Western Libraries

VAH 9500 - Research Methods

Literature Reviews

Your literature review will help you situate your research project in existing scholarship.  The complexity of a literature review can make it one of the more challenging aspects of writing about your project.  The role of the literature review is to:

  • Summarize existing literature
  • Critically evaluate the literature
  • Show relationships and intersections in existing literature, and
  • Identify scarcity in scholarship and where your research fills a gap

Background Information

Consult reference material for background information to help you with key concepts and theories that you consider in your literature review.

Sources of information

Consult all of the following to identify scholarship and sources relevant to your research project.