Tuesday, July 1, 2014

Research Methods and Methodologies (DJ)









 

1. Introduction
The purpose of this manual is to provide you with essential materials that will help you conduct professional and academic research. In addition, there are also suggestions to guide you in extending your research skills and exploring further sources of information. We encourage you to take up these opportunities regularly because your success as a researcher depends at least in part on your familiarity with available resources.

2. Referencing
Referencing is a method of acknowledging the sources you have used in your academic work. It is a way of ensuring that you maintain academic integrity in all of your written assignments and that you use the work of others in an ethical way.

Acknowledge any ideas or information which are not your own when:
      quoting directly, or word for word
      summarising or paraphrasing another person’s work
      using data such as statistics, images, diagrams, graphs, etc.

Sources of information you need to reference include:
      books or chapters from books
      articles from journals or newspapers, both print and online
      films, television, podcasts or radio programs
      emails, interviews or letters
      blogs or wikis
      works of art or music
      websites

Your list of references, or bibliography enables another to follow the steps you have taken in your research. In addition, this enables others to verify your citations and confirm that you have not plagiarised the work of another person. Plagiarism is the act of presenting another person’s work or ideas as your own. Plagiarism is a serious breach of ethics in the workplace and is not taken lightly.


2.1 Styles of Referencing
While there are multiple referencing systems that exist throughout the world, it is important to choose one style and apply it consistently throughout your work. Two of the most widely applied referencing systems are as follows:
      An online guide for the Harvard referencing system can be found here: http://www.staffs.ac.uk/assets/harvard_quick_guide_tcm44-47797.pdf
      An online guide for the Vancouver referencing system can be found here: https://workspace.imperial.ac.uk/library/Public/Vancouver_referencing.pdf

2.2 Citation Machines
Citation machines or generators help students and professional researchers to properly credit the information that they use. Citation machines can be found for a variety of referencing systems, including ALA, MLA, Harvard, Vancouver and Chicago.

      Queen’s University of Belfast provides a citation machine that generates the Harvard and Vancouver system of referencing: http://www.qub.ac.uk/cite2write/
      The website ‘Cite This For Me’ also provides a citation machine that generates the ALA, MLA and Harvard systems of referencing: http://www.citethisforme.com/

3. Locating Resources

This section will help you learn how to find the various types of academic information that will assist you in the workplace and university.

3.1 Primary and Secondary Sources
Primary sources represent original thinking, reports on discoveries or events, or they can share new information. They are usually the first formal appearance of original research.

Secondary sources involve analysis, synthesis, interpretation, or evaluation of primary sources. They often attempt to describe or explain primary sources.

Scholarly journals, although generally considered to be secondary sources, often contain articles on very specific subjects and may be the primary source of information on new developments.

Secondary Sources
      commentary and digests
      journal articles and research reports
      textbooks
      books and articles that interpret or review research works
      histories
      criticism of literature
      biographies
      political commentary
      encyclopedias
      dictionaries
      newspaper editorials
Primary Resources
      statistical data
      manuscripts
      surveys and interviews
      speeches
      autobiographies
      oral histories, interviews
      reports involving empirical research
      government documents
      original documents e.g. trial transcripts
      domestic and international legislation
      domestic and international case law

3.2 Peer-Reviewed Literature
Journal articles that are peer-reviewed have been assessed by the author’s peers, an editorial board of subject specialists in a particular discipline. They review, and accept or reject articles that have been submitted for publication based on the validity and scholarship of the article.

This scrutiny by the author's peers ensures that high standards of research and scholarship are maintained. The peer-review process also helps build a reliable body of knowledge.

Peer-reviewed articles:
      present more highly regarded and authoritative information
      include bibliographies that provide you with further reading of a similar quality and standard
      focus on original academic research
      are also called refereed articles

3.3 Alternative Subject Terms
When you start to look for resources on a topic, it is useful to identify some alternative terms or keywords to help you search.

The words in your assignment question may not be the same words or terms that are used in a library catalogue or database.

Terms that describe things may vary between countries, for example:
      caravans can also be referred to as trailers
      primary school can also be referred to as elementary school
      university can also be referred to as college

Identifying alternative terms or keywords will help you to find a range of resources that are relevant to your topic.

