General Library Sources
This list organizes resources for the Situated Knowledge project, in which students "investigate the social life" of an everyday object.
This guide is an instructional tool and should not be considered as complete. For leads to further resources, review the list of subjects in the Fondren Libguides page.
When searching these resources, you will mainly be looking for information on either a company or an industry.
When searching for a company, start with the company or brand name. Look for helpful identifying information like the names of parent companies and unique ticker symbols in the item records you find. Databases like LexisNexis will have pages listing financials and other essential information for public companies; these can be looked up by company name or, better, ticker symbol.
Many item records will also include a code number and/or title for the company's main industries. These codes (called NAICS codes) were developed by the US Census Bureau. Knowing them will help you find industry reports treating your company's products and competitors.
A good workflow might be to find articles on a company, then use the article record's industry codes to find relevant industry reports.
Always scan the left side of the results page in business databases to narrow your results to news reports, trade publications, SWOT analyses, industry reports and other document types.
There is a whole genre of videos devoted to the design, manufacture and use of everyday objects. Search for them on Youtube and also in our Films on Demand database. Many documentaries are also available in our DVD collection and the Kanopy streaming video database; use OneSearch to search across all these resources (this tutorial explains how).