Something Useful for Researchers

One of my students gave me an invaluable tip the other day: she had gone to the local library with her daughter and had been told about the "Opposing Views" database. You can put one view, like 'global warming' in the database, and get what are effectively antonym views out. Of course, these have to be pretty hot topics to provide binary, polarising views.

Hot fingered I dashed off an email to our NMIT Library, because this would be SUCH a great resource for providing balance in research! However, our lovely Library people had not heard of this either, but did some digging for me.

They found that this great little idea is the "Opposing Viewpoints In Context" in the Gale Database/Cengage Learning set. It is, in Gale's words an "online resource covering today’s hottest social issues, from Offshore Drilling to Climate Change, Health Care to Immigration. Opposing Viewpoints in Context helps students research, analyze and organize a broad variety of data for conducting research, completing writing assignments, preparing for debates, creating presentations and more".

All I can say is that this is a FANTASTIC idea, and I wish that everything was in here, not just hot topics!

Ask your library if you have access to http://www.gale.cengage.com/InContext/viewpoints.htm 

Sam