How to research for your essay

1. How to research for your essay Rachel Haworth, SMLC Rachel Myers, Library

2. Aims • Find the most efficient ways to identify relevant and useful material for essay topics: • Frame your ‘research questions’ on the basis of your essay title • Find suitable websites for your topic • Search for relevant materials using library catalogue • Search for journal articles using bibliographic databases

3. TYPES OF ESSAY QUESTION • Description [Define, describe, outline, explain, state, summarise, present] • Discussion [Analyse, examine, explore, comment, illustrate, account for, consider] • Evaluation [Evaluate, justify, comment on, to what extent] • Comparison [Compare, contrast, differentiate, distinguish] ** Essay questions often combine two of these tasks**

4. Gloss (verb): to comment upon, explain, interpret Glossing the question Example: To what extent was nationalist discourse during the First World War a product of pre-existing French political and/or cultural ideas? Illustrate your answer with examples taken from nationalist texts and/or images.

5. Rephrasing the question • To what extent was nationalist discourse during the First World War a product of pre-existing French political and/or cultural ideas? • Did WW1 nationalist discourse come from pre-existing ideas? Or not? • Essays often have a for/against structure – i.e. yes it did come from pre-existing ideas [= I agree with the statement]…BUT it changed in WW1[ = I disagree with the statement]

6. Now have a look at your essay title (in pairs…) • What kind of question is it? (Description, Discussion, Evaluation, Comparison) • Is it a quotation followed by ‘discuss’? Gloss the quotation, and think about a possible answer based on agreeing/disagreeing with the statement. • Rephrase your question. Is it asking for a for/against (agree/disagree) structure?

7. Starting your research Where do we look for sources when researching an essay question? • The web • Reading lists • Other bibliographies • Electronic databases

8. Using the web • What are the pros and cons of using the web (with search engines such as Google) to do research for your essay?

9. Web searches • Try Googling your essay topic. Approximately how many of the hits look useful? Is this an efficient way of conducting research for your essay? • Way of filtering/refining your searches: http://scholar.google.co.uk/

10. Evaluating websites. Questions to ask: • Is it a personal webpage? Is it from a reliable source, such as an educational site (.edu or .ac.uk) Why has it been written? • Who wrote the page? Are they an expert? What are their qualifications/credentials? • Is the page dated? Is the information up-to-date? • Is it scholarly – i.e. are there footnotes or links to other credible sources?

11. Wikipedia • What are the pros and cons of this type of source for doing research for an essay at university level?

12. Using bibliographies • How do you know what to read? • Think about using.. • Index • Introductions of edited volumes • Footnotes • Bibliographies • Electronic databases …to build up/refine your bibliographies

13. Finally….quoting and plagiarism • Take detailed notes, including page numbers, for referencing in your essays • Be careful about plagiarism. This is NEVER acceptable. • Beware of being too reliant on a limited number of sources, even if you are not directly plagiarising.