Before you begin writing your masters dissertation you first have to overcome the hurdle of completing your dissertation proposal. Whilst this may seem like the easy part of dissertation writing, it is extremely important to get your dissertation proposal right, partly in order to ensure its acceptance by your supervisors, allowing you to proceed with your topic of choice and partly to provide you with a strong basis from which to begin your work. Follow our top tips to Masters dissertation proposal success!

Dissertation proposal layout

Remember your dissertation proposal is not an essay in itself but more of a sales pitch, intended to give a clear potted view of the appeal and value of your chosen masters dissertation topic. Don’t be afraid to use bullet points and sub-headings to clearly show the different areas your dissertation will explore such as proposed chapter headings.

Dissertation proposal language

Those assessing your masters dissertation proposal will be looking for academic value and intellectual merit, so be sure to use formal, academic language throughout. Try to write in the third rather than the first person, as it sounds more professional:

For example:

“This dissertation will explore the significant and far-reaching consequences of religious conflict in the Middle East for Muslims currently residing in Western nations.”

Sounds much more professional than:

“I am going to look at the effects of religious wars in the Middle East on immigrants in England and some other countries because I think it is an interesting topic”.

Dissertation proposal contents

One of the most common questions asked by students writing their masters dissertation proposal is “what should I include?” The answer is simply to remember the purpose of the dissertation proposal – to indicate clearly the subject area your proposed dissertation will explore and to explain how you intend to pursue your line of argument.

Remember that the dissertation title alone often gives little indication of exactly what you will be writing about, so imagine you are explaining your title to somebody with little knowledge of the field and explain exactly what you intend to cover in your dissertation structure.

The assessors will want to be reassured that you will be writing your dissertation on a topic with enough scope for in-depth study and research, but with finite boundaries to prevent you from covering too wide an area, so try to clearly demonstrate where the limits of the topic fall and which areas you will explore in the most detail in your dissertation writing.

Dissertation proposal top tip

Finally, remember if your dissertation covers new ground or an exciting advance in a particular area, be sure to emphasise this in your proposal, as dissertation examples which are of importance to their particular field are extremely likely to succeed and perhaps even to be published at a later date. This is likely to greatly aid the success of your masters dissertation proposal.