writing a master's thesis - my experience

A European and global law master’s program can be a rigorous training ground for scientific-style writing—especially when coursework relies heavily on research papers rather than exams. After finishing a dissertation presentation, Mariana Vieira describes how that structure reshaped her writing habits, research approach, and academic confidence, even though the thesis itself demanded major revisions and repeated reworking.

Vieira enrolled in the master’s in 2017, choosing it for an international legal perspective and a less traditional evaluation model than her bachelor’s. Instead of midterms and finals, many courses were assessed through papers, giving students more freedom to select research questions and develop arguments in their own words. She credits this paper-based workload—writing “tons of papers” in short timeframes—with improving both her writing and the way she investigates legal issues. The program also pushed her into scientific writing practices within law, an area she found appealing because she had long wanted to write more seriously.

The dissertation phase brought a different kind of challenge: not starting from scratch, but cutting and rebuilding. Vieira says she had to delete entire sections, rewrite arguments, and convert footnotes and citations into a new style. Those setbacks became part of the learning curve rather than detours. She also stresses that thesis success depends on disciplined reading and planning. Most professors recommend reading widely first; she adds that reading can take two to three months (or longer), after which students should produce reading summaries that capture authors’ arguments and theories. Building a table of contents early helps students decide what to summarize and what details to preserve, since small points can matter later when drafting.

Once notes are ready, writing becomes less about “having ideas” and more about translating them into academic language. Vieira highlights the difficulty of moving from everyday phrasing to precise academic wording, and recommends reading academic-writing resources and examples to learn how that translation works. She also emphasizes constant revision—rewriting paragraphs repeatedly and reviewing material “all the time”—as the mechanism for thoroughness.

Communication with a supervisor and discussion with others outside the topic area also play a practical role. Vieira advises talking about thesis ideas regularly so feedback can reveal whether arguments land clearly, whether the core thesis is convincing, and where explanations break down. Even people without deep subject knowledge can provide useful signals about clarity, while technical readers may focus on argument mechanics.

The dissertation presentation, which she feared despite her comfort writing in English, became a conversation rather than a hostile interrogation. She practiced her 10-minute presentation repeatedly—about 20 times in the week before—because editing on YouTube can hide language mistakes that cannot be edited out live. During the one-hour discussion, three professors offered welcoming feedback, probing whether she believed in the thesis, could support it with strong arguments, and could defend it out loud. Vieira ends with a positive takeaway: the master’s process can be valuable for anyone who enjoys research and structured long-term writing, and she recommends protecting personal information online if thesis materials are stored publicly.