Intervention

1. DISSERTATION 101:
So, You’ve Completed Your Coursework, Aced Your
Exams, and Gained Topic Approval. What’s Next?
Sherry Wynn Perdue, Director
Oakland University Writing Center
wynn@oakland.edu
Anne Switzer, Assistant Professor
Outreach and Social Sciences Librarian
switzer2@oakland.edu

2. Part I: Composing the Literature Review
• WHAT is (and is not) a literature review?
• HOW should you frame the literature you locate?
• How should you draft the literature review?
• WHAT role does the committee play in your project?
• WHERE is institutional support available?

3. Getting Started
• Do you understand the purpose and scope of a
literature review?
• Do you comprehend the difference between an
abstract or an annotation and a literature review?
• Have you examined dissertations that your chair
values? Have you (and your chair) annotated
these models to demonstrate why and how authors
have succeeded?
• If your dissertation is qualitative, look for qualitative models,
etc.

4. What is the Dissertation Literature Review?
• A professional conversation framed by a guiding concept
• A comprehensive exploration of existing scholarship on a
specific topic
• “An account of what has been published on a topic by
accredited scholars. . .” (Taylor & Procter, 2001)
• An answer to a persistent question (R. Elmore, Harvard
Graduate School of Education)
A well-framed (by theme, method, chronology, etc.)
presentation of the current state of topic knowledge,
which is designed to highlight past research findings
and to pave the way for your study

5. Characteristics of a Dissertation Literature Review
• An introduction that shares the persistent question(s) the
reviewed literature will address and indicates how the
reviewed scholarship will be framed
• An organizational frame, which groups relevant
scholarship by topic, chronology, theoretical approach,
methodology, etc. and/or a combination of approaches
• A series of transitions organic to the discussion that
indicate how different studies approach the same issues
both within individual paragraphs and between
paragraphs

6. Characteristics of a Dissertation Literature Review
• Evidence of how conflicting findings within the literature
might be understood or potentially resolved by addressing
the methodology, sample size, questions asked (and not
asked), etc.
• A conclusion that clarifies how the literature demonstrates
the efficacy of the dissertation study. Does it demonstrate a
gap in the literature? Does it identify a conflict that needs
resolution? In many cases the specific research questions
for the student author’s proposed study will be shared here
too

7. Literature Review Pitfalls: Forgetting to Frame
Failing to synthesize ideas and information from your sources
into a narrative account of what the professionals currently
know with the purpose of credentialing your study
• This synthesis could be framed by date, theoretical
orientation, method, issue, etc.
• The literature review, however, is not an annotated
bibliography. In other words, you organize the
literature review by issues and ideas rather than by
individual sources. Your goal is to create a
conversation between and among the scholars on
each important issue reviewed.

8. Literature Review Pitfalls: Overreliance on Quotations
Excessive quoting undermines your authority, drowns out your
voice, and creates disturbances in the narrative flow. You gain
your reader’s trust by sparingly and strategically using other
people’s words.
• In most cases, you should paraphrase the material,
selecting only the portions of the original quote that you
need.
• Generally when you use consecutive words from the
original, you must place quotation marks around all
directly quoted material and use a parenthetical citation
that includes the page number. This advice does not
include the names of theories or tests, which are often
quite long and should be included as used in the
literature.

9. Literature Review Pitfalls: Patching not Paraphrasing
“Patching” occurs when you insert a series of borrowed ideas and
phrases; these strings often differ only slightly if at all from the
original wording, whereas paraphrasing involves both rewording
and reorganizing the original material; “synonym swapping” is not
a paraphrase. Patching is a form of plagiarism, even if the writer
provides a parenthetical citation.
• You can mediate the potential for plagiarism by taking
accurate notes in your own words, carefully noting the
source and page number.
• You can ensure that the relationships between ideas and
sources are clear by using rhetorically accurate transitions.
For examples, see Graff and Birkenstein’s They say/I say:
The moves that matter in academic writing (2010).
Note: To avoid patching, practice making this material your
own. You will need to read a great deal more material than you
cite.

10. Literature Review Pitfalls:
Cursory Overview or Biased Sample
Haphazardly collecting research on your topic
• You must implement a specific search strategy and a culling
strategy, which you can justify to your readers.
Failing to ensure that your literature review is comprehensive
because you were unaware of the seminal studies on the topic
• ISI Web of Science is helpful for locating such works.
Consciously choosing to omit scholarship that challenges your
initial hypothesis, methodology, etc.
• If you narrow your review to two of three pedagogical approaches
or to three potential antagonists among many, you must indicate
the rationale for this decision.
Note: Whether intentional or not, these omissions will invalidate your
claims. Further, you may find it necessary to consider this pitfall as
you evaluate other scholars’ research.

11. Literature Review Pitfalls: Failing to Connect
Foundational Studies to Your Project
Citing “seminal” works—studies that are most cited by
others—without demonstrating how these significant, early
studies complement, qualify, or contrast with the approach
taken in your research.
• While it is helpful to consult reviews of the literature most
crucial to your subject (because they can guide your
understanding of your own source base), it is essential to
gain a firm understanding of the foundational studies that
will contribute to the argument you make.
Note: Everything you discuss in your literature review
needs to pave the way for your project.

