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both to first, say what you want to say, and second, say it in the best
possible way at the same time. It is sensible, therefore, to do it in stages.
 Serialists see writing as a sequential process in which the words are
corrected as they are written and who plan their writing in detail before
beginning to write. Here is an example of the serialist approach:
It s stylistic, the phrasing of the work and the way it flows, that I m
having difficulty with at the moment. When I do write sentences I
feel good about my style. I don t feel like an inadequate writer, but
writing sentences is very slow.
 Holists can only think as they write and compose a succession of com-
plete drafts:
I write a complete first draft in longhand. As I go along I tend to
revise a bit, but when I ve finished I revise a great deal and it tends to
look like World War III on paper. If I m really interested in it I ll start
at 8.30 a.m. or 9.30 a.m. and go on until late at night. Once I start I
want to see it finished, the shorter the time between conception and
finished article the better.
The serialist emphasizes the writing of sentences which is very different
from the way the holistic writer talks about his work.
THE FORM OF A PhD THESIS 65
Getting down to it
Phillips (1991) found that research students in science disciplines showed
a preference for experimental work, including keeping lab books up to
date. Writing papers or thesis chapters was assigned to evenings, weekends
and holidays:
If it s time-consuming and mindless, like just repeating experiments,
I like it, but if it s difficult too, like writing an introduction and con-
clusion, then I don t like it.
I d rather potter about in the laboratory during working hours  it s
less taxing mentally.
Writing was not perceived as  real work , and as it was thought to be of
only secondary importance was never undertaken at the time intended.
One student said,  I m doing bits and pieces of writing-up whenever I get a
minute, but repeatedly abandoned the latest piece of writing.
Procrastination and incoherence are often the order of the day and,
until supervisors have training in providing adequate supervision of writ-
ing, you cannot realistically expect very much assistance. In fact most
research students tend to postpone writing until their final year, but we
advise very strongly indeed against adopting this course of action.
Our advice is always to be writing something and to write up the easiest
parts of the thesis first. This may sound so obvious that it seems unneces-
sary to mention it, but it is surprising how many people believe a thesis
should be written in the order that it will be published and subsequently
read. Not true. In an article entitled  Is the scientific paper a fraud? Meda-
war (1964) explains the process of writing up research as an exercise in
deception. By this he means that readers are deceived into believing the
research was conducted in the way it is described and the report written in
the logical and sequential manner in which it is presented. He maintains
that this is misleading and might be discouraging to others who wish to
conduct research and write scientific papers, but who find that nothing
ever happens quite as systematically for them as it seems to do for the
experts.
Consider writing the method section first. You know what you did, and
how you did it, so it is a good way of getting started on the thesis, even
though this chapter will come well into the body of the finished work.
Alternatively you may prefer to start with the literature review, which is a
safe way of reminding yourself of what has already been written about
your topic. If you do start here, remember to check at the end of your work
for important subsequent publications.
Our recommendation is that you approach every piece of writing in
the following way: First of all, if your computer does not have a built-in
66 HOW TO GET A PhD
dictionary and thesaurus which you can use at the press of a button,
ensure that you have hard copy versions readily available together with a
copy of Gowers Plain Words.
Generate the main points (in any order if you re a holist, and sequen-
tially if you re a serialist), noting everything that comes into your
mind, thus making a rough plan (which you need not stick to).
Organize this into an acceptable structure.
Only then attempt to construct the points into grammatical paragraphs
made up of well balanced sentences. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
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