1. Comedy & Community: Some Strategies for Research

2. Comedy & Community: Some Strategies for Research
Babbalooo, Lucy! I’m so essited!
We gonna learn about library
research
Gary Handman
Director
Media Resources Center
Moffitt Library

3. Writing About Film…
Scholarly
Current
Pop
Historical
Fan

4. Comedy & Community : Some Strategies for Research
Sources for Film &
TV Scholarship
and Research
Journals, Magazines, Newspapers
Reviews
Critical/ScholarlyArticles
Books
Web Sites
Other online databases

5. How Do You Tell em’ apart?
Comedy & Community
Books
Scholarly/authoritative works
Pop schlock and fan works
How Do You Tell em’ apart?
Author’s credentials/affiliations
Publisher (e.g. BFI, AFI, University Presses vs pop press)
Scholarly apparatus and sources: notes, bibliographies, other documentation
If they’ve been widely cited by other scholars

6. REVIEWS Current Historical Found in: Comedy & Community
Popular & fan journals and newspapers
Film studies & scholarly journals
Web sites
Fan and enthusiast sites
Commercial sites (e.g., studio sites, video distributors)
Academic sites

7. Critical/Scholarly Articles
Comedy & Community
Critical/Scholarly Articles
Current
Historical
Found in:
Film studies & scholarly journals
Popular & fan journals and newspapers (but only occasionally)
Web sites (even less occasionally…except for academic and commercial databases)

8. Comedy & Community
Reviews: Current
Use:
Expanded Academic Index (fair amount of full-text)
News Index
ProQuest (some full-text)
Lexis/Nexis
Movie Review Query Engine (web: full-text)
Film Review Annual

9. Reviews: Historical Comedy & Community Use: Readers Guide
NY Times Index (or NYT Film Reviews ) (in MRC)
Film Review Index, (in MRC)
Film Index International (CDROM in Main/Moffitt Only)

10. Scholarly/Critical Writing
Use:
Expanded Academic Index (1980-present)
Modern Language Assn. Bibliography (1963-present)
Film Index International (CD-ROM in Main and Moffitt)
Film Literature Index (Print Index in Media Center) (1977-present)
Art Abstracts ( & AA Retrospective) (1920s-present)
Periodicals Content Index (PCI)

11. Once You Find a Citation, How Do You Find the Article?
Yo!…Hey man, use Pathfinder!
Or..
Some indexes provide holdings info
Some indexes link to full-text
Satirist Nabs Movie Queen! John Waters takes all of Hollywood hostage in the jolly Cecil B. DeMented. (The Arts/Cinema)(Review) (movie review) Richard Corliss.
Time August 14, 2000 v156 i7 p70
View text and retrieval choices (287 words)

12. Books Use Pathfinder Comedy & Community Search by
Title and/or Subject Keyword
Director Name (as subject)
Movie Title (as Title and/or
Subject Keyword )

13. How to Begin? Before you click: THINK
Formulate your search in terms of:
KEY WORDS and SYNOMYMS:
--Looks for words anywhere in record: title, subject, abstract and full-text (if avail)
PHRASES:
--Looks for words in the exact order entered

14. How to Begin? Before you click: THINK
Formulate your search in terms of
keyword and key phrases:
Sex [women, love, relationships] and Death [dying, mortality, fate] in the films [cinema, movie*] of Woody Allen.
The representation [reflect* portray*] of gender [sex*] and masculinity [masculin*, male, men] in the films films [cinema, movie*] of Jim Jarmusch.
****
Truncation varies from db to db: * # ?
emigra* = emigrant, emigrants, emigrate, emigration

15. Comedy & Community http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/MRC/FilmBibMenu.html
a growing listing of bibliographies on various film topics and individual films compiled by MRC (includes bibs for genres, filmmakers, national cinemas, and individual film).

16. Call me: Gary Handman 643-8566 ghandman@library.berkeley.edu
…being driven totally bananas by your research?
Call me:
Gary Handman