Skip to main content
LibApps staff login

Literature Reviews and Annotated Bibliographies

What is an Annotated Bibliography

Annotated Bibliography:

Sometimes people confused Literature Reviews with Annotated Bibliographies but they are quite different in format but they are similar in purpose, to survey the literature.

So what is an annotated bibliography? "... is a list of citations to books, articles, and documents. Each citation is followed by a brief (usually about 150 words) descriptive and evaluative paragraph, the annotation. The purpose of the annotation is to inform the reader of the relevance, accuracy, and quality of the sources cited.” Definition from Cornell University Library, available at https://guides.library.cornell.edu/annotatedbibliography/home <Accessed February 1, 2022>

To write a good annotated bibliography you need to be:

  • Concise: Go to the point of what is the book/article about, in few words, summarize.
  • Evaluative: Determine who is the author, what is his/her expertise in the topic, how reliable is the information
  • Critical: Reflect on what is the strength and weakness of the work, what is missing, etc.
  • Comparative: how each piece review compares to other similar works

Useful site with tips on how to write an Annotated Bibliography:

Subjects: General, History

The ASU Library acknowledges the twenty-three Native Nations that have inhabited this land for centuries. Arizona State University's four campuses are located in the Salt River Valley on ancestral territories of Indigenous peoples, including the Akimel O’odham (Pima) and Pee Posh (Maricopa) Indian Communities, whose care and keeping of these lands allows us to be here today. ASU Library acknowledges the sovereignty of these nations and seeks to foster an environment of success and possibility for Native American students and patrons. We are advocates for the incorporation of Indigenous knowledge systems and research methodologies within contemporary library practice. ASU Library welcomes members of the Akimel O’odham and Pee Posh, and all Native nations to the Library.