The prospectus launches you into the dissertation. In the prospectus you explain the issues your dissertation will address and why they're important. You demonstrate that your approach to these issues is original, and that this field has not been mined already in someone else's dissertation or published critical work. You also sketch out the dissertation's planned organization, and give a bibliography of your primary and secondary sources. You discuss the prospectus with a major part of what will be your dissertation committee in the prospectus conversation, a session that allows your committee to make suggestions at an early stage about content, organization, directions for your argument, and profitable readings.
The prospectus, plus your committee's suggestions, then becomes your blueprint for the dissertation. The prospectus also is required as part of your application for major CU dissertation fellowships. The Department will not consider you for the Reynolds, Udick, and Devaney dissertation fellowships unless you have submitted the prospectus and your summary of the prospectus conversation to the Director of Graduate Studies (see below).
Ideally, the issues explored in your comprehensive exam will direct you toward a dissertation topic, so that you should be able, within a few weeks of passing your comps, to sit down and write a preliminary sketch (5 or so pages) of your prospectus. If you do this, in all likelihood you will be able to complete a prospectus within two or three months of passing your comps. At the outside, you should write the prospectus no later than six months after passing your comps.
The prospectus stage is when you choose a dissertation director, if you have not done so already. (The Director of Graduate Studies will help you make this choice, if necessary.) You will discuss drafts of the prospectus with your director, and in consultation with him/her, decide when the prospectus is ready for your prospectus conversation.
For the purposes of your prospectus conversation, you will also need to assemble at least two members of your dissertation committee in addition to your director. Ultimately, your dissertation committee will consist of five faculty members, one of whom must be from outside the English Department; any of these may be included at the prospectus stage. Please note that your dissertation committee members must be tenured or tenure-track faculty members; an instructor may not direct dissertations, and may be included on a dissertation committee only by special appointment to the Graduate Faculty. Check with the Director of Graduate Studies if you wish to include an instructor on your dissertation committee. Also check with the Director of Graduate Studies in the case of other special circumstances — for example, if you wish to have co-directors of your dissertation, or to include a faculty member from another university on your dissertation committee.
The prospectus should be about 15-20 pages long, exclusive of a bibliography of primary and secondary sources, which usually takes up about another 5 pages. There are various ways of organizing a prospectus. However you organize it, you should (1) lay out the problems/issues the dissertation will address; (2) give the critical consensus on these problems/issues — going as far back in the history of the criticism as you need to; (3) explain the advantages and limitations of the criticism, demonstrating that your approach is original; (4) give the historical, intellectual, and/or theoretical background to your approach; and (5) outline your planned chapters in some detail. Since the prospectus is a formal essay, it should conform to standard MLA or Chicago style.
When your prospectus is drafted to your and your dissertation director's satisfaction, you will schedule the prospectus conversation at a time and place convenient to you and the members of your committee who will be present. Distribute your prospectus to the faculty involved at least two weeks before the conversation takes place.
The prospectus conversation is not an exam; it is a discussion of the current state of your ideas, and the directions those ideas may and should take as you write the dissertation. The Director of Graduate Studies need not be present for the prospectus conversation. The conversation generally lasts an hour to an hour and a half.
You will need to take notes during your prospectus conversation. When it is completed, write a summary (1 page or so) of the major suggestions made by your committee members, noting who made them. No later than one week after your prospectus conversation is held, you must turn in a copy of your summary, as well as a copy of your prospectus, to the Director of Graduate Studies, who will place it in your file.
Occasionally, a committee will ask the student to revise the prospectus immediately, as a way of redirecting and focusing the argument before dissertation-writing begins. If you are asked to revise your prospectus, you should submit the revised version within a month of your prospectus conversation, both to the members of your committee and to the Director of Graduate Studies.
Immediately after your prospectus conversation, meet with your dissertation director to strategize about what to do next: how to reshape the dissertation based on the committee's suggestions, what chapter to write first, etc. Set up a schedule for meeting with or talking to your dissertation director throughout the process of writing the dissertation: you should consult with him/her twice a semester, at the very minimum. Your dissertation director is your primary reader, and will advise you on revising drafts of your chapters.
When you begin to write your dissertation, you will need to choose your entire committee, and to clarify with each member what his/her role on your committee will be. Your second and third readers should be consulted frequently, but will generally wish to see drafts only of complete chapters, and only once you have already revised them based on suggestions from your director. Before setting a dissertation defense date, you should have a general feeling of approval about the entire dissertation from your director and from your second and third readers. The fourth and fifth readers generally will not wish to see your dissertation until you have completed a defense draft. The faculty member from outside the English Department is usually considered the fifth reader, but the nature of your project may mean that you wish more involvement from this faculty member; in that case, he or she may act as the second or third reader.
Work on a regular schedule. Some people can be productive for eight hours a day; some can be focused for only two hours a day. What is key is that you work on your research and/or writing every day, five or more days a week. This will require you to cordon off time from all your other responsibilities — teaching, family, etc. As long as you set a regular work schedule and stick to it, you will finish in good time.
Join or start a dissertation group. Writing the dissertation, including the prospectus, can be isolating. Indeed, some isolation is essential, since you need to spend significant time alone researching and writing. But not talking to anyone -- or talking just to your dissertation director -- about your work can lead to a lack of perspective and to intellectual roadblocks; as well, you need to get used to explaining your ideas out loud in preparation for your dissertation defense and for the job market. Many PhD students find dissertation groups very helpful. These range from the informal support group (regular get-togethers with friends to discuss problems or writing strategies or just to complain), to the formal dissertation group, sometimes led by a faculty member, in which students meet regularly to exchange and discuss each other's work. Some students benefit most of all from having a dissertation partner, a fellow PhD student with whom you exchange work — even just a few pages — on a weekly or biweekly basis. The most important thing to do is establish a structure for yourself in which you are producing and sharing work regularly. You will only stymie yourself and get bogged down if you do not show work to anyone until it is "perfect."
Keep the right length in mind. About 200-250 pages, including notes and bibliography, is the normal length for a dissertation. If you envision that your dissertation will be much shorter or much longer, you should discuss this issue with your director right away. A too-short dissertation runs the risk of not doing justice to your topic; a too-long dissertation usually needs to be rethought as a shorter project, saving you the time and agony of writing all those additional chapters.
Keep the purpose of the dissertation in mind. The dissertation is, on the one hand, still a product of your academic apprenticeship: while it must feature important ideas, good argumentation, thorough research, and polished prose, it need not and should not aspire to the length, scope, and ambition of a book manuscript. On the other hand, a dissertation does serve some very useful purposes. It proves you have made an original contribution to your field. It may serve as the source for an article or articles that you wish to publish, and may be the starting point of a book manuscript. Perhaps most importantly, it is your source of materials for applying and competing for academic jobs. Your best and most polished chapter, or some portion thereof, serves as your writing sample, and another chapter typically becomes a talk that you deliver on campus visits.
Rev. 5/02