On Dissertation Writing

In an effort to get this thing finished, I'm going to provide an update on my dissertation on the first of every month from now through May (when, knock on wood, I'll be done).  I'm hoping that being responsible to you, dear readers, will force me to keep moving forward (and resist the urge to take a day or two off...which inevitably turns into a week).

But first...

What exactly is my dissertation about?

The short answer is that the dissertation explores how Calvinism  changed over the course of the eighteenth century.  To show these changes, I am focusing on theatre crises in two of the most Calvinist of cities: Edinburgh, Scotland and Geneva, Switzerland.  My argument is that the theatre crises were proxy debates about much bigger issues within the church--namely how (and if) the Church should respond to broader socio-cultural changes.  Depending on your familiarity with eighteenth-century Europe, what I just wrote may or may not make much sense...Apologies :)

The dissertation outline is as follows:

• Introduction
• Chapter One: Theatre Amongst the Reformed: History of how the theatre was used as part of Catholic worship pre-Reformation; why (some) Protestants had problems with this; how branches of the Reformed confession changed their stance on the stage b/t the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries; ends with recognition that, by mid-eighteenth century, most Reformed cities had made their peace with the stage.
• Chapter Two: Eighteenth-century Calvinism; A lot of the bigger arguments re: Calvinism will be made here--18th century Calvinism is not the same as 16th century; theologically, more or less the same, but lots of practical changes in terms of how worship services conducted, disciplinary practices and, ever so slowly, the Church becomes more accepting of civil/secular society
• Chapter Three: Edinburgh: Case study re: the Douglas crisis in 1756; the Church of Scotland is divided about many of the changes made to worship/the Church (i.e. the things mentioned in chapter two, but will go into more detail here about the changes specific to Scotland); Douglas crisis becomes the catalyst for a debate about much bigger issues within the Church
• Chapter Four: Geneva: More or less same arguments from Edinburgh, but in the context of Geneva and the Encyclopedia crisis of 1757
• Conclusion

Progress, thus far:

• All research is complete.

• Introduction: Will write at the end, once I know how the rest of the dissertation shakes out
• Chapter One: Draft complete; no more edits/revisions until the remainder of the dissertation is drafted (for reference, a chapter is approximately 50 pages in length)
• Chapter Two: Drafted, but not in great shape..will need to return to this after chapter four is drafted
• Chapter Three: Draft almost complete--should be done this week and sent to my advisor; assuming he likes it, I'll leave it until the full dissertation draft is done
• Chapter Four: Nothing yet...next up to work on, though, once draft of chapter three is complete
• Conclusion: Will write at the end

My plan at the moment (as is somewhat evident from the above list) is to have good drafts (a good draft is normally the third or fourth actual draft of the chapter) of the four substantive chapters by the end of the fall semester (December).  This would give me the entirety of the spring to write the intro and conclusion and do all necessary edits and revisions.  I think this is a manageable timetable.  

Next time, I'll write more about how I approach writing.  It's something of a scaffolding technique and it took me quite a while to work out what works (and does not work) for me.  

Hope everyone is enjoying the long weekend!