Thesis: Where to start and how to? I'm so lost...

[ReallyNiceGuy]

I have a dumbass question:

When one is entering a MA program and they're faced with 3 semesters of full course loads + languages and then summers for languages and then they don't do the thesis until the last semester how in the world do youuuuuuuuu find time to:

write original work for publication and presentations

put together applications for PhD programs/

*undergrad ignorance- I've got it.

[maeisenb]

I have a dumbass question:

When one is entering a MA program and they're faced with 3 semesters of full course loads + languages and then summers for languages and then they don't do the thesis until the last semester how in the world do youuuuuuuuu find time to:

write original work for publication and presentations

put together applications for PhD programs/

*undergrad ignorance- I've got it.

One way is that the work you will try to publish and/or present could (should?) come out of your classes and papers that you're writing. For example, if you have to write a 15 page research paper for a course, you can use that as the basis for a presentation. If you wrote 2 of those a term, that's several presentations the following term that you can do with some adjustments for public speaking, PowerPoint, etc.. Publications will take a little more time to do, but could conceivably work as an extension of the same papers over the summer when you're doing language. That way you are working off the kernel of something that you have already done and just be shortening, adapting or extending it.

[StrangeLight]

you're supposed to work on your thesis IN ADDITION TO all that other stuff.

semester 1 - take all those courses, do all your requirements, and meet with your advisor to read some books in your topic/field. work on finalizing your topic (since these always change, regardless of how set you were in your original topic when you applied).

semester 2 - if applicable, start writing grants and applying for summer research funding money. this is the point where you should go beyond a topic ("af am's experiences in US southwest") to a research question ("how did af ams negotiate with non-state actors in indian territory?" or something). start researching where your sources are located. can you order them as microfilm through interlibrary loans? or do you need to travel? if you have access on campus to some of your sources, start reading through them and taking notes (or however else you collect data).

summer 1 - in addition to doing more language work (if you need it), the summer is THE time to do your primary research. we don't get summers off anymore, we just get summers (usually) free of coursework. but you're still working, make no mistake about that. if your language class goes from may to june, spend july and august at your archives, collecting your data, reading/sorting it, and writing your outline.

semester 3 (year 2) - ideally, you should finalize your outline this semester and finish reading through all of your data. i would strongly recommend also writing the first draft of your MA this semester (yes, in addition to everything else you have to do). this will also be the semester that (if you still want to go) you'll be applying to PhD programs. these take a lot of time, but if you get a draft of your MA done early in the semester, you may wish to use it as your writing sample.

semester 4 - redraft your MA however many times are necessary and defend it.

summer 2 - if your PhD applications went well, then relax. this is probably the last free summer you will ever have until you're tenured somewhere, which will be 12 (at the shortest) to 20 years away. enjoy it. take a couple language courses if you still need it, read a few more books in your field, and if your MA advisors say so, consider submitting your MA for publication. if the PhD apps didn't go well but you still want to apply, in the summer you should be writing and rewriting your SOP. your now-finished MA thesis can be your writing sample (redraft as necessary). make contacts with potential advisors in september, do it early.

as for conferences and conference papers, you should apply to those all year, starting in the first month of your MA. if all you have to do is write an abstract, then write one. make it up. pick a title for your paper that is broad enough that if your research changes by the time the conference rolls around (and it always does) you can write a different paper from the one you proposed (again, everyone does this) but it'll still fit the topic and the panel you're on.

i strongly recommend that you only apply to conferences that are either regional (i.e. mid-atlantic council of latin american studies) or inter/national (i.e. caribbean studies association). DO NOT APPLY TO PRESENT AT GRADUATE CONFERENCES. these don't appear to be as rigorous on a CV because it is fellow grad students that are selecting your paper for acceptance, not tenured, seasoned professors. while it may be fun, while you may get a lot out of it intellectually, it won't be taken seriously by prospective PhD programs.

p.s. the whole timeline i described above is exactly how i did my MA. i didn't take languages in my first year, but i took both languages and i taught in my second. during my MA, i also presented at 5 conferences. every time i submitted an abstract it was accepted, even though some of them were garbage. i learned a lot from the experience and only presented at one local grad conference because it was held at my institution and i did it as a favour to our area studies center. while i didn't have to apply for PhD programs in my second year, i was applying for a competitive national fellowship, and the grant writing process is at least as intense as the SOP writing process. this isn't to brag; it's to say that it can be done. you CAN do all these things at once. it's actually considered to be the norm for most high quality programs.

