DANC 100: Introduction to Dance History (Zimmerman)

Welcome!

This guide is for Christie Zimmerman's section of DANC 100.

You need to find sources to use for your annotated bibliography and your final project.  Your best bet is to use library databases.

I'm recommending that you use OneSearch, our library discovery tool, for your research.  It's efficient, and you will find it useful for your other classes, too.  Though our libraries are physically closed, you can still access so much information by using OneSearch.

You also need to include an audiovisual source.  Dance in Video, a specialized library database, will be an excellent resource for you to use to find videos by experts which include all the information you need to properly cite the source.  Kanopy Streaming FIlms is another option you can explore.

It's true that our library buildings are still physically closed.  But if you find a book you're interested in while using OneSearch, you can ask that we scan a copy or two of the chapters and email them to you.  Check out these instructions for more info.

Find can find all of these resources on our libraries' homepage.

IF YOU HAVE QUESTIONS as you're searching:

• If you need quick, immediate help: Use the Chat or Call options on the Ask a Librarian page.
• If you have a little time or a more intricate question: Email me (Susan Taylor at setaylor@bsu.edu), describing your topic and what you're having trouble with.  I'll write you back as soon as I can.
• There are really lots of ways you can get help, even though the physical library building is closed.  Just reach out!

Once you've chosen your topic, a search tip that's helpful is to use quotation marks around phrases or names of two or more words.  This tells the database to search for those terms glued together.  You may also want to consider whether your topic could be phrased in different ways. 

Some search examples below.  (Note that capitalization is not important):

• "argentine tango"
• "martha graham dance company"
• "dance improvisation" or "improvised dance"

For your annotated bibliography, AT LEAST 3 of the 5 sources must be a "legitimate scholarly source"

OneSearch will be the best resource for you to use.  It covers a wide variety of disciplines (including dance), and a wide variety of source types (including academic, scholarly writings).

You can always get to it from the Libraries' homepage, but it's also linked below.

Because you're searching a large number of databases at the same time when you do a search in OneSearch, you will get a wide variety of results.  Some will be books (in our physical library), many will be articles (found through our article databases).

If I'm searching on the Latin dance form called the samba, I could type my search into the OneSearch box like this:

I find many, many results.  Some are items I'd have to come to the library and checkout.  Because the library is still closed, let's limit to full-text sources.

To limit your results to full-text sources:

Look on the left-hand side, under REFINE YOUR SEARCH, and click the "Full Text Online" link.  This will limit our results to those articles, books or book chapters which can be read in their entirety online.

To limit your results to scholarly sources:

While everything in OneSearch has gone through some kind of editorial review process (which you cannot say about webpages found via Google), not all of it is academic in nature.  You need to find "legitimate, scholarly sources" for your annotated bibliography. 

Using the REFINE YOUR SEARCH box, we can limit to "Scholarly & Peer-Review," as shown here:

To limit by discipline:

Because OneSearch searches across a wide variety of disciplines, I may want to look under the Discipline headings and choose those areas I'd like to focus on.  (Sometime you'll want to click on the "More" link to see more options.)  I'm choosing dance and anthropology, as shown here:

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To learn more about your results:

I can click on the "Preview" link to get more information about a particular title.  Often it will provide me with the abstract, which helps me get an idea of what the article is about.

To get to the full article:

Either click on the article title or the "Full Text Online" link.

• Sometimes it will take you directly to the article.
• Sometimes you may be brought to another OneSearch page (like this one), where you need to click on a link under "View Online."

Bear in mind that it's unlikely that the first titles will be the best ones for your research.  Be willing to scroll down and read a lot in order to find the titles that really work for your assignment.

To get a citation for a title:

You need to use MLA citation style for your assignment.  You can get an MLA citation for your title by looking for the quotation mark icon toward the top of the record.

After clicking on it, you can choose MLA from the"Choose a Citation Format" drop-down menu, as shown here:

However, be aware that citations generated by databases are not guaranteed to be correct!  It is your responsibility to verify the formatting.  See MLA citation style for resources to help you do that verifying.

For your annotated bibliography, "AT LEAST 1 of the 5 sources must be audio visual in nature."

Though there is an abundance of audio visual sources available online, both Dance in Video and Kanopy Streaming Films provide curated, high-quality video of high-quality recordings complete with the authorship information you need to appropriately cite them in your work.  The Ball State University Libraries subscribe to these resources so that you can use them.  You can get to them from the Libraries' Databases page, and they're also linked below.

See below for links to each, and some tips.

Tips for using Dance Online: Dance in Video

To search by a topic or by a name, type your words into the search box in the upper-right hand corner, and hit Enter.

Then, if you'd like to place limits on your search, to be more specific about the sort of video you're interested in, click on "Filter your results" or the funnel icon.

For example, I may want to limit to videos including performance and some discussion of Martha Graham, as shown here:

When you click on a filter choice, your results will be adjusted.  You may place several filters; but do understand that you'll find fewer and fewer results as you place more filters.

To watch a certain video, click on the video's title, and a new window will open up and the video will start in full screen.

To see more about the video, use the links at the top of the screen.

Especially helpful is the "Cite" option, which allows you to easily get a sample citation for the video in MLA or APA format.