sorry "monitor, keyboard and mouse, no actual computer." - why have a monitor, keyboard and museum but no computer?? Mind boggles here.

Well, I already know everything. Next question?

Hi there fellow forum people, has any of you written a monograph from their thesis? I have been approached by a university publisher to turn mine into a monograph and I have just finished the proposal. I am sending it out to colleagues for feedback but also wanted to hear the forum wisdom if anyone has done so. My discipline is cultural/institutional/political history with a strong visual arts slant. My plan is not to change very much from the thesis itself as I wrote with a monograph in mind from the start but change the language from the slightly laborious that seems to be required for doctoral thesis into a more appealing style.

Hi there BigNige

of course I can say, it was Manchester.

With my chagrin I did not live in Manchester as I am based in London where my principal archives were (and also I have a family) but I think Manchester is a great city and the university is world class (I have done my undergrad and master at 4 different universities with bursaries etc. so I feel I can compare :)) - basically this is to say you do not have to live in campus at all but try to go as often as you can as oyu really learn a lot from being there, going to reading groups, seminars, bootcamps, etc.

[My wish is to get a good job in Manchester and move there with all my family! Hubby, kids & cat! :D.]

I did my PhD full time, fully AHRC funded but I also kept working - I had 2 consultancies that I wanted to keep, so I diminished my hours greatly (you are allowed to work only 6 hours per week if you are fully funded) - basically in the past three years I had NO social life, and everything else pretty much disappeared too -

I used to be a quite decent marathon and ultra marathon runner (I placed in the top 10 of my age category at big races and once I even placed second outright at a 40 miler!!) but that had to go. Impossible to do 3+ hours training a day on top of PhD+ job + family..

Anyway, I have given up much but also gained much - have published 4 articles while writing my PhD and now just finished my book proposal for my first monograph...

So... was it worth it? I do not know. I miss having friends and I miss running like a lunatic in my lunch break but I also know that writing it's something that it is in me and if I had not done this I would have neglected another big part of myself.

Hi there I just finished mine - I am on my 40s - My PhD was in history but legal aspects (historical) were present as I studied a series of Acts of the Gladstone Government, including the Settled Land Act 1882, which changed conveyancing. Sp probably nothing to do with what you are doing but do get in touch if you need to vent nevertheless. It can be a lonely journey and sometimes eroding one's self confidence so, in my humble opinion, peers and friends who have been though it/going through it are very helpful.

This is exactly what happens when the cost of studying is so high = people who can afford it will enter courses rather than people who are proficient and able to cope with the material, and actually give a contribution to the discipline. People who can afford to *pay* to get their essays done will go further. I hope that those of you who have paid for essays are chased by the ghost of Marley all night long, every night for the rest of your life. Basically, yes, I am cursing you. You're welcome.

It's amazing - it's not only for science. All history-based papers are also there. My work, my journal. It's brilliant. Well done Alexandra Elbakyan!

I think that the point is that you cannot do any paid work on a tourist visa, and that would apply to you going to the lab? Our travel, lodgings and expenses were provided but we were not given any money. I believe that even if you are given a 'stipend' as opposed to a wage you can go on a tourist visa as long as you stay less than three months.

hi there I was invited to the USA for a specialist research project which lasted 6 weeks and we (from Europe) all came on a normal tourist visa.

Pm133, I agree with you, it's such a crooked business! I have said clearly so in the thread about the case for colonialism - I have written a couple of long posts there explaining how it works and so I won't repeat here.

I just want to say that in the arts & humanities the situation is not much better. I am a historian and 'work' for T&F but I encourage authors quite openly to put their work on open access on academia, etc

I wish universities would take back control on this, starting journals, paying editors decently and then making the results available to all, open access. Until then, I feel an accomplice in a really 'dirty' situation, and my way of coming to terms with this is:

a) encouraging authors to give the pdfs of their work away or putting it on academia or other site

b) telling them to 'pirate' as many images they can. That's another huge problem, copyright and reproduction fees.

So, basically, I am 100% with you on this - pirates ahoy!

T&F has over seven hundred journals. People churn out pages and pages of scholarship that nobody reads. We need less journals, less articles, but written with more care and edited better.

The journal in question (of the case for colonialism) comes out 11 times per year – My hunch is that the editor is earning a 'wage-non-wage' through T&F from editing, having failed to gain any other paid academic positions. They are desperate for contributions and their standards are slipping. Fast.

