PRELIMINARIES: Read carefully through the profile of Polycat on Dr. Schwartz's Guide to Kennedy Library Research Tools.  Be sure you are clear about what it is, what it contains, when (and why) to use it, its strengths and its limitations.

 The first stop in any research project should be the Kennedy Library.  Yes, even in the electronic age, you should go there IN PERSON!  Once in the library, follow these steps to identify useful secondary sources -- studies ABOUT your author, topic or work.  Keep careful notes of the specific searches you try and their specific results (the type of search, the search terms used, the number of records generated, and their degree of usefulness).  You will compile this information for your first report to the class Research Archive.

1) First, look up your primary source itself by doing an "author" search for your author (if applicable, be sure to check alternate spellings, e.g. Christine de Pisan and Christine de Pizan) and by doing a "title" search for your title (if applicable, be sure to check: both full and partial titles, e.g. both Canterbury Tales and Franklin's Tale; both original language and translation of title, e.g. Romance of the Rose and Roman de la Rose; and any commonly used alternate titles, e.g. both Yvain and The Knight with the Lion).  Note that these searches will generate a list of primary sources -- books by your author and/or editions/translations of your work -- rather than secondary sources -- studies ABOUT your author, topic or work.  So since your task is to find useful secondary sources on your topic, why bother?  Because secondary sources ON your topic are typically shelved next to editions and translations of the primary works they discuss.  One of the best ways to begin your research is to figure out where primary sources by your author are shelved (note the call numbers) and go BROWSE THE STACKS!  See what looks interesting, and select a few items to check out. (Hint:  smart researchers let the critics they find in the stacks work for them:  consult THEIR bibliographies and look for / order any items that sound promising!)

2) Go back to Polycat and try some "word" and "subject" searches on your author and/or title (try both with and without quotation marks if it is more than one word) and/or on your author plus key words from your title or from specific topics you are interested in.  Again, note the type of search, the search terms, and the number and sorts of results you obtain for each search combination (are the hits useful? off topic? too many to sift through?), as you will need to include these details in your report to the Research Archive. Once you have found some good secondary sources on your topic, 1) note author, title and call number so that you can retrieve these works from the stacks; AND 2) go into the record and check the subject headings it is catalogued under.  Click on those links to determine what other works share the same subject headings; they are fertile grounds in which to look for good resources on your topic.

NOTE: Oddly, it is not always fruitful to begin your research by doing a subject search, since the precise subject headings under which an item is listed are not always easy to guess.  For instance, suppose you are planning to write a research paper on Shakespeare's Rosalind in As You Like It.  There are 503 (!) subject headings in Polycat that contain the word "Shakespeare"; unless you feel like scrolling through all of them, it can take some time to discover that secondary sources on your topic are catalogued under the subjects " Shakespeare William 1564 1616 Criticism And Interpretation" (288 records, many of which won't be useful); "Shakespeare William 1564 1616 Criticism Textual" (40 records, many of which will not be useful); "Shakespeare William 1564 1616 Comedies" (51 records, only some of which will prove useful"; "Shakespeare, William, 1564-1616. As you like it" (5 records, two of which look promising); "Shakespeare, William, 1564-1616. As you like it -- Criticism, Textual" (1 record which is clearly a secondary source but may or may not have information on Rosalind).  A subject search on "Shakespeare's heroines" yields nothing; a word search yields one volume containing an essay that may or not be relevant, while a word search on "Shakespeare heroine" yields a DIFFERENT volume contatining a DIFFERENT essay which may or may not be relevant, etc.  Finally, a word search on the phrase "As you like it" including the quotation marks yields 35 records, some of which are irrelevant but several of which are promising resources which I hadn't come across in any of the other searches.

3) Assuming that you have found both the primary works on your topic and some useful secondary sources, try this trick:  use the call numbers found in the previous exercises to help track down useful works which were  not there when you browsed in the stacks (e.g. because they are in transit, misshelved, checked out by another patron or on reserve).  Go back to Polycat (from the library or remotely) and use the "search by call number" function to browse the collection by call number beginning with the call numbers which you noted in the first parts of this exercise (for both primary sources and useful secondary sources).  You will in effect be browsing the stacks electronically, finding the Polycat listings for items which would be shelved near your author or text if they were not checked out, missing, on reserve, etc.

• Should you come across an item that you are interested which is checked out to another patron, you may place a hold on that item (recall it) online (use the "place a hold" tab in the Polycat entry and type in your name and barcode at the prompts).  But, in a seminar with a common area of inquiry,  it's good manners to ask your classmates / professor if they have the book checked out and would be willing to share it before placing a hold.  You can do so verbally in class, by checking reports of "Kennedy Library Results" in the research archive, or by querying the class email alias ("Does anybody have . . . ? Would you mind if I had a look at it?").
• If an item is not checked out (and not on reserve) but you can't find it in the stacks, proceed to the front Circulation Desk and fill out a Search card; library staff will initiate a search for the item and email you when it is located.  Of, if it's officially declared lost, they will authorize you to order it from off campus (which you cannot normally do for items within our collections).

Please type (or cut and past) your reports directly into Blackboard -- do not submit them to the archive as attachments.  Start a separate "thread" for each report.  (My replies to your reports will be part of the same threads; for subsequent reports, you will start a separate "thread.".)  

Report One: "Searching Polycat."  Provide a specific and detailed account of your search process: what you looked for, where/how you searched, and what you found.  Be sure to specify the specific types of searches you tried, using what specific search terms, and report how many results each of these searches generated; comment on how many of these results were actually useful secondary sources on your topic.  In this report, you do not need to list specific titles.   The subject line of this report should read "Searching Polycat." 

Report Two: "Kennedy Library Results."  Provide a list of all the works you have checked out so that a classmate wishing to consult the work in question can have the courtesy to ask you about it, rather than recalling it from you. (If desired, you may also provide a separate list noting items that looked interesting, but that you did not check out).  List items alphabetically by author; provide a complete bibliographic citation in correct MLA format followed by the item's call number.  The subject line of this report should read "Kennedy Library results."
 

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