Robbins Library Notes

Good morning, readers!

Today, I’ll outline the concept of “the literature search.”  Some of you may be wondering what exactly a literature search, or “lit. search,” is.

What is a literature search?

Basically, a literature search is a large search, usually over a broad range of resources and time period, to see what has been written about a particular topic.

The term “lit. search” is sometimes used when looking for one or two articles, but, properly speaking, lit. searches are, as noted above, broad searches for many articles, not targeted, focused searches.  If you are searching for a specific article, you are not doing a lit. search.

Here is an example to illustrate my definition.  Last fall, I was asked to do a literature search on the topic of “inner speech” in the database, MEDLINE. The patron was interested in the topic, and wanted to learn if any other research aside from the that being done by the one researcher with whom the patron was familiar existed.  Using just the phrase “inner speech” across the whole time period of the database turned up over a hundred articles going back to 1969.

When do you do a literature search?

Most often, a lit. search is performed when you want to get a broad background on a topic, e.g., when doing the preliminary research for a dissertation.  Another example would be for writing a book, or an article, to see what else has been done on a topic about which you are writing.

What databases would you use for a literature search?

For philosophical research, Philosopher’s Index and Arts & Humanities Index are two good places to begin.  However, the choice of database may vary with your topic; thus, it’s very important to establish at the start what exactly you’re looking for, since this will help guide you to the relevant resources.  (Remember the first guideline from my Searching 101: Research Guidelines post!)

As with my example above, of “inner speech”: both Philosopher’s Index and Arts & Humanities Citation Index would have been of limited help in answering this question, given its scientific and medical bent.  MEDLINE was the proper database to use, and was the one that the patron requested.  Likewise, for a literature search on philosophy of law or legal issues, LexisNexis is a relevant database, and perhaps the archives of law journals on JSTOR.

Speaking of JSTOR, it is useful for lit. searches of older materials.  However, I would not use it alone, unless your question is specifically looking at older research.  You are much better off combining it with other current database, so as not to miss more recent work.

Examples of Literature Searches

The list of potential literature searches is endless.  Here are four that I have been asked to do in my ten years as a librarian:

• All research on “inner speech” in MEDLINE
• All articles published on topics in early modern philosophy in the last 10 years
• All references to Alan Greenspan being “God” or “a god” in the popular press, from mid-1998 to late 1999.  (Yes, this was a real lit. search I was asked to do once.  How times have changed…)
• All literature on Hannah Arendt and research examining her project as being a phenomenological one

Hopefully, these examples give you some idea of what a literature is.

Summary

As I noted above, a literature search is a large search, usually over a broad range of resources and time period, to see what has been written about a particular topic.  There’s no trick to it, really, other than to dive in and start doing them.  As I’ve found, the more literature searches you do, the better you get at them, because you start to learn the quirks and tricks that will help you to define and refine your searches.  And if you get stuck, consult my searching guidelines post… or just ask me! I’m very happy to help. 

Good morning, readers!

Today is the start of the Spring 2009 term, and I’m set and ready to help you with your information needs!

To get you started:

• Helpful cheat sheets on searching
• Useful databases for philosophical research
  

With what else can I help you?

Good morning, readers!  Happy Monday to you!

Some of you may not know about Project MUSE, a database of online journals maintained by Johns Hopkins University.  Project MUSE is a great database to use for research in the humanities, and especially in philosophy.

Last week, I was sent a link to a vodcast (video podcast), highlighting how to use the Library of Congress (LC) subject headings to refine your searching in Project MUSE, and, by extension, in library catalogs.  Here’s the promotion from Project MUSE:

A vodcast is a video podcast. The MUSE vodcast is a tool for both users and librarians and runs just over three minutes in length. Users can learn, on their own, what subject headings are, where to find them in MUSE, and how they help locate articles specific to a research topic. Librarians may find the vodcast useful as a supplement to instruction classes. The vodcast is a lighthearted approach to demystifying the notion of Library of Congress Subject Headings as they appear in MUSE.

On the MUSE website, find the link for the vodcast in the Training Materials section under the Tools & Resources and Librarians tabs, http://muse.jhu.edu/about/resources/vodcasts.html.

