what makes a nation thesis statement

Twelve Theses on Nationalism

Subscribe to governance weekly, william a. galston william a. galston ezra k. zilkha chair and senior fellow - governance studies.

August 12, 2019

• 16 min read

This piece was originally published by “ The American Interest. “

B y the end of World War Two, nationalism had been thoroughly discredited. Critics charged that national self-interest had prevented democratic governments from cooperating to end the Great Depression, and that nationalist passions had led not just to war, but also to some of the worst crimes groups of human beings had ever perpetrated on others. The construction of international institutions and norms—in economics, politics, and human rights—as antidotes to nationalist excesses dominated Western diplomacy for decades after 1945, and the global struggle between liberal democracy and communism muted the expression of nationalist sentiments on both sides of the Iron Curtain. The peace and economic growth that characterized this period built public support for this strategy.

As decades passed and new generations emerged, memories of the Great Depression and World War Two lost their hold on the Western imagination. With the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union, the postwar era began giving way to new forces. The European Union, its boosters convinced that their enlightened post-national project represented the future of politics for mankind, sought to move from economic integration to political integration. But public opposition swelled in many member-states. The “captive nations” of eastern and central Europe reemerged as independent actors, and long-submerged nationalist feelings resurfaced. But the feelings were not limited to the east: Growing regional inequalities within countries drove a wedge between left-behind populations and the international elites many citizens held responsible for their plight. The Great Recession of 2008 undermined public confidence in expert managers of the economy, and in the internationalist outlook that had long dominated their thinking. In Europe, concerns over immigration grew as people from lower-wage countries in the EU moved freely to wealthy member-states. These concerns exploded in 2015 after German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s decision to admit more than 1 million refugees from Syria and other countries wracked by conflict and economic stagnation.

All these trends, and others, were at work in the United States. The consequences of China’s entry into the WTO, especially for U.S. manufacturing, stoked concerns about international trade. Five decades of robust immigration transformed America’s demography, a shift celebrated by some but deplored by others. In the wake of the Great Recession and the Iraq war, the costs of America’s global leadership became increasingly controversial, and the belief that other nations were taking advantage of the United States intensified. Postwar internationalism became a new front in the decades-old culture war. In retrospect, it was only a matter of time until someone mounted a frontal challenge to the consensus of elites in both major political parties. When it did, “America First” hit the established order with the force and subtlety of a wrecking-ball.

“Nationalism rightly understood means that no nation is an island, and that in the long run the wellbeing of one’s nation cannot be decoupled from the fate of others.”

The growth of nationalism as a political phenomenon encouraged the emergence of nationalist theoreticians and ideologues. In the United States, a July 2019 conference on “National Conservatism” brought together thinkers who argued—in direct opposition to the leaders of the postwar era—that nationalism offers a more secure and morally preferable basis for both domestic and international policy. Similar convenings have occurred in Europe. Critics of the new nationalism have been quick to weigh in.

As the battle has been joined, the ratio of heat to light has been high. And yet so are the stakes. Our democratic future depends on whether publics come to see nationalism as the solution, the problem, or something in-between. As a contribution to clarifying the debate, I offer twelve theses on nationalism.

Thesis One:   Nationalism and patriotism are not the same.  Patriotism is love of country—as George Orwell puts it, “devotion to a particular place and way of life.” Nationalism means giving pride of place, culturally and politically, to a distinctive ensemble of individuals—the nation.

Thesis Two:   A nation is a community, united by sentiments of loyalty and mutual concern, that shares a cultural heritage and belief in a common destiny.  Some nations additionally invoke common descent, which in nearly all cases is mythical, as it was when John Jay posited it for the nascent United States in Federalist 2. As political theorist Bernard Yack observes in  Nationalism and the Moral Psychology of Community , not all nationalist claims are based on ethnicity. Ethno-nations are distinct, he observes, in that they make descent from previous members “a necessary, rather than merely sufficient, condition of membership.”

Thesis Three:   An individual need not be born into a cultural heritage to (come to) share it.  Entrants into the national community commit themselves not only to learn their nation’s history and customs but also to take on their benefits and burdens as their own, as Ruth did when she pledged to Naomi that “Your people shall be my people, and your God my God.”