Subject dictionaries and encyclopedias help you identify alternative terms and keywords.If you are looking for a definition of fascism, look for a dictionary or encyclopedia on a broader subject such as politics.

Find dictionaries and encyclopedias using www.thefreedictionary.com or www.tfode.com
      search using broad subject terms, such as politics, medicine, engineering
      truncate encyclopedia e.g. encyclop* to find encyclopedia (US spelling) and encyclopaedia (UK spelling)

Very new terms
As subjects develop, new terms are created. If you are trying to find a very new term, look in a recently published dictionary.

Some terms could be too new to be included in print dictionaries. Search the internet for information about very recent terms, but remember to evaluate information found via the internet before using it in your work.

3.4 Selecting Information
When you are researching a new topic and you don't have a reading list, you will need to find information that will be appropriate for your assignments.
Some sources of information are regarded as more reliable than others because of the way they are produced or created.

The following guidelines will help you select information:
      some sources of information have a higher level of accountability, e.g academic texts and peer-reviewed journals;
      take time to read widely to gain a deeper understanding of a topic, and;
      go through an evaluation process with any information you find, checking it for quality, relevance and usefulness.

3.5 Sources of Academic Information

Databases
A library database is a collection of published literature, such as journal and newspaper articles, conference proceedings, reports and book chapters. Databases can be subject specific or multi-disciplinary. They can als be subscription or open access. Searching a library database is a good way to find scholarly information.

      Subscription databases
Many important databases require users to pay for access to their content. Libraries subscribe to these databases and access to each individual database is subject to licence agreements. This means that only currently enrolled students and staff have access to UNSW Library subscription databases.
      We encourage all interns to ask whether their universities or employers have access to any subscription databases.

      Open Access Databases
Some databases are open access, providing free access to selected scholarly journal articles, these, scholarly monographs and book chapters.

      The Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) is an online database that aims to be comprehensive and cover all open access scientific and scholarly journals that use a quality control system to guarantee the content: www.doaj.org
      Jurn provides journal articles in the arts and humanities: www.jurn.org/
      Social Science Research Network is a website devoted to the rapid dissemination of scholarly research in the social sciences and humanities: http://www.ssrn.com/en/

Library Catalogues
Library Catalogues provide records of items held in a library’s collection. They can also link you to online content such as e-books, e-journals, digitised content such as images, documents and databases. Library Catalogues can be searched online from anywhere in the world, helping you discover what is held in a Library’s collection.
      We encourage all interns to ask whether their universities or employers have access to any library catalogues, as they usually require a login.

Google
Google is a fast, easy way to search for information, ranging from the very general to the scholarly. It is important to carefully evaluate any information you find through Google. If you are specifically searching for scholarly information, it can save you time to first search library resources such as databases, journals and catalogues.
      www.google.com

Google Scholar
Google Scholar can link you to scholarly literature, such as journal articles, books and conference papers. Not all academic material will be available via Google Scholar. Searching library resources such as databases can be a more thorough way of checking the literature in a subject area, ensuring you do not miss key information.
      www.scholar.google.com

