Surveying Your Topic and Finding Sources

Surveying Your Topic, Finding Sources, and Creating Works-Cited Entries

Directions

To see if you can find enough information on your topic and to be sure it is the one you want to write about, find some books or articles (including online sources) on your topic and do some pre-reading to survey your library and online resources.
After about an hour's research, you should be able to determine whether or not you'll be able to find enough good resources. To survey your topic, skim resources to find the thesis and main points your experts wrote about in their works. You will want to create a thesis statement (a sentence that states your topic, your position about the topic, and three or more main points that provide evidence for your position) similar to those in your sources.
Example
You have found six sources about Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Five agree that the book is an important literary work which should be read and studied. One source says it is horrible because it uses the N-word. It will be far easier to write a thesis stating that the book should be read because most of the sources agree that it should. Trying to write a research paper proving what you personally believe, but for which you can find no works to support your belief is nearly impossible. After reading the sources, several blame the tragedy on Abigail Williams, Tituba, and Judge Danforth. As a result, it is possible to create a thesis statement: The three characters in The Crucible most responsible for the deaths in Salem are Abigail Williams, Tituba, and Judge Danforth.
Print out your online sources. It is actually much faster to create a research paper by using notes and/or sources which are on paper.
Make a works-cited page as soon as you have found sources you can use. Click here to see a sample MLA paper with its works-cited page (scroll to last page). (You may use EasyBib or KnightCite, but if you don't understand what information EasyBib or KnightCite is asking for, you might type in the wrong information, so be sure read the information below and then compare your EasyBib or KnightCite results to examples found at the Purdue Online Writing Lab.
Before you create your works-cited entries, learn how to read works-cited entries:
Book
Here is an example of a works-cited entry for a book:

To cite a book in MLA style, include the following elements in your works-cited entry:

Author. (Author's name: Last, First.)

Title of source. (Novel title: Italicized)

Publisher, (The name of the publishing company is Warner Books.)

Publication date. (The last publication date on the copyright page is 1982. Note that the date is followed by a period because it is the last core element.

Here is an example of the combination in-text and parenthetical citation which matches the works-cited entry:

Harper Lee shows how humans can be irresponsible citizens by having her character Atticus Finch say, "Serving on a jury forces a man to make up his mind and declare himself about something. Men don't like to do that. Sometimes it's unpleasant" ( 297).

Warning: You need the page numbers for any information you find in a book, whether it is quoted, paraphrased, or summarized.