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HOW TO WRITE A SUMMARY OF YOUR MASTER’S DEGREE THESIS IN ENGLISH Sometimes it is necessary to summarize an article, paper, book or some other kind of written text, such as your Master’s degree thesis, i.e. to write a summary. You can also find the word abstract in the meaning of a summary (as these two expressions designate the types of writing quite close to each other as far as their function is concerned). The Czech equivalent for an abstract or summary is “resumé”. In Czech journals, scientific monographs, research papers or dissertations, abstracts can be found written in one or two international languages at the end of a periodical or a book. The purpose of summarizing a text is to introduce briefly the format, content and conclusions to a potential reader so that s/he can decide whether or not to read the whole text. The summary IS NOT just a set of sentences chosen from individual parts of the writing but it also describes the structure (e.g. subdivision into chapters, sections, parts, paragraphs, etc.), what the author’s approach is (e.g. description, analysis, comparison, etc.) and what his or her conclusions are. Writing your summary you should answer three basic questions: WHY have you chosen a particular topic? You should explain what the aim / purpose of your research is and what your initial hypotheses are. HOW have you looked into the issues? The methodology chosen, scope of research, and the structure of your work should be described here. WHAT has been the outcome of your research? Briefly introduce results and conclusions you have arrived at. The language of an abstract uses a limited number of verbs describing the content of a text. The following table lists the most frequent nouns and verbs: article analyzes, argues for / in favour of, argues that, attempts to, paper challenges, characteri