Master’s students working under the English MA Plan I at Sam Houston State University have the option of writing a thesis to fulfill six of the thirty-six hours required for the degree. A working definition of a thesis, a discussion of why one would choose to write a thesis, and the step-by-step process of producing the thesis follow:

What Is a Master’s Thesis?

The thesis is a well-researched, well-developed, and well-articulated essay of scholarship/criticism or a carefully considered and crafted body of creative work. It is essentially a long essay or a cohesive creative work and not a doctoral dissertation: You should not seek to produce a monograph of several hundred pages. Instead, find a topic and a focus that you can manage in about six-eight months.

While there are no length requirements cast in granite, most scholarly and creative theses run between sixty and eighty pages (excluding title, abstract, and works cited pages). Although the thesis project itself usually guides both the length and structure of the work, a scholarly thesis is typically divided into four or five chapters, with an introduction. The creative thesis may be something like a cycle of short fiction or poetry, a novel, a full-length screenplay, or a collection of familiar essays; the body of creative work is prefaced with a critical introduction that lays out the author’s aesthetic.

Copies of approved English theses from years past, both creative and scholarly, are kept in the Department of English office. Have a look at several. You’ll find much variety here, but look for what is common to them in approaches, structure, and ambitions.

To Write a Thesis or Not?

Some students prefer the structure of classwork to the riskier independence of writing a thesis, and they choose to take the two extra classes rather than write the thesis. Plan I of the English MA is such that it allows the option for students of varying interests, ambitions, and energies.

Why, then, might one choose to write a thesis? First, and perhaps most selfishly, a thesis project allows you to indulge yourself in researching and making an argument about a particular topic dear to you or to produce a cohesive body of creative work that has long been your great interest and ambition. Perhaps a topic in a class along the way has excited you and you wish to indulge yourself in nothing but glorious researching and writing about that topic for several months. Or perhaps you have been writing short fiction or poetry for years and see in the thesis an opportunity at last to bring your work into focus and into fruition.

A second reason concerns the very nature of what we do in a graduate program: One of the goals of the English MA Program at Sam Houston State University is to make of you an independent critical thinker and writer. Term essay assignments and comprehensive examinations, as agonizing as they may sometimes seem, work to that purpose by requiring that you research a subject at length and craft a waterproof and convincing argument about the subject. Creative and professional writing portfolio assignments similarly work to make you independent thinkers and writers. These goals in mind, the MA thesis may serve as a kind of capstone project for you; it demonstrates to yourself and the graduate faculty that in and through this graduate program you have, in fact, become the independent critical thinker and scholar who can converse intelligently and articulately about literature and language with other critics and scholars and the independent writer whose words carry weight in the world.

Despite some prevailing myths, you need not complete an MA thesis for admission into a PhD program, if you plan to apply for one. However, as a third reason, writing a thesis can serve as a kind of warm-up for the more extensive dissertation research and writing required of doctoral candidates. And while we would never suggest in your Master’s program that you lock yourself into a subject and approach for a doctoral dissertation before you have had PhD classwork, writing the MA thesis may inspire more extensive research and writing about a particular subject later in your career.

Steps in Writing the Thesis:

The following is a detailed step-by-step guide to writing the MA thesis in English. Please read carefully through these steps before beginning work on the project so that you have a good understanding of the sequence of events from start to finish. The model timelines for completing the thesis, which follow this overview, may guide you in mapping out the steps semester by semester.

A. Beginning: Prerequisites, Selection of Topic, and Finding a Director

• The thesis option is available only to those English MA students on Plan I who have been accepted in regular admission status and have declared a major (been accepted as degree candidates). If you have not already fulfilled the requirements for candidacy and filed a declaration of major form, you must do so before beginning work on the thesis. See Declaration of Major.

Aside from the other information requested on the major form, designate the following:

• Degree:                  MA
• Major Code:          ENG
• Minor Code:          THE

• A student who undertakes a creative thesis must have successfully completed two graduate-level creative writing workshops.

• Decide upon the author, texts, and literary age that you will investigate in the thesis or the type of creative or professional project that you will undertake. Be sure that you choose a subject that will sustain your interests and energies for six to eight months.

