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RECOGNIZING THE IMPORTANCE OF ACADEMIC METHODS

Sound scholarship is the essential prerequisite for all academic publishing. Therefore students need to know both how to distinguish between good an bad scholarship. Here are some Web Sites that deal with the use of references and plagiarism:
 
http://www.ucalgary.ca/~hexham/study/study.html
 
Next one need to learn correct and valid research methods. Here are some introductory texts:
 

BASIC TEXTS ON VARIOUS RESEARCH METHODS

 
Herbert Spencer, The Study of Sociology, London, H.S. King, 1877
 
This is a classic text on what today is called the “hermeneutics of suspicion”. It reminds the reader that people in the past were not as stupid or biased as half-educated postmoderns like to claim.
 
Rodney Stark, Sociology, Belmont, California, Wadsworth, 1989
 
If you read only one text on sociology read this one and don’t be fooled by the deceptively easy writing style. This book will teach you both about sociology and how to write.
 
Earl Babbie, The Practice of Social Research, Belmont, California, Wadsworth, 1986
 
Most Religious Studies and Theology students confuse methodology as a philosophical discussion with research methods. This book brings the philosophically inclined down to earth by concentrating on practical research methods.
 
John Beattie, Understanding an African Kingdom, London, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1965
 
A short and incisive introduction to research methods in social anthropology that if brim full of practical advice.
 
N.F. Cantor & R. I Schneider, How to Study History, Arlington Heights, Illinois, Harlan Davidson, 1967
 
A good short introduction to historical methods
 
W.W. Fearnside and W. B. Holther, Fallacy: The Counterfeit of Argument, New York, Prentice-Hall, 1959
 
An excellent introduction to basic logic
 
Anthropological methods
 
George D. Spindler, ed., Being an Anthropologist, London, Holt, Rinehart and Winston,
 
L.L. Langness, Life History in Anthropological Science, London, Holt, Rinehart and Winston,
 
David C. Pitt, Using Historical Sources in Anthropology and Sociology, London, Holt, Rinehart and Winston,1972
 
W.B. Shaffir, Robert A. Stebbins and Alan Turowetz, eds., Fieldwork Experience, New York, St. Martin’s Press, 1980
 
James P. Spradley, Participant Observation, London, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1980
 
Thomas Rhys Williams, Field Methods in the Study of Culture, London, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1967
 
James P. Spradley, The Ethnographic Interview, London, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1979
 
Michael H. Agar, The Professional Stranger, London, Academic Press, 1980
 
Robert G. Burgess, ed., Field Research: A Sourcebook and Field Manual, London, Allen & Unwin, 1982
 
H. Russell Bernard, Research Methods in Anthropology: Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches, London, Alta Mira, 1994
 
Mandda Cesara (Karla Poewe), Reflections of a Woman Anthropologist, London, Academic Press, 1982
 

Sociological methods

 
Emile Durkheim, The Rules of Sociological Method, New York, The Free Press, 1966
 
Peter H. Mann, Methods of Sociological Enquiry, Oxford, Blackwell, 1968
 
H.J. Loether & D. G. McTavish,, Descriptive and Inferential Statistics: An Introduction, Boston, Allyn and Bacon, 1974
 
Herbert F.Weisberg, Jon A. Krosnick, Bruce D. Bowden, Survey Research and Data Analysis, London, Scot, Foresman and Company, 1989
 
Chava Frankfort-Nachmais and David Nachmais, Research Methods in the Social Sciences, New York, St. Martin’s Press, 1966
 

Historical methods

 
Georg G. Iggers and James M. Powell , eds., Leopold von Ranke and the shaping of the historical discipline, Syracuse, N.Y. : Syracuse University Press, 1990.
 
Leopold von Ranke ; edited with an introduction by George G. Iggers and Konrad von Moltke, The Theory and practice of history, New York : Irvington, 1973.
 
R. J. Shafer, A Guide To Historical Methods, Homewood, Illinois, The Dorsey Press, 1980
 
Louis Gottschalk, Understanding History, Ndw York, Alfred A. Knopf, 1963
 
Arthur Marwick, The Nature of History, Chicago, Ill. : Lyceum Books, 1989
 
Paul Thompson, The Voice of the Past: Oral History, New York : Oxford University Press, 2000
 
G. R. (Geoffrey Rudolph) Elton, The Practice of History, Glasgow : Collins-Fontana, 1967.
 
G. R. (Geoffrey Rudolph) Elton, The Sources of History, Ithaca, Cornell University Press, 1969
 
G. R. (Geoffrey Rudolph) Elton, Return to Essentials : Some reflections on the present state of historical study, Cambridge, England : Cambridge University Press, 1991.
 
Gertrude Himmelfarb, The New History and the Old, Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard University Press, 1987
 
John Cannon, ed., The Historian at Work, London, George Allen & Unwin 1980
 
Peter Gay, Style in History, New York, W. W. Norton, 1974
 
Content analysis
 
B.L. Smith, K.F. Johnson, D.W. Paulsen, F. Shocket, Political Research Methods, Boston, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1976
 
T.F. Carney, Content Analysis, Winnipeg, University of Manitoba Press, 1972
 

Philosophical analysis - logic

 
Irving Copi, Introduction to Logic, New York : Macmillan, 1990
 
D.H. Fischer, Historians Fallacies, New York, Harper & Row, 1970
 
Jeremy Bentham, The Handbook of Political Fallacies, New York, Harper & Row, 1962, first edition 1824
 
Karl R. Popper, The Open Society and its Enemies, New York, Harper Torchbooks, 1963
 
Karl Popper, The Myth of the Framework, London ; New York : Routledge, 1996
 
Karl Mannheim, Essays on the Sociology of Knowledge, London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1952
 
Walter Kaufmann, Critique of Religion and Philosophy, London,Faber and Faber, 1958

 

 

 

  
 

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