I’ve watched the video, and it is indeed amusing and funny, and very helpful in showing someone how to use the LC subject headings in Project MUSE.  It’s a good illustration of using search limiters to target a search and locate articles on the topic you’re researching.

If you’d like to learn more, please contact me to arrange a bibliographic instruction session.  I’d love to show you!

Good morning, readers, and happy Friday to you!

Looking ahead to Spring Term 2009, which begins in a few weeks, I want to remind my readers that I do far more than making scans and photocopies. For instance:

• Interested in learning more about the various resources available to you at Harvard, and how to maximize their use?  Contact me for a bibliographic instruction session.  One-on-one, small groups, large groups — I’m willing to tailor a session to your needs.  Want to include a session as part of your course?  Contact me and we can discuss.
• Need some help with research?  I’m happy to assist if you want a fresh pair of eyes on a search, or just some help so as to take pressure off your schedule.
• Would like someone to proofread your philosophy paper, or to offer some guidance on what to write?  I’d be glad to do so.
• Web site help — would you like to set up a personal Web page?  I can help you get this process started, and to consult with you on how to build and to design your site.

How else can I assist you with your information and research needs?  Please let me know!

Good morning, readers!

I found a few items on Google and searching yesterday that you might find of interest:

• Google SearchWiki – A Beginner’s Guide
• Google Introduces SearchWiki, But Does It Have a Downside?
• Can you ditch Google for a metasearch engine?
• The future of search: Do you ask Google or the gaggle?

A hat-tip to Garrett Eastman and the Rowland Institute at Harvard’s Library News & Notes, December 12, 2008 for these links.

Good morning, readers!

Thanks to those of you who have sent in suggestions — they are greatly appreciated.  Please keep them coming in.  I’m happy to receive them.

A few days ago, I received a suggestion in which the reader asked the question: “Which feeds, mailing lists, webpages, etc. should one monitor to get ALL of the information on new publications?”  The reader, interested in early modern philosophy, and Kant in particular, wants to know if there is a way in which one can be informed of the latest publications from publishers, without having to search through publisher catalogs and Web sites.  It’s a very good question — here’s what I’ve found in answer to it.

I have not, to date, located one aggregator site or place that lists every new publication in philosophy.  Given the large number of books published every year — including philosophy — I’m not sure how feasible creating such an aggregator site or resource would be.

However, there are several resources that, used together, will likely give you a fairly robust list of new philosophy publications.  The majority of the books provided by these resources will be in English, though other languages (most notably German and French) will appear also.

• Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews.  This is a great site to learn about new philosophy books.  Oftentimes, I learn about books of potential interest from reading the reviews.

• Philosopher’s Index. This database is probably the closest thing to an aggregator site at present, though it is far from complete.  The database does list books among its records, and with the CSA Illumina interface, you can view records by book, book chapter, article, book review, and so forth.

Example — You want to search for recent books on Kant listed in Philosopher’s Index.  When you login, go to the Advanced Search Screen, if this is not set as your default search option.  Enter in “Kant” for your search term in the first line, setting the limiter to “Keyword.”  (Why?  Because this will focus the search more on books that specifically deal with Kant, rather than those that merely mention him off-hand.)  Next, go down to the “Date Range” field, to limit your search to the last year or so.  I chose 2007-2009 as a range.  Below that, in the Philosopher’s Index Indexes & Limits section, click on the “Browse Publication Type” link, and in the window that opens, click on “book,” then “Add to Search.”  When that window closes, click on “Search” and you should get 329 results, which are subdivided into books, chapters/essays, and book reviews, respectively.

• Book Reviews in Journals. Many philosophy journals carry book reviews, which are worth checking out, some more extensive than others.  (The Review of Metaphysics has an especially in-depth one once a year, for example.)  For those interested in Kant, e.g., Kant-Studien offers book reviews.  Thus, I’d suggesting checking out whatever journals focus on your interests, as they may let you know about the latest and greatest books in your area(s) of interest.

• Philosophical Books. This is a great journal to read in order to learn about new books being published in philosophy.  As the blurb on the Wiley-Interscience site reads, “Philosophical Books carries extensive discussions of major new publications in all areas of analytic philosophy.  The journal includes: book symposia in which two or three writers discuss a book and the author replies; articles discussing recent work in particular fields; full-blown critical notices; and short, one-page reviews”  I’d check this journal out on a regular basis.

