2008 Humanities & Social Science Resources

Resources for SURF Fellows
in the Humanities and Social Sciences

Research and Bibliographic Management

Part of your job as a researcher is to manage the results of your research. This means keeping track of your quotations, and the books, articles, webpages and other sources you use in your writing. This will help you build your bibliography and avoid plagiarism.

A handbook that is helpful to most student researchers is The Craft of Research, by Wayne Booth, et al. It gives guidance about structuring your paper, effective writing, making an argument, and using evidence. It's available in the Library and you can buy a new or used copy in many places.

How can I capture and keep track of my research?

There are several kinds of software to help you keep track of your research and to format your citations for footnotes and bibliographies. They generally offer ways to format your citations in the standard style manuals listed above. Here are three good ones. There are many others.

Refworks is free to Berkeley students, is web-based but requires you to set up an account, so your collection is available from any computer. It works with many of our databases, allowing you to automatically download the information from a database to Refworks.

Refworks tutorial: www.lib.berkeley.edu/Help/tutorials.html When you get to this page, scroll down to Refworks: Creating Bibliographies.

Endnote is similar to Refworks, but you have to buy your own software, which runs about $250. Your collection resides on your computer. It works with many of our databases, allowing you to automatically download the information from a database to Endnote. Endnote includes instructions, and the website also gives instruction.

Zotero is free to anyone, and resides on your own computer. If you have a laptop you can do your research anywhere and bring it all with you. Or you can install Zotero on a flash drive for portability. Zotero also allows you to save snapshots of anything from the Web, which you can notate and organize in a variety of ways. You can export these citations to Endnote or Refworks. Microsoft Word is compatible. The Zotero site offers tutorials and documentation.

What style manual should I use?

Each academic discipline has its own style manual. These are the standard titles, but ask your mentor to confirm. The Library website offers abridged versions of MLA, APA, and Chicago at <http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/Help/guides.html>www.lib.berkeley.edu/Help/guides.html. Turabian is a variation on Chicago.

Anthropology Chicago Manual of Style ("Chicago")
Art History Chicago Manual of Style
Biology Scientific style and format : the CBE manual for authors, editors, and publishers
Classics Modern Language Association Manual of Style ("MLA")
Comp Lit Modern Language Association Manual of Style
Economics Chicago Manual of Style
Education Chicago Manual of Style, or Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association ("APA")
English Modern Language Association Manual of Style
History Chicago Manual of Style
Law The Bluebook or Chicago Manual of Style
Psychology Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association

How do I avoid plagiarism?

"All written work submitted for a course, except for acknowledged quotations, must be expressed in the student's own words. It must also be constructed upon a plan of the student's own devising. Work copied without acknowledgment from a book, from another student's paper, from the internet, or from any other source is plagiarized. Plagiarism can range from wholesale copying of passages from another's work to using the views, opinions, and insights of another without acknowledgment, to paraphrasing another person's original phrases without acknowledgment." from the College of Letters and Sciences Faculty Help Desk FAQ

The easiest way to avoid plagiarism is to cite thoroughly. For a thoughtful look at how to use quotations, paraphrases and summaries, see: http://gsi.berkeley.edu/textonly/resources/conduct/paraphrase.html

How can I get help with my research?