...yeah, as if!

My third year at university has only just started, and already I feel kinda overwhelmed by the whole "Write your dissertation"-situation. I am trying to really put in a lot of effort this year, copying lecture notes, doing all the necessary reading etc. and I'm fine with that. But when it comes to my dissertation - the thing I've been working towards for the last 2 years - I don't know where to start.

I know what I want to write about. I'd love to compare different travel magazines and newspaper travel supplements and determine how their content, style, tone, symbolism, semantics relate to their readership. I want to look at it both from a journalistic point of view (ie styles etc.),but also from a marketing point of view; analysing how readers can be split up into different market segments, what would appeal to these segments and whether they overlap or not. Is there a segment missing? Then why is that? And do travel publications vary from country to country? I want to find out, whether Britain, as an island nation, developed a different travel market than for example Germany, which has 9 land borders.

The problem is: I can't word my question. And without one, I can't work. Don't get me wrong, I've done my research proposal, I'm halfway through my literature review - but I need to formulate my question in order to get started. I'm the same in journalism. I need my headline first, to give me an angle on the story, to focus. At the moment, I feel like I'm hanging in limbo. If you have any suggestions, on how to put all that into a proper, academic-sounding dissertation topic, let me know!

I know I'll need to write about 10,000 words (without counting quotations) until mid-March and that I'll have to write a certain number of words per day or week to get there. We get tutorials at uni, on how to reference in the Harvard-System, but what I for one need, would be a look at a previous dissertation. How did they lay it all out? Did they include an appendix? How structured were the dissertations? I know that this is just about style, but once again, this helps me focus and getting the job done.

Over the next week, I'll have to read the books (including the ones about writing dissertations - like the "15 mins a day" one) and make a start. Get my first few paragraphs on paper. March seems miles away from now, and yet I know it'll come around too soon!

Wish me luck!