the thesis whisperer verb cheat sheet

Verb cheat sheet

Author: Thesis Whisperer 

A list of verbs and that show judgement about the topic. Great for EAL learners as well as upper-level undergrads and graduate students who are looking for ways to develop their academic vocabulary and find a more scholarly voice.

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Writing Resources I Like

• #acwri Twitter chat Connect and learn from other academic writers.
• Literature Review Grid Example This is an example literature review grid that I made for an MDIA 1091 class. If you'd like to use this template, click File > Make a Copy and then save the file to your own Google Drive.
• Ohio University's Graduate Writing & Research Center The GWRC offers writing and research tutoring, as well as writing groups, workshops and Write Now! sessions
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• Pomodoro Technique If you ever struggle to focus on reading or writing, this method may help you get to work. Set a timer for 25 minutes and commit to working for that whole time period. Then take a break. There are lots of pomodoro apps to help you track your time.
• Thesis Whisperer Literature Review Matrix Describes a method for organizing your resources into a matrix for easier writing later.
• Thesis Whisperer Verb Cheat Sheet #1 A list of suggested verbs to use when you need a new way to describe someone else's writing.

Software for Writing

• Zotero A free tool for collecting, organizing and citing research materials.
• Scrivner Scrivener lets you break up your writing into different pieces so you can stop staring at a black Word document. It has many features, but I particularly like that you can use a split screen to view your writing as well as files you've added to Scrivener for your research.
• Evernote Evernote bills itself as a tool for remembering everything. It's a great way to collect web docs, screenshots, PDF files and more. You can also do basic writing here. It has apps for all sorts of mobile devices, so you can do your writing anywhere.
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ABP (Architecture, Building and Planning) Study and Research Guide

• Planning your work
• Architecture
• Construction
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• Urban Planning and Urban Design
• Architectural History and Urban and Cultural Heritage
• Buildings, Maps, Plans and GIS
• Google Scholar
• Indigenous Research Guides
• Standards, Statistics and Data
• Theses and Cultural Collections
• Skills for searching
• Evaluating what you find

Referencing and sources

• Note taking and file naming
• Creating your work
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• Working with copyrighted material

Why reference?

In your work at university you are expected to:

• acknowledge the authors and creators of the ideas and material that has informed your work, and
• show that you have used reputable sources of information. 

These acknowledgments are normally presented in the format of a particular referencing style.

If you fail to acknowledge the work of others correctly, you may be guilty of plagiarism, even if you have done so unintentionally. 

The University of Melbourne produces a wide range of resources to ensure that you understand the requirements of referencing, including: 

Academic integrity at the university of melbourne, referencing essentials, using sources (online module), referencing styles.

There are two recommended referencing styles in MSD/ABP

Chicago A (footnotes) APA (in text citations)

Make referencing easier - try using software like Endnote or Zotero

Referencing software

How do I reference collages/multiple images in one work?

If you are using multiple images to make a collage or to add detail to your own work you will need to provide a reference for each image. 

For more information on referencing images, see the guidelines for Chicago A (footnotes) or APA .

In either style, your caption should explain or describe the image you have created, with the details of all the images you have used in creating it listed in the list of figures.

Using videos

including snippets from multiple videos you will need to provide a reference for each image/video clip. Include your list of references with or after the credits at the end of the video.

For information on citing videos see the guidelines for Chicago A (footnotes) or APA .

What do I do if I need to cite something more than once?

Sometimes you need to go into more detail about one particular source, and you may want to refer to it several times within one paragraph. This is perfectly fine. The most important thing is that the reader understands where the information came from. That could be   another citation, or a word or phrase that clearly refers back to the source you have already mentioned.

APA  

Jane Jacobs (1958, p.140) discusses the 'death' of Downtown, calling for planning that enables "an atmosphere of urbanity and exuberance". She states that  planners and designers should walk around the city to understand what is needed to make it thrive. More recently,  Perrone (2019) has analysed and commented on the article, demonstrating the continuing relevance of Jacobs' arguments. Jacobs (1958) strongly advocates for citizen-led design of the city, exhorting planners to be guided by the desires of citizens.

