How to write a thesis statement

How to write a thesis statement

A thesis statement: tells the reader how you will interpret the significance of the subject matter under discussion. is a road map for the paper; in other words, it tells the reader what to expect from the rest of the paper. directly answers the question asked of you. A thesis is an interpretation The thesis statement is the “road map” of your paper, directing you as you write it and guiding the reader through it. Do Know your essay’s type. Make a statement. Make a debatable claim. Be specific Don’t Announce the thesis, e.g. “This paper will discuss.” Announce yourself, e.g How to Tell a Strong Thesis Statement from a Weak One. 1. A strong thesis statement takes some sort of stand. Remember that your thesis needs to show your conclusions about a subject. For example, if you 2. A strong thesis statement justifies discussion. 3. A strong thesis statement expresses

How to Write a Thesis Statement | 3 Steps & Examples

This handout describes what a thesis statement is, how thesis statements work in your writing, how to write a thesis statement, and how you can craft how to write a thesis statement refine one for your draft. Writing in college often takes the form of persuasion—convincing others that you have an interesting, logical point of view on the subject you are studying. Persuasion is a skill you practice regularly in your daily life. You persuade your roommate to clean up, your parents to let you borrow the car, your friend to vote for your favorite candidate or policy.

In college, course assignments often ask you to make a persuasive case in writing. You are asked to convince your reader of your point of view, how to write a thesis statement. This form of persuasion, often called academic argument, follows a predictable pattern in writing. After a brief introduction of your topic, you state your point of view on the topic directly and often in one sentence.

If your assignment asks how to write a thesis statement to take a position or develop a claim about a subject, you may need to convey that position or claim in a thesis statement near the beginning of your draft.

The assignment may not explicitly state that you need a thesis statement because your instructor may assume you will include one. When in doubt, ask your instructor if the assignment requires a thesis statement. When an assignment asks you to analyze, to interpret, to compare and contrast, to demonstrate cause and effect, or to take a stand on an issue, it is likely that you are being asked to develop a thesis and to support it persuasively.

Check out our handout on understanding assignments for more information. A thesis is the result of a lengthy thinking process. Formulating a thesis is not the first thing you do after reading an essay assignment. Before you develop an argument on any topic, you have to collect and organize evidence, look for possible relationships between known facts such as surprising contrasts or similaritiesand think about the significance of these relationships.

Both the argument and your thesis are likely to need adjustment along the way. Writers use all kinds of techniques to stimulate their thinking and to help them clarify relationships or comprehend the broader significance of a topic and arrive at a thesis statement. For more ideas on how to get started, see our handout on brainstorming. Even if you do not have time to get advice elsewhere, you can do some thesis evaluation of your own. When reviewing your first draft and its working thesis, ask yourself the following :.

You can use the questions above to help you revise this general statement into a stronger thesis. After thinking about your answers to these questions, you decide to focus on the one impact you feel strongly about and have strong evidence for:. Because not every voice on social media is reliable, people have become much more critical consumers of information, and thus, more informed voters. This version is a much stronger thesis! It answers the question, takes a specific position that others can challenge, and it gives a sense of why it matters.

Think about aspects of the novel that are important to its structure or meaning—for example, the role of storytelling, the contrasting scenes between the shore and the river, or the relationships between adults and children. Now you write:. In Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain develops a contrast between life on the river and life on the shore.

This final thesis statement presents an interpretation of a literary work based on an analysis of its content. Of course, for the essay itself to be successful, you must now present how to write a thesis statement from the novel that will convince the reader of your interpretation. We consulted these works while writing this handout. Please do not use this list as a model for the format of your own reference list, as it may not match the citation style you are using.

For guidance on formatting citations, please see the UNC Libraries citation tutorial. We revise these tips periodically and welcome feedback. Anson, Chris M. The Longman Handbook for Writers and Readers6th ed. New York: Longman. Lunsford, Andrea A. The St. Ramage, John D. Bean, and June Johnson.

New York: Pearson. Ruszkiewicz, John J. The Scott, Foresman Handbook for Writers9th ed. Boston: Pearson Education. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4, how to write a thesis statement.

You may reproduce it for non-commercial use if you use the entire handout and attribute the source: The Writing Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Make a Gift. Skip to main content.

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Creating a Thesis Statement, Thesis Statement Tips // Purdue Writing Lab

A thesis statement: tells the reader how you will interpret the significance of the subject matter under discussion. is a road map for the paper; in other words, it tells the reader what to expect from the rest of the paper. directly answers the question asked of you. A thesis is an interpretation The thesis statement is the “road map” of your paper, directing you as you write it and guiding the reader through it. Do Know your essay’s type. Make a statement. Make a debatable claim. Be specific Don’t Announce the thesis, e.g. “This paper will discuss.” Announce yourself, e.g Sep 27,  · A thesis statement is often confused with a topic sentence, the first sentence in a paragraph, because they both introduce the central idea of what follows. You can think of thesis statements as the topic sentence of your entire paper