Library Guides: GLE 230 Composition Guide: Finding Sources

NYT, WSJ - Credible Popular Sources

Franklin Pierce provides subscription access to the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal for students use. These newspapers are two examples of credible, popular sources.

They are credible because they have established reputations for research and fact-checking, strong reporting, and clear editorial policies.

They are popular because they are written for a wide audience that may not have a background in the topic they are reading about.

These sites are good places to search for information about national and international news, business news, and editorials and opinions on different topics. The New York Times offers historical access back to the 1850's.

For complete access you must set up an account with each newspaper. Once your account is set up, you can go directly to the newspaper's web site.

Set up a New York Times account.

Set up a Wall Street Journal account.

Finding Scholarly and Popular Resources

Popular Sources:

Written for an everyday audience, no special knowledge on the part of the reader required.
May contain quotes and links, but does not list resources used.
Vocabulary is written at a high school or below level.
May or may not have a listed author.
More like reporting, less like a research paper.

Scholarly Sources:

Written for an audience with in-depth knowledge of the topic.
Vocabulary is specific to the topic/discipline and may require specialized knowledge.
Authors listed, may have multiple authors.
Quotes are all attributed with footnotes or endnotes. Research references listed at the end of the article.

These databases cover a wide variety of topics and contain many full-text articles including both scholarly and popular sources:

Academic Search Complete This link opens in a new window
"This multi-disciplinary database provides full text for more than 4,600 journals, including full text for nearly 3,900 peer-reviewed titles. PDF backfiles to 1975 or further are available for well over one hundred journals, and searchable cited references are provided for more than 1,000 titles."
JSTOR This link opens in a new window
JSTOR is an interdisciplinary digital library consisting of digitized issues of academic journals, books, and primary sources. It provides full text searches of almost 2,000 journals.
Opposing Viewpoints: Gale in Context This link opens in a new window
-More than 20,100 pro/con viewpoints
-More than 19,200 reference articles, including topic overviews
-More than 12,700 charts and graphs, along with other statistical information
-300+ profiles of federal agencies and special-interest
ProQuest Central This link opens in a new window
"This database serves as the central resource for researchers at all levels. Covering more than 160 subjects areas, ProQuest Central is the largest aggregated database of periodical content. This award-winning online reference resource features a highly-respected, diversified mix of content including scholarly journals, trade publications, magazines, books, newspapers, reports and videos."