204 ◆AUTHORING A PHD
normally only write them in a hectic final rush to get finished.
Some treat them as just another boring piece of university
bureaucracy to be got out of the way as painlessly as possible.
Other people toil over producing this short nugget of text in an
unguided and not very effective way.
A well-written abstract should be about 300 words or so long.
Its structure should closely follow this sequence:
◆ Start with either one or (at most) two sentences
summarizing the state of the literature to which your thesis
contributes, constructed so as to frame, and highlight, the
value-added which your research has achieved. Be careful,
though, to keep your characterization of the literature fairly
broad-brush and defensible.
◆ Next add two or three sentences characterizing the
theoretical contribution made by your work. They should
pick up any key innovations you have made or the main
theme or theory concepts from the title. You should make
clear the central thrust of your argument in a substantive
way. Do not write purely formalistic stuff at this point.
◆ Devote one sentence to setting out as briefly as possible the
methods you followed. Standard methods are not worth
expounding at length in the abstract. Only if your original
contribution lies especially in methodology should you say
much more than this. By now you should have covered all
the material included in the lead-in chapter(s) of the thesis
and you can put a paragraph break in your abstract here.
◆ Next go through the arguments of each of your more
substantive chapters (usually chapters 3 to 7 in an eight-
chapter thesis). Assign onesentence to summarize the
‘bottom line’ import of each chapter for the overall
argument of the thesis. Do not write: ‘Chapter 4 argues
that ...’, because an abstract is a condensation of your whole
argument and not a guide to your chapter structure. Instead
with each new sentence in the abstract just go straight into
what the relevant chapter shows.
◆ Finish the second paragraph of the abstract with two
sentences crystallizing the bottom-line conclusions of your
final chapter. These points should return to the main theory
or theme concepts used in the thesis title and covered also