• Publisher Web Sites: E-mail and RSS Feeds. Many publisher Web sites now offer the option of signing up for periodic e-mails and RSS feeds of notifications of new materials.  I’ve known several scholars who have done this, who then let me know so that we can look into acquiring the book for the Robbins collection.  A quick look reveals that Cambridge University Press, Oxford University Press, Harvard University Press, and Yale University Press all offer e-mail alerts and RSS feeds.  So these might be worth subscribing to.  Other university and academic presses will likely have them as well.

• Ask Your Friendly, Neighborhood Librarian. Seriously!  I get a number of catalogs on a regular basis, so, if you ask me to keep an eye out for certain topics, persons, and the like, I’d be very happy to let you know when something new comes out.

Are there other resources out there that my readers use which might be of help?  What about non-English philosophy books?

Good morning, readers!

Many of you are likely aware of, and perhaps are (heavy) users of, Google Book Search.  For those who don’t know, Google Book Search allows users to search for full-text, scanned copies of millions of books, many of which are out-of-print or hard to find.

However, Google Book Search has not been without controversy.  Some of the books which have been scanned into the database are still in copyright.  This hasn’t made the publishing industry or authors happy, because they view Google Book Search as a violation of copyright, which means no revenue from royalties and such that authors and publishers are owed.  Google, on the other hand, saw their scanning project as falling under the “fair use” clause of copyright.

Needless to say, the upshot of this led to a lawsuit filed by the Authors Guild against Google.  Two days ago, after a few years of negotiations, the Authors Guild and Google reached a deal.*  All sides have come to an agreement that allows Google Book Search to continue while paying authors and publishers (back) royalties for their work.

Why is this important to philosophical research?  Well, from what I’m reading, it looks like the deal will benefit all the interested parties — Google will be able to keep the books it has scanned in the database, and continue to add even more books to its database, which means that more texts become available to researchers.  It also means that publishers and authors will get paid what they’re due, and which may make them more amenable to contributing to the database.

Additionally, beyond the mere pragmatic aspects of the settlement, it also raises some interesting questions about the nature of texts, and our interactions with texts, something touched on in a slightly different context by Peter Brantley, in “Homes for Good (Orphan) Books.”

How do we, as philosophers, engage with and access philosophical texts in pedagogy, writing, and research?  There are some interesting and as yet barely discussed questions around these issues.

Thoughts, readers?

Update 11/03/2008: There has been some additional discussion on Peter Brantley’s blog, which is worth reading.

*A hat-tip to the family member who forwarded this on to me.

Good morning, readers!

Last week, I was forwarded a link to “Wikipedia and the Meaning of Truth: Why the online encyclopedia’s epistemology should worry those who care about traditional notions of accuracy,” by Simson L. Garfinkel, from the November/December 2008 issue of MIT Technology Review.

Yes, I’m continuing the debate on Wikipedia, for two reasons.  Why?

Well, for one, because I think the use of Wikipedia needs more real discussion than it has received to date, from what I’m reading and hearing.  Wikipedia is ubiquitous, and so many students, and not a few researchers, use it as part of their work.  Thus, to simply throw up our hands in defeat and accept Wikipedia without question is defeatist.  Likewise, the other extreme, of outright banning its use, is a bit reactionary, in my view.  Let us understand exactly what Wikipedia is, what its standards for accuracy and truth are, how it is organized, and such.  From there, we can determine its uses and relevance.

Secondly, there are some fascinating philosophical questions in this article about epistemology, truth, objectivity, standards, and many other things that have been held dear for many centuries in Western culture.  In my view, these questions are ones the philosophically-minded should be weighing in on as Wikipedia gets debated.

So, why is “wikitruth” problematic?  According to Garfinkel:

So how do the Wikipedians decide what’s true and what’s not? On what is their epistemology based?

Unlike the laws of mathematics or science, wikitruth isn’t based on principles such as consistency or observa­bility. It’s not even based on common sense or firsthand experience. Wikipedia has evolved a radically different set of epistemological standards–standards that aren’t especially surprising given that the site is rooted in a Web-based community, but that should concern those of us who are interested in traditional notions of truth and accuracy. On Wikipedia, objective truth isn’t all that important, actually. What makes a fact or statement fit for inclusion is that it appeared in some other publication–ideally, one that is in English and is available free online. “The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth,” states Wikipedia’s official policy on the subject.

