Research Guides: *Religion: REL 3171: Religion & Food: Topics in Ethics

Getting Ideas, Getting Started

Oxford Handbook of Food Ethics by Anne Barnhill, Tyler Doggett, Mark Budolfson, editors
ISBN: 9780199372263
Publication Date: 2018
This handbook provides a sample of interdisciplinary scholarship across multiple areas of food ethics: conventional agriculture and alternatives to it; animals; consumption; food justice; food politics; food workers; and, food and identity.
The SAGE Encyclopedia of Food Issues by Ken Albala, editor
ISBN: 9781452243016
Publication Date: 2015
This academic encyclopedia focuses on social and policy aspects of food production, safety, regulation, labeling, marketing, distribution, and consumption. A sampling of general topic areas covered includes Agriculture, Labor, Food Processing, Marketing and Advertising, Trade and Distribution, Retail and Shopping, Consumption, Food Ideologies, Food in Popular Media, Food Safety, Environment, Health, Government Policy, and Hunger and Poverty.

Finding Scholarly Sources

Developing Keywords

The first step in a successful search is generating a list of keywords that we hope will match the kinds of information we need. In our daily lives, we do this without really thinking about it. When we Google for a restaurant menu, a how-to guide on YouTube, or driving directions, our search terms (keywords) are often obvious.

Searching for scholarly sources can be a bit more challenging, especially if we are unfamiliar with the topic, or don't know the specialized language that scholars in religion, ethics, or related fields use when describing ethical and cultural practices about food production, distribution, and consumption.

Brainstorm the keywords you think scholars might use in the TITLES or ABSTRACTS of books and journal articles about your topic.
Combine two or three keywords in OneSearch.
Evaluate your results.
- Are you on the right track?
- Do you need to test a different set of keywords?
- Can you refine your results to just peer-reviewed articles, or sort by date, to get better sources?
Evaluate individual books or articles.
- What ethical dilemma does your author identify?
- What evidence does the author present to describe and explain the ethical dilemma?
- What solutions, if any, does the author propose?
- Are you convinced?
Think about how you might use a source in your own writing.
- Does this source provide helpful background information so your reader better understands your topic?
- Do you agree with some of the author's findings? Can you use this source as supporting evidence?
- Do you disagree with some of the author's findings? How will you convince your reader that your position is stronger?

Worksheet: Keywords
We will use this worksheet in class to create lists of keywords for our search strategies and to organize the ideas we find.

Citation Management

Zotero: Quick Start Guide
Zotero is a free, easy-to-use tool to help you collect, organize, annotate, cite, and share research. This quick start guide walks you through the process of installing Zotero on your computer and how to save and cite sources.