Finding Theses & Dissertations

(I posted this on my other blog, but thought it would be good to share here as well.)

A number of projects are under way to digitize theses and dissertations and make them openly available to the wider online community and/or to establish a central access point for these important research materials. Here are some examples of both national and regional efforts:

Australasian Digital Theses Program [access]
- Provides access to both digitized theses and bibliographic information about non-digitized theses.

British Library EthOS [access]
- Aim is "[t]o offer a 'single point of access' where researchers the world over can access ALL theses produced by UK Higher Education." A list of participating institutions is provided on the site. Some full-texts are available at no charge. Free registration required.

DART-Europe E-theses Portal [access]
- Aim is to "encourage the creation, discovery and use of European e-theses." Most texts appear to be available in full at no charge.

Database of African Theses and Dissertations [access]
- Free registration required to search bibliographic database with information on theses and dissertations completed at African universities.

Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations [access]
- NDLTD is "an international organization dedicated to promoting the adoption, creation, use, dissemination and preservation of electronic analogues to the traditional paper-based theses and dissertations." Access above is provided via the VTLS Visualizer, a search and discovery system. Other systems available for searching the same collection can be found here.

Theses Canada Portal/Portail de Theses Canada [access]
- Provides access to bibliographic records for theses and if available, electronic texts.

23 Things: Online Databases

This exercise involved selecting a site from the Web 2.0 Awards and experimenting with it. I selected Dabble DB, which allows you to create online databases. You can sign up to try it for free for 30 days; after that, you can choose to upgrade to a paid plan or a free Commons plan. I was curious to see how an online database application would compare to a wiki. Dabble DB is not quite as intuitive as PBWiki. However, I did manage to create some fields and enter data into them! Based on my limited time with it, Dabble DB appears to be particularly well-suited for more administrative and management processes. (One example provided of a user is Pacific Northwest College of Art Library, who uses the system for managing book orders.) Because it's less geared to document management, though, it would not have been a suitable candidate for my purposes, i.e., organizing and displaying bibliographic descriptions. For more information on using databases for NGO-specific needs, visit TechSoup's Learning Center.

23 Things: The Eleventh Tool = Wikis

I have written previously about wikis and their use in the forced migration field. I have also used the wiki format to "publish" a research guide (see Researching Forced Migration). Wikis represent an easy way to set up a database online. Personally, I have limited technical knowledge, but using pbwiki.com, I was able to create over 450 pages of narrative text and bibliographic descriptions, and inter-link them in such a way that - hopefully - makes my research guide easy and intuitive to use. I can also regularly update the guide, as well as quickly make corrections to URLs and other bibliographic details.

I did add a page to SLA's Wiki Sandbox, to see what other applications are like.

23 Things: The Tenth Tool = Book/Library Catalogs

The purpose of this exercise was to try out LibraryThing, an online service that is designed to let members easily catalog their personal book collections. Small libraries can also use it to catalog their collections. I cataloged five items: Two were books whose bibliographic details were automatically retrieved through Amazon (you can also choose to have them retrieved through the Library of Congress); two were grey literature titles, so I entered the bibliographic details manually; and one was a chapter in a book, so I entered its details manually too. While LibraryThing's main template is book-oriented, you can still enter other types of documents, like book chapters and journal articles. For these, the only consideration is that the onus is on you to enter the details consistently, since the system will display them as entered.

Clicking on "Your Library" displays all the items you've entered alphabetically by title. There are several different display options available. And all your entries are searchable, or you can browse by tags.

This would certainly be a useful tool for small information centers who lack an online catalog. It just requires time to enter the bibliographic details.

Wikis and Their Use in the Forced Migration Field

A wiki is defined as "a page or collection of Web pages designed to enable anyone who accesses it to contribute or modify content." Most users of the web equate the term "wiki" with Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia that can be edited by members of the public. So, for example, you can visit the "refugee," "internally displaced person," or "forced migration" pages on Wikipedia, click on the "edit this page" tab, and add to or edit the entries.