Verifiability is one of Wikipedia’s three core content policies; it was codified back in August 2003. The two others are “no original research” (December 2003) and “neutral point of view,” which the Wikipedia project inherited from Nupedia, an earlier volunteer-written Web-based free encyclopedia that existed from March 2000 to September 2003 (Wikipedia’s own NPOV policy was codified in December 2001). These policies have made Wikipedia a kind of academic agora where people on both sides of politically charged subjects can rationally discuss their positions, find common ground, and unemotionally document their differences. Wikipedia is successful because these policies have worked….

Verifiability is really an appeal to au­thority–not the authority of truth, but the authority of other publications. Any other publication, really. These days, information that’s added to Wikipedia without an appropriate reference is likely to be slapped with a “citation needed” badge by one of Wikipedia’s self-appointed editors. Remove the badge and somebody else will put it back. Keep it up and you might find yourself face to face with another kind of authority–one of the English-language Wikipedia’s 1,500 administrators, who have the ability to place increasingly restrictive protections on contentious pages when the policies are ignored….

So what is Truth? According to Wikipedia’s entry on the subject, “the term has no single definition about which the majority of professional philosophers and scholars agree.” But in practice, Wikipedia’s standard for inclusion has become its de facto standard for truth, and since Wikipedia is the most widely read online reference on the planet, it’s the standard of truth that most people are implicitly using when they type a search term into Google or Yahoo. On Wikipedia, truth is received truth: the consensus view of a subject.

That standard is simple: something is true if it was published in a newspaper article, a magazine or journal, or a book published by a university press–or if it appeared on Dr. Who.

Thoughts?  Comments on Wikipedia’s understanding of truth?

A hat-tip to Slashdot.org and my forwarder for this article.

At left: “Multiple cloud-to-ground and cloud-to-cloud lightning strokes during night-time.” Source: NOAA.

Good morning, readers!  Happy Monday to you!

A few weeks ago, I received a very interesting request that I want to share with you, because it turned out to be more involved and trickier than I had originally anticipated.  Here’s how the search unfolded…

A patron contacted me, and was interested in learning what ancient philosophers (e.g., Thales, Aristotle, and the like) had called the phenomena of electricity and electromagnetism.  He was curious since the word “electricity” is of relatively recent origin — the Oxford English Dictionary lists the first use of the word at around 1646 — even though these two phenomena were well-known in antiquity from observations of static electricity generated by amber and lodestone.   Armed with this information, I began to plan my search.

For the reader’s clarification: all of the text that follows in bold font are steps from my Searching 101: Guidelines post, to highlight the importance of focusing on the how of searching, i.e., the method of searching.

First off, what is the question? The question is, simply: what word or words did the ancient philosophers use to describe the phenomena of electricity and electromagnetism?  That’s fairly straightforward, and doesn’t require too much additional clarification.

Next, what search terms come to mind? “History,” “electricity,” “electromagnetism,” “Greek(s),” and “Thales” come to mind.  Also, knowing that classical discussions of electricity and electromagnetism arose out of observations of static electricity created by rubbing amber on cloth and of lodestone, we could add the terms “amber” and “lodestone” to the search as well.  Variants and truncated forms of these words should be considered, too, as part of the Synonym Game.

Thirdly, where should we look first? It’s generally best to start searching in a narrow space, and then broaden out the search.  As you read through where I looked, hopefully you will get a sense for this practice of applying Ockham’s Razor.

The first place I checked was Greek Thought: a Guide to Classical Knowledge, edited by Jacques Brunschwig and Geoffrey E.R. Lloyd (Robbins Philosophy DF78 .S2813 2000), as this is usually a great source for information on the classical world.  However, none of the entries discussed views on electricity in the ancient world.  Nor did any of the encyclopedias that I consulted next — the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, or the Encyclopedia of Philosophy.  Now was I getting intrigued.  None of these big sources were mentioning anything.

