Sources and Information Needs
Using sources to function in these roles is how you enter into the scholarly conversation with all the other research and writing that has covered your topic before.
In the next few pages, you’ll learn more about each role by analyzing how sources are used in the pop culture essay cited below. Seeing how the essay’s author puts his sources to work in their various roles should help you envision how you can do the same in your own papers. The essay discusses how pop culture affects American (and global) values.
Example: Zombies
Nasiriuddin, M. et.al. (2013). Zombies – A pop culture resource for public health awareness. Emerging Infectious Diseases. 19(5). 809-813. http://dx.doi.org/10.3201/eid1905.AD1905.
BEAM: Background Sources
BEAM: Background Resources
Let’s look at a statement in the second paragraph of the Zombie essay:
“Although zombies are currently an integral part of our popular culture, our morbid fascination with the walking dead spans several centuries. Historians and anthropologists trace the origin of zombies to the folklore of several tribes in western Africa, from Ghana to Nigeria.” (Nasiriuddin et.al., p.809)
How do you know that zombies are a part of our experiences? Or that the folklore is indeed the stuff of popular culture? These are examples of common knowledge.
Looking a little deeper…
Without context, this paragraph could also be the conclusion of a paper about how we study folklore and culture. But the paper is not about the folklore of zombies, rather how their popularity can be used to promote public health. This is an assertion that the authors use to help set up his different arguments and is meant to be taken at face value. So it’s an example of how the same source can play different roles in different written assignments—all depending on how writers use them.
There is more about background sources in Background Reading.
BEAM: Exhibit and Evidence Sources
Generally, exhibit and evidence sources are works of literature (or other media), collected data, or some observed phenomenon, etc. that you have been asked to write about. They are what you analyze or interpret.
Looking again at the pop culture essay, the exhibits being examined are zombies, pop culture and public health. Specifically, the essay is examining the relationship between the three:
“These popular and varied manifestations of zombies elucidate the potential for a comprehensive dissemination of knowledge, from identifying traits indicating infection to explaining the significance of public health infrastructure.” (Nasiriuddin et. al., p.810)
Exhibit sources are not limited by discipline; they could also be data that was collected in a scientific experiment or by a website’s user survey. They can also simply serve as examples that help support a claim.
BEAM: Argument Sources
Argument sources provide you with the other voices in the academic conversation about your topic. Who else has done similar research, and how should your paper respond to what they’ve said? Does your paper refine or extend an existing hypothesis someone else has tested? If so, those sources belong in your paper.
Sometimes the purpose of including an argument source is to disagree with it and definitively indicate a different direction.
From our zombie example:
“The numerous parallels between zombies and rabies, as well as other infectious diseases that are a threat to public health, enable the use of a popular media creature to promote the prevention and control of a public health problem.” (Nasiriuddin et. al., p.811)
The author is taking part and taking a stand in the ongoing scholarly discussion of zombies and public health. Although this work could possibly be considered a method source if the argument in the article went in a different direction.
BEAM: Method Sources
While argument sources help you frame your paper within the larger scholarly discussion about your topic and exhibits provide a focal point, method sources help provide underlying and sometimes implicit assumptions for your argument or analysis.
For some research, these are literally the methods you use to collect data like a focus group or a particular statistical analysis, and they provide justification for them. In other research, your paper might reveal a leaning toward a major attitude or school of thought within a discipline.
As a persuasive piece of writing, the essay has this intrinsic thread of caution and warning that is summed up in its conclusion:
“Zombies can be used as a powerful tool for increasing awareness of issues of public health significance. The popularity of the CDC piece on preparing for a zombie apocalypse has been instrumental in teaching how to prepare for disasters like the Tohoku Earthquake in Japan.” (Nasiriuddin et. al., p.813)
While this is a subtle example, you would generally cite or at least credit your methods and theories that frame your analysis in your bibliography.