Dissertation

Don’t Plagiarise it. Remix it!

Academics have been remixing since forever.

You cannot move forward without taking from what is already behind you.

Yet remixing is different from plagiarising.  Academics reference the work they’re using and explain how they reached the detail they’re presenting.

photo by Thomas Hawk

photo by Thomas Hawk

There is a common misconception amongst students that you shouldn’t reference too much, because it looks like you haven’t done any thinking yourself.  But the more you refer to, the broader your research has been. Your scope widens as you read more, leading to more citations.

A high number of references is a healthy sign.  Those references have to be relevant, mind!

As you bring all these works together, you are creating a brand new work.  Remix. Mashup. Collaborate. From all this comes your own unique work.  You rely on others to make your own mark.

Coursework is a continuation of other people’s work, full of quotations, and full of ideas.  Even a groundbreaking, brand new finding/viewpoint must interact with previous research.  And each interaction requires an explanation of where it came from.

Additionally, if you have an opinion and want to back it up, it’s acceptable to find similar arguments elsewhere.  I spoke to one student who said they kept having to change their conclusions because they were the same as someone else’s view.  But there’s no harm in holding a similar view.  It’s just as natural to agree with others as it is to disagree with them.  Agreements in academia are helpful, because it’s material to back up your arguments.  It would be more difficult to back something up if everyone else disagreed with you!

Look at enough journal articles and you’ll start to see exactly how much academics manage to reference throughout their writing.  They don’t leave references out through fear of looking unoriginal.  When they discuss what has gone before and refer to previous findings, they are still creating a brand new work.

Your essays aren’t always unique research projects or a demonstration of new findings.  You may simply be discussing the merits of a statement or exploring a particular concept.  In doing so, your job is to cover as much ground as possible through primary resources and secondary material.  Should you find opinions that go against what you want to argue, bring that up too.  Explain why you don’t agree and back up with even more references on top of your own findings.

Next time you see an academic paper where the bibliography takes up the same number of pages as the article itself, hopefully you’ll understand why this happens!

It’s bad to plagiarise.  It’s great to remix!

“Writer’s Block” – The uninvited break

“I don’t believe in writers block particularly. I think you can feel you’re getting writer’s block and then you call it writer’s block and you’re in trouble. So I refuse to call it writer’s block. I call it ‘time for tea’ instead.”
[Graham Coxon, via morjames]

You’d be forgiven for thinking that “writer’s block” is some sort of disease, given the amount of coverage and advice it gets.

photo by amypalko

photo by amypalko

Faced with a 2,000 word essay, your words need to be important, hard-hitting, scholarly, impressive…

You want those words to be right, so you don’t write any old stuff.  You ponder the possibilities and dismiss most ideas as non-starters.  After hours of doing this, you’re no closer to completing the essay.

Thinking too much about the right words can stop you in your tracks.  You’re allowed to write whatever you want while nobody is looking.  The nonsense you start producing now won’t be the final essay you hand in for marking.

So write nonsense.  Talk rubbish.  Get words down on the page and see where it takes you.

James Dunn recently mentioned writer’s block “coming in waves, as inspiration wavers, usually through little mental stimulation or nothing of note occurring”.  James isn’t alone.  It’s hard to be inspired all the time.

Thursday Bram makes this point, saying that she can pump out 500 words in 30 minutes with no problem, but that doesn’t mean an eight-hour day of writing should produce 8,000 words.  She has managed this feat and even written a 12,000 word e-book in a day:

“But every time I’ve made a push at writing so many words, I’m absolutely useless for two or even three days afterward. There are certainly elements of exhaustion: writing that much leaves me feeling physically wrung out and like I just hiked up a mountain. I may not have run a marathon, but I’ve definitely exerted myself.

“The other reason that I need so much recovery time is that I feel like I’ve burned up whatever it is that lets me put together sentences in a generally pleasing fashion. My writing simply sucks after one of my all-day writing sessions.” [Thursday Bram]

Some people find it a struggle to even begin, let alone pumping out 500 words in 30 minutes.  It’s not burn-up, because the match hasn’t even been lit.

