Contact info

For Library research help, please contact Moninder Lalli, Liaison Librarian for Labour Studies by email moninder_lalli@sfu.ca or Ask a librarian.

Essay  

Start Your Research Here - This page gives you an overview of the research process, or in other words how to find materials for your essay.

Selected reference works

It is useful to start by obtaining an overview of a topic by consulting scholarly encyclopedias, handbooks or even textbooks.  These assist with identifying key authors, debates and resources.

• A dictionary of sociology
• Encyclopedia of global studies
• Handbook of Globalisation
• Handbook of Migration and Globalisation
• Handbook of the politics of labour, work and employment
• Histories of Global Inequality New Perspectives
• International encyclopedia of the social & behavioral sciences
• Research handbook on leave policy : parenting and social inequalities in a global perspective 
• Routledge handbook of gender and development
• Routledge handbook of migration and development
• Routledge handbook of human trafficking
• Routledge international handbook of globalization studies
• Sage eReference

Find journal articles

Use these indexes/databases to locate journal articles on your topic.  Use the "Get@SFU" icon to find a copy of the article.  Limit search results to "academic / scholarly" articles.

• Sociological Abstracts - indexes journals in Sociology, labour studies and other social sciences
• Social Sciences Full Text  - access to articles in social sciences
• Political Science Complete - indexes articles related to globalization and labour studies worldwide
• GEOBASE - for labour and migration topics
• Business Source Complete - indexes business journals and provides a "business management" perspective on labour topics
• EconLit - indexes economics journals
• CBCA Complete - indexes Canadian journals.
• Canada Commons (formerly, Canadian Electronic Library from desLibris) - for public policy documents from Canadian institutes, think-tanks and research groups.

For more databases, try Labour Studies Databases

Guide: How to find journal articles

Selected journals

Simplest way to search for a particular journal is to search for it by "journal name" in the A to Z journals list (from Library's Home page).

• Global labour journal : a scholarly forum for global labour studies.

Find books

Library Catalogue search guide 

The Library Catalogue provides access to books, journal articles, videos, government documents and much more.  To limit the search results to "books", use the filter (left-hand column in search results) to "resource type" of "books."

Search the SFU Library Catalogue, either the Basic or the Advanced search

For known items it is best to check using "Browse by title" icon.

E.g. Part of the family? : nannies, housekeepers, caregivers and the battle for domestic workers' rights

Search for books by a specific author or organization

Select "Author" from the pull-down menu in the Browse Search.

• Herod, Andrew

Search for topics using search strategies (see, below).  You can limit your results by subject (left-hand column) and resource type, books and sorted by "newest first"

• (worker* OR labor*" OR labour ) AND (agrarian OR agro* OR agricultur* OR farm*)
• (Amazon OR "Jeff Bezos") AND (employee* OR worker* OR labour* OR labor* OR job*)
  • Above results limited by selected "subjects"
• capitalism AND (labor OR labour)
• "global capitalism"
• "global capitalism" AND (work* OR labor OR labour OR jobs OR unions)
• global* AND (labor OR labour)
• "labour internationalism"
• ("free trade agreement*" OR "Free trade" OR NAFTA OR "international economic institution*" ) AND (labor OR labour)
• "neoliberal policies" AND (labor OR labour OR worker* OR Jobs OR Unions)
• "international migration" AND (labor OR labour)
• (women OR female* OR gender*) AND (labor OR labour) AND (race OR class* OR ethni* OR "visible minor*") AND canad*
• (paid OR unpaid) AND (work OR employment OR jobs OR labor OR labour)

Proper syntax for Boolean logic (words that allow you to combine concepts)

Combine different concepts using AND
Combine same concepts using OR
Use quotation marks to search for a phrase
Use brackets for synonyms
Use asterisk (*) for different endings of words

Note:  For Catalogue Search, when combining concepts, use CAPITAL letters ( "OR", "AND")

Look at the titles in the "results list" and for those books that look relevant, click on their subject headings to find more books on that topic.

