Evaluating InformationInquiry & Critical Thinking

Students need to think critically about the information they encounter and how they will use it in their course

work, careers, and everyday life. In a2012 study of how college graduates solve information problems once they

join the workforce, Project Information Literacy researchers learned that employers found new college

graduates skilled at finding information, but less skilled at interpreting research results. Most new college hires

were prone to deliver a quick answer by using a search engine, entering a few keywords, and scanning a couple

of pages of results. (http://projectinfolit.org/)

The activities below emphasize evaluating information by considering the source's authority and format, in the

context of an information need.

Activities for Evaluating Informationo Provide students with two different information types (with two different goals) on the same topic by the

same unnamed authoritative creator/author (for example, scholarly article and blog post). Use as

discussion starter with students about context in relationship to authority.

o Ask students in professional or career-focused programs to consider who has authority within their areas

of study and the origins of that authority.o Ask students to find several scholarly sources on the same topic that take very different stands. How was it

that the authors came to different conclusions? Does it have to do with authority?

o Ask students to brainstorm situations when traditional peer review might not accomplish its purpose.

o Ask students to create a citation "web" using a citation analysis database, and conduct a content analysis of

the linked authors by affiliation (workplace, academic preparation, geography, and subject expertise). Do

authors cite each other? Are there some authors who are outliers in the web? How do such connections

impact information generation?

o Ask students to identifii the format of the sources they find for a given research project and articulate why

the chosen formats are appropriate for the information need.

. Ask students to find sources about the same topic in two divergent formats, e.g. newspaper movie review

and literary journal movie review or scholarly article and a researcher's blog. Have students compare and

contrast the type of information found in each format, as well as articulate the processes underlying the

creation of each format.

Melissa Bowles-Terry, Head of Educational lnitiatives - UNLV Libraries, melissa.bowles-terrv@unlv.edu

UNIVERSITYI-IBITARIIi,S

ary.unlu.edu

7

Proftestdocument 1 of I

10t6t2014

Back to previous page

search.proquest.com/printuiewfi le?accountid=36 1 1

Joss Whedon's'Dollhouse' is no 'Buffy'Pergament, Alan. Mcclatchy - Tribune Business News [Washington] 12 Feb 2009.

Find a copy

@FindTextlhttp://qm3ut3ze6e.search.serialssolutions.com/?ctx_ver=239.88-2004&ctx_enc=info:ofi/enc: UTF-8&rfr_id=info: sid/ProQo/o3Aabidateline&rft_val_fmt= info:ofilfmt: kev:mtx: journal&rft.genre= unknown&rft.jtitle= Mcclatchy+-

02- 12&rft.volume=&rft.issue=&rft.spa9e=&rft.isbn=&rft.btitle=&rft.title=McClatchy+-+Tribune+Business+News&rft.issn=&rft_id= info: doi/

Abstract (summary)

give them their personalities and provide comic relief; Dichen Lachmann as another sexy Active, Sierra; Enver Gjokaj as a Russian informant, Lubov; and Tahmoh Penikett as FBI

agent Paul Ballard, who is out to uncover what's going on in the Dollhouse even though everyone in the department thinks he's a fool.

Full TextFeb. 12--The early plots of the new Fox series "Dollhouse" have a few serious cracks in them, but it's a visually arresting show that is hard to keep your eyes off of.

The title conjures up images of a program that has a childlike innocence, But nothing is as it seems in the latest adventure series from Joss Whedon ("Buffy the Vampire Slayer,""Angel"), whose image needs a little repairing after the flop of his last Fox series, "Firefly."

That failure apparently meant Whedon had to accept some Fox criticisms of an earlier pilot of "Dollhouse," which was reshot to satisfy the network.

some humor, though not as much as "Bury" fans may expect or want.

TV Review

"Dollhouse"

3 stars (Out of four)

9 p.m. Friday, Channel 29

standards.

given to her by a highly illegal and underground group.

Echo is described by the show's characters as "an empty hat until you stuff a rabbit in it" and "a talking cucumber."

The underground group is hired by wealthy, powerful and well-connected people who want Echo to be sexy and fun or disciplined enough to solve a serious problem like childkidnapping.

The wealthy people, their enemies and the people who work for them can have some serious and weird issues. Let's just say the "Dollhouse" crew that sends Echo on missionswon't do the vetting for any more prospective members of the Obama administration.

