I agree that you should be judged on the basis of the quality of your PhD, but no one is going to read your thesis from cover to cover when applying to an academic/industry job (let alone if they have 100 candidates!). So they go for things like published articles instead (which I don't find fair).

I published a translation (I mean, an academic translation, with preliminary study, notes, etc.) in my 2nd year as an undergrad. However, this is not really relevant now because my PhD (and hopefully future academic jobs!) is in a different field.

A short article of mine will be published this month, however it is in a minor, interdisciplinary publication, so I guess it doesn't count that much. The same can be said about conferences - I just gave a paper in one but it was a very small one.

I have submitted/ am about to submit some material for more serious journals/conferences, but it's just to see what happens, I'm still in my first year and my true goal is getting published/heard during my second year which I think is more realistic.

I think that most research councils (for example AHRC for the arts and humanities andso on) offers scholarships for part-time studies, however in this case the scholarship covers your tuition fees only (as opposed to FT scholarships where you get tuition fees + living costs).

I currently have a scholarship from my Uni to pay my tuition fees which can be held either in a FT or a PT basis. I suppose most University scholarships arealso flexible.

Happy birthday!

Doesn't your university have an online message board where you can post job offers? That would be my first option i.e. having the oportunity to meet the designer in person as opposed to arranging all via the Internet. If not, I would print out some ads and distribute them on campus (basically in the Media Arts, Visual Arts and related departments).

Have you taken a look to http://www.abebooks.co.uk to see if you can find it there?

My interview was based almost exclusively on my research proposal. You should be able to explain it in detail, tell them about existing bibliography (although they won't expect you to have read everything), explain why your research will be important to the discipline, why it will be original and new, show that you know which are the resources you need and wheter they are available...

If you have applied to a PhD whose topic is already decided, you should show your knowledge of the topic, possibly doing some reading about it before the interview.

I was told that start applying even 1 year before you finish your PhD won't hurt. Some postdoc scholarships (for example those at the Oxbridge colleges) are advertised in October-November for start in September next year.

I'm planning to do so for next year. Currently I'm living near my uni but have to go about 2 times a week to the archives where the materials I need for my topic are held (that's about 20 miles from home). Next year I'm planning to do the opposite, that is, live near the archives and go to the campus perhaps 1 time per week, to borrow books and see what's around at the department.

Same here. I started my PhD only 3 months ago but I have managed to read quite a lot and now I have quite a lot of material. But when it comes to actually order, analyze it and write something about it I get blocked and wonder if I could spend say the first 2 years reading and making rough notes, and the last year just writing up.

I wrote a short paper over Christmas using some of the material I collected during these months - at the beginning it felt like a nightmare but I started by writing from memory a summary of what I thought the main points, then I browsed my rough notes to find material related to each one of these points to see how could I develop each one of my original ideas. Once I had a clear scheme of what I wanted to write and in which order, the process of actually writing wasn't so painful... I just tried to ellaborate my ideas by supporting them with examples and using links to relate them to each other.

I worked for about a year in various PR/ arts management companies as an intern (so I didn't have that much money!). Not strictly related to my PhD which is in Historical Musicology but I gained valuable skills plus I hope this experience will be useful to get a job in one of these industries if I don't manage to get an academic job after my PhD.

Then I worked about 1,5 years in an IT helpdesk. Taking calls, resetting passwords and forwarding problems to competent technicians was not my dream job, but I managed to save a lot of money as it was well paid plus I could practice my languages and being paid for it as we were a multilingual team.

I addressed my supervisor "Dear Dr ..." a couple of times before I felt confident enough to address him by his first name. He had always addressed me by my first name so I thought he shouldn't be offended if I did the same.

In my opinion the most important thing is to explain why is your proposal relevant to your discipline i.e. what can you contribute in terms of knowledge, and you must also show that the topic has not been fully explored so that you can say something new about it. That can include a short bibliography related to your topic which you may use in your PhD but which doesn't cover the area you intend to study.

Take a look at http://www.daad.de which is the official webpage about studying in Germany and it is both in German and English.

As far as I know, the only university based on distance learning is the Fernuniversitaet Hagen (in Hagen, West Germany, close to Bochum, Dortmund...) and yes they offer PhDs in some areas as well although I don't know how many presencial hours they require.

Hi Maggie,

I don't know much about your topic but the primary portal to search for PhD studentships is http://www.jobs.ac.uk.

As Islamic studies doesn't seem to be a very common field, I would also try to find out which universities in the UK have departments or chairs of Islamic studies (I suppose there aren't that many) and visit their homepages or send them an informal e-mail asking about PhD opportunities that may arise in the future.