The Thesis Whisperer verb cheat sheet
www.thesiswhisperer.com
Verbs are judgmental. The verb you use to describe someone else’s work indicates your feeling about the quality of the work. For instance, “Mewburn (2010) argues…” is kinder than “Mewburn (2010) asserts…” (a scholar who asserts is not really a scholar at all).
Choose your feeling, and then pick a verb from the list that fits your sentence. Or just scan the list for best fit. This is the list I made to put on my own wall – you may disagree with my categories. Feel free to change it to suit your style.
Note: This attached handout is released under the creative commons share a-like attribution license. You may circulate and change it, but be cool – acknowledge Dr Inger Mewburn as the original author.