Thesis Four:   Nationalism and patriotism can yield conflicting imperatives.  Many Zionists felt patriotic connections to the states in which they lived, even as they labored to create a nation-state of their own. Although many of today’s Kurds in Iraq, Syria, and Turkey harbor patriotic sentiments, their primary loyalty is to the Kurdish nation, and their ultimate aim is national self-determination in their own state.

Thesis Five:   Nationalism poses a challenge to the modern state system.  The familiar term “nation-state” implicitly assumes that the geographical locations of distinct nations coincide with state boundaries. Occasionally this is true (Japan comes close), but mostly it isn’t. Nations can be spread across multiple states (as the Kurds are), and states can contain multiple nations (as Spain does). What some regard as the ideal arrangement—a sovereign state for each nation and only this nation—is still exceedingly rare despite the convulsions of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and still could not be realized without further massive, bloody disruptions of existing arrangements. Hitler’s determination to unify all ethno-cultural Germans into a single nation would have been a disaster, even if he had harbored no further ambitions. Today’s Hungarians have grounds for objecting to the Treaty of Trianon, which left millions of their co-nationals outside the borders of their shrunken state. Nevertheless, any effort to reunite them under a single flag would mean war in the heart of Europe.

Today’s state system includes international organizations, which many nationalists oppose as abrogating their states’ sovereignty. This stance rests on a failure to distinguish between revocable agreements, which are compatible with maintaining sovereignty, and irrevocable agreements, which are not. In leaving the European Union, Britain is exercising its sovereign rights, which it did not surrender when it entered the EU. By contrast, the states that banded together into the United States of America agreed to replace their several sovereignties into a single sovereign power, with no legal right under the Constitution to reverse this decision. When the southern states tried to secede, a civil war ensued, and its outcome ratified the permanent nature of the Union.

Thesis Six:   It is possible to be a nationalist without believing that every nation has a right to political independence, but it isn’t easy.  The U.S. Declaration of Independence speaks of “the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them.” Similarly, Israel’s Declaration of Independence invokes the “self-evident right of the Jewish people to be a nation, as all other nations, in its own sovereign state.”

There are often practical reasons to deny some nations political self-determination (see Thesis Five). But doing so in principle rests on the belief that some nations are superior to others and deserve to rule over them. The claimed superiority can be cultural, hence mutable and temporary, or ethno-racial, essentialist, and immutable. The former often includes the responsibility of dominant nations to prepare subordinated nations for independence, as John Stuart Mill’s defense of tutelary colonialism did. The latter implies that subordinate nations are at best means to the well-being of dominant nations; at worst, lesser forms of humanity who exist at the sufferance of superior nations.

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There is no logical connection between the undeniable premise that each nation is distinctive and the conclusion that mine is better than yours. But the psychology of pride in one’s nation can lead even decent, well-meaning people from the former to the latter.

Some contemporary defenders of nationalism claim that it is inherently opposed to imperialism. Nation-states want only to be left alone, they say, to govern themselves in accordance with their own traditions. As Rebecca West once put it, there is not “the smallest reason for confounding nationalism, which is the desire of a people to be itself, with imperialism, which is the desire of a people to prevent other peoples from being themselves.”

She would be right if all nationalism were inwardly focused and guided by the maxim of live and let live. But the history of the 20th century shows that some forms of nationalism are compatible with imperialism and worse. It depends on what a nation thinks that “being itself” entails. The proposition that nationalism and imperialism always stand opposed rests not on historical evidence, but rather on a definition of nationalism at odds with its real-world manifestations.

Thesis Seven:   It is possible to be a nationalist without believing that the interests of one’s nation always trump competing considerations.  Writing in the shadow of World War Two, George Orwell declared that nationalism was “the habit of identifying oneself with a single nation, placing it beyond good and evil and recognizing no other duty than that of advancing its interests.” Although this is an unmatched description of Nazism, it conflates an extreme instance of nationalism with the totality.

In fact, nationalism is compatible with a wide range of ideologies and political programs. It motivated not only Nazi Germany but also Britain’s heroic resistance to fascism. (Churchill’s wartime speeches rallied his countrymen with stirring invocations of British nationalism against its foe.) And because the nation need not be understood as the supreme good, “liberal nationalism” is not an oxymoron.

