Resources

Resources for your research paper

Create a Works Cited

http://www.easybib.com/

Guide to databases

Data bases to use

  1. Gale via Brooks Memorial Library

To access follow these steps:

  1. Go to http://www.brooks.lib.vt.us/
  2. Click on “Resources”
  3. Click on “Academic Onefile” (the first thing on the list)
  4. Enter this number in the box: 21791000241652
  5. Click on “Change Databases” in the upper right hand corner
  6. Select your preferred database and begin searching

Appropriate databases are:

  • General reference center gold  (a mixi of technical and less technical)
  • Infto trac custom newspapers  (newspaers—duh)
  • Expanded Academic ASAP
  • Student Edition (stuff that’s easier to understand)
  • Academic Onefile  (tends to be very technical)
  • General onefile

Once you are in a database, there are several ways to search:

a.  Advanced search—combinations of key words you are looking for in each box.    Example:  If I’m looking for links between being left-handed and being depressed, I might type in “left-handed” into one box and “depressed into another. 

  1. Google Scholar. 
    1. Go to google.
    2. At the top of the page click on “more”
    3. Click on “scholar” and begin to search 

You might find things here that you don’t have full access to.  If so, and they seem very useful, you can search for them in one of the other databases. 

 

  1. Regular Google search, but be discriminating.  Use only websites of reputable newspapers, journals, universities, and think tanks.  No blogs, use Wikipedia as a starting point, but not an ending point.  

 

Examples of a feature artilce with Personal voice

1. "Power Steer" by Michael Pollan-- article about buying a beef cow and tracking its life, and issues related to factory farming. http://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/31/magazine/power-steer.html

2. "Time and Impermenance"  Article about Buddhism and Physics--brings in a personal story about the author's son and roto tiller, among other personal tidbits. 

http://www.buddhanet.net/timeimpe.htm

3.  Most of the articles in the Comapss Science of the Mind Journal

http://www.compass-school.org/news/2010/06/17/2010-science-mind-journal-...

Tips on article writing/research methods:

1.  Tips on how to conduct an interview/ use the interview in your writing:

http://theater.nytimes.com/learning/students/writing/voices.html

 

Examples of Academic Papers 

1. Two sides of an issue--Sweatshops  Explains the history of sweathsops, discusses pros and cons regarding their economic benefit/pitfals, and offers a viewpoint. 

2. Many ways of knowing about Religion Incorporates: anthropology, religious studies, psychology, neuroscience, song lyrics, reflection on personal experience, and interviews  in order to answer the question: "Why do people believe in God?"

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Step one--complete one of the following surveys, print out the results, and bring them in to class.  Write a one paragraph reflection on the experience, focussing on the prompt--This survey measures happiness well because... and this survey does not measure my happiness well because....  or, this survey makes sense beacuse... a weakness of this survey is....

Step two-- Explore the country rankings/comparssions in part 2 below.  Pick  any two of the lists and compare the rankings/measurements of both the United States and Domincan Republic on the lists.  In one paragraph explain why both countries are where they are in each list, and if you think this makes sense. Explain any huge differences in where the countries are on each list.  Base this on your own intuitoins/expriences, and also on the relevent readings from part 3.

 

Step three--optional-- Using any and all data from all the sites--Analayze how any country's happiness level is correlated to any other factor--such as literacy, health, weatlh, inequality etc. 

Part 1 Measures of happiness/contentment  surveys

  • Quality of life

http://www.utoronto.ca/qol/survey.htm  (A survey)

  • Gallup Healthways well being  index
  • Life evaluation
  • Happy Planet Index

Your Happy Planet Index

http://survey.happyplanetindex.org/

(well being survey) http://www.nationalaccountsofwellbeing.org/engage/survey/view/1

 

 

Part 2 Rankings/Comparisons of countries

  • Worldmapper

http://www.worldmapper.org/atozindex.html (list of maps by category)

  • United Nations Human Development Index

http://hdr.undp.org/en/data/build/ (build your own index) 

http://www.happyplanetindex.org/explore/global/ (world map with scroll over)  Note that the highest is Costa Rica at 76.1—you can compare other countries based on this scale.  

