ABSTRACT: (1) A short summary of an ARTICLE in a scholarly JOURNAL. It usually appears at the beginning of the article. (2) A printed or electronic INDEX to journal, magazine, newspaper, articles that not only provides a CITATION to the articles, but also a brief summary of each article. (3) A summary of a paper presented at a conference. The full text of the paper is not always published. (See also Indexes) AGGREGATORS: Vendors of databases. ALMANAC: A publication that provides data, facts, figures, statistics and tables for different subjects. ALERTS: A research profile/strategy that you may preset to have table of contents or lists of article citations e-mailed directly to you. ARCHIVE : A non-circulating collection preserved for historical purposes. Materials are in a variety of formats including rare books, manuscripts, personal papers, organizational records, photographs, films, posters, and memorabilia. ARTICLE: A (brief) essay or research report on a subject. Articles can appear in MAGAZINEs, JOURNALs, newspapers, full text online databases, or other sources such as encyclopedias. ASK A LIBRARIAN : The choices of reference services from the BC Libraries that includes the ability to receive help from a librarian via live, online chat from your office, home, or dorm room. ATLAS: A bound volume of maps, charts, plates or tables illustrating any subject. AUTHOR :The writer of a book or ARTICLE. Usually this is a person (or several people), but it can also be a government agency, a symposium, a company, or other group that does not necessarily give the name(s) of the people who actually wrote the work. Such an author is referred to as a Corporate Author . Examples of corporate authors are: American Chemical Society, U.S. Department of Commerce, or Boston College. B BAR CODE: A small white label with closely spaced black stripes that can be read by a computer. Bar codes on books and your EagleOne Card are used to CHARGE OUT books from the library. BIBLIOGRAPHY: (1) A group of CITATIONS used to research a topic. These are gathered together at the end of the article, book, or paper, usually arranged alphabetically by AUTHOR. (2) A publication that consists only of a list of books, ARTICLEs and other works on a particular topic. Sometimes bibliographies are annotated, that is, they include brief ABSTRACTS summarizing the important features of the works. Bibliographies of both types can be very valuable in locating information on a subject. BIOGRAPHY: A book or an article about a person. BLOG: An online discussion forum. BOSTON LIBRARY CONSORTIUM: The Boston Library Consortium, BLC, is a cooperative association composed of sixteen academic and research libraries. The Consortium allows BLC community members access to the catalogs and collections of the member libraries. BOUND PERIODICAL : Several consecutive issues of a JOURNAL, MAGAZINE or newspaper, are placed together between two hardcovers so they resemble a book. These may be shelved with the print collection, in the stacks. C CALL NUMBER : The unique group of letters and numbers given to each item in the library according to its subject matter. A label with the call number is usually located on the spine or cover of the item and indicates where the item is shelved. CD-ROM : Compact Disk Read-Only-Memory is computer software which can hold large amounts of data including images and sound. CITATION: Basic information about a specific source of information. A citation for a book will include the Author, Title, and Place of publication, Publisher, and Year of publication. A citation for an article in the Periodical will add the title of the periodical, volume number, pages and date. A bibliography is a group of citations. CITATION STYLES: A particular method of documenting references. Some disciplines or academic departments require writers to use a specific style such as the Modern Language Association or American Psychological Association. There are handbooks for specific styles at the Reference Desk. CONFERENCE PAPERS / PROCEEDINGS : Research presentations from conferences and professional meetings that are published. CONTENT EVALUATION : Analysis of the content of an article, book, journal, website, film, or other media. Analysis may cover the relevancy of the material, the point of view of the author, the expertise of the author, depth of the material, intended audience, and location of the work within its genre. COPYRIGHT: Protection of intellectual property for a certain period of time. COVERAGE : The years, viewpoints, and content material covers. CRITICAL THINKING: The mental processes of conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and evaluating information. CURRENCY : How up to date material is. CURRENT AWARENESS or ALERTS: A research profile/strategy that you may pre-set to have table of contents or lists of article citations e-mailed directly to you. D DATABASE : A collection of organized information. The online catalog in a library is a database of the librarys holdings. Expanded Academic ASAP and the General BusinessFile ASAP are examples of electronic databases. DIRECTORY: An alphabetical or classified list, such as names and addresses. DISSERTATIONS : Doctorate level dissertations are sources of original research, and they can usually be found at the university at which they were completed. E EDITION or REVISION: The copy or version of a title. Some titles are updated or revised on a periodic basis to include updated material. ELECTRONIC JOURNAL: A journal, or version of a journal that is produced online. ENCYCLOPEDIA: A book or multi-volume set containing articles on a range of subjects. An encyclopedia may be general and multidisciplinary, or subject specific and comprehensive. F FAIR USE: Legally sound use of or paid use of copyrighted material. FULLTEXT: The complete work in either print, electronic, or microfilm format. G GIF: The Graphics Interchange Format (GIF) to view graphics or images on the web. GOVERNMENT DOCUMENTS: Publications originating in, or printed with the authority of the U.S. Government, state and local governments, international government and international organizations. You can use databases and Holmes to access government documents. For additional help, please consult the Government Documents librarian or a member of the reference staff.
Posted on: Tue, 11 Mar 2014 06:16:47 +0000
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