In the three episodes made available for review, Echo becomes a red-hot lover. a calm negotiator and an art thief, and has to deal with a pedophile, a psychotic killer and agreedy thief.

Fortunately, she has a handler, Boyd Langston (Harry Lennix). who is around to try to keep her alive. Boyd is hired by the group's clinical British leader, Adelle Dewitt (Olivia

"Actives," give them their personalities and provide comic relief; Dichen Lachmann as another sexy Active, Sierra; Enver Gjokaj as a Russian informant, Lubov; and TahmohPenikett as FBI agent Paul Ballard, who is out to uncover what's going on in the Dollhouse even though everyone in the department thinks he's a fool.

A women-in-jeopardy pattern is established in the early episodes with a few variations. Echo is hired to be some kind of fantasy woman; something technical goes haywire; and

she needs to be saved in some explosive manner or has been given a personality trait that helps her figure out how to do it herself.

After the episodes end, Echo's memory -- or slate -- is wiped clean and she goes back into her cubicle in the "Dollhouse" until she is needed again. However, there appears to be

another glitch. Echo supposedly will start remembering some things slowly about hertrue identity.

Whedon claimed on a conference call that he is pleased "Dollhouse" is airing on Fridays after another strong action-adventure female series, "Terminator: The Sarah ConnorChronicles," when initial ratings expectations are low.

Whedon said "Dollhouse" was inspired by his fascination with questions of identity and identity manipulation in a computerized, medicated world.

http://search.proquest.com/printviewfi le?accountid=36 1 1 1t2

7

t+

alHC)

-oo

\o

*

aa60b0q)

U)

-1.n(s

ozo

t7()

U>\

.,.oEoda

o

"I'M NOBODY"

The somatechnical construction of bodies

and identity in Joss Whedon's Dollhouse

Holly Randell-Moon

Television and film wrikr Joss Whedon hos produced a number of papular culture worls which

explore representotions of what female bodies are seen to be copable of ond how these

representdtions affect what female bodies can do. Terts such as Buffi7 the Vampire Slayer (1997-

2003) Serenity (2005), and Dollhouse (2OOg-2010) are as much celebrated for subverting gender

and genre conventions as they are criticized for reinforcing sexualized images of women and

violence. lnstead of approaching Whedon's texts in terms of their representations of gender, ond how

feminist or otherwise these representations are, this paper explores the ways in which Whedon's tuts

suggest thot subjectivity is textually ond discursively constructed. ln particular, I will stage o reading

of his latest telarision program, Dollhouse, os a representotion of the somatechnicol construction of

bodies and identity. Somatechnics refers to the inextricable connection betvveen the soma, the

material corporeolity of bodies, ond fhe techn e or txhniques and technologies through which bodily

being is produced and lived. By moking visible the somatechnics of bodily being ond the ways gender

and embodiment are experienced through ond produced by cultural and discursive technologies,

Dollhouse emphasizes the role of power in the construction of embodied identity rather than

somahing which always or inevitably oppresses and constrains bodies gendered as female'

KEYWORDS powe[ embodiment; subjeaivity; technology; feminism; somatechnics

Introduction

The term somatechnics refers to the ways in which "material corporeality (soma) is

inextricably conjoined with the techniques and technologies (technics) through which

bodies are formed and transformed" (Joseph Pugliese & Susan Stryker 2009, p. 1).

Approached through somatechnics, the body is not simply a vehicle that can be altered by

the values and discourses of its surrounding culture or potentially modified by

biotechnology. Rather, the body is always already marked by culture and the historical

and political processes through which we come to embody sets of knowledge about

gender, sexuality, race, and ability that constrain and enable the body's actions in certain

ways. This emphasis on bodily being as experienced through and produced by cultural and

discursive technologies, makes somatechnics an appropriate analytical tool to examine the

television and film work of Joss Whedon. Whedon's work is characterized by an

engagement with the links between representation, identity, and embodiment. Principally,

Feminist Media Studies, Vol. 12, No. 2,2012ISSN 1,16&0777 print/lSSN 1 47 1'5902 online/l 2/020265-280

@ 201 2 Taylor & Francis hnp://dx.doi.orgl 10.1080/1 4680777.201'1.597 1O5t) RoutledgeE\ I!rrtr&r,rr^ti"ur: