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Conducting a Literature Review: Annotated Bibliography

A guide to the basic steps of doing a literature review.

What is an annotated bibliography?

An annotated bibliography is​ a list of citations to books, articles, and documents selected on a subject and theme. ​

  • Each citation is followed by a brief (usually about 150 words) descriptive and evaluative paragraph (the annotation)​ that analyzes the quality, accuracy and relevance of the sources selected.

Annotation vs Abstract

Abstracts are the purely descriptive summaries often found at the beginning of scholarly journal articles or in periodical indexes. They can be either a paragraph or structured (Objectives / Methods / Results / Discussion)​

whereas

Annotations are descriptive and critical; ​they may describe the author's point of view, authority, or clarity and appropriateness of expression.

What to include in an annotated bibliography

The first paragraph should define the scope of your topic and explain where and how you found your sources (typically peer reviewed articles in academic databases available from the University of The Bahamas Libraries website).

For each article or source write a concise annotation that summarizes ​

  • the central theme and scope of the article. ​

  • Include one or more sentences that ​

    • evaluate the authority or background of the author, ​

    • compare or contrast this work with another you have cited, and 

    • explain how this work is relevant to your bibliography topic.