While literature reviews can look different in each discipline, the technical questions related to them reveal shared epistemological concerns.

References and citations are more than technical; rather, their presence signals relationships, camps, and alliances. Who doctoral students cite reveals much about their academic training and perceived place in the discipline.

Disciplines are built around specific topics and interpretive paradigms, but these ideas do not develop on their own. People are always behind them.

Literature reviews are rarely just a summary of existing literature; instead, literature reviews are argumentative—they often deploy a discourse to make a point instead of reconstruct a discourse.

Correctly citing secondary sources is more than a mere technicality. Instead, it is about demonstrating the academic labor of others.

When doctoral students write literature reviews, they need to make clear not only what connections are being made, but also who is making them. The concept of historiography can help frame this aspect of writing literature reviews.