• Choose a thesis director from among the graduate English faculty. Because you will be working closely with your director for some time on a specialized topic, find a member of the faculty with expertise and interest in the general field of the thesis topic and, for your own sanity and that of your director, someone with whom you can work productively and amicably. (See Graduate English Faculty: 2007-2008 for further guidance.) Having decided upon a possible director, be sure to ask the professor if he or she is willing and able to supervise the project; don’t presume. Most faculty are willing to serve without hesitation, but occasionally such circumstances as sabbatical absences, editorial duties or publishing commitments, and pre-tenure preparations make thesis supervision difficult.
  
  A student who writes a creative thesis must work under the direction of a recognized graduate creative writing faculty member.

• Sit down with the director and decide upon the other two readers for your thesis committee. Ideally all three members of the committee will have interests, training, or experience in the general field of the thesis topic.
  
  In appropriate cases, one of the readers may come from outside the Department of English.
  
  A student who writes a creative thesis must appoint at least one graduate creative writing faculty member as a second or third reader.

B. First Semester of Thesis Work: Preliminary Paperwork and the Thesis Prospectus

• For the first semester of thesis work, enroll in ENG 698 (Thesis I). The goals of this course are to read extensively in your subject, to complete and submit necessary preliminary paperwork, to produce an approved thesis prospectus, and to draft an introduction or first chapter. Your committee may also require that you complete one or more other preliminary steps (for example, an annotated bibliography or other review of the literature).
  
  During this semester, a candidate who undertakes a thesis involving human subjects (for example, in interviews for oral histories or surveys for statistical measurements) must also submit paperwork for approval by the Sam Houston State University Office of Research and Special Programs. For further information, see the ORSP Web Page.

• For future reference, download a copy of Directions on Form, Preparation, and Submission of the Final Copies of Master’s Theses and Doctoral Dissertations from the Newton Gresham Library.  
  
  Although you will not be writing the thesis until the following semester, this important manual prescribes the submission format for the finished thesis and provides models of required pages, a thesis checklist, and a copy of the route sheet. It would be a good idea to read through the manual during this term so that you have a good idea of what to expect.

• Fill out an Appointment of Thesis Committee Form and submit it to the Graduate Director at the beginning of the semester. This form does not require original signatures from your committee members, and you need describe your project in only a very generalized way at this point. If at any time the members of your thesis committee change, you must immediately submit a new appointment of committee form.

• In consultation with your director, develop a carefully considered thesis prospectus. The prospectus requires that you describe the nature of your project fully, discuss the critical contexts for your work and the relation of your work to other relevant research or creative work in the field, and identify all source materials and facilities available for the successful completion of your project. Obviously you are not writing the thesis itself at this point, but the prospectus should demonstrate that you have a good plan and that you know the critical/scholarly or creative contexts into which your work will fit. The prospectus, as the product of a semester’s worth of work (especially reading in the subject), must be very carefully considered and very well-developed. Your director, readers, and the administrators who oversee the program will not approve an underdeveloped or hastily conceived proposal.
  
  If you are writing a scholarly thesis, the prospectus must address the following:

• Describe fully the nature of your project: In some detail, what is the topic? What are the contexts? What is the rationale for undertaking the project? How will you develop and structure the work?
• Outline your proposed procedure and methods of investigation.
• Discuss the relationship of your study to other relevant research and findings by scholars in your general area of concentration.
• Comment on all source materials and/or facilities available for the successful completion of your research, and attach a preliminary bibliography.

            See the Model Prospectus for a Scholarly Thesis.

If you are writing a creative thesis, the prospectus must address the following:

• Describe fully the nature of your creative project: What is it generically? What is the rationale for undertaking it? How do you define your aesthetic? How will you develop and structure the work?
• Discuss specifically the context for your project—literary, critical, historical, or otherwise—that will be examined in your critical introduction to the project.
• Comment on all source materials and/or facilities available for the successful completion of your project, including its critical introduction. As appropriate, attach a provisional bibliography of sources for the introduction.
  
  See the Model Prospectus for a Creative Thesis.

• Typically the thesis candidate will write the prospectus in consultation with the director, then distribute it to the other two readers for approval. The approved prospectus must be submitted to the Graduate Director by the final class day of the term. Be sure that your committee members have the prospectus in plenty of time for them to read, consider, and, as appropriate, ask for revisions and development. Do not—do not—force your readers into a time crunch by demanding that they read the proposal a day or so before the deadline.

• Having written the thesis prospectus to the approval of your director and two readers, submit the prospectus with the Thesis Prospectus Form attached, as cover, to the Graduate Director by the final class day of the term. The form must bear the original signatures of the thesis director and the other two readers on the thesis committee.

