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--20 Item (Minimum) typed bibliography of CAREFULLY SELECTED sources for your first research project

--25 Item (Minimum) typed bibliography of CAREFULLY SELECTED sources for your second research project

--For both bibliographies, use of AT LEAST THREE BIBLIOGRAPHIC TOOLS to gather your bibliography

--Use proper MLA format (See Hacker's A Writer's Reference)

--Indicate the bibliographic source in which you found each entry. [After each entry put square brackets around the name of the bibliographic tool in which you found that entry. You will not indicate the bibliographic source on your works cited page at the end of your paper.]

A working bibliography is a preliminary list of any sources you think you should use to explore your subject, find a significant question about it, and answer that question. A working bibliography should contain works that deal specifically with your subject to help you learn what has already been written about it as well as works from other areas (called collateral areas) that you must examine in order to understand your subject fully and answer your specific question about it.

To gather your working bibliography for this research project, you are required to use AT LEAST THREE BIBLIOGRAPHIC TOOLS. A bibliographic tool or "first-search" source is an index containing bibliography (lists of published materials) on particular subjects. It does not contain the articles or books themselves, but it tells you in what journals, magazines, newspapers, or books you can find the articles and it gives you all the publication information on books. In other words, a bibliographic tool tells you where you can find the articles or books you need on your subject.

SOME BIBLIOGRAPHIC TOOLS AVAILABLE ON COMPUTER IN MCCONNEL LIBRARY

--RU Electronic Catalog. Our library catalog of books and periodicals. You can do a subject search for titles pertinent to your study.

--Virginia Tech's library catalog of books (Marion) available on internet. You can do a subject search for titles pertinent to your study. You can get books on inter-library loan from Tech and many other libraries in the world.

--MCConnel LAN--A CD-Rom Index that contains several separate data base indexes of bibliographies in specific disciplines including:

Humanities Index--1984 to present. Scholarly journals.

Social Sciences Index--1983 to present. Scholarly journals.

General Science Index--1984 to present. Scholarly journals

--MLA International Bibliography (All modern languages and literatures; also popular culture, cultural studies, critical/literary theory)--1981 to present. Scholarly journals.

--ERIC (Education Index)--1966 to present. Scholarly journals.

--Nursing and Allied Health Literature--1983 to present. Scholarly.

--InfoTrak--A CD-Rom Index that contains 3 separate data bases but covers only from 1994-1998, including:

Expanded Academic Index: 950 journals in humanities, social sciences, and pure science. Covers both popular and scholarly sources. Is very good for current issues and events.

Business Index: Covers 800 business related magazines and journals both popular and scholarly.

National Newspaper Index: Covers the 5 major national newspapers. Great on current events and issues.

--First Search on the Internet offers many of the indexes we have on McConnel LAN and is somewhat easier to use, but it does not indicate whether our library owns the journals.

The working bibliography you submit should reflect a careful selection of sources (not just the first 20 on the computerized card catalogue under your subject or the first 20 that you find on InfoTrak). Read through all the entries in the bibliographic tools you consult and select the titles that seem most appropriate to your study. Remember that we are a relatively small university, and so our own library resources at Radford are limited. Virginia Tech has a larger library holding, and you can borrow books from them. Our Interlibrary Loan Department does an excellent job of helping you get the books you need, but you must submit requests for books and articles well in advance of deadlines.

Select works that you ACTUALLY KNOW YOU CAN GET AT RADFORD, VIRGINIA TECH, OR THROUGH INTERLIBRARY LOAN WITHIN a COUPLE OF WEEKS. You can check the RU Electronic Library Catalogue by doing a title search to see if we own the journal your need. The name of the journal is the title you search under. Some indexes on McConnel LAN also tell you whether our library owns the journals in which articles appear.

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