As writer’s block is psychological, there is no solution to fit all shapes and sizes.  Blocks can manifest themselves in many ways, such as:

  • General tiredness
  • Personal problems
  • Burn out
  • Lacking inspiration
  • Seeking perfection ‘out of the box’
  • Pressure to produce something ‘better than last time’
  • Uncertain what is required
  • Not enough research to provide much discussion
  • Distractions
  • Lacking belief in your own ability and/or comparing yourself to others

Just look at famous writers and artists.  Nobody is immune from writer’s block, no matter how talented they may be at their craft.

If you’re truly stuck, try writing random words.  Write a shopping list and then write about writing the shopping list.  Write about why you can’t write.  Type out a paragraph from a book and look at the words on the screen.  The screen isn’t blank any more…is that less intimidating?  Increase the font size on screen and let the text take up more space.  Use handwriting instead of the keyboard, and vice versa.  Try something…anything different.

If you really don’t want to suffer from writer’s block, don’t accept the break exists.  On the flipside, do accept that you need a break sometimes.  I don’t want to hear that you’ve gone bonkers…

20/20 – Day 7: 20 ways to get the word count right

Word counts. Ah, yes. We’ve all been through it before.  You either get stuck after writing about 800 words of a 1,500 word essay, or you fly past the required number of words in the hope that triple the length is acceptable.

Below are 20 ways to help you achieve the word count you need.  Ten for when you’re struggling to write, ten for when you’ve rocketed past the limit.

When you can’t find the words

  1. Write the way you feel. Make it scholarly later. In other words, ignore your internal editor!
  2. Read more. There is always more to add and other avenues to explore.  Further reading should help uncover new areas that you haven’t discussed yet.
  3. Return to your notes. Has something been covered that could be included as part of your argument?  Did your tutor provide any broad topic areas that are relevant to your writing?
  4. Ignore the essay so far. Just list all the points/opinions/arguments you want to make. Anything currently missing from the essay can now be written up.
  5. Step away from the essay. Leave it for a while and return when your mind’s fresh.  Sometimes it’s the only way to wake your mind back up.
  6. Think prodding, not padding! Just adding text for the sake of making up numbers is pointless and it won’t get you any extra marks.  Question everything you read. Does a text agree with your argument? If so, how has the author moved the topic on?  If not, can you criticise that argument in order to back up yours?
  7. Ignore the word count. It starts you off with the wrong mindset altogether.  If you consider the number of words before you’ve written anything, you will automatically stop writing at points in fear that you’re writing too much.  In fact, you need to write more.  So return to any writing that you’ve already done and try expanding on what you’ve got without it turning to padding.
  8. Ask your tutor how the essay is shaping up.  Discuss what you can examine next, where to explore, and so on.
  9. Return to the question. What else could it mean or imply?  Rarely is an undergraduate essay a simple question with an unambiguous answer.
  10. Stop restricting yourself. If you do all the above and still can’t get near to the right number of words, you’re somehow blocking yourself.  Remember that there’s no right or wrong answer.  Critical engagement is so much more than that. If it’s proving that difficult to engage, look to staging a completely different argument.  Maybe you’re trying to give an opinion that isn’t really your opinion.

When you’re over the limit

  1. Cut, cut, cut!
  2. List points in order of importance. Cut the rest to brief points and references.
  3. Check for repetition.
  4. Check verbosity. Are you unnecessarily labouring a point? Be brutal.
  5. Consider depth. Have you given more detail than is expected of you?
  6. If a particular discussion or argument uses many more words than your other set pieces, cut from here.
  7. Take a reality check. “There’s no way I can cut this without cutting something crucial. I need to include everything.”  Seriously, you don’t.  Count yourself lucky that you’ve got the ideas. If it’s still tough, talk it through with your tutor. They will almost certainly suggest areas to chop.
  8. Don’t retell a story or explain from scratch. Introduce the point briefly and reference.
  9. Don’t panic if you’re slightly over.  0-5% is no big deal. 5-10% is worth being vigilant over.  Anything above 10% needs serious reduction.
  10. If you’re going to write so much, why not make it your dissertation subject? 😉
Title image: original by tiffa130 (cc)

Make your work rock and get your creative juices flowing!