  • Quality of Life Rankings on Wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quality-of-life_index   (explanation is found by clinking on the PDF link at the bottom under “Notes and References)

  • Subjective Well Being rankings

http://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:akWeJq9oHHoJ:www.nsf.gov/news/newsmedia/pr111725/pr111725.pdf+subjective+well+being+survey&hl=en&gl=us&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEESisMiZ38expBIx2O3hEcYJ3j2kJJ5JdU7r7KIBI3rYpbPIQ9mQPqtLZm7cEdirogmUE7RQDBViOruAqMW0xEKc0qUlWr1TEIs6X_1E3BC8MQdXF36aKsLvd5Z40HO9gMxd2NdUL&sig=AHIEtbRxuurAxVltQh0PgQVq3AWMkoIvVw

 

Part 3. What each survey/comparison claims to measure and why

  • Standard of living general discussion

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_of_living

http://www.skeptically.org/economics/id21.html 

  • Happy Planet

http://www.happyplanetindex.org/learn/

http://www.happyplanetindex.org/engage/manifesto.html

 

 

 

  • Human Development Index

http://hdr.undp.org/en/statistics/faq/

  • World Mapper

http://www.worldmapper.org/about.html

  • World database of happiness

http://worlddatabaseofhappiness.eur.nl/

  • Subjective Well Being

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Happiness_economics

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What is a Jewish State?

1. New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/25/world/middleeast/25israel.html

2. The Spectator

http://spectator.org/archives/2010/10/13/netanyahus-jewish-state-gambit

3. Al Jazeera

http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/2010/09/201091914540375557.html

4. Electronic Intifiadah

http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article6896.shtml

5. Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/10/01/AR2010100104177.html

 

6.Palestine remembered 

http://www.palestineremembered.com/Acre/Palestine-Remembered/Story417.html

 

7.  AIPAC

 
Dec. 3, 2006
 
 
The Importance of the Jewish State
 
The Jewish people’s connection to the Land of Israel is among history’s oldest facts, enshrined in the
first pages of one of Western civilization’s foundational texts.   
 
In the centuries that followed God’s Biblical vow to make Abraham’s descendants a “great nation” in
a promised land, Jews built a thriving civilization along the Jordan River.  Centered on the city of
Jerusalem, it became the realm of David and Solomon, the concern of prophets such as Isaiah and
Jeremiah and the setting for the ministry of Jesus.   
 
That nation and its successor—the modern-day state of Israel—stand as the only independent political
entities to exist in the area since Biblical times.  Since then, neither the Palestinians nor any other
group has ever established a state in the territory that is Israel.
 
While foreign armies have temporarily interrupted Jewish sovereignty over Israel and dispersed some
of its people across the globe, they have never managed to completely dislodge Jews from the land.  
Jews have maintained a continuous presence in the Land of Israel for more than 3,000 years.   
 
An Idea to Build a New Nation in an Ancient Land  
 
The modern movement to re-establish a Jewish state in the Land of Israel took form in the 19th
century among the descendants of Jews forced out of Israel and dispersed after 70 C.E., when the
Romans sacked Jerusalem, destroying the Second Temple.  
 
From their 1492 expulsion from Spain to the Russian pogroms of the late 19th century, Jews were the
subject of discriminatory laws, regular violence and even expulsion in almost every country where
they lived.  The memory of Israel and the desire to return to their ancient homeland remained a central
part of their faith.
 
This religious yearning became a political imperative in the 19th century, when the virulence of
European anti-Semitism made itself plain in the form of persecution and massacres.  Many Jews came
to believe that they would only escape discrimination and murder in a state of their own.   
 
The most outspoken proponent of this belief, known as Zionism, was Theodor Herzl, a prominent
Austrian journalist.  Through articles, pamphlets and other forms of advocacy, Herzl in the late 1890s
helped rally religious and secular Jews to the idea that a viable Jewish state could be re-established in
the historic Land of Israel.   
 
The Zionists sought international backing for their quest to form a new political entity in the land of
their ancestors –a sparsely populated desert wasteland described by an American visitor, Mark Twain,
as “a desolate country…given over wholly to weeds—a silent mournful expanse.”  In a major political
victory for the Zionists, the British issued the Balfour Declaration in 1917, pledging to facilitate the
establishment of a national home for the Jewish people in the ancient Land of Israel.
 
Holocaust Increases Urgency for Establishing a Jewish State    
 
Two decades later, the genocidal murder of Europe’s Jews at the hands of Adolph Hitler would clearly
demonstrate to the world the vital need for a safe Jewish refuge.  Trapped without anywhere to turn,
six million Jews—a stunning 35 percent of the world’s Jewish population—were systematically
murdered in Nazi death camps during the Holocaust.   
 
