Photo: Kristin Hardwick, via Wikimedia Commons (CC0) Say the words "writing retreat" to a PhD researcher and watch their eyes light up around one thing: the word count. A few days away from supervision meetings, teaching admin, and emails arriving in the background. Just you, a laptop, and a target you have been promising yourself … Continue reading What Writing Retreats Actually Teach You
At a time when higher education budgets are tightening and funding opportunities can feel increasingly uncertain, many people are questioning whether pursuing a PhD is still financially possible. For international students especially, the cost of tuition, visas, relocation and everyday living can make doctoral study feel like something reserved for people who already have access … Continue reading The PhD Journey Begins Before Enrollment: The Journey to Finding Your PhD Funding
There is something deeply hopeful about watching someone else reach the end while you are still standing near the beginning. Their graduation does not promise that your own journey will be easy or predictable, but it reminds you that the end is possible. Someone else once stood where you are standing now, unsure of how they would make it through, and somehow, they kept going.
There is something oddly comforting about finding yourself in a room full of other postgraduate students and realising that the academic world is much larger than your own desk, your own department, and your own very dramatic reading list.
From Advocacy to Mobilisation to Organising What mechanisms are there for doctoral students to advocate, challenge, collectivise, and take agency both within and beyond the structures of higher education? How might we better take agency, use our advocacy, and form networks of solidarity and support? On 12 May 2026, we gathered at the University of … Continue reading Building Community Through the SGSAH Doctoral Researcher Committee
Doing a PhD is not just about locking yourself away with books, notes, deadlines, and a document that refuses to behave. Some of the real learning happens when you leave the desk, enter the room, listen to other people’s work, and realise that your research is part of a much bigger conversation. This blog is a reminder to show up, sign up, pay attention, and make the most of the spaces that help shape you into the researcher you are becoming.
Doing a PhD in the Arts and Humanities in 2026 is more than an intellectual exercise—it is an emotional, spiritual, and structural negotiation. This reflective guide explores how to stay grounded, think critically, protect your wellbeing, and develop your voice while navigating doctoral research.
This week, Resident Blogger Emma shares what she wishes she had known when she started her PhD by writing a letter to her 'first year self'...
This week, Resident Blogger Emma prepares for her very first conference as a PhD Researcher, reflecting back on mistakes from her first conference experience prior to the PhD...
This week, Resident Blogger Emma writes candidly about her experience of being weaned off anti-anxiety medication amidst the PhD...
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