Giving priority to the interests of one’s nation does not mean ignoring the interests of others, any more than caring most about one’s own children implies indifference to the fate of others’ children. Nations are sometimes called upon to risk their blood and treasure to respond to or prevent harm in other nations. At some point, the imbalance between modest costs to one’s nation and grievous damage to others should compel action. Even though some Americans would have risked their lives to prevent the Rwandan genocide, America’s failure to intervene was a mistake, a proposition that nationalists can accept without contradicting their beliefs.

Thesis Eight:   It is a mistake to finger nationalism as the principal source of oppression and aggression in modern politics.  As we have seen repeatedly, creedal and religion-based states and movements can be just as brutal, and they can pose, in their own way, equally fundamental challenges to the state system. The Reformation triggered a full century of astonishingly bloody strife. More recently, for those who took class identity to be more fundamental than civic identity, “socialist internationalism” became the organizing principle of politics, and similarly if membership in the Muslim  umma  is thought to erase the significance of state boundaries. Those outside the favored class or creed became enemies with whom no permanent peace is possible, and the consequences are as negative for decent politics as any of the evils perpetrated in the name of nationalism.

Thesis Nine:   As a key source of social solidarity, nationalism can support higher-order political goods such as democracy and the welfare state.  Democracy rests on mutual trust, without which the peaceful transfer of power comes to be regarded as risky. The welfare state rests on sympathy and concern for others who are vulnerable, whether or not the more fortunate members of the community see themselves as equally vulnerable. Shared nationality promotes these sentiments, while in the short-to-medium term (at least), increasing national diversity within states weakens them.

This helps explain why many nationalists who are not driven by racial or ethnic bias nonetheless are ambivalent about high numbers of immigrants and refugees. It also points to the most important domestic challenge contemporary nationalists face—reconciling their attachment to their co-nationals with fair treatment for other groups with whom they share a common civic space.

Thesis Ten:   Although we typically think of nations as driving the creation of nation-states, the reverse is also possible.  A generation ago, Eugen Weber showed how, over the decades before World War One, the French state deployed a program of linguistic, cultural, and educational unification to turn “peasants into Frenchmen.” During the past half-century, post-colonial governments have sought, with varying degrees of success, to weaken tribal and sectarian ties in favor of overarching national attachments.

Many historians have discerned similar processes at work in the United States. Prior to the Civil War, lexicographers such as Noah Webster crystallized a non-regional American English, distinct from British English, while historians such as George Bancroft told the story of America’s creation and growth as a narrative that all could share. After the Civil War, as flows of immigrants from Central and Southern Europe accelerated, programs of civic education proliferated—with the aim, one might say, of turning peasants into Americans. Because it was no longer possible to say, as John Jay did in 1787, that Americans were “descended from the same ancestors,” let alone “professing the same religion,” it became all the more important to create a common cultural heritage into which millions of new immigrants could be initiated. The process may have been rough and ready, even coercive, but in the main it succeeded. And today, after a half century of cultural strife and large flows of immigrants from an unprecedented diversity of countries, it may be necessary to recommit ourselves to this task, albeit in less favorable circumstances.

Thesis Eleven:   Although scholars distinguish between creedal nationalism and ethnic or cultural nationalism as ideal types, there are no examples of purely creedal nations.  In the United States, abstract principles and concrete identities have been braided together since the Founding. Our greatest President, who famously described the United States as a nation dedicated to a proposition, also invoked (unsuccessfully) the “mystic chords of memory” and our “bonds of affection” as antidotes for civil strife and advocated transmuting our Constitution and laws into objects of reverence—a “political religion.”

Thesis Twelve:   Although nationalism is a distinctively modern ideology, national identity has pervaded much of human history and is unlikely to disappear as a prominent feature of politics.  As Bernard Yack has persuasively argued, nationalism is unthinkable without the emergence of the principle of popular sovereignty as the source of legitimate political power. Because this theory characterizes the “people” who constitute the sovereign in abstract terms, it does not answer the key practical question: Who or what is the people?

The U.S. Declaration of Independence exemplifies this hiatus. Before we reach its much-quoted second paragraph on the rights of individuals, we encounter the assertion that Americans constitute “one people” asserting its right to “dissolve the political bands that have connected them with another.” Americans are one people, the British another. The governing class of Great Britain had a different view: Americans were subjects of the king, just as residents of the British Isles were, distinguished from them only by location. Even to assert their Lockean right of revolution, of which George III was no great fan, Americans had to make the case that they were a separate and distinct people. It turns out that in the case of the United States and many that followed, national identity offered the most plausible way to meet this challenge, which is why John Jay resorted to it. 19th century nationalists had richer intellectual resources on which to draw, including Herder’s account of distinct cultures, but their strategy was much the same.

