions allow you to do topic or keyword searches to find all relevant publications, regardless of the year of publication. Ask a librarian for help with accessing and searching the database.

ONLINE AND CARD CATALOGS

Your library’s catalog will guide you to books about the author’s work. However, the title of a potentially useful book may be too general to indicate whether it covers the text and topic in which you’re interested. If your library’s catalog is online, use keyword searches to limit the number and range of books that the computer finds. For example, if you’re writing about William Faulkner’s "A Rose for Emily," first limit the search to items that include both "Faulkner" and "A Rose for Emily." If you find few matches or none, broaden the search to include all books about William Faulkner.

The books that you find through a catalog search will lead you to a section of the library where other books on your subject are held (because each will have a similar Library of Congress call number). Even if you locate the books you were looking for right away, take a moment to browse. Books shelved nearby probably cover similar topics, and they may prove even more useful than the ones you originally sought. You can also do this kind of browsing online because most online catalogs offer the option of moving from the record of one book to the records of those that appear just before and after it in the catalog.

THE INTERNET

With its innumerable links and pathways, the Internet seems the perfect resource for research of any kind. And in fact some excellent online resources are available to students of literature. Bartleby.com is a good, general information site. Here you can access and search several reference works, including the Columbia Encyclopedia, the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, and the eighteen-volume Cambridge History of English and American Literature, as well as full-text versions of numerous poems and works of fiction and nonfiction.

There are also many scholarly sites dedicated to specific authors, works, and literary periods. Most sites provide links to others. One site especially useful as a gateway to thousands of more specific sites is The Voice of the Shuttle <http:// vos.ucsb.edu/>.

If you don’t find an appropriate link on The Voice of the Shuttle, you will probably want to conduct a search using one of the commonly available search engines. Searches using keywords such as "Chekhov" or "poetry" will lead you to thousands of possible matches, however, so you should limit your search by creating search strings longer than one word. Read onscreen directions carefully to make sure that the search engine treats the search string as a unit and doesn’t find every mention of each individual word.

Despite the obvious benefits of the Internet, you should be cautious in your use of online sources for two reasons. First, although many sites provide solid information and informed opinion, many more offer misinformation or unsubstantiated opinion. Unlike journal articles and books, which are rigorously reviewed by experts before they are accepted for publication, many Internet sources are posted without any sort of review process, and authorship is often difficult to pin down. As a result, you need to be especially careful to identify and evaluate the ultimate source of the information and opinions you find in cyberspace. (For more on evaluating sources, see Evaluating Sources.)

Second, because the Internet enables you to jump easily from one site to another and to copy whole pages of text merely by cutting and pasting, you may lose your place and be unable to provide readers with precise citations. More serious, you may lose track of where your own words end and those of your source begin, thereby putting yourself at risk of plagiarizing (see Using Sources Responsibly). In addition, the Internet is itself constantly mutating; what’s there today may not be there tomorrow. All this makes it difficult to achieve the goal of all citation: to enable readers to retrace your steps and check your sources. When you find sites that seem potentially useful, bookmark them if you can. If not, make sure that you accurately write down (or, better, copy directly into a document) the URL of each, as well as the other information you will need for your list of works cited: the author’s name, if available; the site or page title; the date the site was last revised or originally published; and the date you accessed it. If the material on the site has been taken from a printed source, note all of the particulars about this source as well.

As a general rule, Internet sources should supplement print sources, not substitute for them.

Evaluating Sources

Not all sources are equally reliable or credible. The credibility and persuasiveness of your essay will depend, in part, on the credibility of the sources you draw on. This is a good reason to start with reference works that will guide you to credible sources.

Nonetheless, it is very important to learn how to gauge for yourself the credibility of sources. As you do so, keep in mind that finding a source to be credible isn’t the same as agreeing with everything it says. At this stage, concentrate on whether the opinions expressed in a source are worthy of serious consideration, not on whether you agree with them. Here are some especially important questions to consider:

1. How credible is the publisher (in the case of books), the periodical (in the case of essays, articles, and reviews), or the sponsoring organization (in the case of Internet sources)?
   
   Generally speaking, academics give most credence to books published by academic and university presses and to articles published in scholarly or professional journals because all such publications undergo a rigorous peer-review process. As a result, you can trust that these publications have been judged credible by more than one recognized expert. For periodicals aimed at a more general audience, you should prefer prominent, highly respected publications such as the Los Angeles Times or the New Yorker to, say, the National Enquirer or People magazine.
   
   Internet sources are not subjected to rigorous review processes, but many sites are created and sponsored by organizations. Be sure to identify the sponsoring organization and carefully consider its nature, status, and purpose. The last part of the domain name will indicate the kind of organization it is: the suffix .com indicates that the ultimate source is a company or commercial, for-profit enterprise; .org, a nonprofit or charitable organization; .gov, a government agency; and .edu, an educational institution.
   
