College research ain’t easy. It’s nothing like the papers from high school, because the training wheels are off. You are part of the academic conversation. New vocabulary, technical writing, and using citations to talk with scholars/professors about proof you have done your homework behind the thoughts.

Luckily, while not a short-cut, there is a wise tool to add to your skillset. In the library’s databases, you can search
“Literature review” AND “your topic”

Remember to use the double quote mark to help the computer ignore:

1. literature without the reviews, 
2. reviews that aren’t about your topic, and
3. Articles that mention your topic but are not “literature reviews.”  (the image below is of a Venn diagram of literature AND review– with a subcircle inside the overlap for  “literature review” )

Continue reading →

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 Some may have been retracted or disproven yet remain part of a historical record.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.

Part of a librarian’s job is exploring databases (collections of articles or books). These are described in the Articles & Databases tab as an annotated bibliography. 

To find the relevant databases across all collections use the search bar on the right, under Databases A-Z; type in a discipline or format. 

Continue reading →

When you’ve searched Google for a book, has Google ever suggested, “Go to your local library”?

No.

Imagining this is the book you are looking for. You typed the name in and the result is like this:

But none of these results will tell you that your Library already has it! 

Part of that is on us, librarians: we haven’t opened our data and we are working on that. But it’s also because we (libraries) don’t pay Google to promote us. No one really knows Google’s algorithm, so it is hard to guess what sources it isn’t showing you 

Continue reading →

Twenty years ago, a scholarly source was clearly different from everything else. Very little was online yet, but many voices were unjustly ignored. 

If you look at newspapers, magazines, or pulp novels, these are meant for daily consumption by anyone. Others, like scholarly journals or books (from novels to dictionaries), take years (decades!) and dozens (hundreds!) of hands. You can feel the effort of editors, authors, and artists. 

Huazi Ribao Newspaper Issue

The amount of time, wisdom, and energy invested establishes some of the credibility in dictionaries, encyclopedia, or university press books. This is harder to see today when dictionaries or encyclopedia (whether Wikipedia or Britannica) all look pretty much the same as blogs on your phone or laptop. 

Oxford Dictionary of National Biography volumes

Take the time to learn about the author and publisher. It is a necessary step. Is this subject their specialty? That way you don’t cite someone who has been discredited in the field. Or perhaps you find an authentic voice who merits greater respect. 

Samuel P Massie academic gown

Three quarter length portrait of Miss Kate Violet Edgerley in academic cap and gown standing

You may not have to do this every time. You will start to recognize names in your discipline from your assignments and readings. 

Who is eligible for off-campus access?

Our electronic resource license agreements restrict access to current NYU faculty, staff, and students enrolled in degree or diploma programs. 

How do I access databases from off-campus?

1）EZProxy

To access NYU license electronic resources from off-campus, you need to be routed through the Libraries’ proxy server called EZProxy, so that you can be authenticated after providing your NYU NetID and password.

There are three ways to reach resources through the EZProxy

• Start from the Library’s homepage
  Use the links provided in NYU Libraries’ Catalogs or Articles & Databases,
  
• Proxy prefix
  Prepend http://proxy.library.nyu.edu/login?url= to the resource URL.

• Proxy bookmarklet
  To install the bookmarklet, please refer to  this page for the instructions

2）Virtual Private Network (VPN)

NYUSH users may optionally log in through VPN to access library resources from off-campus.

Having trouble accessing library resources off-campus?

1. Check if you are using non-NYU VPN
2. Activate your NetID
3. Try another browser or clear your Web browser cookies before you try again
4. Contact library staff for assistance

NYU Shanghai Library provides great resources for ebooks, videos and news. They can be easily accessible through the main website and in a few steps. 

Step 1: Open NYU Shanghai Library Website:

https://shanghai.nyu.edu/academics/library

Step 2: Click the “Articles & Databases” tab

Step 3: Locate “Content-Specific” databases

Step 4: Access “Ebook Collections”, “Video Collections” and more

Step 5: Explore our content-specific collections based on your own research needs

• Ebooks

• Videos

• News & Newspapers

This month, NYU Shanghai welcomes guests who will explore issues in Language & Identity, including a film screening of Talking Black in America on February 22nd, and a panel discussion on February 27th that investigates the relationship between language and our collective and personal identities.

Are you intrigued by these topics or looking for more reading, including fiction and memoir? Check out these books from NYU:

Americanah Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Check it out!	Native Speaker Chang-Rae Lee Check it out!	Typical American Gish Jen Check it out!	Lost in Translation: A Life in a New Language Eva Hoffmann Check it out!
French Lessons: A Memoir Alice Yaeger Kaplan Available as an ebook	Hunger of Memory Richard Rodriguez Request it!	How the García girls lost their accents Julia Alvarez Request it!	When I was Puerto Rican Esmeralda Santiago Request it!
Chinese Englishes: A Sociolinguistic History Kingsley Bolton Request it!	Dialects at School: Educating Linguistically Diverse Students Jeffrey Reaser, Carolyn Temple Adger, Walt Wolfram, Donna Christian Available as an ebook	China and English Globalisation and the Dilemmas of Identity Joseph Lo Bianco, Jane Orton, Gao Yihong Available as an ebook

Don’t forget about our scholarly journals! Keep up with recent research trends in journals like these:

• World Englishes, ISSN: 0883-2919
• Journal of Language, Identity, and Education, ISSN:1534-8458
• Journal of English as an International Language, ISSN: 2200-2014
• Journal of Sociolinguistics, ISSN: 1360-6441

You can now access a design database called Designer’s Home through NYU Shanghai Library.

URL: www.51sjsj.com

Term of the Service: until 09/30/2018

Access Methods:

For PCs: direct access within the school’s IP domain, no registration needed

For mobiles: access through accounts (accounts should be reactivated within the school’s IP domain in every 3 months )

What is Designer’s Home

Designer’s Home is, at the moment, a leading and pioneering platform which targets towards skill learning,  resource collecting, material downloading, idea sharing and design competing. The resource library of Designer’s home is divided into five sections, which are tutorials, news, lectures, resources and forum. High-quality tutorials and lectures are accessible to the users, as well as the latest news and information in the design industry. Along with that, the website also contains features like overall analysis of designer’s ideas and progressions, online sharing space in the user’s community, too.

Designer’s Home is aiming to be a globally outstanding platform which serves designers in all sorts of dimensions. It covers nine main fields including industrial design, environmental art, graphic design, UI design, post-production of films, animation, game production, digital graphic, and photography. Tutorials on powerful software like Photoshop, Illustrator, CINEMA 4D on the website would be beneficial for various fields from still to animation designs.

Join in the community of Designer’s Home and have fun with designing now!

TEL: 400-881-6535

QQ: 3557302294

QQ group chat: 21596071