Research Methods by Dr. Robert Gitunga

Scholarly Research: Writing and Publishing into Journals and Books captures the value, process and publication of research findings. The core thesis is that conducting research is uniquely significant as it is one of the age-old means of responding to the diverse questions that face humanity. Indeed, systematic, objective, and rigorous research form the basis of most cutting-edge discoveries in the history of mankind. Conducting research is one step in the knowledge construction enterprise; dissemination is the other. Unless research results are disseminated, their significance is considerably undermined. Dissemination ensures that claims made by a researcher are interrogated, shaped, and re-interpreted by peers which forms the basis of additional scholarly discourse and calls for further research, ad infinitum. Dissemination also ensures that research findings reach policy makers and inform policy formulation. While findings from research can be disseminated through a number of outlets, this book focuses on academic publishing in books and journals. It describes the core principles in academic research and its reporting, guided by time-tested conventions that have evolved in the field over time. We discuss, as a foundation, what scholarly research is and explore writing for scholarly publication in the form of journals and books. It is hoped that this work will generate intellectual conversations, amongst our research peers and beyond, especially with regard to the broad concept of epistemology in practice.