Legal Resources

International and Foreign Sources of Law
      GlobaLex provides information on international law, comparative law, foreign law research, as well as tools for building foreign, comparative and international law collections: www.nyulawglobal.org/Globalex/
      JuriGlobe provides multilingual information data bank, containing general information relating to the different legal systems in the world, to the different official languages and to some of the most important international commercial conventions and multilateral commercial tools: www.juriglobe.ca/eng/apropos/index.php
      LLRX provides free international and foreign legal research resources and tools:
      LLRX International: www.llrx.com/category/857
      LLRX Foreign: www.llrx.com/category/1050
      Max Planck Encyclopedia of Public International Law (MPEPIL) provides a comprehensive analytical resource covering the whole of public international law, plus online-only articles since 2001: http://opil.ouplaw.com/home/EPIL
      WordLii is a free, independent and non-profit public access to worldwide law by the Free Access to Law movement. It provides access to law journals, databases, international law libraries, courts and case law and an international treaty collection:  http://www.worldlii.org/
      HUDOC provides a database of the case-law of the supervisory organs of the European Convention of Human Rights: www.hudoc.echr.coe.int/
      African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights provides relevant legal information on African legal instruments: www.achpr.org
Domestic Sources of Law
      The Chbab.net website is building a repository of Cambodian jurisprudence to enable access to Cambodian laws: www.chbab.net
      Cambodian Centre of Human Rights provides relevant legal information on human rights law in Cambodia: http://www.sithi.org/
      The Senate website provides law lists, reports and publications on legal developments in Cambodia: http://www.senate.gov.kh/
      Asian Legal Information Institute (AsianLii) provides free access to Asian Law, including Cambodia: http://www.asianlii.org/
      Open Development provides certain Cambodian laws and regulations: http://www.opendevelopmentcambodia.net/laws-regulations/
      The Guide to Law Online contains a selection of Cambodian legal, juridicial and governmental sources accessible through their website: http://www.loc.gov/law/help/guide/nations/cambodia.php
      GoCambodia provides a wide variety of laws and regulations: http://www.gocambodia.com/laws/





My Sixth Reflexive Diary with DJ



D E S T I N A T I O N   J U S T I C E
Memorandum
Reflexive Diaries
Project
Justice Sector Internship Program
From
Destination Justice
To
Justice Ambassadors
Date
04 April 2014

My Sixth Reflexive Diary

          Dear, Catherine and Sophie
         
          Hi, my good trainers. Today I would like to share of my sixth reflexive diary with both of you about my experience, duty, and learning from last week. First, I would like to talk about my experience and duty. I really appreciate with my experience and duty nowadays that I have done a part-time job with the International Bridges to Justice (IBJ), I also work at the weekend with the Career Advising Services (CAS) Team. For example, I felt so excited when I had a good chance to work in my organization as a legal intern. Therefore, I have gained some good knowledge, experiences from my organization. As you have known IBJ has been working with the legal services in order to help the victimized clients. IBJ is my first organization that I have worked with, but sometimes I think it was not good enough for me because it lacked the duties for me to do. So it wasn’t strange and new thing for me. I really want to do the new thing to get a new knowledge. However, I am still really grateful for IBJ which provided me for those good experiences, and I felt happy and warm when I had a good relationship with co-workers. That is, it has a good situation in my workplace. Another thing I would like to mention is my duties that I have worked and achieved so far such as:
-       Bringing the documents that sent from IBJ’s provincial offices,
-       Sending the documents to provincial offices,
-       Sending the invitation letters for high rank leaders in other institutions to make the street laws or round tables together with IBJ,
-       Counting the attendant lists of participants in round tables and street laws,
-       Putting the defended letters or released letter for victimized clients at the Municipal of Phnom Penh Court and the Court of Kandal province,
-       Carrying the paid receipt away for Internet; electricity; telephone services and others,
-       Preparing the documents or equipment for roundtables or street laws
Second, one more thing that I like is to work in the social work at the weekend with Career Advising Services (CAS) Team which is operated with the Peace Corps. For instance, CAS Team is a service to provide some information for the high school students such as how to study well in high school, how to live in Phnom Penh, how to apply for the scholarship from university, especially how to choose the major to study at university. Therefore, I and my team have to speak a lot in front of the students. Thus, I am so excited that I have learned some strategies about public speaking from trainers at the Destination Justice. It really helped me to abolish the fear in order for making a good presentation or public speaking by some strategies such as using the gesture or body languages with the eyes contact, practicing to speak with parents, friends and other people around us regularly or speaking alone in front of mirror, managing the time properly, and other methods from the Destination Justice.
          Last but not the end of my reflexive diary, so see you the next part of my seventh reflexive diary rom my workplaces, Destination Justice, and school. Moreover, I would like to say thank for my workplaces which provided me the good knowledge, good experience, and I’m really highly grateful for the Destination Justice which has made these workshop happened for the interns.
Thank you,
Best regards,

PEOU Dara
Cambodia Legal Intern
International Bridges to Justice (IBJ)
#25K, Street 488
Phnom Penh, Cambodia
www.ibj.org

