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         This section of the WWW Virtual Library system is a frequently updated Internet directory of over 2000 annotated links to high-quality English-language resources for a wide range of current international affairs, international relations, international studies, global studies, and global education topics. These sites are recommended for regular research use, and are carefully selected for their cost-free, authoritative, and reliable information and analysis. Each website is described only in general terms because of the typically frequent changes in details of site contents and features. Use the constant menu on the left-hand side of every page to navigate this whole directory by topic, to find annotated sources of interest to you. Search within those remote sites to find the information that you seek. Resources are listed alphabetically on each page, within categories. Any major directories, specialized search engines, other locator services, or blogs are featured at the top of each page. All referred sites will open in a new window or tab of your browser. This Virtual Library is designed as a guide for thorough academic or professional research on desktop and laptop computers rather than for quick, once-and-done consultations on smart phones.

 

Internet search techniques for academic and related purposes are specific to those fields and must be learned and practiced to be fully effective. The "Quick Fix" approach of just entering several words into Google in hopes of "finding something" is not a complete research strategy. Impatience, short attention span, and haste are the most common enemies of top-quality results. Consider taking time to learn better, proven search techniques, to get consistently better results on all searches.

More Effective Use of Search Engines-- There are many options within and beyond Google

• Your success with the Google search engine may be greatly improved by using Google's Advanced Search option and by consulting the advice from Google's Search Help about how to use operators. For example, search results in Google vary by how you set the order of your keyword search terms. Google has also prepared a video series about "How Search Works."

• Lifewire posts many helpful search technique suggestions on the whole page found at How to use Advanced Google Search Commands.

• Try Google News concerning your research topic, because it scans news sources worldwide and in many languages, with an advanced search option. Note that there are many different national and language editions available. Google Books may be useful for full-text retrieval. Google Image Search helps you to find or to verify the source of online graphic images such as charts, diagrams, and maps.

• Google Scholar "enables you to search specifically for scholarly literature, including peer-reviewed papers, theses, books, preprints, abstracts and technical reports from all broad areas of research... to find articles from a wide variety of academic publishers, professional societies, preprint repositories and universities, as well as scholarly articles available across the web." Many international affairs sources are included. Particularly good for finding open access, free, and recent items. For search technique tips, see the Google Scholar Blog and the Research Buzz article "Google Scholar and the Full-Word Wildcard."

• Different search engines have been shown to produce different results, with the same search terms. Therefore, useful complements to Google include Bing and Yahoo!, because they have their own (and different) indexing systems. There is a Bing Blog, with tips on use of Bing. Startpage, Disconnect Search, Mojeek, Qwant, You.com, and DuckDuckGo have user privacy features. Search-22, and Visymo provide direct inquiry access to many search engines, from a single interface. Whenever possible, on any search engine, consider using the "advanced search" option.

• Search Engine Journal posts "23 Great Search Engines you can use instead of Google," including many using Artificial Intelligence, as well as a free book in PDF, "How Search Engines Work."

• "Top 15 Best Search Engines" is a constantly updated ranking from eBizMBA.

• Try to find limited area search engines and aggregators in your topic of interest. They focus sharply by searching within a specified number of only the most relevant websites in a defined subject matter, rather than covering the whole web. This Virtual Library links to excellent limited area search engines and aggregators tailored for Think Tank Publications, the LibGuides library reference system, Library Holdings Worldwide, Scholarly Literature, European Research Theses, Academic Open Access Web Resources, European Union News, World News (in many languages), World Legal Information, and US Congressional Research Service Reports, among other subjects.

• The Association of College and Research Libraries posts an assessment guide for students and other Internet users, "Evaluating Online Sources: Introducing a 4-Step Strategy."

• For ongoing search technique tips from an expert, see the Learning Search category at Research Buzz.

• The Internet Archive's Wayback Machine allows access to copies of billions of web pages and other material from the past. Internet Archive Scholar contains millions of research articles and other scholarly documents, with a fulltext search capacity and a User Guide. The Archive has a search facility for all types of materials available in its repository, including books, video, and audio. The blogs provide ongoing updates and tips. Consult the blog entries "A Few Advanced Search Tips" and "Search Scholarly Materials Preserved in the Internet Archive" for best use practices. The UK Web Archive "collects millions of UK websites each year."

• If you are seriously "searching the literature" in a topic, be sure to see the tips provided by the Thesis Whisperer in How to Become a Literature Searching Ninja and related posts on that very helpful academic blog.

Beyond Search Engines-- All of them together index only a tiny portion of the Internet

• The Deep Web or Invisible Web is a vast area of the Internet (by far the major portion of it) that commonly used search engines (including Google) fail to index. The Open Education Database provides "The Ultimate Guide to the Invisible Web." The "Dark Web" is something else.

• "Academic and Scholar Search Engines and Sources" by Marcus P. Zillman, Executive Director of the Virtual Private Library and Internet research expert, is a helpful listing of "selected resources both new and existing that will help anyone who is attempting to find academic and scholarly information and knowledge available on the Internet." Of special interest are his Guide to Searching the Internet, Online Research Tools, and Deep Web Research and Discovery Resources guides. Mr. Zillman also posts a list of his excellent and numerous White Papers on Internet research.

Policy Statement

          This site was kindly supported by Elizabethtown College, PA, USA for the first 22 years of its existence, until 2020. It does not use cookies, intrusive programs, or spyware. All information collected at this site is non-intrusive, such as site usage statistics. Such information will not be used for any purpose other than the evaluation and improvement of this site for the benefit of its users. All descriptive statements taken verbatim from the web sites annotated in this Virtual Library are in quotes. The WWW Virtual Library: International Affairs Resources is not responsible for changes in the content of remote web sites that we link and annotate, but over which we have no control. Any subsequent change of ownership or hacking of an annotated remote site may lead to radical changes in the nature or the contents of that site, but still located at or referred through that same URL.