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In short, national identity is transmuted into nationalism through its encounter with the doctrine of popular sovereignty. When the people are understood as the nation, popular sovereignty becomes national sovereignty.

Because pre-modern politics lacked the theory of popular sovereignty, it could not develop a doctrine of nationalism. Nonetheless, national identity has pervaded human history, for the simple reason that we are finite beings shaped by unchosen contingencies. Although we are social, cultural, and political beings, we are born helpless and unformed. We are formed first by the ministration of parents and kin or their equivalents, then by the experiences of neighborhood and local community, and eventually by the wider circle of those with whom we share a cultural heritage. To be sure, the encounter with those whose formative influences were different will not leave us untouched. No matter how much our horizons are broadened, we never set aside our origin. We may leave home, but home never quite leaves us, a reality reflected in our language. “Mother tongue,” “fatherland”—the age-old metaphor of our place of origin as nurturing, shaping parent will never lose its power.

N ational identity is an aspect of human experience that no measure of education should seek to expunge—nor could it if it tried. But as we have seen, the modern political expression of national identity is multi-valent. Nationalism can be a force for great evil or great good. It can motivate collective nobility and collective brutality. It can bring us together and drive us apart.

In the face of these realities, the way forward is clear, at least in principle. Acknowledging the permanence of nationalism and its capacity for good, we must do our best to mitigate its negative effects. Nationalism need not mean that a country’s cultural majority oppresses others with whom it shares a state; putting one’s country first need not mean ignoring the interests and concerns of others. On the contrary: To adapt a Tocquevillian locution, nationalism rightly understood means that no nation is an island, that in the long run the wellbeing of one’s nation cannot be decoupled from the fate of others. The American leaders who rebuilt Europe understood that theirs was not an act of charity but rather a means to the long-time best interest of their country. The leaders of the civil rights movement knew that they promoted not only the cause of justice, but also the strength of their country, at home and abroad.

The details may have changed since the days of George Marshall and Martin Luther King, Jr., but the essentials remain the same.

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Thesis Statements

What is a thesis statement.

Your thesis statement is one of the most important parts of your paper.  It expresses your main argument succinctly and explains why your argument is historically significant.  Think of your thesis as a promise you make to your reader about what your paper will argue.  Then, spend the rest of your paper–each body paragraph–fulfilling that promise.

Your thesis should be between one and three sentences long and is placed at the end of your introduction.  Just because the thesis comes towards the beginning of your paper does not mean you can write it first and then forget about it.  View your thesis as a work in progress while you write your paper.  Once you are satisfied with the overall argument your paper makes, go back to your thesis and see if it captures what you have argued.  If it does not, then revise it.  Crafting a good thesis is one of the most challenging parts of the writing process, so do not expect to perfect it on the first few tries.  Successful writers revise their thesis statements again and again.

A successful thesis statement:

• makes an historical argument
• takes a position that requires defending
• is historically specific
• is focused and precise
• answers the question, “so what?”

How to write a thesis statement:

Suppose you are taking an early American history class and your professor has distributed the following essay prompt:

“Historians have debated the American Revolution’s effect on women.  Some argue that the Revolution had a positive effect because it increased women’s authority in the family.  Others argue that it had a negative effect because it excluded women from politics.  Still others argue that the Revolution changed very little for women, as they remained ensconced in the home.  Write a paper in which you pose your own answer to the question of whether the American Revolution had a positive, negative, or limited effect on women.”

Using this prompt, we will look at both weak and strong thesis statements to see how successful thesis statements work.

While this thesis does take a position, it is problematic because it simply restates the prompt.  It needs to be more specific about how  the Revolution had a limited effect on women and  why it mattered that women remained in the home.

Revised Thesis:  The Revolution wrought little political change in the lives of women because they did not gain the right to vote or run for office.  Instead, women remained firmly in the home, just as they had before the war, making their day-to-day lives look much the same.

