Wow, thank you everyone for your responses, you've been so helpful! I am definitely going to find the books mentioned, and have a look through. Thank you all once again!

Thank you so much! This is exactly the thing - finding a question that is meaty enough to be sustained, but not so complex as to be completely incomprehensible. Oh. And original.

Hi all, thank you for your responses! I may not have been clear about this - I am still at the proposal stage...I have met with my potential supervisor, and whilst he likes the direction I am coming from, he has advised that I get as focussed as possible as to what it is that I am asking. Which is, of course, logical, but it is pretty damn difficult. I'm just wondering how others approached this?

Hi all. I was wondering if you had any tips for me. I am new to the PhD process, and am floundering as to how to best formulate a PhD question. I have my basic research framework - in that I want to analyse conflict in Zimbabwe as an inherent symptom of a distinctive political logic that is to be found throughout Africa. I know it is broad at this stage, but I am only a month in to the general research, and I have found that unless I have a QUESTION, my research really could be endless. Has anyone else had difficulties with formulating the basic question? I am getting increasingly frustrated as I am doing all of this work, and don't feel any closer to clarity. Any tips?