Guidelines for Sources

In this class you'll often be asked to conduct some research. With the internet at your fingertips, it makes it easy to search. But how do you know if what you read is from a reliable source? Review this video from theUVU Library's web site.

Links to an external site.

Here are a few of my own guidelines:

• NEVER quote web sites like Wikipedia, ask.com, about.com. Sometimes you can go to wikipedia and look at the bottom of an entry for the links that serve as footnotes. Some are reputable.
• A great resource for scholarly articles is JSTOR, which is accessible for free on the UVU campus
• Is it a web site you've heard of? (The Wall Street Journal, aiga.com, etc.)
• Is it a web site of a museum (moma.org, themet.org, or other museums)
• Don't use web sites where you cannot tell who authored the information. If you don't know who wrote it, it is not a reliable source. A caveat to this are sites from museums like moma.org, metmuseum.org or other museums, which often don't list the authors, but are reliable sources.
• If you can see who wrote something, check their credentials. What is their area of expertise? Do they have an educational background that would qualify them as an expert? Are they well-known? 
• Don't be afraid to use the UVU Library's web site, including the Ebsco database.
• There are a number of graphic design related sites that are very reliable sources: designobserver.com (Links to an external site.), EyeOnDesign.org Links to an external site., printmag.com (Links to an external site.), ilovetypography.com (Links to an external site.), rit graphic design archives (Links to an external site.), eyemagazine.com Links to an external site., to name just a few.