This revision is an improvement over the first attempt because it states what standards the writer is using to measure change (the right to vote and run for office) and it shows why women remaining in the home serves as evidence of limited change (because their day-to-day lives looked the same before and after the war).  However, it still relies too heavily on the information given in the prompt, simply saying that women remained in the home.  It needs to make an argument about some element of the war’s limited effect on women.  This thesis requires further revision.

Strong Thesis: While the Revolution presented women unprecedented opportunities to participate in protest movements and manage their family’s farms and businesses, it ultimately did not offer lasting political change, excluding women from the right to vote and serve in office.

Few would argue with the idea that war brings upheaval.  Your thesis needs to be debatable:  it needs to make a claim against which someone could argue.  Your job throughout the paper is to provide evidence in support of your own case.  Here is a revised version:

Strong Thesis: The Revolution caused particular upheaval in the lives of women.  With men away at war, women took on full responsibility for running households, farms, and businesses.  As a result of their increased involvement during the war, many women were reluctant to give up their new-found responsibilities after the fighting ended.

Sexism is a vague word that can mean different things in different times and places.  In order to answer the question and make a compelling argument, this thesis needs to explain exactly what  attitudes toward women were in early America, and  how those attitudes negatively affected women in the Revolutionary period.

Strong Thesis: The Revolution had a negative impact on women because of the belief that women lacked the rational faculties of men. In a nation that was to be guided by reasonable republican citizens, women were imagined to have no place in politics and were thus firmly relegated to the home.

This thesis addresses too large of a topic for an undergraduate paper.  The terms “social,” “political,” and “economic” are too broad and vague for the writer to analyze them thoroughly in a limited number of pages.  The thesis might focus on one of those concepts, or it might narrow the emphasis to some specific features of social, political, and economic change.

Strong Thesis: The Revolution paved the way for important political changes for women.  As “Republican Mothers,” women contributed to the polity by raising future citizens and nurturing virtuous husbands.  Consequently, women played a far more important role in the new nation’s politics than they had under British rule.

This thesis is off to a strong start, but it needs to go one step further by telling the reader why changes in these three areas mattered.  How did the lives of women improve because of developments in education, law, and economics?  What were women able to do with these advantages?  Obviously the rest of the paper will answer these questions, but the thesis statement needs to give some indication of why these particular changes mattered.

Strong Thesis: The Revolution had a positive impact on women because it ushered in improvements in female education, legal standing, and economic opportunity.  Progress in these three areas gave women the tools they needed to carve out lives beyond the home, laying the foundation for the cohesive feminist movement that would emerge in the mid-nineteenth century.

Thesis Checklist

When revising your thesis, check it against the following guidelines:

• Does my thesis make an historical argument?
• Does my thesis take a position that requires defending?
• Is my thesis historically specific?
• Is my thesis focused and precise?
• Does my thesis answer the question, “so what?”

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Developing a Thesis Statement

Many papers you write require developing a thesis statement. In this section you’ll learn what a thesis statement is and how to write one.

Keep in mind that not all papers require thesis statements . If in doubt, please consult your instructor for assistance.

What is a thesis statement?

A thesis statement . . .

• Makes an argumentative assertion about a topic; it states the conclusions that you have reached about your topic.
• Makes a promise to the reader about the scope, purpose, and direction of your paper.
• Is focused and specific enough to be “proven” within the boundaries of your paper.
• Is generally located near the end of the introduction ; sometimes, in a long paper, the thesis will be expressed in several sentences or in an entire paragraph.
• Identifies the relationships between the pieces of evidence that you are using to support your argument.

Not all papers require thesis statements! Ask your instructor if you’re in doubt whether you need one.

Identify a topic

Your topic is the subject about which you will write. Your assignment may suggest several ways of looking at a topic; or it may name a fairly general concept that you will explore or analyze in your paper.

Consider what your assignment asks you to do

Inform yourself about your topic, focus on one aspect of your topic, ask yourself whether your topic is worthy of your efforts, generate a topic from an assignment.

Below are some possible topics based on sample assignments.

Sample assignment 1

Analyze Spain’s neutrality in World War II.

Identified topic

Franco’s role in the diplomatic relationships between the Allies and the Axis

This topic avoids generalities such as “Spain” and “World War II,” addressing instead on Franco’s role (a specific aspect of “Spain”) and the diplomatic relations between the Allies and Axis (a specific aspect of World War II).

Sample assignment 2

Analyze one of Homer’s epic similes in the Iliad.

