Until I began graduate school two weeks ago, I thought doing literary research was an easy task. "I know how to use the library," I thought. Easy as pie! Boy, was I wrong.
Fortunately, the Virginia Tech library system has thorough research tools such as Summons and Addison. I was also happy to learn the Library of Congress numerical system and the ease of the website's navigation, a step further from last week's homepage tutorial.
Initially, I plan to begin my research by performing a general search on our library's journal systems, Summons and MLA International. Although I have done a general search on Google, I do recognize the need to take care in using online sources, and I followed most of those found on Cornell's library site.
At this point, my research interests center around contemporary writers, so I need to prepare myself to expand my search in case I do not find sufficient material. I do not look forward to this difficulty, but am open to suggestions as our research progresses. At this point, our bibliographic search seems even more taxing because I have yet to find primary sources of which I would like to work. However, I recognize the need to find a thematic element, a tying together of written strings.
Outside of our research topics in particular, I am most grateful for the bits about networking and learning through collaboration. It is essential for some of us to become active members in organizations such as the NCTE (http://www.ncte.org/) and participate in conferences, of which many can be found here (http://cfp.english.upenn.edu). Graduate students from another university have told me of this great resource.
I wish us all good fortune.
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