How to edit your dissertation: Some thesis editing tips to get you started

It’s common for supervisors to say: ‘It’s now time to edit your dissertation’, and for you to think: ‘Great!’ and then really soon after ‘But what does that even mean?’. Copyediting and proofreading your dissertation are some of the most important things you will do before it goes off to the examiner, which makes knowing how to edit your dissertation crucial.

The ‘three Cs’ of editing: Making sure your writing is clear/coherent, consistent, and correct

So: what are we actually doing when we edit our dissertations? Editors sometimes talk about the ‘three Cs’ of editing: clarity, consistency, and correctness. And I think that offers us a start as to what we’re trying to do at this stage of the writing process. We have a draft; we know what we want to say, broadly speaking; and we have a structure – it may need tweaking, but we have an idea of how the argument flows from introduction to conclusion. At this point, we want to do three things with this writing: we want to make sure that all of your content is clear (or coherent), that it is consistent, and that it is correct.

What’s the difference between copy-editing and proofreading?

One of the main questions I get asked about what I do is: What is the difference between copy-editing and proofreading? And while both phases of editing involve trying to get your 'three Cs' in place, they look quite different in terms of process and in terms of how long it takes. But, in short, you will need to do both when the time comes to edit your draft. 

Copy-editing is the first bit of the editing process you'll need to undertake as part of the revision process, and it takes time. It can actually be quite disheartening, and I say this not to scare you, but to comfort you if you do find yourself feeling disheartened. This is because you have a full first draft (hooray! Amazing!) but now you sit down and see that there is still so much work to do (boo! Not amazing!). You will often end up needing to make changes so extensive that it feels less like copy-editing and more like rewriting. All part of the process, don't worry.

Once you've got your full draft together, you need to deal with all the fiddly stuff (consistent formatting, spelling, grammar, fixing the sentences you got halfway through and forgot to finish), make your writing voice sound consistent all the way through, address any structural issues, come up with (or hone) your thesis statement and make sure you have a ‘thread’ that runs through all of the chapters and ties the whole thing together, find the full citation details of those blasted I-don't-need-to-write-it-down-I'll-remember-where-that-quote-came-from references... Anyway, that’s copy-editing.

The proofreading stage is essentially you doing your final readthroughs. The idea with proofreading is that we have already picked up on the big errors during the comprehensive copy-editing stage (which will include formatting, consistency checks, tidying up your bibliography,  and so on), so proofreading is about looking at making smaller tweaks: finding any remaining typos, and making sure that you have included all of the bits of your dissertation that your institution might ask you to include in its style guide or submission guidelines (you'll often be asked to sign a statement that all the work is your own, for example). You might also pop in a few more strategic references, and make sure everything is up to date (particularly things like your abstract, table of contents, and any list of tables or figures – it’s really easy to forget to refresh the page numbers of these in particular).

I do suggest leaving a little bit of space between copy-editing and proofreading if you can so that you can revisit your work with fresh eyes, but obviously, there are many factors that will impact how you tackle your edits, including looming deadlines, carer obligations, and work commitments. It really is just a matter of doing the best you can with the time you have.

You do not need to hire a professional thesis editor...

This might seem like an odd thing for a professional thesis editor to say, but there are plenty of reasons why you wouldn’t hire someone to edit your thesis. The first is money: hiring an editor to work on a project the size of a dissertation is expensive. Some, but not all, universities, departments or supervisors are able to provide funding, but even then, it often won’t cover the whole amount. The second is time: professional editors have calendars that fill up in advance, and you may have simply run out of time to engage an editor. A third reason is that you might not actually need that level of editing: you might be confident in your writing skills, or have a supervisor or thesis committee who are able to provide some of the support that an editor might otherwise offer.

Another thing to keep in mind is there are strict rules about what an editor can and cannot do when they edit a thesis. They can certainly help with the fiddly stuff I mention above (like formatting, spelling and grammar, syntax, and whatnot), flag anything that needs your review, and double-check that your references are all in tip-top shape, they can’t do any rewriting or restructuring, or engage with the substantive content of your dissertation. This means that you’ll still have to do many of the things that I mention above in the discussion of ‘copy-editing’ even if you're paying a copyeditor or proofreader to provide professional editing services.

That said, having a professional editor help you to edit your thesis does have its benefits. (But of course I was going to say that). The main benefit they bring to your final draft (apart from hopefully being qualified and experienced) is that they haven't read your work before and they have been trained to pay particular attention to the things that tend to trip writers up. They can become a key part of your supervisory team and make the final steps of your dissertation journey feel more manageable and less overwhelming.

… But you do need to write for your end reader (aka your examiner)

And then the other thing we need to do, when editing a piece of writing, is to keep thinking about the end reader. This is good practice for all writers, but if you are about to submit your dissertation, it’s all the more important because your reader isn’t just any reader: it’s your examiner. You need to be asking questions like:

•  How can I make life as easy as possible for the reader (answer: clear, consistent formatting, a pithy thesis statement)?

• What can I do to avoid annoying them (things like inconsistent or incorrect spelling or punctuation, an arbitrary mix of single and double quotation marks, or a structure that leaves them feeling lost)?

• Am I doing everything I can to help them navigate this dissertation (in other words, is my signposting guiding the reader along)?

• Will my thesis make a good impression on the reader (no spelling mistakes or grammatical errors, a tidy bibliography, a table of contents that looks good)?

Now, the thing you need to keep in mind about your examiner is there’s a high likelihood that they will not sit down and read your dissertation in one go. They’re going to have a flick through when it lands on their desk or in their inbox; maybe read the abstract; have a look at the reference list, perhaps. And then they’ll have to run off to run a seminar or pick their kids up from school. And then a few hours later, or the next day, they’ll sit down and read through the introduction, maybe skim the conclusion. Then life gets in the way again – deadlines, someone gets the flu, there’s a pile of assignments being handed in with a tight marking turnaround – and a week passes before they pick it up again. You get the idea.

This means that you need to write for a reader who you know will be busy, sometimes distracted, sometimes grumpy… and write for this reader in every paragraph, in every chapter. Edit your dissertation with a view to making your examiner’s life easier. Because I’m sure you’ll agree that having a happy examiner can only be a good thing. And that’s what editing your dissertation is really all about: making your writing as clear, consistent and correct as you can for your frazzled examiner.