8 Tips for Finding a Thesis or Dissertation Topic

Finding a good thesis (or dissertation) topic is like being a hunter, looking for that flicker of movement that catches your eye. You follow the trail to see where it goes. Sometimes you lose the trail, sometimes you find a carcass that something else has already picked to the bone, and sometimes you find an eighteen-point stag!

There’s much to consider when choosing a thesis topic. I’ve written three theses myself, supervised dozens of them at all degree levels, and examined more than I can remember. Let me share with you some of the big mistakes students make when choosing a thesis—as well as what makes a good thesis topic.

Table of contents

1. Know your level
2. Start with the end in mind
3. Don’t go too broad
4. Ensure your institution has the requisite resources
5. Don’t combine unrelated topics
6. Don’t beat a dead horse
7. Consider testing a repeated consensus
8. Look for gaps in scholarship

1. Know your level

There’s a big difference between writing a thesis for a bachelor’s, master’s, or doctoral degree. So choose a thesis topic appropriate for your level.

Bachelor’s

For a bachelor’s degree, the thesis will normally be a short project—maybe thirty pages (or 10,000 words)—designed to explore a topic relevant to your degree that you find interesting.

A bachelor’s thesis doesn’t have to be groundbreaking. It’s your first crack at high-standard academic writing. It’s the crowning achievement of your bachelor’s degree.

Master’s

For a master’s degree, the thesis is anywhere between 25,000 and 50,000 words. It’s a robust piece of academic writing that analyzes a position or text, masters secondary literature, and wrestles competently with primary sources.

A master’s thesis pushes toward a high scholarly standard, but nobody expects it to change the world. It shows an advanced level of knowledge and academic skill and can be a beta-test for further study.

Doctoral

For a doctorate, the thesis (or dissertation) is intended to be an original piece of work that demonstrates the highest standards of scholarship and a command of primary sources and secondary literature, and that contributes to the academic discussion in a particular area.

A doctoral thesis is not your magnum opus. It’s a trade test, a ticket to become a professional academic.

That said, a doctoral thesis is not your magnum opus. It’s a trade test, showing that you can engage in academic discourse at a world-class level. It’s a ticket to become a professional academic or to engage with the world of international scholarship.

2. Start with the end in mind

Make sure you know why you’re writing a thesis. Perhaps it’s simply a capstone to a program of study. Maybe it satisfies your desire to explore a particular topic and adds to your professional qualifications. It could be your ticket into a particular vocation. Or it could open up opportunities for further study.

Try to know—even in general terms—where you (might) want to go next. Pick your institution, degree, and thesis topic accordingly.

3. Don’t go too broad

A thesis is not mapping out an intergalactic ecosystem. It’s more like putting a postage stamp under a magnifying glass.

I once had somebody tell me that they wanted to write a thesis on the Scottish Reformation in 50,000 words. I gave them the “Hm, that’s a courageous idea, but …” speech. Then, after some pouting, an honest heart-to-heart, some suggestions and further reading, we narrowed it down to “John Knox 1559–60: The Dawn of Scotland’s Religious Revolution.”

Keep the topic narrow, explore it in granular depth, and stay focused on the main thing.

4. Ensure your institution has the requisite resources

I once had someone who wanted to write a doctoral thesis on the history of the church in Dubai. I think it’s a great topic. But none of our faculty had any expertise in this area, we didn’t have access to any of the resources needed, and not even the student knew Arabic or had any connections in Dubai. So the choice was either move to Dubai or find a different topic.

If your institution doesn’t have expertise in the area you want to research, then you’re paying your supervisor to be a very expensive spell-checker.

5. Don’t combine unrelated topics

Sometimes, students are interested in two unrelated areas and, for reasons that mystify (though often entertain) me, insist on putting them together. Think of combinations like “Cornelius van Til and the Bible Code”; “Mid-Tribulation Rapture and the New Perspective on Paul”; or “Ancient Jewish Vegetarianism and the Covenant Theology of Nineteenth-Century Switzerland.”

When I raise my eyebrows at such proposals, the student protests that it’s entirely original, to which I retort, “Nobody has done this before—because it’s like making a smoothie by putting a frog and peanut butter in a blender.” Alas, when it comes to thesis proposals, there’s a difference between original, niche, and plain kooky.