In 1947, the United Nations voted to partition the historic Land of Israel into two states—one Arab
and one Jewish.  Even though there was no historic precedent for an Arab state in the territory and
most of the area allocated for the Jewish nation was desert, the Zionists immediately accepted the
compromise.  But the Arabs rejected it, and five Arab armies invaded Israel after its inception,
beginning a campaign to eliminate the Jewish state that persists in some circles to this day.
 
A New Nation Survives—and Thrives
 
Since its establishment in 1948, Israel has been forced to wage a struggle for survival, facing hostile
neighbors with numerically superior armed forces while also contending with the constant threat of
terrorism against its civilians.
 
Three defensive wars against its Arab adversaries (in 1948, 1956 and 1967) left Israel in control of
territory including Gaza and the West Bank as well as the ancient capital of Jerusalem.  The united city
is Israel’s capital, and Israel has opened the city to all—protecting Christian, Muslim and Jewish holy
sites and guaranteeing access.
 
Israel’s enemies have not confined their fight for its destruction to the battlefield.  Arab nations have
attempted to economically weaken Israel with a decades-long boycott, and they routinely initiate
efforts at the U.N. to single out Israel for diplomatic criticism.
 
While combating these challenges, Israel has also faced the task of forging a unified nation from an
incredibly diverse range of immigrant groups.  Since its founding, the tiny state has absorbed millions
of immigrants from more than 100 countries, including  
Europeans, Jews from Ethiopia and Jewish refugees forced to leave homes in Arab states.
 
The achievements of modern-day Israel are even more remarkable considering that the country
possesses few natural resources—two-thirds of its land mass is arid desert. Israel’s pioneer founders
developed agricultural techniques that enabled their nation to develop a worldwide reputation for
“making the desert bloom.”  Today, Israel is home to world-class universities and is a global giant
when it comes to high-tech innovation and entrepreneurship.  The NASDAQ stock index contains
more companies from Israel than from any other country except the United States.  Technology
products used every day around the world—from computer processors to cell phones to instant
messenger—have all been developed in Israel.   
 
Every year, some of the world’s most advanced scientific and medical innovations are achieved in
Israel, which produces 70 percent of the world’s generic drugs, and whose doctors are developing
medical treatments and techniques for saving lives and treating patients.  
 
A National Ethos: Repairing the World
 
For Israel, it is not enough to serve as a safe haven for world Jewry. Equipped with first-hand
knowledge of the challenges that resource-poor countries face, Israel has always strived to fulfill the
Jewish command to “repair the world.”  
 
Before it had even established embassies in many world capitals, Israel sent experts abroad to teach
Third World nations such skills as how to upgrade medical facilities, improve schools and coax crops
from arid land. Israel has one of the most extensive foreign assistance programs in the world for a
nation of its size.  Israel has established medical clinics in Africa, exported agricultural techniques to
China and India and shared its expertise in economic development with countries in the Arab world.   
 
Less than a century removed from being only a dream in the hearts and minds of millions of Jews,
Israel has emerged as a thriving democracy and global leader, committed to fulfilling its Biblical
mandate of being a light unto the nations.  

 

What is Palestinian?

1. http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=22564

2. http://www.palestinecampaign.org/Index5b.asp?m_id=1&l1_id=6&l2_id=26

3. http://www.ifamericansknew.org/history/

4. http://www.palestineremembered.com/Acre/Palestine-Remembered/Story413.html

 

 

MLA format for various citation can be found here:

http://www.studyguide.org/MLAdocumentation.htm

MLA format for heading, title, page numbering, font, and margins can be found here:

http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/557/01/

 

My notes on the Bhagavad Gita pre reading

What we are reading  The Bhagavad-Gita,  Song of God, a philosophical poem, eighteen chapters extracted from a larger epic war poem the Mahabharata.  Most scholars say it was written between 500 and 200 BC, or about 2200-2500 years ago.  It chronicles events that may have taken place around 1200 BC.

The Scene: A battlefield on the sacred plain of Kuruksetra.—an epic war.  Most interpretations see the battlefield as not just a physical place, but as representative of the battlefield of the mind.

The narrator Sanjaya –a visionary narrator who knows all.

The players:  Supreme Lord Krishna as a charioteer, The prince Arjuna

What’s going on:  Arjuna begins to lament being a warrior and becomes dejected and paralyzed—unable and unwilling to act.  He realizes that amongst the warriors on the other side are many friends and family members and decides that he doesn’t want to fight. 

