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ENG 120: Fieldwork Secondary Research

Field Work & Ethnography Assignment

For the Fieldwork assignment, students will:

  • Take detailed field notes during (2) 1-hour observation sessions.
  • Reflect on collected notes that consider about member interaction, communication practices, norms, and culture.
  • Determine patterns which require support from secondary research sources.

In the boxes below, you will find videos and tips that will help you craft searches and locate secondary sources.

Search Tools

The best place to start for scholarly research to support your fieldwork findings is the QuickSearch tool on the Pace Library homepage. The video below will walk you through doing searches and locating the resource. 

It is possible to locate reliable, scholarly research on Google. Most of those articles will be different than those available through the Pace Library so it's ok to check both!

  • Use Scholar.Google.com and search on that resource that focuses on research articles
  • Add the terms scholarly articles to your searches on Google
  • Reminder: NEVER pay for articles online. If you are prompted to pay, ask a librarian for how to access that article. 

Watch the video below for additional strategies to evaluating the information you find on Google. 

The Opposing Viewpoints database includes essays, articles, statistics, and more giving the pro and con sides on topical social and political issues. 

What is a scholarly article?

You are required to locate scholarly secondary sources that support your analysis of your observations. But how do you identify one?

 

What is a scholarly article? 

Scholarly articles are written by experts in an academic or professional field. They differ from commentary or news articles in their purpose which is to outline original research or original analysis of a topic. 

For example, a marketing scholar might study the impact of COVID on small businesses. A journalism scholar might study people's perceptions of news in order to inform policy on misinformation.

What are the parts of a scholarly article?

Scholarly articles follow pretty standard outlines which helps readers locate specific information more quickly as they read. 

  • Abstract: A brief summary of the article that usually includes their research question, methods & conclusions.
  • Introduction: Describes a background of the research topic and concept definitions.
  • Literature Review: Explains and cites previous research on the broad topic & the specific research question.
  • Methodology: Explains how the study was conducted. Including samples taken and measures to gather & analyze results.
  • Discussion/Results: Presents and explains the outcome of any data gathering + testing. Also explains the impact on the topic and future research potential.
  • Conclusion: Summarizes the entire study. May address limitations in the application of the results.

See the example article below with the "anatomy" of these sections outlined in colors. 

Anatomy of a Research Article (JK) by Jessica Kiebler