What is a literature review?
A literature review is a critical analysis of the literature related to your research topic. It evaluates and critiques the literature to establish a theoretical framework for your research topic and/or identify a gap in the existing research that your research will address.
A literature review is not a summary of the literature. Although you may find yourself making summaries of what you read, you also need to engage deeply and critically with the literature.
Your literature review should show your understanding of the field related to your research topic and lead to presenting a rationale for your research.
A literature review could be a stand-alone assignment or part of a research project or short thesis.
A literature review focuses on:
- the context of the topic
- key concepts, ideas, theories and methodologies
- key researchers, texts and seminal works
- major issues and debates
- identifying conflicting evidence
- the main questions that have been asked around the topic
- the organisation of knowledge on the topic
- definitions, particularly those that are contested
- showing how your research will advance scholarly knowledge (generally referred to as identifying the ‘gap’)
