Research+Tools

=Creating an Annotated Bibliography= media type="custom" key="8573468"

=NoodleBib: Basic Instructions= Use Noodle Bib to create your Annotated Bibliography:

NoodleBib
See Ms. Voss or Ms. Williamson if you need to set up an account. Create a New Project. Select MLA Advanced. Under Description, type Author Project. Click on Author Project. Click on Share Project with a Teacher's Drop Box. In Assignment Drop Box, type your teacher's name and select your section. Enter your First and Last Name so your teacher can identify you. Use the Bibliography Component to create your bibliography and annotate your sources. You can also use the Note Card feature to link your sources to your notes.

=Finding Sources=
 * Your teacher keeps talking about "literary criticism," and you're having a hard time understanding what exactly** **he means and how you're supposed to find it. Find answers below.**

**What is literary criticism?**
Literary criticism is the analysis or interpretation of literary works. The kind of literary criticism that your teachers are probably looking for will be published in "academic" or "scholarly" journals--in other words, NOT on a random fan website or in //People// magazine. The people who write serious literary criticism are typically college professors who have spent large amounts of time studying an author or a particular work, and they submit their work to academic journals to be published. After these critical essays are published in journals, they are often indexed in databases like Literary Resource Center, or sometimes published in anthologies or collections as a book.

**How can I find literary criticism?**
There are two motherloads of literary criticism available to you via the McCulloch Library: the library's amazing print collection of literary criticism and databases.

Library Catalog: Quest
Do an Advanced Search for your author's name as a SUBJECT to find information about your author. Check to make sure that the book you need is IN, and make sure you write down the call number!! You can also log in to Quest using your portal name and password to put things on hold, renew items, and find out what you have overdue.
 * Warning: Quest will not work if you are using Google Chrome as your browser*

Past Author Project Papers
In the library, we have a file of old author projects written by former students, and these will come up in your Quest search. We encourage you to use them to see what kinds of sources past students have used. The Author Projects are located in the tall gray file cabinet by the black and white copier, and they are in alphabetical order by author. See Ms. Voss with questions.

**Reference**
These series have different kinds of indexes, so make sure you are looking in the right one. Most series have a title index, an author index, a topic index, and a nationality index. Each cumulative index will direct you to the appropriate volume number to look in. Then look in the volume for the entries under the author's last name. Ask the librarians for help!

REF 809 CON //Contemporary Literary Criticism// Includes authors now living or who died after 1960.

REF 809 TWE //Twentieth Century Literary Criticism// Includes authors who died between 1900 and 1959.

REF 809 NIN //Nineteenth Century Literature Criticism// Includes authors who died between 1800 and 1899.

REF 809 LIT //Literature Criticism from 1400 to 1800// Includes authors who died between 1400 and 1799, excluding Shakespeare.

REF 822.33 SHA //Shakespearean Criticism// Includes criticism from Shakespeare's time up to the present.

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Gale Literature Resource Center is your number one best bet for literary criticism. Make sure you click on the tab called "Literature Criticism" and check out the links on the left side of the screen to narrow your search.

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Once you have mined Gale Literature Resource Center (also known as LRC), you are ready for the big-time, also known as JSTOR. If you know this database by the time you go to college, you are guaranteed to impress the professors. There are so many articles on JSTOR that I suggest you go straight to the "Advanced Search" and try searching for your author in "item title." You might also want to add search terms to narrow your search. For example, you could try searching for the author AND the title of a work. Or you could try searching for the author AND an important theme in the works.

Historical New York Times If you are researching an author that is not contemporary, you may be interested in how critics responded to the author during his or her time period. Make sure you click on Historical Newspapers to get to the right database. The Historical New York Times contains all content from the New York Times from 1851-2007. If you, for example, wanted to see how critics responded to Mark Twain in his time, this is the best place to go. Make sure you limit your searches appropriately, and see Ms. Voss for help.

Columbia Granger's World of Poetry If you are researching a poet, you should also try this database. Search for a poet and then click on the tab called "Commentaries" at the top of the search results for in-depth analysis of specific poems.

Research Apps for your Phone
Gale App Just scan the QR code to put a Gale app directly on your phone, and voila! You are ready to research anytime, anywhere.