The Thesis Statement
What is a thesis statement?
• A thesis statement is the most important sentence in your
paper.
• A thesis statement tells your readers what your essay will be
about.
• In other words, a thesis statement provides a forecast for the
entire essay.
• The thesis statement comes at the end of your introduction.
One way to think about it:
• The thesis statement is to your whole essay what
your topic sentence, or “point,” is to your body
paragraphs.
• If something is in your thesis, it must be illustrated
and explained somewhere in your essay.
One kind of thesis…
… is the analytical thesis. An analytical thesis
statement usually answers the question
• “How?”
“How?
• This refers to how the author chooses to write, or
which rhetorical strategies s/he uses.
• How does he get our attention?
• How does she make us think?
What does this mean?
• The “How” question refers to how the author of a
text goes about presenting information or stylistic
choices to his readers. S/he specifically makes these
decisions in order to fulfill the purpose of the essay.
• When you analyze your text, you choose one or two
rhetorical strategies within the text to write about.
There will be many strategies within an essay, but you
will choose the examples that best illustrate your
point.
Some of the rhetorical strategies
include:
• Using a specific tone or style (ethos)
• Using specific vocabulary choices (pathos)
• Organizing or structuring the text in a certain way
(logos)
• Writing for a specific audience (ethos)
• Orchestrating a connection between the beginning
and ending (logos – structure/organization)
• Using figurative language (pathos - emotion)
Example thesis:
• This is the example from your assignment sheet:
• In Joe Smith’s “Education Should Be Free for Everyone,”
he effectively uses pathos by including real-life examples
and references to the values of his audience.
• How? = Which appeal is mentioned here? Which
strategies are pointed out?
Rhetoric to be analyzed
• In Joe Smith’s “Education Should Be Free for
Everyone,” he effectively uses pathos by including reallife examples and references to the values of his
audience.
• Appeal: pathos
• Strategies: real life examples and
references
Look at a student example:
• She efficiently provides concrete evidence to describe
the harmful effects of chemicals in our environment.
In addition, her figurative language highlights the
dangers these chemicals pose.
• Which strategies will this paper analyze?
Rhetoric to be analyzed
She efficiently provides concrete evidence to
describe the harmful effects of chemicals in
our environment. In addition, her figurative
language highlights the dangers these
chemicals pose.
• Evidence (logos)
• Figurative language (pathos)
For this essay you also need…
• Evaluation
• How well did the
author use the strategies
you mention?
• Was the author
successful in fulfilling
her purpose?
… so you add one more piece to the
thesis.
• Because the thesis is pretty long, you could do
this simply: try for an adverb.
• In Joe Smith’s “Education Should Be Free for
Everyone,” he effectively uses pathos by
including real-life examples and references to the
values of his audience.
• Where’s the adverb? Is it positive or negative?
Our other example:
• She efficiently provides concrete evidence to
describe the harmful effects of chemicals in
our environment. In addition, her figurative
language highlights the dangers these
chemicals pose.
• Where’s the adverb? Is it positive or negative?
Additionally, your thesis statement should meet
the following requirements:
• 1. It should be interesting to your readers. Your brain
works differently than anyone else’s in this room.
Show us a point of view or a perspective we might
not have considered before.
… and …
• 2. It should have precise and specific wording. Try
not to use the same words everyone else will use
(good, well, bad, etc.).
… and …
• 3. It should be manageable. Don’t try to cover every
bit of your paper. Make it broad enough that it
covers the whole paper. Simplify!
• Note: If you’ve mentioned the author’s full name in
the introduction, you can use her/his last name only
in the thesis statement. This might help you simplify.
Last but not least
• Understand that your thesis statement might, and
probably will, change as you draft and revise.
Oftentimes when we are writing, our ideas becomes
clearer or sometimes even shift to a slightly different
interpretation. THIS IS OKAY.
The “Working Thesis”
• Sometimes writers wait until they have drafted an
entire paper before truly shaping their thesis
statement.
• They begin with a rough statement, almost a
sketch, of what they want their thesis to be, then
they write the essay, then they go back and refine
the thesis. The rough draft of a thesis statement
is called a “working thesis.”
Start here:
• The necessary ingredients to your thesis for this paper:
• Title
• Author
• How? ( = Strategies!)
• Does it work?