[StrangeLight]

also... research papers from seminars are great bases for conference papers. i would NOT recommend submitting them for publication. the only place that a seminar research paper is likely to be accepted is in a graduate student journal, and your time is better spent getting one publication in a real (sorry, but it's true) journal than 10 graduate journals. a research seminar paper can certainly serve as the jumping off point for your MA and for an eventual publication, but the work it takes to move it from being a class paper for a publishable article is more than just a few weeks of redrafting it.

and while you may think it's too early to worry about this, it's not. when you're on the job market, you want to present a clear arc to your published and soon-to-be-published research. if you're going to be a historian of sex and gender in ancient china, then all of your publications should at least touch upon sex or gender in ancient china. just because you have a good research seminar paper on gender in europe doesn't mean you should get it published. when you look for jobs, the search committees will look for every published thing you have out there (if you make it to the top 10 list). if you've got 10 grad journal publications, they'll ignore it as early work (and potentially ignore some good work!). if you've got 2 or 3 articles in really random fields (your regional field but not at all close to the cutting edge work you do in your dissertation), they'll doubt your scope and vision as a scholar.

i know that's a ton to put on your plate at this point, so the tl;dr version: use research seminar papers for conferences (but ONLY conferences where professors will be attending as participants on panels, not just as chairs/discussants/keynote speakers). work on your MA from day 1, in addition to everything else you're supposed to do. don't worry about publications until a prof approaches you and says "X is great, you should really try to get it published." and try to get it published in refereed journals, not grad student publications.

Edited February 20, 2012 by StrangeLight

[runner09]

Strangelight, how are you so wise?? This is great- very helpful. I've applied to only PhD programs and am hoping to start in the Fall- do you recommend that I follow the same "steps" you outlined as I complete my first couple years? OR, is it different given that I will have comps to study for and won't have to apply (hopefully!) mid course. Does that make sense?

[ReallyNiceGuy]

SL- thank you so much, that's exactly what I needed.

I want to go 0 to 60 immediately and I'm not really interested in being mediocre. I just don't know how to go about these things!

Thanks!!!

[TMP]

My timetable in my MA program was basically like SL's. That could've been me, minus the conferences.

As my 1st semester wound down, the first thing my graduate adviser asked me was, "So, do you have a thesis topic yet?" This was... December, right before the finals!!! I ended up spending my winter break thinking about the topic.

2nd semester- I applied for summer research and language grants. I took 2 very relevant classes (very rare for it to happen in my program) at the same time and bounced some ideas with the professor in a research seminar. She encouraged me to use my final research paper as the basis of my thesis.

Summer:

1st 2 months were devoted to research

3rd month- devoted to language study abroad

4th month- back to research, totally not expected as I suddenly found a wealth of materials and had to ask for more support, which my department was very willing to give. I had, maybe, 2 weeks of actual vacation time.

3rd Semester: Started writing right away (of course, those long training runs for a marathon helped me to write my thesis in my head) while carrying 2 seminars unrelated to my methodological interests and independent study in language. I put a LOT of time in my thesis that my grades kind of suffered. Oh well. But adviser was super happy. Coursework was finished. And I applied to PhD programs at this time.

4th semester: Whole piece was done by mid-March. I had nothing else to do expect to keep up with my independent study and take up intensive German.

