Introduction to American Ethnic Studies (AMETH 160)
Your Assignment
For the Research part of your personal ethnography assignment, you will need to identify the history of your ethnic group and discuss different cultural elements from your culture of origin. You will research your ethnic group, identify your ethnic group’s indigenous/immigrant history, and determine which unique cultural characteristics or attributes set your group or culture apart from others.
Some of you have to find recipes for this assignment. There is a list of cookbooks on the Reference page.
Getting Started
If you are new to doing library research, I highly recommend completing the AMETH Research Tutorials first, and learn how to use the Get It button.
Before you do any in-depth research, it is always benficial to consult reference books in your topic first. While websites like Wikipedia are easy to use, and they could provide a quick way to find keywords in a given topic, the content is not considered credible. The best way to use a website like Wikipedia is to use it to find relevant keywords/key phrases, so you can use those keywords or key phrases to look for reliable information from credible sources. Do NOT cite Wikipedia in your paper.
A good reference source for this course is the Gale Virtual Reference Library (Look under Multiculturalism - Gale Encyclopedia Multicultural American 2nd Edition). Search for your ethnic group, for example, "German Americans", or "Cuban Americans". You should find a good overview article. Note the keywords you find in the article, they will help you find more articles later. Don't forget to look at the Works Cited section, it is also a good way to find more relevant articles.
Another good reference source for this course is Credo Reference. This database searches a large collections of reference books.
The DowMRC website has a wonderful reference book database, where you can find many relevant printed and electronic resources that our library owns. You can click on any of the tags on the right of the page, and see a list of items that have elements of that subject.
To expand you search, you can use our Library Catalog to search our entire collection.
To expand further, you can use WorldCat to search the collections of more than 10,000 libraries in the world. If you find items that we don't own, Interlibrary Loan Service (ILS) will try to get it for you (most at no cost). Books will come in about 5-10 days. Articles will be scanned and emailed to you in about 2-5 days (sometimes even on that day).
Suggested Resources
Books:
1. Culture and Customs series - The series captures the essence of nations today in individual ready-reference volumes. It offers a comprehensive overview of the cultural life of countries most studied and in the news. (Search "Culture and Customs" by Title in the Library Catalog.)
2. The World Cookbook for Students (5 Volumes) - The volumes are organized alphabetically by country or group name. Each entry includes a brief introduction to the land and people and their cuisine and then an overview of the foodstuffs, typical dishes, and styles of eating in simple bulleted lists. Approximately 5 recipes are provided per country/ethnic group of typical dishes and holiday fare, for a total of 1,198. A ebook version is also available via Netlibrary.
3. Countries and Their Cultures - This world is full of many different countries and even more different cultures. Countries and their Cultures is a four-volume set that focuses on countries, and the cultures within them, around the world. This reference is ordered alphabetically and covers a total of 225 countries. In addition to the cultural summaries, there are country maps, photographs, and an index. Each summary provides a mix of demographic, historic, social, economic, political, and religious information on the country.
4. Greenwood Encyclopedia of World Folklore and Folklife (4 Volumes) - Organized in four volumes, the encyclopedia provides convenient access to information about folklore generally and to the traditions of particular regions:
Volume 1: Topics and Themes, Africa, Australia and Oceania
Volume 2: Southeast Asia and India, Central and East Asia, Middle East
Volume 3: Europe
Volume 4: North and South America
5. Encyclopedia of African-American culture and history: the Black experience in the Americas - African American history is rich with cultural diversity and notablty enigmatic figures. The Encyclopedia of African American Culture and History contains 2,200 biographical entries. It ranges from the beginning of the seventeenth century to the end of the twentieth century`, from slave and poet Jupiter Hammon to jazz greats like Louis Armstrong. The reference includes notable people such as Nobel-prize winning author Toni Morrison along with other entries dealing with events, historical eras, legal cases, and culture. The encyclopedia also includes entries for all fifty states as well as separate articles for cities with special significance for black Americans, past or present.
6. Gale Encyclopedia of Native American tribes - There are many different Native American tribes, 400 of which are covered in The Gale Encyclopedia of Native American Tribes. This reference contains information on both the historical and contemporary issues for each tribe. All entries begin with an introduction about the tribal roots, historic and current location, population data, and language family, followed by segments covering the history, religious beliefs, language, buildings, means of subsistence, clothing, healing practices, customs, oral literature, and current tribal issues. The reference also includes illustrations and a bibliography.
7. African American slave narratives : an anthology / edited by Sterling Lecater Bland, Jr.
8. Encyclopedia of food and culture / Solomon H. Katz, editor in chief ; William Woys Weaver, associate editor.
9. Encyclopedia of American immigration / James Ciment, editor.
10. Harvard encyclopedia of American ethnic groups / Stephan Thernstrom, editor ; Ann Orlov, managing editor, Oscar Handlin, consulting editor.
11. Gale encyclopedia of multicultural America / contributing editor, Robert von Dassanowsky ; author of introduction, Rudolph J. Vecoli ; edited by Jeffrey Lehman.
