Librarians and professors suggest you start your research process from the library’s website because of filtering (described in our previous post). The librarians collect scholarly (peer-reviewed) material. That doesn’t mean every book on the shelf is perfect. Some may have been retracted or disproven yet remain part of a historical record. Recent examples are Frey’s A Million Little Pieces or when Krakauer disproved Mortenson’s Three Cups of Tea.
Information surrounding us (~6 min)
As a scholar yourself, in order to build your own ideas, part of your work is to double-check, verify, or cross-reference what others have said or written about the documents you are reading and citing . Who knows? You may find the first voice announcing major errors identified through new techniques or new information.
I–perhaps oddly–prefer the deliberate search bars of ProQuest and BobCat. Filters (usually on the left of the screen in a results page) are explicit and focus a broadsearch into something more specific to your needs. Unlike Google, typing more words into BobCat’s or ProQuest’s search bars will not help you. Start with two words then use the filters.
Check in with a librarian. We can share screens with you in chat at Ask a Librarian{point out the contact us feature at the bottom of wechat? Or add a screen clip of the “Chat with us” from the library homepage}. If you have time, ask for instructions on how to run the search or select the filters yourself.