(note I didn't TA)

It can be all done if you can go into the MA program with a good idea of what you'd like to do your thesis on and take relevant classes to get started on it a bit. I was the first one in my MA program to actually finish on time- within 2 years because so many MA students still don't have an idea of what they want to do so they spend their precious summer wandering through the shelves in the library looking for a topic.

So get started!

[rising_star]

I have a dumbass question:

When one is entering a MA program and they're faced with 3 semesters of full course loads + languages and then summers for languages and then they don't do the thesis until the last semester how in the world do youuuuuuuuu find time to:

write original work for publication and presentations

put together applications for PhD programs/

*undergrad ignorance- I've got it.

No worries.

1) You don't need to worry about publications as a MA student. As StrangeLight has wisely said, those pubs will follow you forever so wait until you really have a solid grounding in the field and the literature to publish.

2) You don't actually wait until your last semester to do your thesis. Ideally, some of your coursework will lead to writing papers that can be incorporated into your thesis. If you're having difficulty finding courses that allow this, enroll in a few independent study courses instead of taking seminars.

3) In a lot of ways, applying is easier when you're in a MA program going for a PhD. If the program you're in grants PhDs, you're likely to be admitted there. Moreover, if you've been to conferences, you've met some of your POIs already, so you can spend less time trying to court people via email or googling people to find out what they're doing.

i know that's a ton to put on your plate at this point, so the tl;dr version: use research seminar papers for conferences (but ONLY conferences where professors will be attending as participants on panels, not just as chairs/discussants/keynote speakers). work on your MA from day 1, in addition to everything else you're supposed to do. don't worry about publications until a prof approaches you and says "X is great, you should really try to get it published." and try to get it published in refereed journals, not grad student publications.

I agree with all of this. I've used seminar papers for thesis chapters and conference papers but not for anything else. I only go to the regional and national conference in my discipline so that's where all of my presentations are. I don't really care about who I present with because I know that faculty will be in attendance either way (because they are the discussant or because their grad student is presenting or because they know me and want to see what I'm up to).

As far as timelines, mine was pretty similar to what ticklemepink describes. Note though that I'm not a historian, I didn't TA, and I didn't have to study any languages (though I did audit one for fun at one point).

Semester 1 - 4 courses (3 seminars, 1 required stats class). For two of my classes, I used the same final paper, with permission from both professors. That paper was a draft thesis proposal. Granted, it was very preliminary and got altered a great deal subsequently.

Semester 2 - 4 courses (3 seminars, 1 how-to methods course); thesis proposal defense. I ended up taking an incomplete in one course and finish it over the summer due to personal matters that interfered with the course. But, I was able to start from the proposal draft I'd written the semester before to have a good basis for my thesis proposal.

Summer 1 - conducted field research for my MA thesis.

Semester 3 - Took 2 courses, both seminars. For one of the courses, the final paper I wrote was a thesis chapter. That helped because I only had to revise the chapter later. I also did my data analysis and read all the literature I thought would be relevant, taking notes on it to facilitate writing later. Oh, and there were memos about the data and the literature that I was later able to flesh out when writing my thesis. I also turned in a thesis outline (of chapters and their content) to my advisor and did 7 PhD apps.

Semester 4 - Took 1 course, took in 2 untrained foster dogs, worked PT, wrote my thesis and visited programs. My MA advisor made me submit a full draft by February 1. I didn't really start working on it until Jan 3 or so, and found that I was able to write pretty quickly because I'd organized everything beforehand. I'd write for maybe 4-5 hours per day, which was enough to have 75 pages by Feb 1. Her logic was that I'd be visiting PhD programs (she was more confident about my chances than I was!) and would need to have a draft in pretty early so that I wasn't trying to write amidst the chaos of visiting. She was absolutely write. I would turn in a draft and she'd have comments to me within a week and then I'd have 2 weeks to revise before I had to turn it back in. I ended up handing my thesis in to the committee in late March and defending April 9 or so. The deadline to submit for May graduation was at the end of April and I had all my revisions done by then.

