SCC Research Guides: Disinformation and Misinformation (Buzzard): 2. Explore Your Topic

Watch the Documentary

Begin by watching the following documentary:

Trust Me. Directed by Roko Belic, New Day Films, 2020. Kanopy, https://www.kanopy.com/en/sccsc/video/11111301.

Kanopy
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Watch over 30,000 Documentaries, Classic and Indie Films. Stream films anytime, anywhere on your preferred devices.

Explore Topics and Issues

After watching the documentary, identify a specific topic related to digital literacy and misinformation that interests you. This could be a current issue, trend, or challenge in the field of digital literacy.

When looking through the issues, look for Disinformation, Misinformation, Digital Literacy, and Fake News.

Browse Issues in Opposing Viewpoints in Context
Browse viewpoint articles, topic overviews, full-text magazine, academic journal, and newspaper articles, primary source documents, statistics, images and podcasts, and links to Websites. Proxy Bypass
Browse Issues A-Z in Issues & Controversies
Features pro and con articles on more than 800 thought provoking topics in business, politics, government, education and popular culture. Updated weekly with links to a 12-year back file. Facts on File database.Proxy Bypass
Browse Issues by Category in Points of View
Contains a balance of materials from all viewpoints, including more than 1,300 main essays, leading political magazines from both sides of the aisle, newspapers, radio & TV news transcripts, primary source documents and reference books. Proxy Bypass

Credo Reference
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Articles from almost 600 reference books, covering various subjects.

Analyze Your Topic

Who

Think about who might be involved. This could be specific people, but it could also be groups of people - consider different groups based on age, race, ethnicity, gender, socioeconomic status (wealth), who may be affected (good or bad) by your topic.

What

Consider what factors are involved in your topic. Read some background information or a summary to learn more about your topic, and then make a list of relevant factors.

The background reading can also provide you with keywords, specialized vocabulary, and definitions, which will be useful for future searches.

When

What time period is involved? Are you considering present day, current time? or are you going back in history to look at a time period long ago. Be sure you know what dates and times are involved in your topic because that will affect how you write about them. Your topic may have specific dates associated with it or it may be more general.

Where

Sometimes places or geography are important to your topic. Are you considering issues in the United States or another country? The situation can be quite different in some countries than it is here.

Why

This is a really important one. Why do people care about this topic? Why is it important or controversial? What's at stake? or Why did it happen / is it happening?