What’s at stake?  To act or not to act?  What is the value of action?  What are the dangers of inaction?  Do we have a duty to act? 

Key Terms and concepts: 
1.    Righteous or sacred  duty (dharma)  literally that which upholds, supports or sustains—law, the way things are, the natural law of the universe, which is just, ordered and harmonious.  In Hinduism this is associated with rights and duties accorded to all dependent on his/her place in society.  In Buddhism it tends to have a slightly different definition—it refers to a more general conception of the way things are (stripped of a naturally ordered social hierarchy) which manifests as particular phenomena (events, occurrences) and in teachings and practices which help the yogi to discern and understand the nature of reality.
2.    Action, Deed (Karma) your actions and the effects or fruits of your actions. 
3.    Bhagavan- (lord)  a kind of divine god in the form of a person with personal attributes.  Krishna is a Bhagavan.  There are many Bhagavans in Hinduism—different sects worship or focus around different ones.  Buddha is seen as a Bhagavan by many Hindus. 
4.    Brahman (Transcendent non personal god, the divine ground of all matter)
5.    Atman (divine self) the innermost reality of a person
6.    Discipline (yoga) from sanskirt root yuj “to yoke” “to join” “to unify”  yoga is discipline practice meant to join the yogi with the divine. It literally means union—becoming one. 
7.    Knowledge (jnana)

 

My notes from our visit with Chayim and Mohammed


Common points voiced by both Mohammed and Chayim

•    God knows all, has a plan, but humans are free to choose good and evil
•    Islam/Judaism is the original religion from day 1 of Adam and Eve
•    Both religions are messianic, which is to say they look ahead to a period of utopian peace on earth.  Jews believe this will be within the next 230 years or so.  Muslims say they don’t know when. Related to this ideas is that the garden of Eden was a perfect paradise—humans disobeyed god and were banished.  Now we are trying to get back to the garden—that is the messianic age. 
•    Both believe in life after death in some form.  Chayim believes that souls are reincarnated. 
•    Both put great emphasis on the discipline aspects of religious observance—prayer and ritual, fasting etc. are designed to discipline the mind and heart so that good actions follow.  Good actions lead to merit, bad actions have consequences.  However, God is merciful.  Ramadan—reminds us that some are hungry, discipline us to not eat impulsively. Muslims pray 5 times a day (always on time) to be constantly reminded of their duty to god.  Tefillin (black boxes that Jews put on their heads and arms when praying remind them to align the mind, heart and actions.  The mind should tame the heart so that we do not act impulsively—for instance by committing adultery because we are attracted to somebody.
•    Homosexuality is wrong because the bible says so.  Although certain people have homosexual inclinations, they should not act on them.  It is not our job to question why.  God says so, so it is true.  These people were simply given a greater challenge than others.  The bible also says we should be fruitful and multiply, so if you are homosexual, you cannot do this.  While it might be nice to whitewash these aspects of religious faith, the stark truth should be told.
•    There is one god and only god—only this god should be worshipped, everything else, including the ego should be subsumed to god.  People worship money, or sex, or other things, but only god should be worshiped because god is the creator who set everything in motion, and god continues to sustain this world in every moment, continuously creating everything.

Some points made by Chayim
•    In moments of doubt, Chayim reflects on the awesomeness of the human form, how can there not be a god given the awe we have when we consider how amazing it is that we have this complex body.   There must be a creator who created it.  It’s like a hurricane blowing into a house and out comes a 747, how is such a thing possible.
•    Fossils and distant star light were put here as a test—if god were obvious to all people at all times, there would be no challenge.  (Olam=concealment)
•    From great darkness comes light—everything happens for a reason—even great tragedies like the holocaust, floods, 9/11 and so on.  They all happen for a reason.  Our job is not to question these events, and not even to say that we know why they occurred, but to trust that because everything emanates from god, these events are no exception and thus are purposeful.  From darkness comes light.
Hebrew etymologies

Olam— “world” in Hebrew from the Hebrew word for concealment.  Thus, the world as a creation contains God’s wil and plan, but conceals it. 

Pardes—orchard—paradise


Points made by Mohammed
•    Instead of using our bodies for sex or power, we should use them to prostate ourselves before god, to make us humble.  Prayer is a very physical action. 
•    Jews and Christians are the people of the book—the transmission was holy and complete to Moses and Jesus, but people messed it up so Mohammed received another (this time perfect) transmission. 


Useful links:

1.  Brattleboro Reformer list of area churches

http://www.reformer.com/religion/ci_1039695