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POLI 500 - Senior Seminar: Literature Review

Literature Review Learning to write a structured review of literature

What is a Literature Review?

A Literature Review is a systematic and comprehensive analysis of books, scholarly articles, and other sources relevant to a specific topic providing a base of knowledge on a topic. Literature reviews are designed to identify and critique the existing literature on a topic to justify your research by exposing gaps in current research.  This investigation should provide a description, summary, and critical evaluation of works related to the research problem and should also add to the overall knowledge of the topic as well as demonstrating how your research will fit within a larger field of study.  A literature review should offer a critical analysis of the current research on a topic and that analysis should direct your research objective. This should not be confused with a book review or an annotated bibliography both research tools but very different in purpose and scope.  A Literature Review can be a stand-alone element or part of a larger end product, know your assignment.  The key to a good Literature Review is to document your process.

Basics of a Literature Review

Citation

This guide is a curated collection of materials from around the internet used with permission: including videos,  infographics, text blocks, and other materials when citing the entire guide use: 

Karas, Laura B. “Literature Review.” LibGuides, University of South Carolina Upstate, https://uscupstate.libguides.com/Literature_Review.

When citing an element such as an individual video, or infographic use the original source, that is linked back such as:

Vossler, Joshua, director. What Is a Literature Review. Vimeo, University of West Florida, 2014, https://vimeo.com/90324266. Accessed 29 June 2022.

Elements

There are many different ways to organize your references in a literature review, but most reviews contain certain basic elements.

  • The objective of the literature review - Clearly describe the purpose of the paper and state your objectives in completing the literature review.
  • Overview of the subject, issue, or theory under consideration – Give an overview of your research topic and what prompted it.
  • Categorization of sources – Grouping your research either historic, chronologically, or thematically
  • Organization of Subtopics – Subtopics should be grouped and presented in a logical order starting with the most prominent or significant and moving to the least significant
  • Discussion – Provide analysis of both the uniqueness of each source and its similarities with other sources
  • Conclusion  - Summary of your analysis and evaluation of the reviewed works and how it is related to its parent discipline, scientific endeavor, or profession

Literature Reviews: Common Errors Made When Conducting a Literature Review