These E-Books are available on Netlibrary: (Copy and paste the titles and search on Netlibrary)
1. Encyclopedia of Race and Ethnic Studies
2. A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies Blackwell Companions in Cultural Studies
3. The Asian Pacific American Heritage: A Companion to Literature and Arts Garland Reference Library of the Humanities
4. American Folklore: An Encyclopedia
5. Missing Stories: An Oral History of Ethnic and Minority Groups in Utah
6. Encyclopedia of Modern Ethnic Conflicts
7. Prevailing Over Time: Ethnic Adjustment On the Kansas Prairies, 1875-1925
8. Of Orphans and Warriors: Inventing Chinese American Culture and Identity
9. Westward the Immigrants: Italian Adventurers and Colonists in an Expanding America
10. Encyclopedia of Contemporary British Culture
11. Encyclopedia of Contemporary German Culture
12. Encyclopedia of North American Indians
13. The Encyclopedia of African-American Heritage
14. California Soul: Music of African Americans in the West
15. The Multicultural Cookbook for Students
16. The World Cookbook for Students
Databases:
1. ProQuest Research Library - This is a good starting point for finding journal articles on almost any topic. Over 150 academic subject areas are covered, and many articles are full-text. Searches can be limited to scholarly, peer-reviewed journals. Use the "Topics" button to browse topics or get suggestions on keywords to use.
2. Diversity Database Suite - Provides a combined search for Ethnic NewsWatch and Ethnic NewsWatch History which feature newspapers, magazines, and journals of ethnic and minority presses; GenderWatch which features historical and current perspectives of gender roles; and Alt-Press Watch which showcases some of the nation’s most respected and cited grassroots newspapers, magazines, and journals.
3. Gale Virtual Reference Library - Gale Encyclopedia of Multicultural America - contains 152 original essays (about 8,000-12,000 words each) on specific minority and ethnic groups in the U.S., with an emphasis on culture (religions, holidays, customs, language) in addition to information on historical background and settlement patterns. The Encyclopedia also covers ethnoreligious groups such as Jews, Chaldeans and Amish.
4. North American Immigrant Letters, Diaries, and Oral Histories - Personal narratives, including letters, diaries, pamphlets, autobiographies, and oral histories from 1840 to the present. Includes some audio files and facsimiles of personal scrapbooks. Primary source documents from immigrants who have come from virtually all over the world.
5. North American Indian Thought & Culture - Historical resources on nearly 500 North American groups. Autobiographies, biographies, Indian publications, oral histories, personal writings, photographs, drawings, and audio files. Also includes 2,000 oral histories presented in audio and transcript form and at least 20,000 photographs.
6. Heritage Quest - Offers a number of searching tools for genealogical research. Contains images of pages from the complete U.S. Federal Census, 1790-1930. In addition to the ability to search by name and state of residence, many of the census records can also be searched by place of birth, age, and ethnicity. Also includes a collection of more than 25,000 keyword-searchable family and local history books; an index to more than 1.6 million article citations from genealogical and family history periodicals; and records of more than 80,000 individuals who served in the Revolutionary War with both genealogical and historical information for each listed veteran.
7. America: History and Life - Indexes and abstracts approximately 1700 journals in the field of United States and Canadian history. It also includes entries for collections of essays, books, dissertations, and conference papers. America: History and Life has full-text links to 103,000 articles and book reviews available through various online databases.
8. Lexis Nexis Academic - Provides online access to the full-text of documents from over 5,600 news, business, legal, medical, and reference publications. Sources include national and regional newspapers, wire services, and broadcast transcripts from around the world. Legal materials include federal and state case law, codes, regulations, legal news, law reviews, and international legal information. Medical and business news and information is also available to users.
9. Expanded Academic ASAP - A good starting place for finding journal articles on almost any topic. Full-text and/or scanned pdfs are included for many of the articles it indexes. Searches can be easily limited to articles from peer-reviewed (aka scholarly, academic, refereed, or professional) publications. The Subject Guide Search is especially useful for browsing subdivisions of a topic. Note: Expanded Academic ASAP is a subset of InfoTrac OneFile.
10. Credo Reference - This easy-to-search collection of reference books is an excellent alternative to Wikipedia. Use it to find background information, definitions, facts, and lists of resources on a wide variety of subjects. The collection is particularly strong in the Social Sciences and Cultural Studies.
11. Historical New York Times - Digitized version of the New York Times since its first issue in 1851. Patrons can search the full text of articles to find articles on a wide variety of topics.
12. American History in Video - American History in Video provides the largest and richest collection of video available online for the study of American history, with 2,000 hours and more than 5,000 titles on completion. The collection allows students and researchers to analyze historical events, and their presentation over time, through commercial and governmental newsreels, archival footage, public affairs footage, and important documentaries.
Selected Internet Resources (Click HERE for a full list):
Blackpast.org - an online reference center makes available a wealth of materials on African American history in one central location on the Internet.
Asian Pacific American History and Culture - From the Smithsonian.
Country Studies - From the Library of CongressCIA World Factbook - From Central Intelligence Agency
Mapping Census 2000: The Geography of US Diversity
Minority Health - From the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services
How to Write a Research Paper
Writing a Research Paper by Sarah Hamid (Purdue University)
Planning and Writing a Reseach Paper - from the Writing Center at the University of Wiscoinsin at Madison
How to Write a Thesis Statement (Indiana University)
Examples: The bad thesis statement and the better thesis statement (University of Pennsylvania)
Leo Lo
K-State Libraries
Social Sciences/Humanities Department
Hale Library, 203
(785) 532-2158
leolo@ksu.edu
http://www.lib.k-state.edu