Whether you’ve got a few days or a few months to hand something in, there’s always enough time to get creative and produce quality work.

photo by h.koppdelaney

photo by h.koppdelaney

But it’s often so difficult to shine?  Life gets in the way, there’s so much other stuff to distract you, simply starting a project is a pain, the little perfectionist in you has niggling doubts, etc., etc.

Let’s check out some of the ways you can shove those distractions and problems out of the way:

  • Focus on the work in hand – It’s a willpower thing (or Inner Slacker thing).  There’s so much going on around you that it’s insanely difficult to ignore it.  But when you clear nearby distractions, get others out of the way, and isolate yourself from interruption and noise, it doesn’t take long before the work gets a lot easier to deal with. Honest! 🙂
  • Remember that the hardest part is the start – When it feels like hell even starting the work, you then wonder how horrible it’s going to be when you actually get on with it.  Rest assured, once you have the courage to get on with it, everything else comes naturally.  The first hurdle is the biggest one.  The rest of the way isn’t so bad.
  • Move on when you’re stuck – You’re bound to face difficulties in your study.  There are times when something doesn’t sound right, or you struggle to find a way of backing up a point.  Don’t let it hold you up!  When you face a block, make a note of it and come back to it later.  Much better to get everything else out of the way and work on the annoyances later.  You’ll be more focused on those aspects in isolation anyway.
  • Don’t let your Internal Editor get in the way – Another thing that holds us up is our wish to get it right FIRST TIME.  It’s like our brain hasn’t heard of ‘rough drafts’!  The editing process should come later, after you’ve got everything else out in the open.  The longer you agonise over a word or the structure of the coursework, the further away you get from getting the work done.  Edit later.  Piece everything together later.  Your Internal Editor can wait!
  • Don’t do it all in one session – Students who leave an essay to the last minute end up having to do everything in one go.  It’s one of the worst ways of working, but last-minute essay writing is common.  Start as soon as possible on your coursework and complete it over time.  Short sessions are less daunting and help you target specific areas of your work each time.  If you genuinely work better in much longer sessions, remember to take regular breaks from the study.  And do the work as soon as you can…don’t leave it until the day before, when it’s stressful and when you’re in danger of running out of time.
  • Mix it up! – Nobody else can tell you how to put your work together.  Do you like to write the Conclusion first?  If so, do it first!  Does the Introduction come naturally to you when it’s the last part of the creative process?  Is so, do it last!  Work to the order that works best for you.
  • If in doubt, get help – Don’t feel bad when you don’t understand what’s required.  If a question doesn’t make sense or if you can’t get your head around a concept, your tutors should be happy to help.  Make sure you know what you want to ask and what help you’re looking for and, armed with this information, ask away.
  • Your answer is not ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ – Move away from thinking about the ‘right’ answer.  What you’re trying to do is support an argument, explain a function, analyse a concept, and so on.  Critical thinking is not black or white.  It’s all about the shades of grey.
  • Stop fearing the worst – The work you do is private at first.  Nobody is looking over your shoulder.  Well, they shouldn’t be anyway.  So it doesn’t matter what you write down and it doesn’t need to be perfect.  There’s no need to panic about it; just get all your thoughts and quotes and ideas and workings and illustrations out in the open.  Even if loads of the output is rubbish, you’ll have all the good stuff sorted too.  Take the good stuff and shape it into something big.  You don’t have to tell anyone else about the other rubbish you put out.  That’s your own little secret.  It’s the quality stuff that makes you the hero…

These are just some ideas to get the creative juices flowing.  What do YOU do to get those ideas from your head to the page?

photo by SashaW

photo by SashaW