 Hello, this is Jessica Hagman with the Ohio University Libraries, and in this video I'm going to show you some tools for choosing a paper or speech topic using the Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center. Opposing Viewpoints collects opinion pieces, news, and magazine articles and websites on topics that are often up for debate in our society. It's great for those situations where you know you want to write or talk about a particular topic, but you know you need to choose a narrower topic for the length of your speech or paper. To get to Opposing Viewpoints, start from the library's homepage. Then click on the Databases tab. Type Opposing Viewpoints. Then click on the Purple Connect button to go to the database. If you are off campus, at this point you'll be asked to log in with your Ohio ID and password. Opposing Viewpoints is set up to let you search for a topic using the box in the upper right corner, or you can browse for a particular topic. I recommend using the Browse Issues tab in the bar towards the top of the page. On this page you have a list of all the topic pages in alphabetical order, but you can also choose to view issues grouped together by category using the Choose a Category drop-down menu. I choose the Energy and Environmentalism category and can see many topics related to these issues. I'm going to take a look at the Organic Food page because it's an interest of mine. What I really like about these topic pages is that it gives you a good overview of the topic right at the top. Click View More to see the full description. In this description you can see a couple of issues I could write or talk about related to organic food, benefits for the environment and health, or the question of whether or not organic food is really healthier than non-organic. Once I'm done with this page, I can use the topic link or click back to go back to the main page for organic food. As you scroll down you'll see links to different types of sources about this topic. The first one is Viewpoints which are opinions about the topic. Usually you'll see viewpoints on both sides of an issue like whether or not we should allow genetically engineered foods. You can use the links on the left side of the page to choose particular types of sources. So if I'm interested in this idea of genetically engineered foods I can search for that. And then I can see that there are quite a few viewpoints, news, and magazine articles about this topic. And even a few websites I might want to check out. If you are looking at the viewpoints sources remember that these are opinion pieces. So their goal is to persuade you to accept a particular point of view. When you click on a viewpoint you should see the name of the author noted and what they have to do with their topic. So this first viewpoint for example was written by an author who manages a site on food policy. It might be good to look at the site or Google the name of the author so that I can be aware of how their background would influence their point of view here and how they are presenting the information. At the bottom of the viewpoint you'll often find recommended books and articles that would help you explore the topic further. You should be able to use Alice, the library catalog, or articles plus to find these. Aside from viewpoints you'll also find news and magazine sources related to your topic. The full text of the article will be right here in this website. If you don't find a topic page that interests you in opposing viewpoints you can always use the search at the top of the page to look for sources that match what you're interested in. This is actually a good idea whether or not you find a topic page on what you want to talk about in your speech. There may be useful resources on other topic pages as well. I'll try a search for genetically engineered food to see what more I can find. And see that there are lots of sources including statistics and academic journals about this topic that didn't show up on the organic food topic page. Opposing viewpoints is a great way to get started and explore a topic that you want to talk about in your speech or write about in a paper. If you have any trouble finding what you need or find that you're still struggling to nail down the topic feel free to contact me or another Ohio University librarian for assistance. We're here to help.