Your Research, Your Argument

An editor may be the first person to read your work who has not been involved in the research. That distance can be useful. You know what you discovered, why it matters and how you reached your conclusions. The editor only knows what you have actually written.

If the argument works only because the reader already knows what you know, there is probably something missing from the page.

The Reader Has to Be Able to Follow You

An academic argument develops across a piece of work. One point leads to another, evidence supports a claim and the discussion eventually leads to a conclusion. When part of that chain is missing, the writer may not notice because the connection is already clear in their own mind.

An editor can identify where the argument becomes difficult to follow. A paragraph may introduce an idea that has not been explained, a conclusion may depend on evidence that appeared much earlier without a clear connection, or two sections may seem to make different claims about the same subject. The editor can point to the gap; filling it belongs to the student.

Evidence Has to Support What You Say

A sentence may be perfectly grammatical and still cause a problem. Words such as proves, demonstrates, always or never can make a claim stronger than the evidence presented in the document appears to justify.

An editor should notice that. They can ask whether the wording accurately reflects the research or whether the claim needs qualification, but they should not alter the academic position simply because another version sounds more convincing.

The same applies when a statement appears to need a source. An editor can flag it; the student must decide whether a reference is required and provide the appropriate source.

Consistency Matters to the Argument Too

Consistency is not only about spelling and formatting. If an important term is defined one way at the beginning of a dissertation and appears to mean something different three chapters later, that can affect the argument itself.

Names, categories, variables and other terminology may also change during a long research project. Sometimes there is a good reason for the difference and sometimes it is simply something left over from an earlier draft. An editor can find those differences and ask about them. The student decides which usage is academically correct.

A Conclusion Cannot Be Repaired by Editing

A conclusion has to follow from the research and discussion that precede it. If it introduces a new argument, makes a claim that has not been established or does not answer the question the research set out to examine, improving the wording will not solve the problem.

An editor can identify the difficulty and explain where the connection has been lost. Reconsidering the evidence and deciding what conclusion can reasonably be drawn from it remains the student's job.

The Argument Remains Yours

Editorial comments can sometimes feel like questions about the research when they are actually questions about what has reached the page. If an editor writes How does this follow from the previous paragraph?, they are not necessarily saying that the connection does not exist. They are saying that they cannot see it.

That is useful information. Academic writing has to make the student's reasoning available to somebody who was not there while the research was being done. An editor can show you where the reader may lose the argument, but the research, reasoning and answer that put them back on track have to come from you.