Q: How can I start publishing part of my dissertation?
I find it hard to extract a journal article from the thesis.
It is quite a common practice among early-career researchers to start publishing journal articles using material from their PhD thesis or dissertation. It is definitely possible to extract one or more articles from a thesis. You can consider revising the entire thesis and condensing it into an article. Alternatively, you can also consider using certain parts of the thesis and rewriting them into an independent article. However, you have to remember that a thesis and a journal article are two completely different sub-genres of academic writing. Each caters to a different audience and sets different expectations.
Before you start revising your thesis, it is important to understand that the overall approach and format for a journal article would be different. For instance, a journal article would definitely be shorter than the thesis. Additionally, the literature review in the journal article would be shorter and more focused. The materials and methods section would ideally describe only the details of the methodology used and will not be an extensive discussion of the research approach. The results section of an article will discuss only the main findings and analysis and will not include all the findings.
Here are some resources that will help you understand how you can revise your thesis into a journal article:
This content belongs to the Conducting Research Stage