My First Reflexive Diary with DJ



D E S T I N A T I O N   J U S T I C E
Memorandum

Reflexive Diaries
Project
Justice Sector Internship Program
From
Destination Justice
To
Justice Ambassadors
Date
05 March 2014

My First Reflexive Diary

          First, I would like to introduce myself. My name’s PEOU Dara. I am a part-time legal intern at IBJ. I came from Battambang province. After I have finished foundation year of law, I applied for volunteer in other institutions. That is, I applied to be a legal intern or lawyer assistant at the International Bridges to Justice (IBJ). However, before I have worked in IBJ, I also worked in the Context Translation Service as a volunteer for only two weeks. Then I decided to work with IBJ when I was passed the last interview. At that time, I thought I like working with NGOs, so I decided to resign my old work in the translation company. But I still think that both places are very good place for me to work. Because I will gain a good ability and knowledge, especially I want to know how to translate and interpret from Khmer to English, from English to Khmer. Meanwhile, I also think that legal service is also good for me because it is fit to my major. Moreover I wanted to help the victims.
          Now I’d love to talk about my internship at my workplace. According to my opinion, IBJ is good place to help the people who are lack of the legal service for them because the citizens are poor, so they can’t find the legal service to help them. But now it has IBJ to help all of them to get a good result. Moreover, I am really excited with IBJ that has a good vision to help the citizens around the world especially in Cambodia. While I have worked with IBJ, I didn’t have the real task to do so far. That is, I worked in general task that I can help my program officer. I am happy to help them whatever I can do. Therefore, the work that I have done are I frequently brought the letter of defending the clients, letter of releasing the clients out of prison to Phnom Penh court, to Kandal court. In addition, I went to send the letter to other offices through provinces at bus station, and I also received the letter at bus station but it is not very often. I used to work with street law’s lists through provinces. I just counted the positions of each participant in the street law of the lists. Otherwise, I used to help other works. After I have worked with IBJ for a while, I learnt about the environment of workplace that we should know. As we have known that atmosphere and environment of workplace is very important for the worker because when we have learnt about this point. It will help us to know about the situations of workplace, people and the process of the work, too. Sometimes, I have reflexed through the situation of work.
          Even though I have worked not too long, but it made me to understand of some parts of the work processing. I think I like a special skill in my life. That is, I like keeping the relationship with the people me, having a good relationship, but I also want to improve some parts of my life. I want to improve my trust. For example, sometimes I didn’t trust myself when I want to do something. I thought that it might be wrong and not good enough if I express my idea to the publicity, so I really want to strengthen this part to be strong. Furthermore, I want to strengthen my writing and research. I think both parts are helpful for me and other students. I think my writing is acceptable but it is not good enough so I want to get more strengthen about. However, one part that I have faced in the present is research because I don’t know how to research in order to get efficiently. I hope I could improve my writing and research after I have learnt with Destination Justice. Even though it is not too long for this term workshop but it still can help us to improve some parts.

When I have worked with IBJ, I also have done some achievements as well. For instance, I used to bring some letters to the courts to get the success, too. In addition, I helped preparing the workshop successfully.
Meanwhile, I also have the problem while I make workshop though provinces. Namely, nowadays, I have worked in the Career Advising Service which is a place to provide the knowledge how to choose the major logically for the high school students after they graduated high school. But when I make a presentation or share knowledge I felt a little bit shocked. So I think this is my weak point that I should strengthen it, right.

Sometime I think something that we have learnt from university and workplace are different because university contains only the theory but workplace contains the practice more than theory. But some theory that I have learnt from university is also help me too. Beside these, university is still good for the student but we have to take theory to link with practice. I hope after I have finished the workshop with Destination Justice, I will bring this knowledge to help me in writing, do research.

Last but not least, I would like to say thank to Destination Justice that provide us for these workshops. I will send you the next reflexive diary next week later.

Thank you,
Best regards,

PEOU Dara
Cambodia Legal Intern
International Bridges to Justice (IBJ) Cambodia
#25K, Street 488
Phnom Penh, Cambodia
www.ibj.org