Tips for subject searching in EThOS. February 2014

Transcription

1 Tips for subject searching in EThOS February 2014

2 Searching for theses by subject The theses held in EThOS cover every topic imaginable. One thesis might sweep across a really wide discipline or subject area, while another might focus in on a small detail such as one specific chemical structure or one aspect of 17 th century footwear. Finding all the theses relevant to your own research can be long-winded and time consuming, but worth the effort. These notes aim to help users search EThOS effectively to uncover as many relevant theses as possible. EThOS records are also held in the British Library catalogue, Explore, which can be more effective when doing a subject search. Some tips for searching that resource are also included. 2

3 Searching EThOS Simple search Use Simple Search in EThOS This works very well for single, quite specific search terms, or a phrase. Example 1 caffeine 3

4 Searching EThOS Simple search Example 1 caffeine, returns 80 results. You can now browse through the records to identify which are relevant to you. The PDF icon tells you which are immediately available for download. 4

5 Searching EThOS Simple search Example 2 Searching two or more words together. Use speech marks.. to search for a phrase, or just the two words together to find any records with those two separate words. somerset levels - finds 11 records on this wetland region of southwest England. somerset levels - finds 29 records where each word can appear anywhere, as in the example on the next slide. 5

6 Searching EThOS Simple search Searching two or more words together without enclosing them in speech marks.. finds all records where each word appears separately and anywhere in the record. Here, the two words somerset and levels have been used: 6

7 Searching EThOS Simple search Simple search searches all the fields in the record it s looking for your search term in the title, abstract, university name, author name, even in the sponsor field and the subject keyword field. It searches only the record; it doesn t search the actual text of the full-text thesis. Sometimes you ll get theses that aren t in your subject area look at the 6 th one in this list where Zola is the name of the author and not the subject of the thesis. 7

8 Searching EThOS Advanced search Use Advanced Search in EThOS You can make your search more focused by using the Advanced search option. Example 1 Search Aberdeen as the name of the awarding university, and rice as a word to appear anywhere in the record. 8

9 Searching EThOS Advanced search Example 1 Aberdeen is the name of the awarding university, and rice can appear anywhere in the record. 26 theses are returned in the results. Using any word as a search parameter will still return some irrelevant searches there are two authors called Rice with theses from Aberdeen University. 9

10 Searching EThOS Advanced search Other useful Advanced Search combinations might be: Institution name + author last name Institution name + Issue year If you re searching a person s name or place name as a subject, using thesis title or abstract to define the search will ensure you only get theses where the name is the subject of the thesis, not the name of the author or the name of the awarding university. 10

11 Defining the subject of a thesis Databases often have one or more searchable fields specifically for the subject tag that has been applied to that record Subject classification is a human intellectual process, and therefore resource-intensive - and costly. Theses aren t usually given subject tags when records are created In EThOS there are currently two fields that could be used to search by subject tag, but we can t recommend that you use them as the data they contain is incomplete and inconsistently applied. The two fields are LCSH and Keyword see the search boxes shown here. 11

12 LCSH and Subject Keyword LCSH Library of Congress Subject Headings. Although this is offered as a searchable field in the drop-down list of the Advanced Search screen, we don t recommend you use it. The data that this field contains is minimal, unchecked, inconsistent, and is likely to lead to confusing and incomplete search results. We are likely to remove this as a search option in future. The Subject Keyword field in EThOS contains keywords that were usually added by the researcher or librarian at the awarding university when the thesis was deposited. The terms used are not defined or controlled in any way, and may vary widely from one university to another, or even between thesis records in the same institution. Still, you may find it useful to try a Keyword search in the Advanced Search screen, as an alternative to using the same words in a Simple Search. Many of the words in the Subject Keyword field are likely also to occur in the thesis abstract, and you may achieve better results using the Abstract field to search. 12

13 Dewey classification Many records started life as traditional library catalogue records these usually have a Dewey Decimal Subject Classification tag Dewey classification is useful for organising material into groups by subject - for example on public library shelves for browsing, or filtering records in a database. It s based on a numerical scheme, so it can only be used for searching if you know the Dewey number for your subject category You can t search by Dewey in EThOS it s not really a searching system, more a library scheme, and the Dewey field hasn t been set up to be indexed or made searchable You can, however, use Dewey to search the British Library s main catalogue, Explore. 13

14 Searching for theses in British Library Explore Explore is the British Library s main catalogue, listing 56 million items including all UK doctoral theses that are listed in EThOS You can use Explore to search by a subject word or phrase, or by Dewey the principles are the same To do a subject search, go to Then just make sure you are on the Main catalogue tab, and not Our website tab The best approach is to start with quite a wide subject area, then use the filters to narrow your search, e.g. music. This is illustrated in the next few slides 14

15 A note about theses records in EThOS and Explore Please note there are some discrepancies between the theses listed in EThOS and those listed in Explore All new records added to EThOS are also added to Explore But when records are deleted from EThOS (for example if we find Masters theses listed, or duplicate records), these are not currently removed from Explore. This will occasionally result in a broken link from the Explore record to the EThOS record More importantly, changes to existing EThOS records are not currently replicated in Explore, which means that many enhancements and corrections to the EThOS records have not yet been applied to the equivalent Explore record. This will sometimes affect the searchability of the Explore records. This is the situation at February 2014, but plans are in place to correct this misalignement between the two systems. We don t currently have a date for completion. 15

