Introduction to Music Research: Conduct Background Research

Research is a conversation

Conducting research can be a lot like joining a conversation that's already in progress. Research is all about listening, reading, asking questions and eventually responding. For scholars, research never happens in a vacuum, but is always informed by writing and discoveries that already exist or are in progress. Research is a product of many different voices over time and space, so remember that you are never truly alone when doing research. 

Joining the conversation

Knowing what's already been said, and what's left to say, is an important part of developing your research topic and joining the research conversation. Often, finding your unique contribution to conversation means conducting background research.

Doing background research will help you to identify a research topic that is compelling to others in your field. Who are the important scholars in your field, and where are their ideas are being published? There are lots of different ways that you can conduct background research. Helpful approaches include:

• Talking to your advisor, or other faculty, about what important scholarship exists that might be relevant to your research
• Conducting a literature review or an annotated bibliography
• Finding highly cited works
• Reviewing the bibliographies of sources you are already reviewing
• Exploring articles in scholarly encyclopedias and other reference sources

Encyclopedias, and other reference sources like dictionaries, guides, companions, and handbooks, can help you situate your topic within the existing scholarly conversation. They can help you understand how your topic is being discussed (with what terms? by whom? what is not being discussed?). They can also help you put your topic in context, by providing general background information.