Academic Discourse

ACADEMIC DISCOURSE

Discourse Communities

Event Initiated Information

The Access Cycle

Who you should know in order to get at secondary/tertiary research
(and what to do if you don't).

Remember, don't just copy/paste a chart, image, or other materials from a company's website. Such resources are protected by copyright, and even if you cite the source you could end up owing them most of your income for years.

Go to

Proprietary information (owned by corporations, etc., who must give permission for you to access and/or use information). Go to their websites. Contact them in person or by letter or email. Explain your project and your interest.

Remember that many large corporations have their own librarians. You may even get an interview with a member of the company (don't forget to ask permission to cite him or her the source in your paper).

Hospitals have medical libraries that are often open to the public with specialist librarians on site to help you.
Invisible College -- talk to your instructors/professors. Cite that as "telephone interview" or what have you, with the date. You may also find family and friends quite helpful, or people with whom you blog or twitter. You may even quote from a lecture you had with another professor in a previous semester, giving the approximate date.
Meetings, Seminars, Workshops. Good researchers are a bit squirrely (like that's a surprise), saving notes and such from interesting seminars and workshops, including the speaker's name and contact information. You may want to email that person, asking about work she or he has done since, "that wonderful talk you gave at...."
Library Databases via the web are
- "Indexes" to what has been published, in:
  - Research reports
  - Journals of Professional Associations and Societies
  - Other peer reviewed journals
- Indexes (or Google) to what has been published in:
  - Newspapers
  - Popular magazines
  - Blogs and other websites
- Library Catalogs via the WWW, often through Google Scholar (Oasis, ORBIS, WorldCat, & JSTOR services)
To locate a copy of these reports, magazines, journals go to

The physical library
Online to our library's website and/or Google Scholar
Government agencies (remember that the Freedom of Information Act has increasingly made information entirely available to you. The trick is not accessing it, but sifting through the results.
Talk to librarians to get help with all of this. They love to help! Remember, they're specialists too. There's a specialist in your major's discipline. Find out who she or he is and make an appointment to chat if you need specialized assistance. Many faculty members have created library course guides of recommended resources as well. Check them out.

Research Assistance, Ganser Library
Reference librarians are available to help you learn how to use library resources, identify sources and information, and locate what you want in the library. A reference librarian can be consulted at the Reference Desk on the Library's first floor, Monday through Thursday 9:30AM-9:30PM, Friday 9:30-4, Saturday, 11-4, and Sunday 1-9:30. For brief, factual information, librarians can also be consulted via email at library.reference@millersville.edu or by phone at 717-872-3611.

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