Literature Review

A literature review is a specific type of research paper that summarizes, analyzes, and synthesizes previous significant research on a topic. Though the style of literature review you produce may vary depending upon your field of study and your assignment, a good literature review should answer the following questions:

• What is already known or has already been written about this subject?
• What theoretical frameworks or methodologies have scholars used in approaching this subject, and what are their relative strengths and weaknesses?
• What points of consensus and debate exist in the literature? Have disagreements been resolved?
• What remains unknown or unwritten about this subject?

Despite some superficial similarities, a literature review is not to be confused with an annotated bibliography. An annotated bibliography is an alphabetical list of sources accompanied by brief summaries, while a literature review is an essay composed around a unifying idea or thesis. In a literature review a single source may be mentioned multiple times, depending on its significance in the field and its relationships to other sources. Unlike a typical research paper, which may address only a single question or analyze a single work of literature, a literature review provides a survey, summary, critical analysis, and synthesis of multiple scholarly works addressing a specific subject area.

A literature review may be assigned to you as a standalone project or as part of a larger research project, such as a departmental honors paper or a graduate program thesis. In either case, the process of conducting a literature review will help you

• Understand the structure and scope of your subject.
• Acquire the vocabulary used by experts in the field.
• Identify the main methodologies and research techniques used in previous scholarship.
• Determine the relationships between theory and practice in the field.
• Distinguish what's been done from what needs to be done.
• Provide a context for your own research.

These books are located in the library's main collection and may be checked out.