Chicago 

Jane Jacobs discusses the 'death' of Downtown, calling for planning that enables "an atmosphere of urbanity and exuberance". 1 She states that  planners and designers should walk around the city to understand what is needed to make it thrive. More recently,  Perrone has analysed and commented on the article, demonstrating the continuing relevance of Jacobs' arguments. 2 Jacobs strongly advocates for citizen-led design of the city, exhorting planners to be guided by the desires of citizens.  3

1. Jane Jacobs, "Downtown is for people", in  The Exploding Metropolis , 1st ed., eds. Editors of Fortune (Garden City, N.Y: Doubleday, 1958) 140.

2. Camilla Perrone, “‘Downtown Is for People’: The Street-Level Approach in Jane Jacobs’ Legacy and Its Resonance in the Planning Debate within the Complexity Theory of Cities,” Cities 91 (August 2019), pp.10–16, https://doi.org/10/gnhswx .

3. Jane Jacobs, "Downtown is for people".

What do I put in an appendix?

If a source is publicly available, you don't need to include it in an appendix. An appendix goes at the end of a paper, after the bibliography or reference list. The information contained is not essential - readers will still be able to understand your work without access to it. It serves to enhance the research. 

Only need to include if you want to refer to it and you want the reader to understand the context. Detailed information that would be too long/distracting in the main body and that isn't readily available to the reader.

Examples of what can go in an appendix:

•  'Dial Before You Dig' reports
•  Survey questions and responses
•  Interview transcripts or correspondance 
•  Raw data
•  Tables that you have compiled and are too large to include in your work but that you want to refer to

 Refer to information in an appendix or appendices in parentheses within the text.

eg.  Survey respondents were clearly in favour of increased bicycle infrastructure (see Appendix 1).    

Do I need to reference images/videos I have created?

Images and videos that you have created for a particular assessment  are considered an unpublished work. They should be treated as a figure, and labelled as the guidelines for the style direct.

For APA, add the words "own work" to the note under the image if you want to make it clear that you have created the image yourself.

For Chicago A, follow the guidelines  for captioning figures. 

What do I do if I can't find the creator/author of an image?

If you can't find the creator of an image, provide as much information as you can to allow your reader/viewer to identify it. The citation or footnote and the bibliography or reference list entry should begin with the title of the work, followed by the rest of the information required for citing.

The Chicago Manual of Style , section 14.79 covers what to do if there is no listed author.

The APA Style Blog  has an entry about missing information.

Incorporating sources

You can incorporate information from other sources into your own work using direct quotes, paraphrases and summaries.

A direct quote uses the exact words of another author. 

A paraphrase express another author's idea in your own words. 

A summary provides a short statement expressing the main point of another author's idea in your own words. 

Sheehan, N.W. (2011). Indigenous knowledge and respectful design: an evidence-based approach.  Design Issues   27 (4), 68-80. 

For some tips to help you rewrite the ideas of other authors in your own words, watch   Paraphrasing ideas in your writing . 

For more information about integrating sources in your writing, refer to using sources in assessments: voice in academic writing ..

In addition to drawing on a range of academic sources in your work, it's important to include your own thoughts and ideas. 

You should use 'your voice' in your academic writing to indicate to readers which ideas are yours, and provide your critical evaluation of the ideas of other authors. 

One way to express your own voice is to directly praise an author's work (e.g. by describing it as 'influential'). 

Alternatively, you could note the limitations of a piece of work (e.g. 'the application of this approach ... in other contexts may meet different challenges'). 

Sheehan, N.W. (2011). Indigenous knowledge and respectful design: an evidence-based approach.  Design Issues   27 (4), 68-80. 

Another option is to compare the findings of different authors, perhaps identifying which piece of work is more relevant to your topic. 

Keep in mind that the strength of your critical evaluation also depends on how you support your ideas with additional evidence or logical reasoning, not only on how you express your ideas . 

To discover more ways to distinguish your ideas from the ideas of other writers, refer to Critical literacy . 

For more ways to develop your own voice, refer to  voice in academic writing  and the thesis whisperer verb cheat sheet . , for a collection of many words and phrases that could be used to express your voice, refer to the following sections of the university of manchester academic phrasebank :, being critical, referring to sources.

