How to Write a Thesis THIRD EDITION

Abstract

Since the fi rst edition of this book was published in 2002, things have changed. It is now expected that students will receive some form of training in writing during their doctorate. There is now broad agreement on the need for training and development in the wide range of skills in a wide range of doctorates, although there is debate about what form that training should take, whether it should be taught in courses, whether these should be credit-bearing, and so on. An update on doctoral skills development has therefore been added to the Introduction, along with guidance on the Training Needs Analysis component of doctoral training programmes, which is one way of ensuring that they meet individuals’ needs. There is also growing awareness of the possibility and consequences of plagiarism – deliberate and accidental – in academic writing, so that section of Chapter 3 has been expanded. There is new pressure on doctoral students to publish during – not after – the doctorate, so that topic has moved to an earlier chapter in this book, while the subject is treated in much more depth in my book Writing for Academic Journals (2nd edn, Murray 2009b). Finally, there are now many more thesis writing courses than there were in 2002, and this book has become a course textbook. Teachers of these courses are now among the audience for this book, and I responded to the request for learning outcomes, which appear at the end of each chapter. However, it seems that this book is still useful to students trying to get a handle on how to manage a bigger academic writing project than they have ever produced before, at a higher level than they have ever achieved before. This book is still designed primarily to help you