The pursuit of knowledge often begins with a sense of bewilderment, a feeling akin to standing before a vast library of knowledge to be learned and synthesised, navigating a maze of myriad search results to surface relevant quality content.
But what if the library was empty? What happens when search results return a rather modest corpus of scholarly content?
This is the predicament that awaited me as I delved into the nexus between policy, cybersecurity, and critical infrastructure. Initial forays into academic databases and search engines yielded a surprisingly scant collection of peer-reviewed materials directly addressing the interdisciplinary problem domain. Refocusing the research initiative toward a field richer in scholarly content undoubtedly would address the challenge; however, having previously submitted the project brief and committed to the topic, the situation demanded an alternative solution be forthcoming.
It quickly became apparent that the insights I seek reside not within the well-trodden paths of traditional scholarly sources, but rather in the lesser-explored realms of government policy documents, committee reports, and other grey literature lurking beyond the purview of academic library catalogues.
Expanding my information search to include these uncharted territories presents a challenge akin to finding a literary masterpiece first edition amidst the detritus of the fabled Black Books shop from the occult comedy series of the same name.
These unorthodox sources, while rich in content, often lack the academic rigour and credibility of peer-reviewed content that underpins scholarly research. Such shortcomings have necessitated a somewhat onerous process of cross-referencing, fact-checking, and critical evaluation in order to attest to the reliability of each source.
While the process remains ongoing, I remain confident this hybrid approach to content discovery will yield a pool of knowledge from which literary review and analysis will precipitate elusive insights that will contribute to the scholarly discourse in the problem domain.