Conventions vary by subfield. In my field (AI) it's more common for the related-work section to go up front, as the 2nd section right after the Introduction. Yo

Conventions vary by subfield. In my field (AI) it's more common for the related-work section to go up front, as the 2nd section right after the Introduction. You first set up/motivate/preview what you're going to do, then you survey what's already been done in this area, and then you present your own advance, once you've laid the groundwork for how you're either building on, or diverging from, the current state-of-the-art. Sometimes it does read better to put it 2nd-to-last, but IME that's less common in AI. (To make sure I'm not completely misremembering, I spot-checked 5 random papers from this year's AAAI proceedings [1], and 5/5 had the Related Work section up front.) [1] http://www.aaai.org/Library/AAAI/aaai14contents.php http://www.aaai.org/Library/AAAI/aaai14contents.php