• During this term, in order to get a good running start into the second semester of thesis work, you will also draft an introduction or early chapter of the work. This step does not require formal administrative approval, so you should negotiate it with your director and readers.

• If you successfully fulfill the formal requirements for ENG 698—the submission of the committee appointment form and the submission of the approved thesis prospectus—the Graduate Director will assign a grade of “Credit,” and you will earn the first three of the required six hours of credit. If you fail to complete the requirements, the Graduate Director will assign a grade of “No Credit,” and you will be required to take ENG 698 again. Because progress is difficult to measure during this first semester, neither grade affects your graduate GPA. 

• You may not take an incomplete (IP) in ENG 698.

C. Second Semester of Thesis Work: Writing, Defending, and Submitting the Thesis

• For the second semester of thesis work, enroll in ENG 699 (Thesis II). The goals of this course are to complete and defend the thesis and to submit it to the College and University for approval.

Writing the Thesis:

• Write the thesis according to the approved prospectus. In doing so, it is best to establish with your thesis director a firm schedule of dates for submitting sections. Keep in mind the deadlines for defending and submitting the finished thesis for approvals.

• Submit a draft of the thesis to the reading committee. Some directors prefer that thesis students complete the entire thesis in draft before turning it over to the second and third readers for comments; others prefer that the committee see the work in progress, section by section. Whichever method you and your director decide upon, it is your responsibility at all times to keep the second and third readers informed of the progress that you are making toward completion. Nothing should come as a last-minute surprise for them.

Defending the Thesis Orally:

• With your director, establish a date and time for the oral defense of your thesis, which should take place at least a day or two before the Graduate Studies Office deadline, to allow time for approvals and routing of paperwork. The defense deadline is typically set by the Graduate Studies Office for beginning of April during the spring term, the third week in June during the summer term, and the beginning of November during the fall term. For specific dates, see the Graduate Studies Office Thesis Timeline.
  
  It is the responsibility of your director to notify both the other readers and the Graduate Director of the date and time of the defense. The Graduate Director will supply the oral defense paperwork to the thesis director. You or your director must supply the Graduate Director with the following information for the Thesis Defense Form:
  
  The date and time of the defense
  The final official title of the thesis
  The names of the committee members

• The thesis committee must have the completed draft, properly formatted according to the Directions on Form, Preparation, and Submission of the Final Copies of Master’s Theses and Doctoral Dissertations, no fewer than two weeks before the scheduled oral defense. It is your responsibility to make sure that all readers have the thesis draft in hand in due time.

• At about the same time that you submit the draft to your reading committee, and before defending the thesis orally, you must take a copy of the draft, formatted to the best of your understanding, to the Newton Gresham Library for approval of basic style and format. As of Spring 2008, the staff member who examines and approves the format is Laura Carter, who works in Circulation; her e-mail address is lib_lem@shsu.edu, her phone number 936-294-4686.
  
  With the copy of the thesis (not yet on bond paper), provide a copy of the approval sheet and of the abstract so that the Library staff can check and approve the format of those documents as well. The staff member should also provide you with a checklist of thesis submission requirements and a schedule of fees for binding final copies.

• Sit for the oral defense on the appointed day.
  
  In general, during the oral defense, the scholarly thesis committee seeks a detailed explanation of the genesis, purposes, methodologies, and findings of the thesis and the value of those findings. While the examiners may tie their questions to particular courses or ancillary issues, their focus will remain on the thesis itself. The defense of a creative thesis, like that for a scholarly thesis, emphasizes the genesis, purposes, critical methodologies, and rationale for the project and requires that the student explain her or his aesthetic. Typically, the committee will ask about long-range plans for the work. 
  
  Thesis defenses are generally pretty pleasant affairs: By the time that you have completed the work, you will probably know the subject as well, if not better, than any person in the examining room. The oral defense gives you an opportunity to talk at length about a project that by this time has become (and remains?) very dear to you. (You have the option of opening the defense to the public, a great opportunity for showing off your accomplishment to friends, family, faculty, and fellow graduate students.)
  
  During the oral defense, the committee members may ask that you develop or correct parts of the thesis; if you have kept all members of the committee informed about your progress and given them the thesis in ample time for reading, there will likely be fewer corrections or revisions. You will have about a week from the date of the oral defense to make any such changes to the satisfaction of the thesis committee.
  
  At the end of the oral defense, the committee members will sign the Thesis Defense Form, which records the results of the defense, and give that to the Graduate Director.
  
