Ask yourself these questions:
Is there an author or authors - or an editor or editors? Is it clear who is responsible for the content? If it is a web site you are looking at - is it signed? Is it clear who is responsible for the content? Is there contact information or a means to verify the legitimacy of a person or organization? If so, what are their credentials? If a book - who is the publisher? Are they well-known and considered reliable? Have they published many other books on this or similar topics? If a web site - does the domain name reflect reliability? Look at the end of the domain name to determine what kind of organization or individual might have been responsible for it:
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.gov |
Indicates Web pages sponsored or written by the United States government and/or its agencies. (Example: United States Senate - http://www.senate.gov/) Generally reliable. |
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.org |
Indicates Web pages sponsored or written by advocacy, professional or noncommercial organizations, including nonprofit groups. (Example: American Heart Association - http://www.americanheart.org). Generally reliable if the organization is considered so. |
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.com |
Indicates Web pages sponsored or written by commercial or marketing sites; generally for profit Web sites. (Example: Microsoft Corporation - http://www.microsoft.com). Reliability varies - these are usually companies trying to sell something, so keep that in mind and realize that the web site could be slanted toward a particular product. |
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.edu |
Indicates Web pages sponsored or written by an educational institution. (Example: Kansas City Kansas Community College - http://www.kckcc.edu/). Generally extremely reliable, although one should verify that pages were done by professors or researchers within departments. Graduate students often use web sites to post research and generally they are reliable. Undergraduate web pages should be looked at more closely. |
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.net |
Internet networks. These are usually, but not always, web pages developed by individuals. These individuals may or may not have the credentials you would want to find in a scholarly or academic web site. Using sites with this domain should cause one to automatically look more closely at the authority of the person(s) or organization(s) affiliated with |
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.mil |
U.S. Department of Defense use. These are web pages developed by the U.S. Department of Defense. |
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.biz |
For use by business organizations. Using sites with this domain should cause one to automatically look more closely at the authority of the person(s) or organization(s) affiliated with. |
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.int |
International organizations sites. Using sites with this domain should cause one to automatically look more closely at the authority of the person(s) or organization(s) affiliated with. |
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.ca, .jp, .uk, etc. |
Represents country domains. Many domain names will contain abbreviated versions of US domains after the country code - such as .co instead of .com for companies and other profit organizations, .ed for .edu for educational institutions, etc. Same rules apply as with other domains. |
Authority can be verified in a number of ways - is the author listed in a reputable directory (Marquis Who's Who, Directory of American Scholars, etc.) that lists credentials, education, occupation, other publications and other information that would show the person or persons are experts in the field they are espousing? Has the person or persons written other books or articles dealing with the subject? Have reviews been posted on anything they've written? Either or both of these can show whether other respected authorities in the field see the authors research as significant and used reliable methods. Is the publisher well-known and/or reliable? Publishing names such as Facts on File, Knopf, McGraw-Hill, Scribner's, etc. are just a few examples of reliable sources in the academic and/or scholarly world. Professional organizations and university presses such as Oxford or Cambridge are usually reliable publishers. Generally avoid vanity publishers or publishers on demand unless you can prove the reliability of the individual author. When it comes to publishers of journals you generall want to stay away from magazines. Those articles are usually written by general staff members and not people doing direct research in a field. Usually the word "journal" in the title can indicate scholarly or academic information, but that is not always the case (example: Ladies Home Journal). By the same token, the word magazine in the title often denotes popular periodicals, but some professional literature uses that name and those would be perfectly acceptable. Often you can check the publishing information near the front cover of the magazine to find out who is publishing it and that is a good way to check out their authority. Also, look for journals that are refereed or peer-reviewed - when searching electronically you can often refine your search to look only for those types of articles. Sources of Biographical Information Available Through KCKCC Library Print:
Is there an author or authors - or an editor or editors? Is it clear who is responsible for the content?
If it is a web site you are looking at - is it signed? Is it clear who is responsible for the content?
Is there contact information or a means to verify the legitimacy of a person or organization? If so, what are their credentials?
If a book - who is the publisher? Are they well-known and considered reliable? Have they published many other books on this or similar topics?
If a web site - does the domain name reflect reliability? Look at the end of the domain name to determine what kind of organization or individual might have been responsible for it:
Contemporary Authors
Online:
Ethnic NewsWatch
African American Biographical Database
Literature Resource Center