OK. So I’ve Submitted My Proposal What Now???

DO YOU LITERATURE REVIEW LA! What’s a Literature Review?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2IUZWZX4OGI&feature=related http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UoYpyY9n9YQ&NR=1

Literature Review A literature review is an examination (not an information dump) of the research that has been conducted in a particular field of study. Hart (1998) defines it as: The selection of available documents (both published and unpublished) on the topic, which contain information, ideas, data and evidence. This selection is written from a particular standpoint to fulfill certain aims or express certain views on the nature of the topic and how it is to be investigated, and The effective evaluation of these documents in relation to the research being proposed (p. 13). Hart, C. (1998). Doing a literature review: Releasing the social science research imagination. London, Sage.

What is ‘THE LITERATURE’? ‘The literature’ means the works you consulted in order to understand and investigate your research problem. In other words, the literature review is a critical look at the existing research that is significant to the work that you are carrying out.

How useful are the following sources? Journals Books Conference Report Newspapers Thesis Internet CD-ROM Magazines

What goes on in a literature review? It is not supposed to be just a summary of other people’s work! You evaluate relevant research work Show the relationships between different work Show how it relates to your work (what work has already been done in your research area). Show how it relates to the other work (eg. What other methodologies have been used? How are they similar? How are the different?) Show how it relates to you work (what is its relationship to your methodology?)

What should your literature review answer? What do we already know in the immediate area concerned? What are the characteristics of the key concepts or the main factors or variables? What are the relationships between these key concepts, factors or variables? What are the existing theories? Where are the inconsistencies or other shortcomings in our knowledge and understanding? What views need to be (further) tested? What evidence is lacking, inconclusive, contradictory or too limited? Why study (further) the research problem? What contribution can your study be expected to make? What research designs or methods seem unsatisfactory?

Writing a Good Literature Review Remember the Purpose: It should answer the 10 questions. Look at how published writers review the literature. You’ll see that you should use the literature to explain your research – after all, you are not writing a literature review just to tell your reader what other researches have done. Your aim should be to show: Why your research needs to be carried out. How you came to choose certain methodologies or theories to work with. How your work adds to the research already carried out.

Writing a Good Literature Review Read with a purpose: You need to summarize the work you read but you must also decide which ideas or information are important to your research (so you can emphasize them), and which are less important and can be covered briefly or left out of your review. You should also look for the major concepts, conclusions, theories and arguments that underlie the work, and look for similarities and differences with closely related work. This is difficult when you first start reading, but should become easier the more you read in your area.

Writing a Good Literature Review Write with a purpose: Your aim should be to evaluate and show relationships between the work already done. Is Researcher Y’s theory more convincing than Researcher X’s? Did Researcher X build on the work of Researcher Y? You also should explain relationships between the literature and your own research. In order to do this effectively, you should carefully plan how you are going to organize your work.

Use the Inverted Pyramid Broad Introduction to Topic At the end of your literature review the reader must have only one thought in their heads …. That your research question must be answered! Level of Detail Your Research Question

Writing the Literature Review Read other literature reviews – take advantage of what others have done Create a unifying theme – tell a coherent story. Relate different areas that you are working with to each other – tell a coherent story. Organize your background materials. Work from an outline – it will help you stay organized. Practice – practice – practice!

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