6. Don’t beat a dead horse

You don’t have to be original in a bachelor’s thesis or even a master’s thesis. However, a doctoral thesis or dissertation should be an original piece of work. (A dissertation should not be your bachelor’s or master’s thesis with another 50,000 words added—no double dipping!)

Your dissertation shouldn’t engage an over-studied area, like Paul’s use of the Old Testament in Romans or the genre of Acts, unless you really do have an original contribution and a fresh methodology. Look someplace neglected and ripe for fresh investigation.

7. Consider testing a repeated consensus

Scholars often repeat a consensus and recycle the same footnotes without ever going back to the primary sources themselves. So, go back to those primary sources, test the consensus, and see what you find!

Here are some examples where this has been done well:

• Revelation has an incipient Trinitarianism that makes sense when located between Second Temple Jewish apocalyptic literature and patristic exegesis (Brandon Smith).
• Matthew’s kingdom of heaven is not simply a synonym for the kingdom of God (Jonathan Pennington).
• Paul’s use of “glory” language reveals that the believers’ conformity to the image of the Son (Rom 8:29) refers to eschatological transformation, not moral conformity (Haley Goranson Jacob).

These scholars took an existing assumption and then demonstrated an alternative based on a closer reading of their primary sources.

I myself found my PhD thesis while reading N. T. Wright’s Jesus and the Victory of God.¹ I became intrigued by how Jesus’s mission to Israel related to the emergence of the gentile mission in the early church. How do you get from “Go nowhere among the gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (Matt 10:5–6), to “And this good news of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the world, as a testimony to all the nations; and then the end will come” (Matt 24:14)?

Not much had been written on the topic since Joachim Jeremias’s book Jesus’ Promise to the Nations in 1959. Most scholars assumed that Jesus’s ministry had nothing to do with a later gentile mission—the latter being an invention of the later church to compensate for the apparent delay in Jesus’s return. However, taking my cue from Wright, I thought to plot the link between Jewish-restoration eschatology, the historical Jesus, and the early Christian mission. Voilà! I had a thesis topic, eventually published as Jesus and the Origins of the Gentile Mission (T&T Clark, 2006).

8. Look for gaps in scholarship

Pay attention to gaps in scholarship that other scholars point out.

For instance, in his thesis on angelomorphic Christology, Charles Gieschen writes in a footnote,

Although the Lamb is the dominant Christological depiction in this document [the book of Revelation], the relationship between the angelomorphic and Lamb elements of this apocalypse has not been widely studied. For a preliminary attempt, see Stuckenbruck, Angel Veneration and Christology, 261–265.²

I don’t know if Matthias Hoffmann read that precise footnote, but he wrote a PhD thesis—under Loren Stuckenbruck’s direction—on how the angelomorphic and divine Christologies of the book of Revelation relate to each other. Hoffmann’s thesis was published as The Destroyer and the Lamb (Mohr Siebeck, 2005). He concluded:

We have been able to deduce that the application of Lamb Christology on the one hand, and an angelomorphic Christology on the other, represents most likely a portrait of Christ according to two major functions. These functions reflect on the implied perception of Christ. To those who see him without totally understanding his salvific meaning he appears as an angelomorphic juridical figure. In contrast, to those who have (or gain) insight into Christ’s significant nature, which is—also according to Melanchthon—his benevolence and his salvific role in history, Christ appears as the Lamb. In this facet of depicting Christological concerns, Christ is portrayed as the one who is with his people (i.e. the Christian community), shepherding and taking care of them.³

Conclusion

Writing a thesis is like joining a conversation. Imagine a group of scholars sitting around a table, discussing a particular topic. What you’re doing is listening to the conversation, taking notes, mulling over what’s being said, and double-checking their sources. Then, after collecting your own thoughts, you sit down at the table and interject a comment that might catch the attention of others and contribute to the ongoing conversation. A thesis is not a conversation killer—it’s a conversation multiplier. It’s adding your two cents to the exchange of ideas in an area of discourse. That’s it. That’s a thesis.

Read widely, consult with faculty and grad students, look for what catches your interest, find problems begging for a solution, revisit old questions that need a new solution, and go looking for that stag. Happy hunting!

Mike Bird’s suggested resources for further reflection

• Firth, Katherine. Your PhD Survival Guide: Planning, Writing, and Succeeding in Your Final Year. Routledge, 2020.

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