OK, so the word limit for my thesis is 100,000. I have a complete draft, and I'm now editing to try and get it down within that limit, but I reckon I am still going to end up between one and two thousand words over. Do you reckon I can get away with this? Maybe just say it 99,500 or something? It is only a couple of pages, after all.

It's not going to please my supervisor who was keen for me to make it well under the limit, but that just aint going to happen, not unless I leave out a whole chapter.

Hi,

it is indeed more difficult to write less words than more. I would be honest with your supervisor about it. I mean if you send things per E mail he can quite easily check the wordcount anyway.

Often the use of tables is a great way to reduce word count.

Check it out with your supervisor and see what the rules state. Usually they will turn a blind eye to a few thousand over, but don't risk it. I know it is tempting to not mention it, but you could face problems if your department is strict. Technically you should apply for an extension of the word limit and if you don't do it properly you could get caught out.

Is it a suggested guide? I was on a committee and we voted in a 60 000 limit for Pure Science, but only as we were the only faculty without a limit. It was supposed to be approximate. You could contact your faculty to ask maybe. There's always things like appendices and tables to cut down limits too

thanks people.

Have just checked the Uni regulations and now I'm more confused than ever. I can't even find anything to say references and appendices are excluded, I'm sure that was there before.

I might check it out with the postgrad office. My supervisor is a bit of an old woman and I dont want to worry him if I can avoid it. I'm getting to the stage where I'm thinking of turning the extracts I've got included from documents and interviews into 'pictures' so they dont count

AAAAAAAAAAAAAARG!

I have been really, really, really strict and gone through slashing anything I conceivably can (mainly foonotes). I got it down to 168 words over the limit of 100,000.

I emailed it to my sup and his first comment was 'I see you are still over the word limit'

168 effin words !

He really wants me to be around 80k I think, but unless I drop a chapter that's not possible.

I reckon the lower the better. As journals and referee always say, the more consice and brief the better. I think its easier to waffle, but harder to get your point across in say 80,000 words.

Don't get caught up in the whole "My thesis is thiiiis long" pointless machismo ( I nearly did).

I agree with Badhaircut ...

80K is plenty for a soc sci PhD (I've known people who have only written 60K and passed).

Less words = less waffle (and less for the examiners to criticise in the viva)!!!

Also ... your supervisor is telling you to edit/chop bits out for a reason - listen to them!

Good luck.

Poor you - it's such a pain to have to cut down. Maybe sit there with your research questions and ensure that everything that you are saying relates directly back to them and the key themes you want to discuss? It may be that there are some tangents in the thesis that are interesting but only indirectly relate back to your research questions? I'm not saying that there are - just that this may be a good place to start thinking about chopping words out. With every paragraph, think 'what is this adding to the overall story?'. Afterall, that's probably what busy examiners are going to be thinking. Good luck!

Aliby,

Maybe try and summarise a chapter, use appendix if required. Use summary as your chapter. Do this with the other chapters as well if it works.

Good luck