Objective
In this lesson, you'll learn how to develop a thesis sentence that guides your
reader and strengthens your writing.
What Is a Thesis?
All writing, no matter what form it takes, has a primary topic. In a college
or high school situation, most professors agree that in a well-developed academic
essay, this primary topic should be expressed in a thesis sentence. A thesis
is a statement that:
o Makes a claim that can be supported by a reason or reasons;
o Unifies the paper by stating the writer's most important or significant
point regarding the topic;
o Is comprised of one sentence that does not diverge into many topics;
o Forecasts the content of the essay;
o Is placed most often in the beginning of the essay, usually within the first
or second paragraph; and
o Is sometimes implied rather than stated outright.
In this lesson, we'll focus on examining what a thesis is, how it works, and
ways you can develop a strong thesis that unifies your work.
Before You Develop a Thesis
It's important to recognize that most writers do not have a clear thesis sentence
as they begin their essay drafting. As you write, often you'll begin to see
your own thoughts develop. You'll begin to understand your own ideas, points,
and direction more clearly. If you are using research, your reading and experiences
become new discoveries that may lead to changing your original direction. Or,
after a peer critique or review by an instructor, you may find that more important
or intriguing issues exist on which to focus your paper.Whatever the case, you
should know that you might not have a clear thesis sentence until you have finished
your first or second draft. Sometimes, this clearer thesis reveals itself at
the very end of an early draft-look for it in your conclusion section.
If your "new" thesis suggests itself in an early draft, revise that
draft with the new thesis in mind, making sure that all of your points in the
essay support your clearer thesis. Often experienced writers will develop a
"working thesis" as they write first and second drafts. Then, as the
writing approaches its final stages, they develop a finalized thesis that accurately
and clearly reflects their main points. Learning to be flexible about your paper's
thesis is part of practicing a strong writing process.
The Major Components of a Thesis
The thesis statement usually is not an announcement that begins, "This
paper is about XYZ." In a polished essay, the thesis will make a claim
about the topic. A claim asserts a position, point of view, or belief. So, let's
suppose that you have to write a paper about the differences between college
and high school. In this paper, the earliest version of your thesis might begin
something like this:
College is very different from high school.
Here you can see that this basic sentence makes a firm statement, or claim.
There is no need to qualify the statement by saying, "This paper is about
how college is very different from high school." Your reader will know
that.
While the statement "College is very different from high school" is
a good start, it is not yet a fully developed thesis. Besides making a claim,
a thesis must be supportable by a reason or reasons. So when you begin drafting
your thesis, ask yourself: Why is college different from high school? What makes
college different from high school? You can think of these types of questions
as the "so what?" test. After looking at your early thesis, ask yourself
"so what?" So what does this statement mean to me? So what does this
mean to my readers? So what does this change or affect? If you can come up with
a number of reasons here, you are well on your way to developing not only a
thesis, but also an organizational structure for your essay. In your paper about
the differences between college and high school, you might continue developing
the thesis in this way:
College is very different from high school, because it requires that students
have and use more self-discipline than they did in high school.
Here, you can see that this thesis statement has integrated some reasons why
college is different than high school. In writing this paper, you would follow
through on your thesis by talking about how college students "have and
use more self-discipline than they did in high school." This addition to
the thesis sentence unifies the topic of the paper with what you, the writer,
sees as its most significant point. This final sentence:
o Makes a claim that can be supported by a reason or reasons;
o Unifies the paper by stating the writer's most important or significant
point regarding the topic; and
o Is comprised of one sentence that does not diverge into many topics.
The true test of a good thesis is whether the paper and the thesis are making
the same point. In this example, your paper should introduce and discuss several
ways that high school did not require the degree of self-discipline that college
does. You should use examples and supportive details to provide insight into
both the high school and college situation.
The type of thesis you write and how you develop the paper that supports that
thesis depend a lot on the audience (reader/s) and purpose (nature of the assignment
or what you want to accomplish) for writing that essay. If you are writing an
argumentative paper, you will write your thesis, called an assertion, differently
than if you are writing an expository paper. Your thesis will change in shape,
as well, when you are writing an exposition that explains "why" as
opposed to one that explains "how." For more information, see the
following lessons in the OWL student Writer's Handbook:
Chapter 1: Purpose (Lesson 4: Exposition Explaining Why; Lesson
5: Exposition Explaining How To; Lesson 6: Writing to Argue a Position)
and Chapter 2: Audience (Lesson 2: How the Audience Affects the
Purpose for Writing).