This omission isn’t completely surprising, given that the question focuses more on history of science than it does on philosophy. Nonetheless, I found it strange to find not even a passing reference to Thales, or to Aristotle, whom I would expect have something to say on the topic.

At this point, I decided to look in HOLLIS, to see what histories of science or histories of the science of electricity might be available.  First, I tried searching “electricity” and “history” as title words in the Expanded Search screen, but turned up very little.  I re-entered these terms, changing the search box to search only subject terms.  The first hit turned out to be the major find of this search:

• Baigrie, B. S. (2007). Electricity and magnetism: a historical perspective. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press.

Baigrie’s book has a great introductory chapter on electricity in the ancient world, as well as a chapter on the 13th century scientist, Peter of Maricourt (sometimes known as “Peter Peregrinus”), who wrote at least one letter, and reportedly a treatise (now lost), on electricity and electromagnetism.  Much of the information that I used to erect the framework of my answer to the patron is drawn from this work.

However, Baigrie’s text was the only recent book that I found that covered the study of electricity and electromagnetism in the ancient world.  Most books, if they even made a passing reference to Thales, treated the study of electricity, and science in general, as beginning only in the early modern era.  Oftentimes, they omitted anything before the 16th century altogether. I’m not sure why this is so, but it is interesting to note.

Next, I decided to search the journals Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, Journal of the History of Philosophy, and Journal of the History of Ideas.  I ran into the same results that I did with the books: no references to the ancients, and all references beginning with the early modern era, regardless of how I manipulated the search terms “history,” “electricity,” “Ancients,” “Greeks,” “Thales,” etc.  Moving to broader search engines, like Arts & Humanities Citation Index still turned up nothing relevant.

At this point, I decided that the final stop would be Google Scholar.  Entering in “history” and “electricity” in the advanced search option, and limiting the results to Social Sciences, Arts, and Humanities, I turned up two very interesting results, which filled out the missing pieces:

• Benjamin, P. (1898). A history of electricity. New York: John Wiley & Sons.
• Ricker III, H. H. (2005). Magnetism of the Greek Era. The General Science Journal.

The first book was available in electronic format via Google Books, as it is out of copyright. Both gave extensive information about the various views on electricity and electromagnetism in the ancient world, some versions of which lasted well into the 19th century.  And they confirmed each other and what I had learned in Baigrie’s book, all of which triangulated my results.

Finally, I knew when to say when. At this point, I realized that I had answered the question satisfactorily.  I typed up a page of results for my patron, and sent them along.

One thing readers might want to note at the end of this post is that, even for a straightforward question such as I was given, the search become quite complicated and involved, involving a lot of trial and error to track down the requested information.  Oftentimes this happens — what appears to be a simple research question will require a good deal of searching in multiple sources.  So, the moral of the story is: don’t give up too quickly if you don’t find the information right away.  It may just require a little more digging to locate.

What do you think, readers?  Is there another way I might have answered this question?  Another source I might have considered?  Please leave your answers in the comments box…

Good morning, readers, and welcome back from the weekend!

I had some final thoughts over the weekend about last week’s “It’s Not All on JSTOR” posts that I want to share with you this morning.

First off, I’m not picking on JSTOR in particular — indeed, I could have written “It’s Not All on Academic Search Premier,” or, “It’s Not All on Google Scholar,” or, “It’s Not All on [insert name of database or search engine one might use exclusively].”  My intention, rather, was to highlight the dangers of using one and only resource when trying to do philosophical research.

Secondly, as St. Thomas Aquinas said in the Prooemium to De Ente et Essentia, a small mistake at the beginning leads to major errors in the end.  Keeping this in mind, the real point of these posts is to focus on the how of searching, i.e., how you set up your searches, how you think about searching, how you formulate your research questions when you start, how you determine where to look, and so forth.  In other words, make sure your searches, even if for only one article, are set up properly right from the start. If you stop and take a few minutes to think about this process before you start searching, you may find that, over time, your searching becomes easier and less frustrating.  Following the guidelines that I’ve laid out, you will find that you will spend less time searching for materials in the wrong places, and more time find them in the right places.

The good news for my philosophically-trained readers is that we are trained to make sure we have our questions clearly stated and articulated right from the beginning.  So, it’s really just a matter of taking a skill we use in one context, and employing it in a slightly different one.

Thoughts?