Dissertation

Good news: I'm making progress on the dissertation. Word count-wise. So far 2000/12000.

Bad news: lack of structure and coherence. I know what I want to write about, and there's a vague plan, but it's not good enough. Everything Mr. Gerig taught about writing an essay (literary commentary to be exact, but the format applies to all essays really) isn't here. I need a clear thesis. 12,000 words make it difficult to be coherent, I seem to drift off the topic on occasions. It's hard to have a clear flow of argument, because everything is inter-related so I don't really know how to link the points together. Plus, I'm still doing reading, so new sources and information keep popping up, and I have to figure out a way to incorporate these new ideas.

I just e-mailed my tutor and postponed the meeting. Right now what I've got is 2000 words on a word document, random unrelated paragraphs in a size 12 Times New Roman font. Maybe I should approach my dissertation as a recipe of a cake. I will do all the research, make sure I have all the ingredients and exact calculations. Then I'll add the ingredients and incorporate them together in an orderly fashion, and spend time "baking" (=writing) it - cooking time will definitely be more than 30 minutes - and perhaps a dissertation meeting with the tutor would be like letting the cake cool and putting icing on top to make it better.