Provided you or your institution have internet access, it is now essential to use it for research to check the resources available on the worldwide web
An email address is also needed to communicate with other researchers and with your supervisor.
At the very least obtain a hotmail or yahoo.com free email address which you can access from any web browser.
There are thousands of sites, but the following are recommended to get you started.
Search Engines.
There are many such as Excite and Yahoo which are great for contemporary stuff.
Search engines with good access to textual material include Alta Vista, Google and MSN.
Type in longer strings in inverted commas, e.g. “theology of mission” not: theology of mission.
You may still have to search through a lot of rubbish and be willing to try different words to get a focus on what you are really after.
Libraries
Catalogues are available for libraries all over the world. The Yale Divinity School Library is particularly recommended for mission studies (click here: YDS). It will also take you to the Library of Congress. For British libraries go to:
Questions of Style
It drives many writers almost crazy, but if you believe in what you are doing you have to get it right. The Modern Language Association of America site is worth looking at, especially if you do not know how to give references for information you found on the web.
http://www.mla.org/main_stl.htm#sources
Research on Contemporary Church Life in America
The Barna research team track questions, some of which are of relevance to the rest of the world as well!
Try Barna: http://www.barna.org/
Online academic journals
Many presses are making journals available online, though it is getting more difficult not less for the non-university researcher to access electronic texts. This is a serious limitation on public scholarship. Sometimes a library can help. The University of Tübingen offers a fee service which some have found helpful and reasonable.
If you have discoveries, or questions, feel free to email me