News Sources
News outlets of all kinds can be incredibly useful for academic research. Though these ‘non scholarly’ sources might not have the type of theory and in-depth research found in peer-reviewed articles, news media can give you an insight into public dialogue about an issue as well as data about when certain things happened.
Market researchers might find company information and market context, sociologists might find evidence of culture, and media researchers and historians can find out how different locations and organisations report on the same event. It can be incredibly interesting to see how an issue or event was discussed at the time it happened: was it front page news? What kinds of words or phrases were used? What kinds of advertisements ran next to it?
If you are thinking of researching your topic in the news, here are a few places to start:
Databases for News
- Global Newsstream This link opens in a new window
Global Newsstream enables users to search the most recent global news content, as well as archives which stretch back into the 1980s featuring newspapers, newswires, blogs, and news sites in active full- text format.
In addition to giving access to national and regional UK newspapers like The Sunderland Echo, The Newcastle Chronicle, The Guardian, The Daily Telegraph, The Observer, The Times and The Independent, it offers access to international newspaper titles like The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Bangkok Post, South China Morning Post, Asian Wall Street Journal, and the Jerusalem Post.
You’ll also find some video and audio news coverage. Newsstream means no more paywalls or individual subscriptions for you, and new content should be added on a daily basis.
- Box of Broadcasts (BoB) This link opens in a new window
This link opens in a new window
BOB is an academically-focused system that allows staff and students, at subscribing institutions, to record programmes from over 75 free-to-air channels; and search an archive of over 3 million broadcasts.
Tips and tricks using Newsstream
If you would like to learn some tips and tricks for searching in Newsstream, have a look at this guide on getting started.
Newspaper Research Tutorial - Using Newsstream
Useful news web sites
- The Chronicle
Website of the popular North East daily paper. - The Sunderland EchoThe website of The Sunderland Echo newspaper
- BBC News (Wear)Regional page on the BBC News website focussing on the Sunderland area.
- BBC News (Tyne)Regional page on the BBC News website focussing on the Newcastle area.
- BBC News (Tees)Regional page on the BBC News website focussing on the Middlesbrough area.
- ITV News Tyne TeesRegional news from ITV covering the North East.
- BBC NewsWebsite for the BBC News services.
- The IndependentWebsite of The Independent newspaper.
- The Mail (Online)Website of The Daily Mail newspaper.
- The GuardianWebsite of The Guardian newspaper.
- The Mirror OnlineWebsite of the Daily Mirror newspaper.
- The TelegraphLatest news, business, sport, comment, lifestyle and culture from the Daily Telegraph and Sunday Telegraph newspapers and video from Telegraph TV.
- The ObserverWebsite of The Observer newspaper, a sister paper to The Guardian.
- The ExpressWebsite of The Express newspaper
- Indy100From The Independent.
- The Financial Times online edition (FT.com)Website of The Financial Times newspaper. Note: some content is restricted by a fee subscription.
- Al JazeeraEnglish version of the Arabic-language news network. Breaking news and features plus background material including profiles and global reactions.
- CNNNewsfeeds from CNN (The Cable News Network is an American basic cable and satellite television channel that is owned by the Turner Broadcasting System division of Time Warner.)
- ReutersWebsite for Reuters News Agency.
- OnlineNewspapers.comFree index to 1000s of online newspapers worldwide. Arranged by geographical area. Note not all are free although headlines can often be viewed free of charge.
- Wikipedia: List of Online Newspaper ArchivesThis is a list of free and pay wall blocked digital online newspaper archives. Most are scanned from microfilm into pdf, gif or similar graphic formats and many of the graphic archives have been indexed into searchable text databases utilizing optical character recognition (OCR) technology. Some newspapers do not allow access to the OCR-converted text until it is proofread. Older newspapers are still in image format, and newer newspapers are available as full text that can be cut and pasted. Most text is in ASCII, some are using Unicode for diacritical marks not available in ASCII. Google now indexes many newspaper archives.
- The British Newspaper ArchiveThis service offers online access to hundreds of historic titles published in regional cities of the UK from approximately 1700-1940. It offers a wealth of resources for social, economic and political historians, including access to original illustrations, advertisements and text. To view the full text of titles available go to the advanced search form and consult the drop down list of newspapers. It is designed for individual historians and requires a subscription for full text viewing. Some iconic dates (such as Waterloo) are offered free of charge.
- Google News ArchiveGoogle have digitised and made freely available a selection of 19th and 20th century newspapers, mostly from the United States but there are a few titles from other countries as well.
- Chronicling America - The Library of Congress historic American newspapersThe Chronicling America site is a project of the Library of Congress and National Endowment for the Humanities as part of the National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP). It provides free access to a selection of digitised full text newspaper articles from titles published between 1900-1910 in a selection of US states including California, District of Columbia, Florida, Kentucky, New York, Utah, and Virginia. These are a rich source of information on the social, political and economic history of the United States during this time. They include coverage of political parties and elections from a state viewpoint. The project website also offers free access to a searchable directory of American newspapers published from 1690 to the present day. This offers bibliographic details and holdings records for the Library of Congress but not the full text.
- Wayback MachineThe Internet Archive’s Wayback machine might not spring to mind when you need breaking news, but because it allows you to look at a website the way it appeared on the date it was saved, it can be a fascinating way to explore how the news looked on a certain day in time. If you’re researching a major event and want to see what it looked like in context, you might consider seeing how different news websites reported it on a certain day.