I think a one hour viva is great news. You now have a date to work towards and I think knowing how long the viva will be is really good. Imagine if they hadn't pre warned you; you would be thinking when it was wrapped up in an hour that it was bad news.

Good luck with the prep :-) Think positive(up)

no worries - be strong ;-). No wonder there is usually a chapter on handling your supervisor in those 'how to do a PhD' books!

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Hi Grit

Really you have said it all yourself. You know your motivation is gone, yet you still want to finish. Beyond the usual, ie disconnect from the internet, catch up on FaceBook at set times of the day (before you start, during lunch, after tea) etc which, let's be honest you already know my advice would be to:

(maybe you have already done this, but if not, it might help kick start you into action. It also presumes you already have all your data collected/in order)

Think through your Table of Contents and committ it to paper (or screen!) - literally go through each of your chapters and work your way through each chapter sub-heading by sub-heading. Be as detailed as possible. Next, open new document for each chapter, officially name them and you have started!

Use your ToC as a guide. Of course it may change but nevertheless if you use it as an overarching guide, you will get a great sense of making progress. Doing it this way means that you will be able to see your thesis building, sub heading by sub heading. It also means that you will keep track of how many words you are writing which again signals progress. Furthermore (I'm writing up!!), it means that some days you can tackle what easier sections, other days you might feel like tackling something more challenging but your thesis will be building up every time you do some work.

Good luck - I have found the writing up process pretty relentless. However, I now have a full draft and although it's not ready to submit, it does feel good to have it all down. In hindsight, while I did draw up a ToC I regret not making it far more detailed. Therefore my advice is given with the benefit of mature reflection! A friend of mine drew up a meticulous ToC and then did not deviate at all from it. That to me would be too constricting but to be honest, he is about to submit so it certainly worked for him.

Hi Kitten

Rant justified in my opinion.

Your supv situ doesn't sound great to be honest. However, you're in first year so there is time to sort it. In my uni if there is a problem like that the way we are advised to sort it is first, obviously try to talk to supv and work out a schedule. Then and if that doesn't work, you could go to your head of department and calmly tell him/her what has been happening. Ideally the HoD should arrange a meeting between you and the supv to sort things out. I know two people who have done this and while it sorts it in one way, obviously there is resentment on both sides that doesn't bode well for relations in later years of the PhD. However, only you can decide if you need to go this far. Failing satisfaction with your HoD, you can go to the head of graduate studies but again this is a farily drastic step and one you should consider before taking - are you prepared for the fallout?

Keep all correspondence etc for future reference, particularly if you are going to complain up the chain of command. Also, have you a second supervisor to bounce things off, or another member of staff to speak to in confidenc? Or could you speak to another student of this supervisor to see if he behaves like this to other students. Some supvs claim to like to leave first years to settle in, trying to be fair it 'might' be something like that. Has he a student close to completion - perhaps he is concentrating all his efforts on that person?

The power inbalance is really weighted against the student in cases like yours so think before you act but your supv sounds, well rude to be honest!

Good luck, hope it gets sorted for you soon (up)

Snap Slowmo :$

Hi Pink

At my uni a social science PhD is supposed to be between 80-100,000 words, including footnotes, appendices but excluding bibliography. However, a friend of mine (who was in the word count) was told that she had too many pages!!! Seems like you just can't win!

winging its way to you now :-)

I can get it Pixie - pm me your email if you want me to send the pdf

Thanks for such a brilliant, evocative account of your viva. You gave a real 'feel' for what it was like and yes, it just goes to show that becuase they kept you there for 3 hours doesn't mean that it was bad news.

Well done Dr. (up)

Hey All

Managed to get full draft completed two days ago so now am process of rigorously editing. Word count came in at 88,000 which was a bit shorter than I thought so I am happy with that. Supv has yet to see it all together so here's hoping it's not a million miles away from what it needs to be. I'd be happy with a thousand miles away - that's doable, I think!

Yo Dunni, the extra star (up)

Sounds pretty long to me too. I think try to keep it just under a page. Less is more with acknowledgements I feel.

Yikes, I'd better find out! Never heard of it at my uni but will check it out - thanks Delta

While I take your point and agree that they probably would look nice and break up the text, if they're only there to make the chapter more interesting [looking] I would imagine your supv would veto them. It's a big 'no no' to have graphs or figures or tables without referring to them in the text; otherwise they're just padding. The same applies, I feel to photos. Unless they're integral to the text, I don't think they should be included.

If you can find a way to refer to them and justify their inclusion, go for it (up)