Internet Research Report

The present Reader's Log differs from all others in that it does not require you to post responses on the Assessments Portfolio. Instead, it directs you to conduct online research and submit a report on the results by e-mail. You may make your essay an integral part of an e-mail message or you may send it as an attachment in either Word or WordPerfect. You should write Research Report on the subject line of your message.

Although the chief purpose of this exercise is to orient you to the tools of online literary research, it will also add to your knowledge of Jane Austen, a major author from the era covered by our course whom we otherwise have not had time to consider. A number of the following exercises will ask you to perform bibliographic searches on Austen.

Respond to each of the items below as instructed. In responding to the request for bibliographical listings below, you should use the MLA style. Underlining or italics for book and journal titles may not show up if you decide to transmit your report as an integral part of an e-mail message rather than as an attachment in Word or WordPerfect. I will give you the benefit of the doubt in case they don't. You should use quotation marks where they usually occur, as around the title of articles, tales, or poems. You will find assistance in the MLA style through items 2 and 3 below.

ONLINE USE OF WSU LIBRARY (items 1 to 7):

Access the library home page at http://library.weber.edu/. Take a few minutes to orient yourself to it. You will find resources of use to you far beyond the requirements of English 4630.

In the following assignment, go to each initial location as indicated and from there go to the subsidiary locations as directed by a > symbol. Carry out each set of instructions carefully. Please enumerate your responses to each of the items below in the order in which they are given. Please repeat the capitalized heading for each of the numbered items. You may send your report as an integral part of an e-mail message or as an attachment in Word or WordPerfect. The disadvantage of sending it as an integral part of an e-mail message is that you may not be able to indicate italics and underlines where the MLA style of documentation requires them. In that case, I will give you the benefit of the doubt, assuming that you know the appropriate font.

1. HOW TO SEARCH THE INTERNET: Library Home Page > Find > Guides > How Do I … > Find Information > Articles > Finding Articles. As a part of your report, summarize the information found at this location. Completing the exercise at the end is not required though you will find it instructive to do so.

2. MLA STYLE OF DOCUMENTATION: Library Home Page > Learn > Information Literacy > How Do I > Research > Cite Print and Electronic Resources > About Citing and Documenting Research. Quote the three reasons why documentation is important. Then drop down to the examples of the MLA style. Copy these five models of MLA style into your report. You should also print them for your own reference and adhere to them as closely as you can in performing the tasks below. Be sure to model you own future documentation of materials in this class on the MLA style.

3. MORE DETAIL ON MLA STYLE OF DOCUMENTATION: Library Home Page > Learn > Information Literacy> How Do I Research > Cite Print and Electronic Resources > Internet Resources > MLA Citation Style-Cornell University . You will find here a very helpful and complete online reference on MLA style created by Cornell University . Describe the parenthetical style of documentation in a way that clearly distinguishes it from a style of documentation relying on footnotes or endnotes. This information will be found in the Cornell guide, which you should examine closely. Bookmark this site so that you can return to it when encountering problems of documentation.

4. WSU ONLINE CATALOG: Library Home Page > Find > Library Catalogs > Stewart Library Catalog. Do a general keyword search by entering the name Jane Austen for a list of books by and about Jane Austen, both printed and electronic, available through the Stewart Library. List one book by Austen and one book about her, giving full bibliographic data in MLA format.

5. OFF CAMPUS ACCESS. Library Home Page > Find > Articles and Data Bases > Connecting from Home. Briefly summarize the instructions given here on accessing the library's data bases and resources from home and tell how to get your student Banner Identification number. (DO NOT give your actual Banner ID number in your report.)

6. OFF CAMPUS ACCESS, FULL TEXT ARTICLES: Library Home Page > Find > Articles and Data Bases > Data Base Finder > Arts and Humanities (from drop down menu) > Academic Search Premier > Enter Jane Austen in search box (limit your results by clicking on Full Text). At one point in this process, you will be required to enter your Banner Identification number. Download an article of several pages, preferably from a scholarly journal rather than from a popular magazine, and browse in it a little. You should be aware that an article available in PDF will probably take longer to download than an article in HTML. Make a proper bibliographical entry for this article, following MLA style for articles accessed online. Annotate this bibliographical information by adding a paragraph below it in which you summarize the apparent intent of the article and offer an opinion as to how it would be useful if you were writing a paper on one or more of Austen=s novels.

7. OFF CAMPUS ACCESS, MLA BIBLIOGRAPHY: Library Home Page > Find > Articles & Databases > Data Base Finder > Arts & Humanities (from the drop down menu) > MLA Bibliography. Unless you have already logged in, you will be required to enter your Banner Identification number at some point in the foregoing process. The MLA Bibliography is the most authoritative and comprehensive bibliography within the large area of modern languages and literature, including English. It does not offer full text articles; rather, it gives you bibliographical information about where the articles may be found. It is unlikely that you would use this when writing a term paper in a literature class. You would typically use it when doing research for a paper in a graduate seminar or a master=s thesis. Do a search on scholarly writings about Pride and Prejudice, Emma, or Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen. Select an item and give the full bibliographical information on it in MLA format.

WEB SEARCHES (items 8 and 9).

Using a search engine, surf the Web in search of sites relating to Jane Austen. If you subscribe to a major Internet portal such as AOL, MSN, Yahoo!, or Excite, you will have a search engine on your home page. There are many other search engines. Google, Lycos, Ask Jeeves, and Go are among them. Ordinarily you can locate such services by entering, as in the case of Google, www.google.com, on your browser=s Web access box.

Be sure to follow the appropriate MLA model for Internet sites in completing the following.

8. ELECTRONIC TEXTS: Do a search for sites which offer full texts of works by Jane Austen, which may be read online. Locate an electronic copy of one of the following major novels: Northanger Abbey, Mansfield Park , Pride and Prejudice, Emma, or Sense and Sensibility , and read the first chapter. Give bibliographical data on the site in proper MLA format. Responding to Austen's general reputation of being a master of subtle, good natured satire, judge whether, in this first chapter of the novel you have chosen, Austen demonstrates a gently satirical attitude toward her characters.

9. LITERARY CRITICISM: List five substantial Web sites about Jane Austen. Annotate each entry (that is, give an evaluative paragraph beneath the entry), describing its content and evaluating its apparent worth. Particularly address the question of each site's reliability and authoritativeness. Cast your entries in proper MLA format. Following is the model given you on the WSU library's site.

Liu, Alan. The Voice of the Shuttle. 30 Oct. 1999 . U. of California , Irvine . 6 Jul. 2001

As you see here, entries for Web sites should include in the following order: name of author or authors, if any; title of article or specific Web site; date the site was created or last updated; title of the organization which sponsors the Web site; date of your accessing the site; URL (the site's World Wide Web address).