How to spell dissertation

hear itdis·ser·ta·tion/,dɪsər'teɪʃən/nounSchwa and roots

What it means: A treatise advancing a new point of view from research.

In a sentence: The student worked hard on her dissertation about animals.

The part people get wrong

Watch for double s, and an unstressed vowel that is hard to hear. Often misspelled as dessertation or disertation.

Same family: dissertate, thesis, paper, research, doctoral. If you can spell one, the shared part carries to the others.

Where it comes from: “Dissertation” comes from Latin *dissertatio*, meaning “discussion” or “discourse.” In early universities, it referred to a formal written discussion on a topic, which evolved into the modern long research paper required for advanced degrees.

Patterns it uses: The unstressed vowel (schwa) · -tion, -sion or -cian? · Prefixes keep every letter

Try spelling it

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Words like this

documentation · expiration · confirmation · resignation · authorization · verification · formation · stationery

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