Recommendations: Watching and Listening

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Traveling this summer? Check out our Recommended Watching/Listening Research Guide!

This guide lists recommendations for audio, TV, and film. Links to award winners are included, as well as popular sites such as IMDb, TED Talks, PBS, and NPR. We also link you to databases in our library that can also provide video and audio. This can be a great starting point in identifying a new interest or author.

If you want look up to see if we have a particular item, see our FAQ on how to search the catalog for films only.  To search audio, do the same process except choose Books on Tape/CD. Or, give the library a call and we can look up an item for you.

Want to check something out to take with you? If you are a student, faculty, or community member of District 509, you can check items out of our library to bring with you! See this site for details.

—Written by Maria Bagshaw, Reference/Instruction Librarian

 

 

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Recommended Watching & Listening

The library has created a Research Guide called Recommended Watching/Listening dedicated to media viewing and listening. It offers review websites, podcasts, audio and video database resources, and more to help you decide what to watch or listen to whether on your commute, studying a topic for school, or at the beach.

You can also check out last year’s Summer Listening, Podcast Edition blog post here.

What to watch now: Part 2

Courtesy of Seth Waite

In Part 2 of our recommended watching series, we include a wide range of contributions from art, music, and social issues.  Let Elizabeth Gilbert, John Cleese, Sunitha Krishnan, Amanda Palmer, Eve Ensler, and more great minds inspire you to be creative and to work toward a better society.

Creativity & Art 

• Amanda Palmer The Art of Asking
• Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie The Danger of One Story
• John Cleese On Creativity—Recommended by Jana Porter 
• Elizabeth Gilbert Your Elusive Creative Genius
• Isabel Allende: Tales of passion
• Amy Tan: Where does creativity hide?
• Elif Shafak: The politics of fiction

Music

• Mark Ronson: How Sampling Transformed Music—Recommended by Maria Bagshaw 
• Emmanuel Jal The Music of a War Child
• Derek Paravicini and Adam Ockelford: In the key of genius

Social Issues:

• Ivan Coyote Why We Need Gender-Neutral Bathrooms—Recommended by Maria Bagshaw
• Bryan Stevenson We Need to Talk About Injustice
• Sunitha Krishnan The Fight Against Sex Slavery
• Adam Foss A prosecutor’s vision for a better justice system
• Aaron Huey America’s native prisoners of war
• Anand Giridharadas A tale of two Americas. And the mini-mart where they collided
• Kevin Bales: How to combat modern slavery
• Leymah Gbowee Unlock the intelligence, passion, greatness of girls
• Roxane Gay: Confessions of a bad feminist
• Courtney Martin: This isn’t her mother’s feminism
• Elizabeth Nyamayaro: An invitation to men who want a better world for women
• Eve Ensler: Embrace your inner girl

–Submitted by Karen Klein, Reference Librarian

What to watch now: Part 1

Courtesy of photosteve101

Although we LOVE to watch those viral videos (cat videos and Carpool Karaoke, anyone?), maybe you would like to change it up and watch something inspiring, uplifting, and educational?

In this two part post, we will provide you with some of our best recommendations.  This week in Part 1, we focus on commencement speeches, education, business/leadership, and science/health.  Have a listen to Neil Gaiman, Amy Cuddy, Sir Ken Robinson, Temple Grandin, and more motivational leaders speak about their passions.

Commencement Speeches

• Neil Gaiman Make Good Art Speech
• K. Rowling’s Harvard Commencement Speech
• Sheryl Sandberg University of California Berkeley Commencement Speech—Recommended by Maria Bagshaw 

Education

• Ken Robinson How to Escape Education’s Death Valley—Recommended by Maria Bagshaw 
• Ken Robinson: Ken Robinson Says Schools Kill Creativity —Recommended by Maria Bagshaw
• Angela Lee Duckworth Grit: The power of passion and persistence

Leadership & Business 

• Adam Grant The Surprising Habits of Original Thinkers
• Susan Cain The Power of Introverts
• Dan Pink The Puzzle of Motivation

Science & Health

• Nadine Burke Harris How Childhood Trauma Affects Health Across a Lifetime
• Amy Cuddy How Body Language Shapes Who You Are—Recommended by Maria Bagshaw 
• Elyn Saks: A tale of mental illness — from the inside
• Temple Grandin: The world needs all kinds of minds
• Eleanor Longden: The voices in my head
• Sherwin Nuland: How electroshock therapy changed me

—Submitted by Karen Klein, Reference Librarian

Films on Demand: Educational video streaming service now available through ECC Library

Films on Demand provides educational videos on a variety of subject areas.  It is billed as a “Web-based digital video delivery service that allows you to view streaming videos from Films Media Group anytime, anywhere, 24/7! Choose from thousands of high-quality educational titles in dozens of subject areas.”

You can find the link two ways:

• On the library’s webpage on the right-hand side list at the bottom;
• On the library’s webpage under Research, then click on Films On Demand.

You will need your usual library card number login to access the service from off-campus.

Click on the link for a downloadable list of available videos in these subjects: Humanities & Social Sciences, Business & Economics, Science,  Health, Technical Education, Family & Consumer Sciences,
Careers & Job Search,  and Guidance & Counseling.

Watch this video for a general overview of this new and exciting service!

Resource Spotlight: Zero in on Your Research Topic with Gale Expanded Academic ASA

Starting research with a very broad topic can feel overwhelming, since there’s so much to learn and so much to cover. Therefore, it’s usually best to zero in on a particular aspect or question that you can cover in more depth.

If you’re still figuring out how to narrow your topic, Gale’s Expanded Academic database can help you see the subdivisions within a topic and decide which one you want to focus on. Watch the video to see how!

Things to keep in mind:

• In Expanded Academic, you are searching for general topics, not specific articles, so start off by searching for a broad topic (for example, global warming, gun control, autism), and let the database do the rest of the work.
• If at first it doesn’t recognize the topic you searched for, try a synonym or a broader version of the topic.
• Use the number of articles next to each topic subdivision to see how much has been written about it.
• When you get to a list of articles, use the links to different source types (Magazines, Academic Journals, News) to see the rest of the results.

Resource Spotlight: Gale Opposing Viewpoints

If you need to do research about a controversial topic such as abortion, immigration reform, or climate change, then we have the tool for you. Opposing Viewpoints collects pro and con essays on a variety of newsworthy issues and presents them to you in an easy-to-navigate format. Watch the video to see it in action.

Things to keep in mind:

• Opposing Viewpoints works best for browsing and exploring a topic. It allows you to search for terms, but that’s not its strong suit.
• Opposing Viewpoints chooses essays that are representative of a certain argument or perspective on an issue, NOT because they necessarily approve of the argument or the quality of the evidence. Use your head about what you read there, just like you would with anything else.
• Looking for research that’s in-depth and scholarly or on a very specific topic? Try searching in EBSCO’s Academic Search Premier or Proquest’s Research Library.

Resource overview and video by Carl Lehnen, Reference/Instruction Librarian