PhD Discussion Forum

Clarification in my university we have minor or Revise and resubmit

Can you meet with your supervisor to go over the amendments? Not critically speaking enough in a lit review is quite common. All it means is to look at the evidence you’ve provided and add your own perspective. For example ‘whilst a novel contribution, the methodology is problematic/the study only represented younger adults. This study would have benefitted from exploring the views of different ages in order to represent XYZ better’.
You need to do the corrections. I know your viva went badly and you have a separate complaint, but part of achieving a PhD is the ability to take constructive criticism. If you disagree with feedback, you don’t argue, you reason it. I.e ‘whilst the method you’re suggesting is advantageous, I believe that these disadvantages xyz make it less suitable’. If you can concede, ‘that’s an excellent idea, if I were to do similar research with the knowledge I have now, I’d probably explore this method’.

I’ve said on your previous posts, you are seemingly going to war with absolutely everything to do with your PhD. You need to separate out the bad conduct of the viva from everything else. Persue the misconduct, but also examine your own responses. Very rarely do people pass without changes, and yours are not that bad. It’s not an MPhil or a fail.

There are plenty of people who have been in your position and still achieved their PhD. Yes, you have the right to get them investigated for the racism, but unless you can show it directly relates to your amendments you are going to have to do them. You need to put your effort in to them.

I understand that you have other complaints, but I'll just focus on the viva issue in this thread.

Can you give us some examples of instances in the viva where you felt attacked? And what was your response to each of these?

Getting defensive =/= reasoning out the comments the examiners make; the latter is the right thing to do in an academic discussion. If you could not do that, then I understand their concerns. The viva must be separated from other issues you may have made throughout your PhD, otherwise you're taking a bucket-load of resentment into an already stressful situation - this might explain why you interpret their comments as attacks and see yourself as a victim?

I'm glad that you acknowledge that insulting your examiners would do you no good.

No they told me congratulations you passed your oral examination with correction up to 12 months and they said that this is a positive thing as it takes the pressure off and that I can easily submit in half of that . But when I read the university regulation it said that they might ask me for a second viva


need to be sorry . On the contrary, I feel it is good to step away from my problem and see how other view it.

I totally do not mind making any corrections that will eventually going to improve my thesis. But from my point of view my literature is critical and hang together and as a non native speaker I am really proud of its level and some of the points they mentioned are already mentioned in the literature but they did not bother to read.

The fact that I have seen the back scenario and how external said of the record this is a “ so what situation “ and was willing to give me minor corrections but then the internal pushed for the r&r.

Also, the fact that their report was brief and they only focused on how inflexible I was made me worry alot that they would be unprofessional and biased in the second submission ( if they are fair then I would be happily doing the corrections and submit but I am 100% sure that they are biased and unfair)

If you push for another Viva, you might fail. Currently you only have to do your corrections, and as long as you can show you have done the corrections you will pass. I'm trying to word this as delicately as I can, and I'm only able to make assumptions based on your word son here, but you come across as very, very defensive. A viva may be a 'thesis defense' but it does not mean you defend it against everything. You have to concede that other people have read your work and found room for improvements. You've given a few examples of you amendments and I wonder if you are seeing them as more major than they are? for instance the comment about critically reflecting in your literature review, and on another post you wrote about integrating chapters; these are all very common corrections and not actually that major. You also highlighted that some of the corrections you think actually came from your supervisor because they wanted something done differently. If you've submitted something that your supervisor didn't agree with, it is always a risk; sometimes it pays off but it's not surprising to then get corrections on it.

If you do sit another viva I think you need to reflect on your own shortcomings, can you say for certain your attitude was entirely correct? Your examiners comments sound like they found you to be quite confrontational when challenged on aspects of your PhD. You cannot do this, you can defend your decisions without going to war with your examiners.

I really don't want to upset you further, and I can see you are still very angry and feeling hard done to in all of this, and as I was not there I cannot say whether this was justified or not, but I really want to see you pass this. I want to be able to log on and read you are officially Dr PhD20sb! My concern, as I've stated before, is that your anger and indignation at the outcome is going to interfere with this. Do the corrections, work with your supervisor and try to mend those bridges.

It's heartbreaking to feel like you've not done enough, and it does bruise your ego. If PhD's were awarded purely for hard work then everyone would get one with no corrections, but they are not. You really, really need to put your anger aside and work on your corrections, because form what you've written they don't sound that bad. Also, many Uni's have an option for minor (1 month), minor (3 months) and R&R, but R&R does not always mean another viva. If you've been told they are major corrections, you may not need another viva. Right now you have complained about your supervisor, your examiner, your corrections etc and it's taking away energy from your corrections.

You're asking for advice, so the advice is to do your corrections, reflect on your own short comings, pursue your complaints about the breach of protocol and racism, and get your doctorate.

Thank you Em89 for your time and your reply is soooo helpful. Definitely I will consider all your suggestions

Update after 6 daunting months I passed and am officially a Doctor!!

Yes my viva and the post viva months were extremely tough , Yes the examiners were biased, Yes my ego was badly hurt during this journey but in the end I passed and this is what matters the most.

Thanks for everyone one who tried to support me in this forum and to those who are struggling, keep fighting and with determination you are going to get there.