Practical tips for research

Ligita Gjortlere
M.Soc.Sc.
Regulating documents at RGSL

RGSL Style Guide

Master Thesis Manual

2
Types of academic databases
 Reference databases
 Library catalogues, Google Scholar, SSRN
 Full text databases (authorized access only)
 Westlaw, HeinOnline
 Legal publisher’s databases
 Oxford Academic
 Cambridge Core
 Kluwer Law Online
 Aggregators
 EBSCO
3
Academic sources

Academic sources are books, peer-reviewed journal

articles, and published reports written by experts for
an academic audience. Academic sources are also
called scholarly sources.

Peer-reviewed process - a formal quality control

process whereby a scholarly article submitted to a
journal is evaluated by several recognized experts in
that discipline.

4
Publications that meet the following
criteria are often academic:
 peer reviewed
 published / edited by a university or scholarly society
 the author is from a university or scholarly society
 reports research
 contains a bibliography and references other works
 written by more than one author
 the paper was presented at a conference, particularly an
international conference, and definitely if the papers were
peer reviewed
 includes cited references

5
Articles from these publications are
usually NOT academic:
 newspapers
 magazines and trade journals
 newsletters
 journals published weekly or more frequently
very short articles (eg one or two pages)
 articles without a bibliography

6
Citation for a journal article

89 AMJIL 42 or 89AJIL42
Citation for a journal article consists of:
 A year and/or volume number
 The abbreviation for the name of a journal
 Page number
Citation for a case

Hunter v Canary Wharf [1997] 3 WLR 684

 The names of the parties in a case
 The year when the case was reported
 A volume number (only when more than one
volume was published in a year)
 The abbreviation for the name of a law report
 Page number (or paragraph number)
Citation formats

 Cardiff Index to Legal Abbreviations

 www.legalabbrevs.cardiff.ac.uk
 HeinOnline
 Citation – Citation Format Guide (using Blue Book
Citation)
 Index to Legal Citations and Abbreviations /
Donald Raistrick – London: Sweet & Maxwell, 2008
 IPRax – Abkürzungsverzeichnis deutscher and
ausländischer Periodika / Bernd von Hoffmann, Karsten Thorn,
2005
Popular citation styles in law
 Chicago Style of References (Notes and bibliography)
http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationg
uide/citation-guide-1.html
 Chicago Style of References (Author–date)
https://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citation
guide/citation-guide-2.html
 OSCOLA – Oxford University Standard for the Citation
of Legal Authorities
https://www.law.ox.ac.uk/sites/files/oxlaw/oscola_4th
_edn_hart_2012.pdf
10
References and bibliographies
 References (or “Works cited”) – the items you
have read and specifically referred to (or cited) in
your paper
 RGSL uses Chicago-Style of References (Notes and
bibliography)
http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationguide/citation-
guide-1.html
 Bibliography – a list of everything you read in
preparation for writing an assignment
 Footnote and bibliography specifics in «RGSL Style
Guide»
How to reference primary sources

 Follow the citation style of the country of origin

• For country specifics see “Guide to Foreign and

International Legal Citations” published by the
New York University School of Law
http://www.law.nyu.edu/sites/default/files/upload_
documents/Final_GFILC_pdf.pdf

12
14-Sep-22
How to reference web sources
 Provide precise and working hyperlinks, preferably permanent
link
 If you are using a commercial database (Westlaw, HeinOnline,
etc.) that provides page numbers as well as complete
information about the source (place of publishing, publisher, year
of publishing, etc.), please cite books and journal articles in
accordance with guidelines for print sources
Examples:
 1. Chalon T. Allen, “The Mediation Process: Navigating the Quagmire”,
Conflict Management 13, no. 3 (June 2009), available on: Academic
Search Complete, EBSCOhost. Accessed September 1, 2020.
 World Bank. Europe and Central Asia Economic Update, Fall 2020 : COVID-
19 and Human Capital. Available on:
https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/34518. Accessed
December 1, 2020.
13
14-Sep-22
Reference management softwares
Mendeley https://www.mendeley.com/ - free reference
manager and academic social network tool.
Generates citations and bibliographies in a whole
range of journal styles
Zotero https://www.zotero.org/ - open-source reference
management software to manage bibliographic
data and related research materials - collect, cite,
and share research
MS Office 2007 or higher offers MS Word tool
References/Citations & Bibliography - easy way to
manage citations and bibliography using or
Chicago style. 14
RGSL Master Theses and Research Papers
 RGSL Master Theses (7-10 rated) in full text
available on the portal Library Resources/Theses
Archive
 The best Master theses and other RGSL
publications on RGSL home page under
Research/Publications
 From 2018 – all Master theses are published in the
RGSL Theses Repository. Access rights will be
defined by the author in the Publication Agreement
 Until 2017 - bound copy at the Library, records in
the Library Catalogue (RGSL Theses)