I finished my first article that is officially part of my dissertation.1 I’m delighted that I don’t have to write a whole book (yet). That one article really stretched my patience. The writing part took me around three months and one more for editing. But, I started working on the dataset early this year and invested far too much time in that activity. Doing that, I learned two things.
- All datasets are dirty
- No amount of work can clean up that mess2
Trying to focus on writing the paper, but doing way to many other things, I got reminded once more about not saying yes to everything that sounds interesting and tempting.
It’s a great feeling to be at the other end of the tunnel, after the text is written and handed over to the publisher.3 Articles are objects that hardly anybody else cherishes that much, as the authors themselves, I guess.
Some takeaways, for myself, might not apply to anybody else.
- The Timeline and Process: Start writing as soon as possible. A lot of it will be dumped again, but writing is thinking, and thinking makes you aware of what is missing.
- Dataset Challenges: I invested a lot of thought into my initial dataset, and I was just not feasible to produce. Instead, I grabbed an already existing collection and expanded on that, inclusive reflection on bias.
- Time Management: Never say yes to anything that doesn’t concern your dissertation. Be greedy with your own time.
- The Writing Process: Writing needs neither talent nor craft. It’s work, that’s all. And the longer you do it, the better you get at it.
- Publishing Experience: Like all administrative processes, journal publishing systems come directly from hell.
Writing this first paper felt grindy. But I enjoyed working on something for that long of a time. I also learned a lot, again.
Footnotes
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Which is a paper-based dissertation. ↩
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… or bias ↩
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Reviews excluded. That is another story. ↩