Time and again, through the course of my studies at the PhD level, I have heard the phrase “Remember, it’s not a sprint but a marathon” used metaphorically to describe the process an individual engages in when writing a PhD thesis (especially here in the UK). I thought, as part of an exercise of writing that is designed to hopefully maintain my own sanity during this thesis writing process, it was high time to dispel this grossly inaccurate metaphor and consider the differences from a semi-objective (and not at all biased) perspective.
To begin, let us consider the definition of a marathon. According to Wikipedia (the scholar’s best friend and most reliable source of information on the internet) a marathon can be defined as: “a long-distance running event with an official distance of 42.195 kilometres (26 miles and 385 yards), usually run as a road race.” This long distance and gruelling race was named by, one can only assume, an individual in the late 1980s who attended an extended concert given by the then famous Christian worship group The Maranatha Singers.
Based on a You Tube clip I vaguely recall watching a few years ago, a marathon begins when someone provides an audible cue (a gun shot, blow-horn, screeching cat, etc.). This incites everyone to start moving in an orderly fashion on a well laid out path. Some people run, others walk, cart-wheel, samba, shimmy and/or shake towards the finish. Along the way there are people cheering the individual’s on, encouraging them to finish. I’ve overheard it said that all the good marathoners pace themselves, not expending their energy too quickly in order to eventually finish the race. While Barry Allen, an assistant scientist from the Criminal and Forensic Science Division of Central City PD, holds the record for the fastest marathon ever completed, many claim to take part in this event for “the pure joy of finishing” or “to compete against myself and beat my own personal best time.” Rumour has it that these people are slow and full of excuses.
I could continue to regale you with interesting and fun facts about marathons but, based on my own current interest level, I should probably move on and describe to you how a PhD thesis is nothing like running a marathon.
To be fair, the beginning of the thesis writing process looks a lot like a the beginning of a marathon: people around you are excited, there is a buzz of energy in the air, the path ahead of you is well mapped out. However, after you get started the differences become massively clear. Based on my expertise in at least one of these things, I have compiled the top five differences for your consideration.
Firstly, your original pathway, or thesis proposal, quickly reveals itself to be one of several things: 1) Grossly unmanageable in its extensive broadness, 2) Wholly non-conversant with current scholarship, 3) Not something your supervisor is really interested in you pursuing, (4 Infinitely naïve and misconstrued, (5 Extensively been dealt with by other, more seasoned scholars.
Second, you start to realize you are completely out of your depth. Like jumping up from the couch, dusting off the crisp flakes, and heading out the door to run 26 miles, sitting in seminars with other PhD students and expert faculty quickly humbles a person to the point of self-doubt. Instead of that motivational theme from a beloved Disney movie (i.e. “We’re all in this together!”) running through your head, the Mission Impossible theme starts to play on a loop in your brain.
Third, you finally hit a stride and start to make some progress, submitting your first five thousand or so words to your supervisor only to get it back with so many red marks and comments that you swear he confused your paper with one from the undergrad class he is teaching. This is not unlike choosing a running buddy in a marathon only to have him trip you up, step all over you while you are laying on the ground, help you up and then rub all your cuts with rock salt.
Fourth, you think you are following the map but get creative, heading out on your own only to find a dead end or a cavernous hole to fall down. This happens a lot in scholarship. As you follow your intuition towards something that could be revolutionary in your field, you run into dead ends that represent hours and hours of “wasted time.” Worse yet is following one of these trails and then coming upon the proverbial cavernous hole of further interesting information that could: really-strengthen-your-project-but will-ultimately-open-up-a-whole-can-of-worms-that-has-the-potential-to-take-weeks-to-figure-out-and-will-end-up-as-a-three-sentence-footnote-in-you-main-project.
Fifth, unlike a marathon that has the end in sight, you feel like you will never really finish the thesis. You work on writing a chapter, send it into your supervisor, get it back with devastating comments and corrections, work on the chapter again, move on to another topic, find a relevant article that vitally changes the argument of the chapter you wrote months ago, wash, rinse, and repeat. Unlike a marathon, the end is not in sight. Rather, your deadline date creeps up on you and jumps out of a bush on the roadside.
I could go on but I think you get my point; thesis writing has almost nothing in common with a marathon. In fact, the whole “thesis writing is not a sprint but a marathon” thing might just be a platitude imagined up by someone who really hates running and considers metaphors to be horrible ways of expressing a Sisyphian existence. I think it is safe to say that 90% of everyone involved in thesis writing has experienced at least 3 of the above 5 situations (the other 10% are probably self-deceived NT textual critics that are too busy trying to decide if this blog would have been more convincing in Arial font rather than Calibri). In fact, I know several people that have even finished their thesis and have never once considered running a marathon to find out if there is some metaphorical interplay between the two. This all goes to show that finishing a PhD thesis is possible, a point that I cling to and sprint slowly towards.
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