phdbug is in the phd room on a date with a broken and temperamental printer.

Congrats, mate. You're are probably British.
(If not, definitely Australian. Or Kiwi. Or Canadian.)

You enjoy most aspects of mainstream British culture, without being stereotypical about it.
You also have a typical British temperament. You wouldn't dream of being impolite.


Lived in London for such a short while still, was totally surprised!!

As you probably realise there are many variations in this: generally asking to write a review and writing a review which is common, high academics writing for prestigious journals well into the third decade of their careers is another thing, and being asked to write a long review essay on a specific book by a specific academic is another issue....

so, take your call...

This DEPENDS.

Its easy to get to write a review u just write to a journal they are always pressed for reviewers and they send u the book.

There are other situations as well. Sometimes an academic *asks* you to review a particular book. Either theirs, or someone's they know. And for a specific journal. A specific book. In a particular area/topic. Thats a totally different situation.

Also, i dnt know what you mean by book summary. A 'review' is not meant to be a summary though many people do that.

This perhaps varies slightly across the UK and I would strongly suggest looking up the assessments section of your programme handbook and/or examination board guidelines and regulations of the school.

Speaking for my university, the pass is at 50%. 60% to below 65% is Merit. 65% to below 70% is high merit (and this is what is required for a PhD place) and 70% and above is distinction.

How the overall grade is determined is determined by school specific exam board policies, on how many units and half units you have and how you fare on an average and therefore your overall grade is not a percentage working of your total received marks across all the papers. This should be clearly mentioned on your results.

best.

And here's one of the threads...i was reading my own posts and laughing now...just in a couple of weeks i seem to have matured a lot LOL !

http://www.postgraduateforum.com/threadViewer.aspx?TID=10455

Hello stressed, first, follow up the archives on endnote out here, people have good advice, also the purple sticky that I started called tips list.

Input everything u read (no matter how stupid or irrelevant u think it is) into zotero or endnote. Put it in and then forget it. Remember to attach PDF files to it though.

Ok, now a personal tactic. This is slightly archival (read ancient or medieval) but it works great with me. Lets say I have ONE piece (themed or just drafty kind) of X number of words, every X weeks or so. What I do is this: I start off by identifying a rough overarching theme for this piece, literally tell myself ok this is what I am going to write about now. (i know this is vague and variable but trust me, if u'r coming from a similar or related area of interest in ur masters, and working with same sup, as both u and me r, its kind of easy to identify some rough themes). Next step: I spend two ful days on a good reading list. Use up all ur Copac, Sconul resources, use other peoples biblios and compile a list. Next. Get the matter in place. I save all the journal readings in a folder thats specifically meant for my written pieces and their corresponding 'resources/rough work'. As for books, make notes on the comp with all details like page numbers etc and store in same folder. So what happens is that for every piece I have a litle resource bank of some 60 pieces. Now, the only RULE i enforce is this: I try to ensure, every piece for the first yr has only about 25% to 30% overlap on readings with the last pieces. This is my personal tactic of ensuring that the lit review is actually going somewhere.

But, but but. This works best if you are targetting a high pressure writing schedule, like one themed piece of 3 to 5 k every 3 weeks, or each month. More often than that would mean u write 45000 words of polished work in the first year LOL :). So in any case if u r targetting written work every 3 weeks (i know i know it sounds dreadfully hi pressure), only then this works BEST. It IS archival and does work independent of my Endnote database, but trust me, I am comfy with it. I have worked in plenty of archives, sifting thru dusty papers etc.

On another note, I am personally trying to do this PhD as a no paper system. Its working well till now. Only remember to back up every day. I use google docs to store every single thing I write and all my biblipgraphies and reading lists and copy up my PhD Year 1 folder on my schools network drives every other day.

Any good?

stressed good u r here....can u gimme the answers to my questions? i am getting slightly freaked out...

Hmm so when you say 4ooo word pieces are these themed pieces or general writing? Also how much do u show ur sup?

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======= Date Modified 14 41 2008 21:41:55 =======
Hi all,

brief question: How much did you write in your first year? I dont mean notes you write from books/papers, but themed constructive writing? Were these in pieces? all together? How many words of good and useable quality by year end? Also, how often did u guys submit written work to your sup? How did you structure these pieces and how long did they have to be?

best

P'Bug

======= Date Modified 14 41 2008 21:41:31 =======
Hi all,

brief question: How much did you write in your first year? I dont mean notes you write from books/papers, but themed constructive writing? Were these in pieces? all together? How many words of good and useable quality by year end? Also, how often did u guys submit written work to your sup? How did you structure these pieces and how long did they have to be?

best

P'Bug

Absolutely agree with coastman and heifer and I think al other here. Our PhDs shall probably not shake the foundations of our disciplines, but nonetheless we are expected to have been (and I am choosing these words with care) thoughtful, creative, critical and constructive in what we have done.

Whether it is science or the humanities, whether you are number crunching or interpreting discourses, all of this requires the space that *time* affords. Technically I find it perfectly possible to write 100000 words in under a year, but do the *work* thats needed for it in that time, (and no, nobody is talking of foundations haking work) is unimaginable.

It is another question altogether if someone does the *fieldwork* or *experiments* component in that time, but that is perhaps not a first year tak. Personally, how would i know what data is to be gathered and how, unless I had clear answers on "method", "purpose" and how would i have all of this without an extensive period of reading?

All of this in a year...beats me!

Well, had mine just now. First bit was usual form filling, deciding on meetings, written work submission etc. But the most of it was spent in discussing a book on which we both had strong views :-) and other scholars and well it was 1 hour of 15 mins admin issues and 45 minutes a lovely intellectual talk! Of course, we fixed dates for next meeting, what i shall write and what we discussed etc etc...But i must admit though, this is my MSc sup continuing as PHD sup so, had already had other meetings before this first phd meeting..

hi stressed why in november? rnt u guys meeting fortnightly in the first yr? at our school thats mandatory!

Hu purplerain there IS a facebook group for this forum and a good many of us are members....but hmmmm...too much stuff discused around here for people to stop being anon LOL!