Summer 2 - So, I ended up not actually submitting it in April because my dept offered me a summer TA position, which required being enrolled. This was awesome since I'd already decided not to do my PhD there and needed the money to pay for my cross-country move. I submitted my thesis in the summer, TA'd a course that lasted a month, and otherwise continued working my PT job and planning my move.

Hope this helps!

[StrangeLight]

Strangelight, how are you so wise?? This is great- very helpful. I've applied to only PhD programs and am hoping to start in the Fall- do you recommend that I follow the same "steps" you outlined as I complete my first couple years? OR, is it different given that I will have comps to study for and won't have to apply (hopefully!) mid course. Does that make sense?

i'm in a PhD program, but we do a 2-year MA if we don't come in with one before moving onto the PhD years. if you don't have an MA when you arrive at your PhD program, you'll probably be put through a de facto MA/research paper/thesis in the first 2 years, so this stands. and you'll be wanting to work on comps reading at the time too.

[Kelkel]

I like this thread. It's a good thread.

So lets say I'm getting my MA and do all the wonderful stuff outlined above. And then I go into a wonder PhD program. It seems pretty standard that the course credits will not transfer. So while StrangeLight got an MA along the way, I assume I would take all the courses (or different ones) again and do research to start/further my dissertation? They wouldn't have someone with a completed MA thesis do another one right? (Unless you change fields like some people have discussed).

[TMP]

Keikei, it's a case-by-case basis in PhD programs. You won't necessarily know until you've been accepted when you can ask how your credits will transfer and how it'll affect the timeline to ABD. Most will take up a year's worth of coursework. Still, it's an individual thing. PhD programs just want to come with a broken spirit.

[ReallyNiceGuy]

Speaking of research grants: are you applying for these via school or an outside party?

[TMP]

Many outside grants require you to be a doctoral student. So you need to depend on your university to supply you with summer research grants. Ask about them!

[StrangeLight]

I like this thread. It's a good thread.

So lets say I'm getting my MA and do all the wonderful stuff outlined above. And then I go into a wonder PhD program. It seems pretty standard that the course credits will not transfer. So while StrangeLight got an MA along the way, I assume I would take all the courses (or different ones) again and do research to start/further my dissertation? They wouldn't have someone with a completed MA thesis do another one right? (Unless you change fields like some people have discussed).

i applied to a PhD program with only a BA. i was accepted, with 5 years of funding, but was officially enrolled in their MA program. they don't offer a terminal MA, so the ONLY people in their MA programs are ones that applied to the PhD and didn't already hold MAs. after 2 years and a thesis and a defense and a language exam, the department decides if they want to keep us or cut us loose. if they keep us, we are formally enrolled in the PhD program, do one more year of coursework (plus comps and overview) then move onto research and writing the dissertation. if they cut us loose, we walk away with an MA only.

most programs that admit students to the PhD straight out of their BA will have some sort of MA process along the way. some are more formal (like mine), others are less so (they just give you an MA after a year or two).

in your case of doing a terminal MA and then applying for PhDs later, the MA credits usually wouldn't transfer to your new PhD program. but you would do less coursework than someone without an MA already. either one or two years less. in my program, students admitted without MAs end up doing 3 years of coursework. in those 3 years, they write MA theses, PhD overviews, and sit comps. students admitted who already have MAs (someone like the hypothetical you) would do 2 years of courswork. in those 2 years, they'd do PhD overviews and sit comps (no MA thesis). does that make sense?

every program is different. the only way to know how your situation would work is to read the graduate handbook of the PhD department and see how they treat students who already have MAs.

[rising_star]

I'm not in a history department but, I can say that both my MA and PhD universities accepted a chunk of coursework from people that did their MAs elsewhere. In the case of my PhD program, I could transfer in up to 24 credit hours (so 8 courses), though I ended up not doing this.

[Kelkel]

Yes SL, that did answer my question fabulously! You are a great wealth of knowledge!

[StrangeLight]

what i am is a great procrastinator.