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Resources for My Subject

Law: legal language.

• UK Legislation
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Legal Language

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Legal Terms

The study of law requires familiarity with some unique language and legal terms. The following page highlights some of the dictionaries and reference works that are available in print and electronically.

LexisNexis Legal Glossary

A legal glossary produced by LexisNexis for Cambridge students. Created with student input and with explanatory videos

Index of Legal Terms

Oxford Reference Online

Oxford Reference Online service provides full text access to a range of reference titles including A Dictionary of Law, A Dictionary of Law Enforcement, A Guide to Latin in International Law and The New Oxford Companion to Law.

Dictionaries

Legal Dictionaries

The Squire Law Library has several print dictionaries available which provide clear definitions and, in some cases more detailed descriptions, of legal terms. These are kept in the Reference Collection, near the Enquiry Desk and include:

• Oxford Dictionary of Law (classmark CR.22.J.36) Also available on Oxford Reference Online (see box on the left)
• Osborn’s Concise Law Dictionary (classmark CR.22.J.8)
• Stroud’s Judicial Dictionary of Words and Phrases (kept at the beginning of the first floor Reference Collection) – which provides more detailed judicial definitions of words and phrases established in decided cases or statutes. Also incorporated into the Westlaw package (see under Index of Legal Terms)
• The Law Society's Legal Glossary

Introductions to Common Law Jurisdictions

You can find several introductory texts to the common law system via iDiscover. These include:

• Learning Legal Rules by James Holland and Julian Webb (Classmark J.e.9.H.2)
• Learning the Law by Glanville Williams (Classmark J.f.9.W.3)
• Common Law Legal English and Grammar: A Contextual Approach by Riley (Classmark J.e.9.R.4)
• English Legal Terminology by Gubby (Classmark J.e.9.G.7)

Writing for Law

There is no set style for academic legal writing. However, you can find a range of books available providing guidance on writing for law and the use of legal language in your own work. These include:

• Successful Legal Writing by Edwina Higgins & Laura Tatham (Classmark) J.e.9.H.6)
• Writing for Law by Dave Powell and Emma Teare (Classmark CR.22.J.88)

For help with referencing material consult the separate referencing tab above.

Writing Tools

This is a short list of some online writing tools that may be of use:

Writers Diet  

Copy and paste a sample of text (100 to 1000 words) to find out if your writing is flabby or fit.

Readability Analyzer  

Estimates the readability of a passage of text using the Flesch Reading Ease, Fog Scale Level, Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level, and other metrics.

Difficult Word Finder

Helps you write clearly and concisely by identifying possible weak points in your prose.

Academic Phrasebank  

Aims to provide you with examples of some of the phraseological ‘nuts and bolts’ of writing organised according to the main sections of a research paper or dissertation

Verb Cheat Sheet  

A verb cheat sheet from the Thesis Whisperer "The verb you use to describe someone else’s work indicates your feeling about the quality of the work."

Halsbury's Laws of England

Halsbury's Laws of England covers the whole spectrum of English Law, and can be browsed by topic or searched. This can be a useful starting point if you are doing research on a particular area of law. It’s available online via Lexis. Alternatively, the print volumes are held in the Squire Law Library on the first floor in bookstack 5.

Critical Reading course

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Using a matrix to organise your notes

This exercise is adapted from a post on Literaturereviewhq.com, based on an idea published on mystudiouslife. Wordpress.com.

Download the literature review matrix worksheet here

A matrix helps you to organise your notes in a format that is easy to translate directly into your chapter draft. The idea is to identify themes you want to write about first so that you can read with more purpose and distill from the articles only what you need. You may find you think up more themes as you read and write. The table below is fictional, just to help you get the idea.

Examples of paragraphs that could be generated from this matrix:

“We can better understand problems like attrition if we know why people choose to undertake a PhD in the first place, however scholars do not pay attention to the reasons why students are motivated to enroll in a PhD. Two notable exceptions are Humbug et al (2009) and Mewburn (2012). Humbug et al noted that different disciplines report very different reasons for beginning a PhD. Mewburn further developed this work in her studies of older students, claiming that gender further complicated the picture of motivation.”

