Occhipinti06

Drew University Library

Research Guide: Italian 111: Is Life Really Beautiful?

Fall 2006

Locating background information:
Specialized encyclopedias offer starting points for research, and may include bibliographies for further research.

Reference 791.405 F487f	Film review, 1976+ Synopses and cast/crew listings of films released in the past year in the UK.
Reference 945.0903 E56e	Encyclopedia of contemporary Italian culture, 2000. Provides brief overviews and recommended reading on the more established or older directors.
Reference 940.531803 E56e	Encyclopedia of the Holocaust, 1990.

For quick definitions of technical terms you encounter while doing your research, consult xreferplus, on the Library's Online Resources page under 'Electronic Books.' (Definitions will be more detailed and discipline-specific than those provided by Dictionary.com.)

Locating books:
Use 'Keyword' in the Drew Catalog, which will pick up both books about specific authors or directors, and books with individual essays on them. WorldCat is the combined records of over twenty thousand catalogs, including Drew's. Use this database to identify material to request through Inter-Library Loan, which will take 1-2 weeks.

Locating articles on films or history:
To find analysis, you'll need to check in a couple of indexes. Some possibilities:

Academic Search Premier or ProQuest Direct : These are broad, general indexes, and generally good starting points. Each indexes approximately 3,000 journals.
MLA (Modern Language Association) Bibliography : The premier index in literary criticism and film theory. Plan on Inter-Library Loan.
Historical Abstracts: Indexes articles and essays on non-North American history after 1450. One odd note: Historical Abstracts does not use a single subject term for the Holocaust. You must instead search 'genocide' or 'war crimes' or names of specific camps or events.

To locate reviews of films, consult a mix of the following:

International Index to the Performing Arts : A subscription database like those above, this indexes 200 international journals, with full text for about 15% of the entries.
LexisNexis Academic Universe: A good source of film reviews, but this particular database made up of multiple internal databases, and you have to be in the right one!
- For English-language reviews, select 'News' from the menu on the left. Then, in the 'Select a News Category' menu, select 'Arts and Sports News,' and then select 'Book, movie, music and play reviews.' Set an appropriate date range.
- For Italian-language reviews, select 'News' from the menu on the left. Then, in the 'Select a News Category' menu, select 'Non-English Language News,' and then select 'Italian Language News.' Enter the name of the film and the director, and then set the date range - often for 'All available dates.'
Movie Review Query Engine (http://www.mrqe.com/lookup), a public website, provides text primarily of reviews. Older movies may be more recently reviewed as they come out on DVD, but it's really stronger on more recent films.
Internet Movie Database (http://imdb.com) is the classic public web standby, but seems to have fewer reviews for newer films than the MRQE.

In the databases provided through the Library's web site, if the text of the article is not present, click on 'Search for article' to see if the article is available electronically through another database. If it isn't, scroll down to 'Additional options for finding full-text' and click on 'Search the catalog by journal title.' If the article still isn't available, use Inter-Library Loan.

Questions?

Call 3588 (9-5, Monday-Friday, 6-10, Sunday-Thursday)
Email me at jcaldwel@drew.edu
Have a live chat session with a librarian at QandA/NJ.

Library Home Page: http://www.depts.drew.edu/lib/
Drew Library Catalog: http://webcat.drew.edu
Research Resources: http://www.depts.drew.edu/lib/research.html

J.L. Caldwell
www.users.drew.edu/~jcaldwel/