UU x Library – What every thesis writer ought to know in April

What every thesis writer ought to know in April:
How revision helps you finish, polish, and check that you priorities are in in line

Thomas Lavelle
Center for Modern Languages
Department of Management and Organization

Research shows that the biggest difference between more and less experienced academic writers is the time spent on revision.  Rather than lecture you about spending more time on revision, this talk aims to make whatever time you do spend as effective as possible.

This begins with by comparing your draft with the considerations shaped by a process model of thesis writing, which we will review. The key areas we’ll cover include:

• Does our draft meet our objectives?
• Have we handled the literature we use fairly and advantageously?
• Does that literature support or help justify our chosen methodology?
• Does the structure of our thesis match academic expectations and help to highlight our results?
• Are we satisfied with the unity and efficacy of our paragraphs?
• Are our sentences structured in ways that match the needs of international, i.e., multilingual, readers and the expectations that follow from writing in English?
• Is our manuscript clean enough for submission?

One of the great things about revision is that it reminds us that writing is more about decision making than it is about rule following.

If we can answer the questions above, we’ll have done a good day’s work.