That's why I am resisting pressure from the publishers to increase publication of my journal. Because if I was to come out more than twice a year I could not guarantee the quality which comes from reading drafts and drafts, and from a close relationship with authors and reviewers.Yes, I earn less money but my reputation is very important to me as it is what will get me (hopefully soon) a good academic job. But if this person has nothing at stake they will be careless - as they have been.

I really believe that by publishing this article they thought they had just "slipped something through the net", thinking it won't get noticed, but it did. (Oh, the irony!! It takes so much work to create impact for good scholarship and then look at the impact this article had - I do not remember any other articles being discussed in postgraduate forum..)

I know that many of you will be desperate to publish but please think carefully to which journal you submit...

Sorry this is a bit of a cynical post - I love my journal dearly and work very hard at it - but I am also very aware of how very 'wrong' academic publishing is, a business based on the desperation of authors to publish. Not a million miles away from vanity publishing, really.

The truth is that academic publishing is a crooked business.

Taylor and Francis (informa.com, a multinational) does not pay editors (but gives a generous 'expense accounts' which is, de facto, a wage (in my case about £5,000 per printed issue) but then asks for more and more administrative hoops and loops to jumps through, so the job attracts either:
* people like me who are, for whatever reason, in between stages of their career (I am finishing my PhD after years in publishing and this is a good way for me to be active in the field, earn some money and do something worthwhile) or
* very established scholars (who have little time) who enjoy a little more money on top of their wages and are happy to provide a service to the field.

Unfortunately because the administrative and technical onus of editing now is increasing so much, and there is less and less money in academia, I am concerned that journal editing is now attracting people who aren't competent in either, 'you pay peanuts, you get monkeys' - and these mistakes happen. T&F should employ scholars as professional editors and pay them a good wage - these mistakes (oversights? overstressed? overworked? or just incompetent?) would not happen, or happen less.

Peer review by itself, sadly, is not a guarantee of serious scholarship - I had complete **conkers** passing peer review - people are hurried, stressed, they do not want to make mistakes and so they tick articles off and approve; on the other hand there are vindictive, jealous scholars that stop perfectly good articles in their tracks because they are not done exactly they would have done it, or worse (actively stopping competitors).

That's why a good editor is vital. because they are ultimately not invested in the minutiae at stake in the article but very much invested in the journal. They want good text.

But I am afraid that with these new automated editorial manager systems the publishers are thinking that the editor is just a cog in the machine of publishing. (continues)

It is interesting to think that the article failed peer review and it was still published. Sometimes I reject articles that 'passed' peer review because the author has made a complete chaotic mess of the revision which the reviewers asked.

There is one thing that needs to be pointed out: every editor wants to publish articles and it is not out of any secret agenda or personal vendetta that I reject. I hate rejecting, but it is important to do so. It is for the reputation of the journal but, ultimately, of the author themselves - many times when I have stopped an article in its tracks, the author was upset, but after a few months' they agreed with me and stated that, with distance, they realised the article was not ready. And in many cases the article comes back with further thought and sees publication! Sometimes the article is perfectly fine but not right for the scope of the journal.

I agree with Tree of Life that this cannot be an admin error (but I would be inclined to exclude bribery). I am wondering if the journal had a few quality submission and the editor was desperate to make up the page quote that the publishers have set? Having a 'budget' for the journal (although I understand the constraints the publishers have) it is the bane of my life. I'd rather publish less but the publishers ***always*** want more...

I looked at the editor's profile when this matter started and I could not find anything about them, no articles, no academic institution page and no online profile - that by itself rings an alarm bell: if you were to look for me you'd find my publications, sample of articles, not to self-publicise but to give evidence that, if you were to choose me as editor, I am able to do my job and that I am a serious scholar. Why is this person editing a journal if they have no experience in the field?This is not a rhetorical question but a real question.

PNV, unless you are at the end of your biological clock I'd advise against the PhD and baby. I did mine with teen kids and a job, did it in 3 years on the dot but, boy, it was the hardest thing I have done. I have aged 10 years in these 3...And that's 3 years of my kids' life I'll never get back. i think that doing the two you won't enjoy neither the phd or parenthood.

Hey Jambo - a suggestion for your bibliography: just cut and paste all your footnotes and take out your bibliography from there - it will take time but it will be accurate. Mine took 2 days but it's a hefty bibliography (about 12,000 words). This, of course, works if you are using the footnote system, if you are using Chicago and parenthesis (Bush, 2002) does not work. Anyway. You can do it. Get off the forum and go to work :)