Library Website : Conflict Studies: Starting Your Research

What is Background Research?

Background research is the research you do before you start writing your paper. Doing background research is helpful for focusing your topic and finding out what information is available to you.

Background research can take many forms, but here's a few ways you can get started:

Choose one or two keywords from your area of interest or assignment description and put them into GLOCAT or a database and see what comes up. Skim over the titles to find ones that sound interesting, and use those to narrow down your topic.
Look through encyclopedias, dictionaries, and other reference sources related to your field for more information on your area of interest. This can help you learn about more specific aspects of your topic that you can use for your assignment, as well as spark new keywords you can search.
Try Wikipedia! While Wikipedia isn't a source you can cite for an assignment, it does have plenty of background information on a wide variety of topics. You can read the Wikipedia page for background information, and most pages will have a references list at the bottom you can use to help find scholarly sources.
Choose a journal in your field and skim the most recent titles to get a sense of what topics are trending.

Using GLOCAT

GLOCAT (Advanced Search)
Search SUNY Geneseo's Library holdings, and holdings of libraries from around the world (including all SUNY libraries), plus hundreds of databases for print and online content.

Use GLOCAT through the link above or the search box on the library homepage to find materials.

"Milne Search" will bring back materials we currently have available through Geneseo, while "SUNY & Worldwide Libraries" will bring back materials you can request through IDS.

Reference Sources

Gale Virtual Reference Library This link opens in a new window
Encyclopedias, almanacs, and specialized reference sources for multidisciplinary and subject specific research in areas such as art, business, education, history, etc.
World Factbook (CIA) This link opens in a new window
Provides detailed country profile” for most countries in the world. Covers geography, people, government, economy, communications, transportation, military, and transnational issues. Includes country maps.

Routledge Handbook of Civil Wars by Edward Newman (Editor); Karl DeRouen, Jr. (Editor)
ISBN: 9780415622585
Publication Date: 2014-03-07
This comprehensive new Handbook explores the significance and nature of armed intrastate conflict and civil war in the modern world. Civil wars and intrastate conflict represent the principal form of organised violence since the end of World War II, and certainly in the contemporary era. These conflicts have a huge impact and drive major political change within the societies in which they occur, as well as on an international scale. The global importance of recent intrastate and regional conflicts in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Somalia, Nepal, Cote d'Ivoire, Syria and Libya - amongst others - has served to refocus academic and policy interest upon civil war. Drawing together contributions from key thinkers in the field who discuss the sources, causes, duration, nature and recurrence of civil wars, as well as their political meaning and international impact, the Handbook is organised into five key parts: Part I: Understanding and Explaining Civil Wars: Theoretical and Methodological Debates Part II: The Causes of Civil Wars Part III: The Nature and Impact of Civil Wars Part IV: International Dimensions Part V: Termination and Resolution of Civil Wars Covering a wide range of topics including micro-level issues as well as broader debates, Routledge Handbook of Civil Wars will set a benchmark for future research in the field. This volume will be of much interest to students of civil wars and intrastate conflict, ethnic conflict, political violence, peace and conflict studies, security studies and IR in general.
The SAGE Handbook of Conflict Communication by John G. Oetzel; Stella Ting-Toomey
ISBN: 9780761930457
Publication Date: 2006-01-18
The means to express conflict is through communication (verbal and nonverbal messages); likewise, the means to manage and address conflict is through communication. The SAGE Handbook of Conflict Communication emphasizes constructive conflict management from a communication perspective which places primacy in the message as the focus of conflict research and practice. Divided into four sections, plus a general introduction and conclusion, the Handbook focuses on contexts in which conflict occurs: interpersonal, organizational, community, and intercultural/international. Editors John Oetzel and Stella Ting-Toomey as well as expert researchers in the field have assembled in one resource the knowledge base of the field of conflict communication; identified the best theories, ideas, and practices of conflict communication; and provided the opportunity for scholars and practitioners to link theoretical frameworks and application tools.