16 Searching for theses in British Library Explore Enter your first high-level, general search term in the Search box, e.g. music Then refine your search to limit your results to theses by using the Material type filter. You ll need to expand the list to see the theses option by clicking Show more or Refine further 16

17 Searching for theses in British Library Explore Refine the subject of your search by using the Subject filter, e.g. folklore This example now shows 59 results for Subject = music AND folklore; Material type = theses. 17

18 Searching for theses in British Library Explore Continue to narrow down your results using the narrower subject filters now available The Subject filter has an option to Refine further. Clicking on this will lead you to the screen shown here, where you can select multiple terms to refine your search 18

19 Searching for theses in British Library Explore Lots of filtering now applied to the original music search, resulting in 14 records At the bottom of the list of filters in the Explore screen (not shown here), there are suggested links to other items written by the same authors, or other items on the same subject. These might be useful to lead you in new research directions And once you re happy with your search results, you can add them to your personal Explore workspace as indicated here. And from there you can send the list to yourself or others for future reference. 19

20 Searching for theses using Dewey in Explore To do a similar search using Dewey classification instead of words, use the same process starting with a wide Dewey heading as your first search, and narrowing it down using the filters. A list of the Dewey classification terms is here For example, type the Dewey number 782 ( Vocal music ) into the Search box at the top of the Explore search page: 20

21 Searching for theses using Dewey in Explore We recommend that you use the wild card asterisk to ensure your results include not only items classed at this number but also any classed in related subject areas, e.g. using the search 782* will also include works classed at (oratorios) and (rock songs) Refine your search to theses only, using Material type as before. 21

22 Searching for theses using Dewey in Explore Further subject refining can then narrow your search results to the required level Here, four items are returned for a search where Material Type = Theses; Dewey = 782*; and further subject refinement = Religion. 22

23 Searching for specific types of thesis We are often asked how you can search for examples of certain types of PhDs and their final research outputs. For example: Creative Writing, where the main output might be a published novel or poetry Practice-based doctoral research, where the research itself takes the form of the production of artistic works, a film, an exhibition, drawings. There might also be a written accompaniment to this output such as a written analysis of the artistic process, or background research to frame the creative practice PhD by Publication. Here the submitted work consists of a collection of published or not-yetpublished journal articles, book chapters or similar, brought together and introduced by extensive new writing that binds the individual papers into a whole. Theses are not usually tagged with any information relating to the type of work forming the final outcome, and it isn t easy to search for them in EThOS or Explore. The next few slides aim to offer some tips to help you find some useful examples. 23

24 Searching for practice-based PhDs To find examples of practice-based theses in EThOS, we suggest you do a combination of searches that should retrieve at least a sample. You will have to try several combinations to get the best results. Use speech marks to search for specific phrases rather than separate words (see Slide 6) Very often the full thesis is unlikely to be available for several reasons: If a novel or other creative writing is going to be published, the author may request an embargo of their PhD output A written work that explores visual or creative practice or one that includes examples of other creative work is very likely to contain extensive Third Party copyright content where permission may not have been sought to make the work openly available. Inclusion of other people s material is permitted under law when used for an examination submission (i.e. the thesis submitted for the PhD award), but explicit permission should be sought from the copyright owner if the Third Party content is to be published in a thesis that is added to an open access repository or EThOS. For this reason, theses that contain extensive third party content (images, photographs, illustrations, data) are often unavailable via open web resources A tangible document capable of being added to a database such as EThOS may not even exist. For example, if the PhD consists of artistic works such as paintings, sculpture or musical composition, then an abstract and the basic record of the work may be all that is available. The following examples may help you get started with your search, but it s likely that you ll get some false results as well. 24

25 Searching for practice-based PhDs For example: Search practice-based + film 26 records retrieved, including: =uk.bl.ethos where the PhD output included an experimental travelogue film. 25

26 Searching for practice-based PhDs For example: Search creative writing + fiction 28 records, including =uk.bl.ethos which included a portfolio of creative writing as well as a critical component of the PhD submission 26

27 Searching for practice-based PhDs For example: Search creative practice + illustration 8 records, including =uk.bl.ethos for which paintings formed part of the final PhD submission. 27

28 Searching for practice-based PhDs Other examples: Liberty Horses (a novel) : narrative and cultural analysis in postmodern English and American texts, EThOS ID Re-Writing The City: The Value Of Psychoanalytic Perspectives To The Creative Writer, EThOS ID Dark Aemilia and inventing Shakespeare, EThOS ID Mr Loverman and the Men in Black British fiction : the representation of Black men in Black British fiction, EThOS ID (PhD by Publication): The role of the scholar-facilitator in generating practice knowledge to inform and enhance the quality of relationship-based social work practice with children and families, EThOS ID U know them by their fruit: unfinalizing the 'extreme other self' in documentary filmmaking, EThOS ID Interrogating the live : a DJ perspective, EThOS ID Includes DVDs and CDs of live performance. 28

29 Useful links About British Library Explore British Library Higher Education newsletter m/webview.aspx General EThOS enquiries - ethos@bl.uk 29