“Does supervision play a role in PhD student attrition? There is no clear evidence one way or the other, although many scholars claim it is crucial. Humbug et al (2009), who surveyed students about their PhD experience, argues that the relationship with the supervisor is a key determinant in the decision to leave PhD study, whereas Mewburn (2012) argues that older students are better able to deal with poor supervision. The culture of supervision in a faculty or Academic Unit and even its wealth (Whathisname, 2013) might impact on the attrition patterns of PhD students.“

Note: This handout is released under the creative commons share a-like attribution license. You may circulate and change it, but be cool – acknowledge Dr Inger Mewburn as the original author.

Category: On Writing

Why you can’t get chattieg to ‘sound good’..

For about 10 years now, I’ve had a profitable side hustle teaching writing. ANU has a generous external consulting policy, which means I can fly all over the country, and the world, teaching academics to be better writers. With the invention of ChatGPT (or as my sister Anitra dubbed it, ChattieG), I expected this work … continue reading .

Share this:

We wrote a 36,000 word book in a single weekend (yes, really).

Ok, it wasn’t a fancy academic book, but still… I want to share how we did it, and what we learned about generative AI in the process, but first some context. For a long time, my friend Professor Narelle Lemon and I have talked about writing a book called ‘Rich Academic / Poor Academic’. The … continue reading .

Writing like an artist

I’m working on the second edition of ‘How to fix your academic writing trouble’ with Katherine Firth at the moment. We’re doing a new chapter on writing process, specifically how to think with generative AI tools. For inspiration, I am thinking about Artist Studios and how they support making work. Artist studios are filled with … continue reading .

My favourite ChatGPT (ChattieG!) writing prompts

We have to talk about ChatGPT, or as my sister @anitranot styles it, ‘ChattieG.’ (which is both funnier and easier to say). The reaction to Chattie in academia seems to oscillate between moral panic (“OMG, The Youngs will cheat on their assignments!!”) and world-weary cynicism (“it writes like shit anyway”). Very few people seem to … continue reading .

Mind the gap (in the literature)

Hey – Before I start, here are some upcoming events I’m doing at Cambridge University, which are open to the public: A lecture at Wolfson College, Cambridge on Tuesday 6 June at 5:30pm, which touches on themes from my new book with Simon Clews ‘Be visible or Vanish’. There’s an in-person option if you can … continue reading .

Using ChatGPT (ChattieG) to write good

I’m on sabbatical for the next three months and have committed to doing a literature review on neurodiversity and PhD study. Ugh. I hate doing literature reviews. I’m just going to say it: most academic writing is BORING and doing a big review means reading lots of it. The thought of reading more than 200 … continue reading .

Building a second brain for writing – with Obsidian

Writing a thesis or book is an enormous task that takes years and involves reading hundreds, sometimes thousands, of books, papers and articles. At the same time, you must produce your own words and make sure you don’t accidentally plagiarise other people. People end up with all kinds of home-brew solutions to solve this epic … continue reading .

The feedback loop of shit

I’ve often compared the last part of your PhD to putting your head in a bucket. In the Researcher developer trade we call this last bit of the PhD ‘The Write Up’. ‘Writing up’ involves hours and hours of detailed work; to end up with a manuscript ready for examiners. There’s a sameness to Writing … continue reading .

Writing as an imaginary conversation with your reader

It’s the end of #acwrimo!! Did you take part in Academic Writing Month this year? I certainly did. It was lockdown, so this year we made a big deal of it at ANU. Not to put too fine a point on it, I taught my ass off. You can see some of the workshops I … continue reading .

How to make your dissertation ‘speak’ to experts

Most people come into a PhD program with well developed writing skills but a  dissertation – or as it is called in Australia, a Thesis, is a very particular kind of writing challenge. All thesis writers must bend their existing skills to the appropriate ‘thesis style’. Ironically, the people I have seen struggle the most … continue reading .

The Thesis Whisperer is written by Professor Inger Mewburn, director of researcher development at The Australian National University . New posts on the first Wednesday of the month. Subscribe by email below. Visit the About page to find out more about me, my podcasts and books. I'm on most social media platforms as @thesiswhisperer. The best places to talk to me are LinkedIn , Mastodon and Threads.

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