Selected books

• Achieving workers' rights in the global economy
• Automation and the Future of Work [print]
• Cost of free shipping : Amazon in the global economy
• Deported: Immigrant Policing, Disposable Labor and Global Capitalism
• Development and Social Change: A Global Perspective [print]
• Disposable domestics : immigrant women workers in the global economy
• Disrupting Deportability: Transnational Workers Organize
• Economic Transition and Labor Market Reform in China
• The everything store : Jeff Bezos and the age of Amazon [print]
• Farm Labor Problem: A Global Perspective
• Farm workers in Western Canada : injustices and activism
• Feminism without borders decolonizing theory, practicing solidarity
• Forces of labor: workers' movements and globalization since 1870
• Gender work ; feminism after neoliberalism
• Gendered Commodity Chains : Seeing Women's Work and Households in Global Production
• Gendered migrations and global social reproduction
• Global Factory: Networked Multinational Enterprises in the Modern Global Economy
• Global capitalism : selected essays
• Global Labour Studies
• Globalization and precarious forms of production and employment : challenges for workers and unions
• Globalization, Labor Export and Resistance: A Study of Filipino Migrant Domestic Workers in Global Cities
• Globotics upheaval : globalization, robotics, and the future of work
• Inequality studies from the global South
• Informal economy in developing countries
• Internationalisation of the Labour Question: Ideological Antagonism, Workers' Movements and the ILO Since 1919
• Just work? : migrant workers' struggles today
• Labour and the Challenges of Globalization: What Prospects For Transnational Solidarity?
• Labor and global justice : essays on the ethics of labor practices under globalization
• Labour in the global south challenges and alternatives for workers
• Labour and globalisation results and prospects
• Labor relations in a globalizing world
• Labour Standards in International Economic Law
• Making Care Count : A Century of Gender, Race, and Paid Care Work
• New African diaspora in Vancouver : migration, exclusion, and belonging
• Revolution at point zero : housework, reproduction, and feminist struggle
• Shifting Trajectories in Globalization, Labor, and the Transformation of Work
• Social dimensions of free trade agreements
• Southern insurgency : the coming of the global working class
• Structural Change and Dynamics of Labor Markets in Bangladesh
• Unfree labour? : struggles of migrant and immigrant workers in Canada
• Value chains : the new economic imperialism
• Vulnerability, Exploitation and Migrants: Insecure Work in a Globalised Economy
• Women and the informal economy in Urban Africa : from the margins to the centre

Book series: Workers' movements and global capitalism

Find books by subject

Browse by Subject    (change the default "title" to "subject").  Browse by Subject will only result in books, not book chapters or journal articles.

• Agricultural laborers
• Agricultural laborers -- [name of country or region]
• Automation -- Economic aspects
• Automation -- Social aspects
• Capitalism
• Capitalism -- Developing countries
• Capitalism -- Social aspects
• Foreign workers
• Foreign workers -- [country or region]
• Foreign workers -- Canada
• Globalization -- Economic aspects
• Household employees -- Legal status, laws, etc
• Industrial relations -- Canada
• International labor activities
• Labor and globalization
• Labor economics
• Labor laws and legislation, International
• Labor market - [country or region]
• Labor market - Canada
• Labor market -- Developing countries
• Labor movement
• Labor movement -- Canada
• Labor movement -- History
• Labor movement -- History -- 21st century
• Labor Unions
• Neoliberalism
• Neoliberalism -- Social aspects
• Precarious employment
• Sociology of work
• Women Foreign workers

Labour standards and other government documents

Canada

Guide: Canadian labour standards

Statistics Canada

• Labour

International

• International Labour Standards

SourceOECD - includes statistical data on country studies, forecasting publications, reports, periodicals, and socio-economic databases. Topics covered include agriculture, developing economies, education, employment, energy, environment, migration, social issues, and sustainable development.

  Click on "Browse by theme" tab and choose "employment"

Recommended web resources

• I-PEEL project: Container
  • I-PEEL project: Coffee
  • I-PEEL project: Grain
     
• Silver, Beverly. (2016). “The Remaking of the Global Working Class.” ROAR Magazine.   
• Urban Africa (podcast) 

Searching using Google

While searching the internet can find unexpected gems, be sure to evaluate the sources using the guide, "Evaluating sources"

• Use intitle: to force Google to find those words in the titles of results.  Use quotation marks ("") to search for phrases.  With a Google search the Boolean operator "AND" is assumed, so you don't need to use it in your search strategy.
   
  • intitle:"future of work"
     
• Use site: to specify results from a government web site
   
  • intitle:(future OR outlook) (work OR jobs OR skills) site:gov
     
  • Use site: to specify results from a government web site from USA
    • intitle:"  " site:gov
       
• Search websites of different countries using the "country domain code"
  • Internet Country Domain List (CIA's list)
• E.g. Search internet domains from China (.cn) or Japan (.jp)

For more, try Search Tips for Google and Google Scholar

Library guides

• Annotated bibliographies
• Evaluating sources
• What is a scholarly (or peer-reviewed) journal?
• What is plagiarism?  Guide to common forms of plagiarism and how to avoid them.

Presentation skills

• Resources on developing your participation skills
• Resources to help you improve your presentation skills

Writing help

• Student Learning Commons
  • Academic writing resources
  • Book a consultation