Find Background Information
Need topic ideas? Make sure you pick something that is interesting to you! Browsing these websites and databases can be a great way to uncover potential topic ideas. These sources will provide background information and keywords for further research.
Best Bets for Public Issue Topics
- The ConversationOn this website (and through distribution of our articles to thousands of news outlets worldwide), you’ll find explanatory journalism on the events, discoveries and issues that matter today.
- CQ Researcher This link opens in a new window
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A weekly publication that covers current and controversial issues with complete summaries, timelines and bibliographies. - In Context: Opposing Viewpoints This link opens in a new window
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Viewpoint articles, topic overviews, full-text magazine, academic journal, and newspaper articles, primary source documents, statistics, images, and more.
Websites
- Pew Research Center Topic ExplorerBrowse reports and data from Pew's public opinion polling, demographic research, media content analysis and other empirical social science research
- StatelineWeekly news articles and research reports on state governments and public policy issues.
More Background Info Resources
- Credo Reference This link opens in a new window
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A collection of digital reference titles. Content includes a wide range of general reference titles together with a large collection of subject-specific books.
- Gale eBooks This link opens in a new window
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A database of encyclopedias and specialized reference sources for multidisciplinary research. - In Context: Science This link opens in a new window
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Contextual information on hundreds of today's most significant science topics. Includes reference content along with full-text magazines, academic journals, news articles, experiments, images, videos, audio files and links to vetted websites.
- Films On Demand: Master Academic Collection This link opens in a new window
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Includes over 317,000 video clips and 43,000 full-length educational videos in Humanities & Social Sciences, Business & Economics, Health & Medicine, Science & Mathematics, and Archival Films & Newsreels.
Researching with Wikipedia (the Scholarly Way)
Wikipedia can be great for starting the research process with a quick overview of a topic, but it's important to understand its limitations as a research tool.
- Researching with WikipediaLearn when to use Wikipedia for research, how to judge article quality, and more
Brainstorm Keywords
Draft a Thesis Statement
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