Wikis are not yet a common feature in the forced migration community, but the examples that currently exist demonstrate the diversity of uses to which wikis can be applied. Wikis are being used in the following ways:

To facilitate access to information in a structured and organized fashion:
- The Forced Migration Guide provides access to information resources relating to refugees and forced migration that can be used for reference and research purposes.
- The Gender Training Wiki provides access to information about institutions, trainings and training materials that promote gender equality and the advancement of women.

To share information and promote collaboration within a defined community:
- MIGHEALTHNET hopes to "stimulate the development of good practices by promoting the exchange of information and expertise, both within and between countries. The project will act as a catalyst in the formation of scientific and professional communities in each country concerned with migrant and minority health. It will thus help to create a ‘critical mass’ which can bring about policy changes on the basis of evidence and experience. "
- RefugeeMap gathers together "information on refugee situations, news and policy, and volunteering opportunities around the UK."

For recommendations and feedback:
- The Refugee Archives at UEL recently launched a wiki not only to share information about its services, but also to solicit feedback about its information resources and recommendations for additions to their collection.

As web sites:
- The Feinstein International Center uses a wiki application as the underlying framework for its web site.

As classroom projects:
- The Refugee Wiki Project was set up by 10th graders to raise awareness of refugee issues and to support the work of the International Rescue Committee.

Research Databases: Sciences, Economics

I have had occasion to use two online research databases recently for forced migration-related searches. The first, Scirus, describes itself as the "most comprehensive science-specific search engine on the Internet." You can use it to locate journal articles as well as web sources on a range of topics including public health and psychosocial issues. The second, IDEAS, is a repository of economics research and provides access to working papers, journal articles, and chapters in books.

Monitoring Research Reports

Many if not most organizations within the forced migration research community have established some kind of presence online. And they often provide notification services in order to apprise visitors of their activities and publication updates. For example, the Brookings-Bern Project on Internal Displacement maintains a listserv, the Feinstein International Center offers an RSS feed, Forced Migration Online has set up a blog, and the Refugee Women's Resource Project circulates an electronic newsletter.

To find other research institutes online and their respective mechanisms for keeping the public informed, search in Forced Migration Online's directory or ReliefWeb's directory.

In addition, take advantage of the e-mail alerts and RSS feeds provided by the following report/grey literature repositories:

ecoi.net
- Country of origin information database.

Eldis
- Development information gateway, with resource guides on "Conflict and Security" and "Aid."

Human Security Gateway
- "Refugees and internally displaced people" is an option in the topic menu.

Refworld
- UNHCR's collection of country reports, policy documents, and legal information.

ReliefWeb
- Humanitarian information hub, with a "Policy and Issues" documents library.

Monitoring Journal-reported Research

Researchers can monitor the scholarly journal literature in the databases below by taking advantage of one or more of the following notification services: requesting topic, author, citation, or search term alerts; generating custom RSS feeds; or receiving updated results from saved searches.

FindArticles (multidisciplinary)
- An article database that lets you generate a keyword-based RSS feed; you can do so by scrolling down to the search box at the bottom of the RSS site map page.

HighBeam Research (multidisciplinary)
- Another database that allows you to build a custom RSS feed based on your search terms; this page explains how.

HighWire Press (life sciences emphasis, but covers social sciences as well)
- Through the CiteTrack service, you can request e-mail alerts for keywords, authors or citations that appear in new journal articles. Alerts also can be created immediately after you conduct a search. For more information, visit the CiteTrack page.

PILOTS Database (mental health literature)
- Registration allows you to save a search, and then be notified by e-mail when new results matching your search criteria appear; more information about alerts are available here.

PubMed (medical and health sciences)
- You can generate RSS feeds after a search with no registration; steps to do so are provided here. Creating a free NCBI account allows you to save a search and then be notified by e-mail when those search results are updated.

Note: These databases provide complimentary access to bibliographic citations and abstracts for journal articles. Accessing full-text content generally requires payment (premium service), although one can often find free articles within the collections as well.