Organizing your sources
Whether you're writing a literature review or gathering sources for a research paper, a mind-map or a matrix can help organize your information. A mind map helps you organize the elements of your review using a structure you create yourself. A matrix pre-sets some of the structure by having columns for each article, and rows for the specific elements you're interested in, you can see if you've got opposing arguments, missing data, methods, evidence, etc. Here's an example of a mind map, or you can create your own: https://www.mindmeister.com/149941134/literature-review You can download a Microsoft Word Matrix for Literature Review here:
The sources below cover many topics in Philosophy. The Philosophy Compass covers the entire discipline of philosophy and publishes original, peer-reviewed, state-of-the-art surveys of current research. The handbooks and companions are focused collections on particular areas in Philosophy.
Getting started on your topic? Begin by checking out these encyclopedia and bibliography databases. They'll provide you with a basic background for your topic, and a list of important papers published on your topic. This is a great time-saver.
When you have a list of books or articles to search for, you can search from our Articles & Books tab on our homepage: http://www.library.rochester.edu.
If you have an article that you like and would like to see who else has cited it since it was published, try Google Scholar - just find your article and then click the "Cited By" link.
If UR doesn't have the article or book you need, Interlibrary Loan (ILL) is a service that will deliver a copy to you. PDFs of articles usually arrive in two days or less! Just go to the ILL page: https://illiad.lib.rochester.edu/
Still can't find what you're looking for? Please contact me!
