ZH0224, got it. Many thanks for your help.

In my experience, it's the student's responsibility to ascertain that the thesis is clearly written and edited so as to enable the supervisor to focus on the contents' nitty-gritty. Of course, in spite of you editing your work, vigorously, anyone reading it could still pick up a few things here and there. Your supervisor can spot these and bring them to your attention. Poorly edited work gets in the way of whoever is reading it with a critical eye and mind, and with a view to providing a feedback. Besides, if the PhD student can't get it right at this stage, when would s/he do so? You may soon realise that after earning your PhD you're in a situation or an environment where you finish working on a manuscript intended for publication in a journal article and the opportunity to ask someone to help you read and provide feedback before sending it off simply isn't there. In that case, if poor writing gets in the way of the reviewers assessment, that could lead to a rejection.

Please help if you have access to this journal. Thans, Patsey.

Van der Kooija, J.C., De Ruytera, D.J. and Miedemaa, S. (2013) '“Worldview”: the Meaning of the Concept and the Impact on Religious Education', Religious Education, 108(2), pp. 210–28.

Have you considered teaching in schools? Under Michael Gove's dispensation, you won't be out of work in an English secondary school if you go down the route of teaching Geography in the secondary school sector. You'll need to gain a QTS, and with time (usually 5 years school teaching experience) you could move into the University sector and lecture on Secondary PGCE Geography programmes. Good luck.

Get it fully ready, save it in pdf, and then send it to the print shop on campus, they'll print and spiral bound it for you and send the bounded copies to the designated person within your university responsible for receiving theses for viva voce examination. You will also need to download, sign and send the necessary forms which accompanies the thesis. Best wishes.

Lexika, I share happyclappy's view. It's quite normal for an academic considering to appoint a post doc candidate to request for either the candidate's PhD thesis or published materials/articles from her/his thesis. This enables the academic to assess the quality (depth and breadth) of the candidate's work. Just be aware that some academics would 'steal' ideas from unpublished materials and hit journals with it, and by the time one considers publishing the work, it's already out there in one form or another. So, I'll personally have to satisfy myself that the academic in question is not reputable for publishing her/his students' works without any references to them -- such cases have been reported elsewhere on this forum.

It's quite common to get rejections. My PhD supervisor, a top notch professor in my subject area and globally well known, once told me that even professors sometimes get their manuscripts rejected. You need to factor in the rejection rate for that particular journal--which means that quite often, very good (bordering on excellent) manuscripts get rejected. Rejection stats vary from one journal to the other. What I would do is to take cognizance of the reviewers' comments in redrafting the paper before sending it to another journal with similar (or slightly lower) Quartile ranking. You may find this link ( http://www.scimagojr.com/journalrank.php ) useful concerning journal ranking in most fields.

In the Arts, Humanities, Social Sciences, you generally don't need to be affiliated to get published. For sciences, especially where the work ought to have been carried out in a lab, then (as I've heard) you need belong (even if informally/unofficially) to a lab. If you still live within the vicinity (or commuting distance) of the uni where you complete your PhD and you still pop in there to attend seminars, etc, you could mention this to your supervisor(s) and still put the department down as your affiliated institutional contact address. It looks better both now and in the future.

The award of a PhD in the UK context is typically based solely on the thesis and the viva voce examination. Period! It's not a condition that you must publish to get a PhD in the UK and perhaps other jurisdictions. This is not the case in Germany, the Scandinavia, etc, where you're expected to have your work published in journals and as a monograph. Also, if your PhD is part of a bigger project (especially, though not exclusively, in the sciences), it's often the case, even in the UK, that the PI would have pushed for publications (he has to because of the Research Assessment Exercise) in which case your name would appear on any such publications as a co-author. That said, it is a good strategy (if at all possible) to get your finding chapters summarised and published (or accepted for publication) in a top tier journal in your field (or an adjoining area). By doing so, you're technically passing on a message to your examiners that your findings have been independently validated through the anonymous peer review process which in high impact journals is rigorous. Not having ant publications wouldn't harm you at all—if you’re in the UK. The problem is that you would struggle, even with the PhD in hand, to secure any academic or research positions without any publications. In a nutshell, I think it depends on which field and which country you're based.

Hello guys, watch out for LAP which also comes under several trading names including VDM Publishing, Verlag Dr. Müller, etc. I suggest you Google this publisher and you'll find a barrage of comments and opinions about the company. The widely held opinion about it is that it is a rogue or vanity publisher. Publishing with them potentially damages your CV especially if you are a budding academic. Faculty search committees are said to bin CVs containing publishing entries with predatory publishers and journals. For similar publishing scam Dr Jeffrey Beall of the University of Colorado Denver, in Denver, Colorado, runs an interesting blog. See:

Dr Beall fascinatingly keeps abreast of the scam which some academics have fallen for. Watch out everyone and don't fall for it.

Dr Pat.

Do urgently help if you can, please. Pat.

Ruyter, D.d. and Conroy, J. (2002) 'The formation of identity: the importance of ideals', Oxford Review of Education, 28(4), pp. 509–522.

Sovran, T. (1992) ‘Between similarity and sameness’, Pragmatics, 18, pp. 329–344.

Many thanks, Aysegul.

Thanks, Poole. I got it and send you a PM. Aysegul, my antivirus prevents me downloading from the link you provided (may be just over-cautious). I've sent you a PM containing my email. Do send me a pdf version. Thanks. Pat.

Still urgently in need of these articles, please. Thanks, Pat.

Ruyter, D.d. and Conroy, J. (2002) 'The formation of identity: the importance of ideals', Oxford Review of Education, 28(4), pp. 509-522.

Bauman, Z. (2001) ‘Identity in the globalising world’, Social Anthropology, 9(2),
pp. 121–29.

Sovran, T. (1992) ‘Between similarity and sameness’, Pragmatics, 18, pp. 329–
44.

Every little helps, please. Thanks, Pat.

Bauman, Z. (2001) ‘Identity in the globalising world’, Social Anthropology, 9(2),
pp. 121–29.

Brubaker, R., & Cooper, F. (2000) ‘Beyond “identity”’, Theory and Society, 29,
pp. 1–47.


Sovran, T. (1992) ‘Between similarity and sameness’, Pragmatics, 18, pp. 329–
44.