Part 2: Background for Proposed Activities
The background part of a research proposal is unique among
other types of proposals. Whereas the background parts of
other proposals provide snapshots of current situations or
states of affairs, the background section of a research
proposal typically offers what is known as a literature
review—that is, a pointed analysis of existing scholarship
that is relevant to your proposed research project. More
formal research proposals use literature reviews to dig into
ongoing scholarly research, summarizing this work in order
to provide background for the proposed research.
Your background section will not include this kind of
literature review; instead, your background section will be
used to focus your inquiry on the particular equity issue
revealed by your autoethnography. To do so, you will reread
your autoethnography. You will revisit the issue of fairness
or justice that you addressed in that piece of writing, but you
will want to describe how the issue can be read using a lens
of power, privilege, or policy.
Your background section will be targeted to expand upon the
equity issue previously identified in your autoethnography.
Nonetheless, your background section can include some new
information that moves beyond the research you conducted
for your autoethnography. For instance, you might return to
The Pudding article, which provides an overview of change
in the use of repetition in songs over the decades. You might
perform a Google Scholar search to see if Morris’s work is
cited or referenced by any other researchers. And, you might
include this information in your proposal’s background
section.