Authoring a PhD
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BOLALAR UCHUN INGLIZ TILI @ASILBEK MUSTAFOQULOV, Ingliz tili grammatikasi
| The abstract The final version of your abstract comes immediately after the title page in the bound version of your thesis. It consists of an especially intensive summary in around 300 words of what the thesis is about. The abstract is a key opportunity for you to set out the core of your argument in a helpful way for readers. Later on when your thesis sits in the university’s library, the title and the abstract will also be the primary elements advertising its contents to the outside world, and the only information included in Internet bibliographies or published directories of PhD research. People deciding whether to try and secure sight of a copy of your thesis via inter-library loans will rely heavily on the abstract. So it is well worth taking the time and trouble to write it well. In practice most PhD abstracts are very badly written. Often authors devote more words to summarizing the previous state of the literature or the routine methods which they have used than to explaining their own substantive arguments, key findings or new propositions. Although abstracts are the culmination of along process of research, students THEE ND GAME 3 2 0 AUTHORING AP H D normally only write them in a hectic final rush to get finished. Some treat them as just another boring piece of university bureaucracy to begot out of the way as painlessly as possible. Other people toil overproducing this short nugget of text in an unguided and not very effective way. A well-written abstract should be about 300 words or so long. Its structure should closely follow this sequence: ◆ Start with either one or (at most) two sentences summarizing the state of the literature to which your thesis contributes, constructed so as to frame, and highlight, the value-added which your research has achieved. Be careful, though, to keep your characterization of the literature fairly broad-brush and defensible. ◆ Next add two or three sentences characterizing the theoretical contribution made by your work. They should pickup any key innovations you have made or the main theme or theory concepts from the title. You should make clear the central thrust of your argument in a substantive way. Do not write purely formalistic stuff at this point. ◆ Devote one sentence to setting out as briefly as possible the methods you followed. Standard methods are not worth expounding at length in the abstract. Only if your original contribution lies especially in methodology should you say much more than this. By now you should have covered all the material included in the lead-in chapters) of the thesis and you can put a paragraph break in your abstract here. ◆ Next go through the arguments of each of your more substantive chapters (usually chapters 3 to 7 in an eight- chapter thesis. Assign one sentence to summarize the ‘bottom line import of each chapter for the overall argument of the thesis. Do not write Chapter 4 argues that …’, because an abstract is a condensation of your whole argument and not a guide to your chapter structure. Instead with each new sentence in the abstract just go straight into what the relevant chapter shows. ◆ Finish the second paragraph of the abstract with two sentences crystallizing the bottom-line conclusions of your final chapter. These points should return to the main theory or theme concepts used in the thesis title and covered also in the first paragraph of the abstract. But now your content should focus on evaluating the worth or applicability of these concepts, or showing how far your theoretical innovations or expectations are supported by the empirical findings or applied analysis of the middle chapters. ◆ Check that you are using the same language in your abstract as in the thesis title, and that both of them match up or mesh with the language of your chapter headings. (Bear in mind the point from pp. 91–2 above, that your chapter headings should work within the thesis title, rather than simply repeating elements of it exactly) Danger signs to lookout for occur where the conceptual or thematic elements triggered in the overall title, the abstract and the chapter headings do not match up. The three elements should not suggest different intellectual problematics or ways of looking at issues. It is best to try and define your abstract early in the rewriting and text revision process. In Britain and Europe university regulations often provide a helpful stimulus in this respect, because they require you to submit an early version of the abstract at the same time that you formally register the thesis title. This first version is not binding and it is used only to help faculty boards decide who should examine your thesis. Download 2.39 Mb. Share with your friends:
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