Abstract:

Abstract This work presents a bibliometric analysis of 100 Master’s dissertations presented to Communication post-graduate courses in Southern Brazilian universities, from 1998-2000, with the purpose of describing the characteristics of the information sources employed by the students. The quantitative analysis was carried out using the SPSS, complemented with interviews with the student´s supervisors. The 7.648 analyzed references showed that book and chapter book was the most utilized document (72,5%); Portuguese was the predominant language in the citations (76,1%); from the 90’s publications cover 60,4% of the citations; 81,5% of cited documents are written by a single author; the citation means were 76,48 references per dissertation. 3.435 different authors were cited. Results show a strong reliance on foreign literature from several other disciplines, like Social Sciences and Philosophy, mainly from French authors, confirming the non-existence, or fragility, of a Communication theoretical corpus.

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