Trying to write an interdisciplinary PhD thesis is great – really, it is exciting and you never get bored – but as I suggested in my previous post, it is also confusing and demoralising a lot of the time.   The problem is that, however much you enjoy your research, eventually you want to run away from your computer screaming.

So, I’d got as far as breaking writing block, and getting (many) words down onto paper.  The problem that remained was how to get those words into the correct order!  I was still procrastinating, and feeling afraid of “chapter documents”.

Enter the Radical Chop-up Über Document (RCUD).

My supervisor asked my what my strategy was in writing my chapters, and I said “err”.  As I clearly had no strategy she suggested the RCUD.  I am still working with this technique, but the bare bones are:

  • Create a new document
  • Save it, and make sure the name contains the word “radical” somewhere.  Note that this is essential, it may sound silly, but you need to be reminded that what you are doing is “radical” otherwise you’re never going to chop it all up.
  • Now open up your other documents in turn and cut and paste the best bits from them into your new document.
  • But, as you do this you must be radical.
  • Don’t take pieces that you don’t think are good enough
  • Feel free to write yourself notes in capitals
  • Put subtitles in for the sections as you add them
  • Reorder sections at will
  • Cut bits when you find you’ve written a better version elsewhere

(And I’ll have to add other instructions as I work out what they are!)

I find that this is helping me to put together my chapters.  Previously, when I have tried to write a chapter from beginning to end I have become paralysed.  I have constantly felt that I’m forgetting important stuff, and I have ended up writing loads of detail on areas outside my main focus of interest.

The radical document works for me because I have lots of documents where I’ve written some good bits and some bad bits, and I also have notes from many presentations and even a couple of lectures that are also relevant.  My brain is too small to hold all the ideas I have for my chapters at once, and by using this technique I don’t feel that I’m leaving things out all the time.

I wonder if that’ll help anyone else.  At least by writing it down here I’m going to remember to use it again!