Use Wikipedia and YouTube in Research! Debunking the Library vs. Internet Research Dichotomy

Although many composition instructors know better, composition textbooks have continued to perpetuate the highly problematic dichotomy about research resources: library/hard copy/authoritative vs. internet/electronic/unreliable, pointing to Wikipedia as the example of all that is evil in research. During this presentation, we present a research resource matrix that helps teachers and students categorize resources on a scale of static, syndicated, and dynamic; cross referenced with a scale of edited, peer reviewed, and self-published. This matrix welcomes more dynamic resources such as blogs, wikis, and YouTube video replies to videos, to name a few. We then discuss how this matrix helps make the scholarly evaluation of resources more critical in a manner that asks researchers to consider the wants and needs of their intended audience and how the authority and credibility of resources in any portion of the matrix fit a specific research project.

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