Literature Reviews 

A literature review should try to answer questions such as:

1. Who are the key researchers on this topic?

4. Have there been any controversies or debate about the research? Is there consensus?

5. Which areas have been identified as needing further research?

6. How will your topic uniquely contribute to this body of knowledge?

7. Which methodologies have researchers used and which appear to be the most productive?

8. What sources of information or data were identified that might be useful to you?

A literature review is a summary of previous research on a topic. It allows the author to summarize and place into context the research and scholarly literature relevant to the topic. It forms the foundation for the author’s subsequent research and justifies the significance of the new investigation.

A literature review can be a short introductory section of a research article, report or policy paper that focuses on recent research, or, in the case of dissertations, theses, and review articles, it can be an extensive review of all relevant research.

The format is usually a bibliographic essay synthesizing the research on the topic and outlining the significance and value of the author’s approach to the research question. Sources are cited within the body of the essay, with full bibliographic citations at the end.

Jackson, J. E., & Warren, K. B. (2005). Indigenous movements in Latin America, 1992-2004: Controversies, ironies, new directions. Annual Review of Anthropology, 34, 549-573. Retrieved June 20, 2007, from Annual Reviews database: http://www.annualreviews.org/ 

Williams, S., & Williams, L. (2005, May). Space invaders: The negotiation of teenage boundaries through the mobile phone. Sociological Review, 53(2), 314-331. Retrieved June 20, 2007, from SocIndex Full Text database (17131600): http://web.ebscohost.com

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