12. Getting Started: The Source Grid
• A graphic organizer that helps you document
your “talking points,” the level one headers of
your literature review
• A non-linear outline of the major topics that your
literature review will synthesize

13. Drafting from the Source Grid
• Read, evaluate, and group the literature by major topics or talking
points, which become the columns of the source grid.
• Draft one column at a time. In other words, compose the text like a
quilt.
• Each paragraph/section develops an idea rather than simply
summarizes the results of one article. While there are times that an
individual study might occupy a whole paragraph (it could be the
only study on an important issue), usually the paragraphs situate
studies on similar topics in relationship to one another using
transitions that indicate the relationship between and among the
sources (similar/different method, similar/different result,
similar/different explanation of a problem, etc.)
Caution: Never compose a draft without including an citation for
each source as you go. For a sad example of what can happen
when this advice is neglected, listen to this story about Pulitzer
Prize winning historian Steven Ambrose.

14. Example Paragraph
Unwilling to equate research and legitimacy with the quantitative
methods that Braddock et al. endorsed, some compositionists began
employing qualitative methods in the late 1970s and early 1980s:
Donald Graves (1979) used case studies, Linda Flower and John
Hayes (1981) turned to speak-aloud protocols, Shirley Brice Heath
(1983) explored community literacy via ethnography, and Nancie Atwell
(1987) advocated reflective practice (Herrington, 1989). Increased
qualitative scholarship, however, was not the only factor contributing to
the methodological debate. Smagorinsky (2005) has attributed these
methodological choices to the emergence of identity politics and to the
growing influence of poststructuralism in academe. The works of
Derrida, Foucault, DeMan, and Bakhtin, founded on semiotics and
poststructuralist theory, encouraged English literature and composition
scholars to resist what they claimed as the objectivism in data-driven
research (Smagorinsky, 2005). While most critics argued that the
method should fit the rhetorical situation (audience and purpose), many
advanced an implicit (later explicit) assumption that social science
methods were not adequate to the task (Johanek, 2000).

15. Drafting and Integrating the Parts
• To mediate distractions, Sherry finds it helpful to open a separate document for
each talking point into which I paste its grid material. If a good idea for a
different part of the paper intrudes on my process, I quickly click on that
document and record the idea before returning to the issue on which I am
currently writing.
• Continue to draft new talking points and redraft previously composed talking
points until you have good fragments (quilting squares) of the paper’s body.
• Once you have the parts, you need to examine them in relationship to one
another to determine which talking points must come first.
• After you determine the order of information within the body of the review, it is
time to insert and refine your transitions.
• After composing the body, draft the introduction and the conclusion. Caution: It
is never a good idea to draft these before you know how the literature will come
together.

16. Committee Concerns: Your Chair
• With whom do you work best? Under what circumstances
have you worked with this person in the past?
• Is s/he good at meeting deadlines and responding to
questions and submitted work? Will s/he read each chapter
in a timely manner and offer feedback on higher order
concerns?
• Does this faculty member understand and appreciate your
research question and your methodology?
• Will s/he work well with the rest of the committee?
• Will s/he agree to let you seek guidance from members of
the committee before your proposal defense?
• Is s/he in a position to be both your coach and your buffer,
as needed?
• Will s/he provide you a model from which to follow?

17. Committee Concerns: Members
• Do potential members know you, your work, and your chair?
• Will each potential committee member’s expertise
complement your project?
• Can those you select work well with and defer to your chair?
• Will they meet with you to offer guidance before you draft the
proposal?

18. Time Management
• Develop a timetable that breaks down the
dissertation into a series of manageable weekly
tasks.
• Start the process early!
• Leave plenty of time for rewrites and edits.
• Request feedback as you go, rather than waiting
until a chapter is done.

19. When Should You Schedule a Writing Consultation?
• After the research consultation (but before you start writing) to make
a plan and review the project specifications
• After you have located and started reading your sources to discuss
potential talking points/headers for a source grid
• After you have created a source grid to explore potential ways to
situate the issues within each major topic
• Once you have drafted a section of the paper
• Whenever you need help with documentation
• Once you have a solid working draft, etc.
• Anytime you get stuck or need a second set of eyes

20. Selected References
Elmore, R. Some guidance on doing a literature review. Retrieved on
January 15, 2010 from
http://www.gse.harvard.edu/library/services/research_instruction/elmore
_lit_review.pdf
Feak, C. B. & Swales, J. M. (2009).Telling a research story: Writing a
literature review. Volume 2 of the revised and expanded edition of
English in today’s research world. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan
Press.
Galvan, J. L. (2013). Writing literature reviews: A guide for students of the
social and behavioral sciences. 5th Edition. Glendale, CA: Pyrczak
Publishing.
Graff, G. & Birkenstein, C. (2006).They say/I say: The moves that matter
in academic writing. New York: W.W. Norton.
Taylor, D. & Procter, M. (2001). The literature review: A few tips on
conducting it. Retrieved January 4, 2010 from:
http://www.utoronto.ca/writing/litrev.html
University of Washington Psychology Writing Center. (2004). Writing a
psychology literature review. Retrieved January 15, 2010 from
http://depts.washington.edu/psywc/handouts/pdf/litrev.pdf

21. Part II. Information Literacy

22. Thank You!
Anne and Sherry appreciate the opportunity to
speak with you about this high stakes manuscript.
Please feel free to schedule a Research
Consultation or a Writing Consultation for
assistance at any stage of the research and
writing process as you move forward.