   Though you will often find more reliable information via .gov or .edu sites, this won’t always be the case. Bartleby.com is, for example, only one of many extremely useful commercial sites, whereas many .edu sites feature the work of students who may have much less expertise than you do.
   
   
2. How credible is the author? Is he or she a recognized expert in the relevant field or on the relevant subject?
   Again, publication by a reputable press or in a reputable periodical generally indicates that its author is considered an expert. But you can also investigate further by checking the thumbnail biographies that usually appear within the book or journal (typically near the beginning or end). Has this person been trained or held positions at respected institutions? What else has he or she published?
   
   
3. How credible is the actual argument?
   Assess the source’s argument by applying all that you’ve learned about what makes an argument effective. Does it draw on ample, appropriate, convincing evidence? Does it consider all the relevant evidence? Are its inferences reasonable? Are its claims sound? Does the whole seem fair, balanced, and thorough? Has the author considered possible counter-arguments or alternative points of view?

Finally, researchers in many fields would encourage you to consider the source’s publication date and the currency of the information it contains. In the sciences, for example, preference is almost always given to the most recently published work on a given topic because new scholarly works tend to render older ones obsolete. In the humanities, too, new scholarly works build on old ones. You should consult recently published sources in order to get a sense of what today’s scholars consider the most significant, debatable questions and what answers they offer. Though originality is as important in the humanities as in other scholarly fields, new work in the humanities doesn’t necessarily render older work utterly obsolete. For example, a 1922 article on Shakespeare’s Hamlet may still be as valid and influential as one published in 2002. As a result, you should consider the date of publication in evaluating a source, but don’t let age alone determine its credibility or value.

Taking Notes

Once you’ve acquired the books and articles you determine to be most credible and potentially useful, it’s a good idea to skim each one. (In the case of a book, concentrate on the introduction and on the chapter that seems most relevant.) Focus at this point on assessing the relevance of each source to your topic. Or, if you’re working your way toward a topic, look for things that spark your interest. Either way, try to get a rough sense of the overall conversation—of the issues and topics that come up again and again across the various sources.

After identifying the sources most pertinent to your argument, begin reading more carefully and taking notes. Again, some researchers find it easier to organize (and reorganize) notes by using notecards, creating one card for each key point. (If you use this method, make sure that each card clearly indicates the source author and short title because cards have a tendency to get jumbled.) Today, however, most researchers take notes on the computer, creating a separate document or file for each source.

Regardless of their form, your notes should be as thorough and accurate as possible. Be thorough because memory is a treacherous thing; it’s best not to rely too heavily on it. Be accurate to avoid a range of serious problems, including plagiarism (see Using Sources Responsibly).

Your notes for each source should include four things: summary, paraphrase, and quotation, as well as your own comments and thoughts. It’s crucial to visually discriminate among these by, for instance, always recording your own comments and thoughts in a separate computer document or file or on a separate set of clearly labeled or differently colored notecards.

Whenever you write down, type out, or paste in more than two consecutive words from a source, you should:

• place these words in quotation marks so that you will later recognize them as quotations;
  
  
• make sure to quote with absolute accuracy every word and punctuation mark;
  
  
• record the page where the quotation is found (in the case of print sources).

Keep such quotations to a minimum, recording only the most vivid or telling.

In lieu of extensive quotations, try to summarize and paraphrase as much as possible. You can’t decide how to use the source or whether you agree with its argument unless you’ve first understood it, and you can best understand and test your understanding through summary and paraphrase. Start with a two-or three-sentence summary of the author’s overall argument. Then summarize each of the relevant major subsections of the argument. Paraphrase especially important points, making sure to note the page on which each appears.

You may want to try putting your notes in the form of an outline. Again, start with a brief general summary. Then paraphrase each of the major relevant sub-claims, incorporating summaries and quotations where appropriate.

Especially if you’re dealing with literary criticism, it can be useful to complete the note-taking process by writing a summary that covers all of your sources. Your goal is to show how all the arguments fit together to form one coherent conversation. Doing so will require that you both define the main questions at issue in the conversation and indicate what stance each source takes on each question— where and how their opinions coincide and differ. One might say, for example, that the main questions about Antigone that preoccupy all the various scholars represented in chapter 31 are (1) What is the exact nature of the conflict between Creon and Antigone, or what two conflicting worldviews do they represent? and (2) How is that conflict resolved? Which, if any, character and worldview does the play as a whole endorse?

A synthetic summary of these sources would explain how each critic answers each question. This kind of summary can be especially helpful when you haven’t yet identified a specific essay topic or crafted a thesis because it may help you to see gaps in the conversation, places where you can enter and contribute.

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