Developing Your Thesis
To develop your thesis you should begin with a draft of your paper, or at least
a basic outline. If you already have a draft, or even some brainstorming notes,
look over them. Carefully read through what you have and look for where you
are making a strong claim about your topic. Can you find one that is central
to what you want to say? Check especially in the second and final paragraphs
since we often don't begin to really understand our own central ideas until
we've already written quite a bit.
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Exercise
Part One
Open a word processing document, or get out a pen and piece of paper. Using
a draft or outline of a paper you are working on, make a list of central claims
that you make in the paper. Keep in mind that a claim is a statement that
asserts a position, point of view, or belief.
Once you've completed your list, take a look at our response to this exercise.
Our notes might look something like this:
-College is harder; classes are difficult; I have to make myself do my work;
no mom to cook or clean for me; job is demanding and if I miss work, I'll
lose it.
-High school teachers were really nice (and my college teachers seem scary);
they would always give you more time or could be talked out of a firm due
date; I knew my teachers, and didn't have to make an effort to meet them;
I worked for my uncle and could take a few days off whenever I needed to.
Part Two
Now look through your paper or outline and identify the points that support
your claim in short sentences. These may be examples, facts from research,
parts of a process, or observations. Note these in your document on on your
paper.
Again, once you've finished writing this out, take a moment and review the
response that we've formulated.
Our response: College requires much more self-discipline than high school.
For example, in high school, my mom did most of the cooking and cleaning,
but now that I'm in college, I have to do it all myself. Another difference
is that teachers in college are not a lenient as high school teachers. You
can't cajole or con them. They expect quality work, and they expect it on
time.]
Part Three
Return to your document; use the two lists you've created to write a thesis
sentence that makes a claim, introduces your topic, and shows the significance
you find in it or your point of view.
If you're having trouble coming up with a thesis, take a look at our model
thesis: College is very different from high school because one must learn
more self-disciplined in order to get to class regularly and on time, to produce
quality work, and to stay alert and fit.
Once you've completed the this exercise, you will have a working thesis that
can guide you as you write. One valuable technique is to write your thesis on
a separate sheet of paper or an index card and keep it in front of you as you
draft and revise. Each time you move to a new paragraph or topic, look back
at your working thesis and ask the following two questions. How does what you're
writing relate to your thesis? Is what you're writing a logical extension or
natural part of the thesis? Keeping these questions in mind can help you stay
focused and avoid digression.
Remember that as your work develops, your thesis may change. Don't be afraid
to alter it to reflect new information or to encompass a new point of view.
In your final review of your paper, identify your thesis and then see whether
the rest of the work supports and explains it. One good way to check yourself
is to write your thesis at the top of your paper and then list the topic of
each paragraph in one or two words beneath that. If you can see a clear pattern
of relationships between your thesis and each paragraph, you've probably done
a good job of staying on task and following through with your thesis.
Once you've made sure the body of your paper follows through on your thesis,
ask yourself or someone else if there's anything else that a reader needs to
know about the topic in order to fully explain or support the thesis. If you
find that there's something in your paper not directly related to your thesis,
consider its value. Does this material need to be in the essay in order to clearly
and fully explain your point of view? If you can take it out and the essay still
maintains it's integrity (or focus), you probably don't need it. If you can't
take it out, and it is not clearly implied by your thesis, don't be afraid to
re-work your thesis.
Placing the thesis within the essay
In the majority of academic essays, the kind that you'll most often write for
college, the thesis is explicitly stated and found early in the work. Many instructors
look for the thesis in the first or second paragraph; some look more specifically
for it at the end of the introductory paragraph/s. After a brief introduction,
perhaps a narrative or general introduction to the topic, the writer usually
makes a statement about the topic.
Sometimes, however, especially for more advanced writing or for writing such
as creative non-fiction (of the type found in magazines such as Utne Reader
or DoubleTake and in many college essay readers), the thesis is implicit,
or implied. In this case, your teacher probably will teach you how to write
the essay so that an explicit thesis statement isn't used but that the main
idea is clear throughout the essay. Check with your instructor if you think
that s/he may want such an implied thesis in your essay. Even with an implied
thesis, however, you must be clear about your main claim and how you want to
support it, making the information in this lesson especially useful for your
writing.
Summary
A strong thesis is one that makes a claim that can be supported by a reason,
or reasons. In every essay, whether it is explicit or implied, the thesis sentence
introduces the reader to the essay's main topic and the writer's point of view
or approach to it. Usually, for good college writing, the thesis should be a
clear, concise statement that guides the reader and that is placed early in
the paper.
  
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