  The committee members should not yet sign the thesis approval page.

• Make any changes to the thesis that your reading committee suggest and, within a week of defending the thesis, return the revised work to the thesis director. The director and two readers will sign the thesis approval page only after they have been assured that you have made any recommended revisions or corrections.

• Procure the signatures of your thesis committee members on the approval page (on bond paper). You will find a template for this approval sheet on page 13 of the Directions on Form, Preparation, and Submission of the Final Copies of Master’s Theses and Doctoral Dissertations. 

Submitting the Thesis for Administrative Approval:

• On page 32 of the on-line version of Directions on Form, Preparation, and Submission of the Final Copies of Master’s Theses and Doctoral Dissertations, you will find a link to the thesis route sheet. Fill out and print the route sheet. Then procure your thesis director’s signature on this form. (This does not have to be on bond paper.)

• Submit the approved thesis (not yet on bond paper) to the Dean of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences by the submission deadline. Typically, this is set for ten-twelve days after the defense deadline.  For specific dates, see the Graduate Studies Office Thesis Timeline.
  
  The approval sheet (on bond paper), signed by the thesis committee, and the route sheet, with your director’s signature, should accompany the finished thesis. 
  
  The Dean’s Office may wish to review your finished work, but the thesis and route sheet are typically due in the Office of the Director of Library Services within a couple days of the College submission deadline. So if the College Office does not return the thesis to you immediately with the Dean’s signature, the staff there will call you within a day or two to pick it up for the next stop.

• Having retrieved the signed thesis from the Dean’s Office, you will then walk it, with the route sheet, to the following offices, as specified on the sheet:
  
  Director of Library Services (Ms. Ann Holder)
  The Dean of Graduate Studies (Dr. Mitchell Muehsam)
  
  The Dean of the Graduate Studies publishes a calendar of deadlines for routing the thesis to each office on the sheet. See the Graduate Studies Office Thesis Timeline.

• Typically by the deadline for submitting the final thesis to the Dean of Graduate Studies, you will also have to submit the final copies to the Library for binding.
  
  Here, at last reckoning, is a list of the required copies:

• One copy for the Newton Gresham Library archives (required): on bond paper
• One copy for the Newton Gresham Library for circulation (required): on bond paper
• One copy for the Department of English (required): on bond paper
• One or more copies for personal use (optional): need not be on bond paper
• One copy for your thesis director (optional): need not be on bond paper
  
  
• With each copy, you must supply, on the appropriate paper type, a copy of the abstract, signed by your thesis director, and the signed approval sheet (you need original signatures on only one of the approval sheets).
  
  
• The charge for binding each copy is $10.00 (with an 8.25 % tax). The Library charges a $3.00 fee for any copy that you would like mailed.

• The Dean of Graduate Studies will send the route sheet to the final stop, the Registrar, who will then count the thesis as a requirement completed for graduation, as specified by your degree plan. 

• If you complete the thesis on schedule at the end of this term, you will receive an A for ENG 699 and the three remaining thesis credits. If you fail to complete the thesis during this semester, you will receive an IP (“In Progress”) for ENG 699 and will enroll in the same course for three credits in each subsequent semester until you finish, at which time you will receive a final grade and the three remaining thesis credits.

• Important Note: Once having registered for ENG 699, you must enroll continuously in this course until you complete the thesis. If you begin in ENG 699 and then withdraw from the program for any amount of time, with the thesis incomplete (open as an IP), when you enroll again in ENG 699 to complete the project you will be required to pay back-tuition for those semesters during which you were absent. 

Suggested Timelines for Writing the Thesis:

The thesis is reserved for those students who have been accepted into the English MA Program in regular admission status and are pursuing Plan I with the thesis option. Students take thirty hours of graduate English coursework and six hours of thesis.

The thesis is designed as a two-semester sequence of ENG 698 (Thesis I) and ENG 699 (Thesis II). According to this plan, full-time students work on the thesis in their third and fourth semesters. For a suggested timeline, see Model Timeline: Two-Semester Thesis Sequence.

It is possible in exceptional circumstances to take ENG 698 and ENG 699 concurrently, although the graduate faculty generally discourage this option. According to this plan, full-time students work on the thesis in their fourth semester. Obviously this compresses the process and requires that the candidate submit parts of the thesis on a much more rigorous schedule of deadlines. For a suggested timeline, see Model Timeline: Single-Semester Thesis.