I want to exchange my dissertation/thesis chapters with yours.

[Dr._Robotnik's_Shadow]

I'm looking for someone to exchange dissertation/thesis chapters with. I really need a fresh set of eyes on my writing and thought reading someone else's term paper or dissertation/thesis chapter(s) and giving them feedback, and then them doing the same for me, would be a good idea. Of course I'm working closely with my advisor, but having another peer look over my work helps to see my own writing better before turning it in. If you are looking for a writing partner to provide feedback (or hold an "accountability" type of arrangement) on their dissertation, thesis or a term paper, I hope you will contact me.

I'm a PhD candidate looking for someone who is in the arts, social sciences, or humanities. My dissertation is on gender representations on children's television. I look forward to hearing about your or even reading yours!

[Eigen]

You really need to find someone in your discipline, and ideally someone you know personally. 

The IP risks with sharing your dissertation drafts are huge, especially if you plan on going on to publish it elsewhere. 

Do you not have peers in your department you swap documents with? I've proofed close to a dozen dissertations for friends, and gotten some to look over my chapters as well. 

[rising_star]

Does your university have a writing center you could work with, @Dr._Robotnik's_Shadow? That's the route I would go. They often have people who specialize in working with graduate students on theses/dissertations.

[Dr._Robotnik's_Shadow]

Thanks for the advice. My department and Uni are a bit dysfunctional. There is a writing center but thus far it's been a waste of time. Graduate writing groups are advertised but have not materialized. I tried forming my own groups, asking colleagues, and sending out emails to other departments to solicit a writing partner but, as indicated here, I think people are afraid to share work or are are not confident about their writing. Every time I ask a colleague to swap work they say they don't have anything ready to show me, but then the next day they tell me they turned in a chapter to their advisor. So I ask, "Why didn't you swap with me then before you turned it in? I thought you said you didn't have anything ready yet." I get no answer in response.

[TakeruK]

1 hour ago, Dr._Robotnik's_Shadow said:

 Every time I ask a colleague to swap work they say they don't have anything ready to show me, but then the next day they tell me they turned in a chapter to their advisor. So I ask, "Why didn't you swap with me then before you turned it in? I thought you said you didn't have anything ready yet." I get no answer in response.

To me, this sounds like a nice way of them saying that they don't want to swap chapters with you. Not everyone wants to trade chapters with their colleagues for review. In all of the departments I've been to, there is currently no culture of swapping chapters with peers for review. I'm not exactly sure why. One contributing factor is that I think all of us feel that our advisor can provide the best comments possible so there's no point swapping with another student before we submit to our advisor.

Maybe it's because when students swap, the small amount of improvement we gain in our manuscript is not worth the time invested in reading the other person's work. Also, we don't want to waste the other person's time because if they make a suggestion but the advisor makes a different one, we'll almost always pick the advisor's suggestion. In addition, in the time it takes to read another person's work, you can be making progress on a parallel project and the amount gained in having another person read your work isn't as much as the amount gained just working on a different project while your advisor reads your work.

In my department, it's common for students to workshop single sentences or small paragraphs with each other. Especially when we want to make sure we are conveying an important idea clearly in our paper. Or maybe we will consult with each other on questions of grammar (e.g. when to use "which" vs "that") especially since many of us do not use English as our first language. 

So, usually it's much more common for us to trade things like conference abstracts or other short pieces of writing but pretty rare to swap things that will take a significant amount of time to read. In my field, the bottom line is getting your chapter read by a student & the advisor isn't going to improve it that much more than just the advisor reading it, so it's not worth the time swapping chapters (not only will you spend more time reading another chapter, but if you want to get your chapter to your advisor by Week X, you need to get it your peer reader by Week X-1).

[Dr._Robotnik's_Shadow]

Thanks, @TekeruK and everyone for replying. I agree with what is being said. I am also hesitant to swap chapters with others and think others feel the same way for all the reasons suggested in this thread....I'll keep chugging along somehow.