The relationship between the portrayal of warfare and the epic simile about Simoisius at 4.547-64.

This topic focuses on a single simile and relates it to a single aspect of the Iliad ( warfare being a major theme in that work).

Developing a Thesis Statement–Additional information

Your assignment may suggest several ways of looking at a topic, or it may name a fairly general concept that you will explore or analyze in your paper. You’ll want to read your assignment carefully, looking for key terms that you can use to focus your topic.

Sample assignment: Analyze Spain’s neutrality in World War II Key terms: analyze, Spain’s neutrality, World War II

After you’ve identified the key words in your topic, the next step is to read about them in several sources, or generate as much information as possible through an analysis of your topic. Obviously, the more material or knowledge you have, the more possibilities will be available for a strong argument. For the sample assignment above, you’ll want to look at books and articles on World War II in general, and Spain’s neutrality in particular.

As you consider your options, you must decide to focus on one aspect of your topic. This means that you cannot include everything you’ve learned about your topic, nor should you go off in several directions. If you end up covering too many different aspects of a topic, your paper will sprawl and be unconvincing in its argument, and it most likely will not fulfull the assignment requirements.

For the sample assignment above, both Spain’s neutrality and World War II are topics far too broad to explore in a paper. You may instead decide to focus on Franco’s role in the diplomatic relationships between the Allies and the Axis , which narrows down what aspects of Spain’s neutrality and World War II you want to discuss, as well as establishes a specific link between those two aspects.

Before you go too far, however, ask yourself whether your topic is worthy of your efforts. Try to avoid topics that already have too much written about them (i.e., “eating disorders and body image among adolescent women”) or that simply are not important (i.e. “why I like ice cream”). These topics may lead to a thesis that is either dry fact or a weird claim that cannot be supported. A good thesis falls somewhere between the two extremes. To arrive at this point, ask yourself what is new, interesting, contestable, or controversial about your topic.

As you work on your thesis, remember to keep the rest of your paper in mind at all times . Sometimes your thesis needs to evolve as you develop new insights, find new evidence, or take a different approach to your topic.

Derive a main point from topic

Once you have a topic, you will have to decide what the main point of your paper will be. This point, the “controlling idea,” becomes the core of your argument (thesis statement) and it is the unifying idea to which you will relate all your sub-theses. You can then turn this “controlling idea” into a purpose statement about what you intend to do in your paper.

Look for patterns in your evidence

Compose a purpose statement.

Consult the examples below for suggestions on how to look for patterns in your evidence and construct a purpose statement.

• Franco first tried to negotiate with the Axis
• Franco turned to the Allies when he couldn’t get some concessions that he wanted from the Axis

Possible conclusion:

Spain’s neutrality in WWII occurred for an entirely personal reason: Franco’s desire to preserve his own (and Spain’s) power.

Purpose statement

This paper will analyze Franco’s diplomacy during World War II to see how it contributed to Spain’s neutrality.

• The simile compares Simoisius to a tree, which is a peaceful, natural image.
• The tree in the simile is chopped down to make wheels for a chariot, which is an object used in warfare.

At first, the simile seems to take the reader away from the world of warfare, but we end up back in that world by the end.

This paper will analyze the way the simile about Simoisius at 4.547-64 moves in and out of the world of warfare.

Derive purpose statement from topic

To find out what your “controlling idea” is, you have to examine and evaluate your evidence . As you consider your evidence, you may notice patterns emerging, data repeated in more than one source, or facts that favor one view more than another. These patterns or data may then lead you to some conclusions about your topic and suggest that you can successfully argue for one idea better than another.

For instance, you might find out that Franco first tried to negotiate with the Axis, but when he couldn’t get some concessions that he wanted from them, he turned to the Allies. As you read more about Franco’s decisions, you may conclude that Spain’s neutrality in WWII occurred for an entirely personal reason: his desire to preserve his own (and Spain’s) power. Based on this conclusion, you can then write a trial thesis statement to help you decide what material belongs in your paper.

Sometimes you won’t be able to find a focus or identify your “spin” or specific argument immediately. Like some writers, you might begin with a purpose statement just to get yourself going. A purpose statement is one or more sentences that announce your topic and indicate the structure of the paper but do not state the conclusions you have drawn . Thus, you might begin with something like this:

• This paper will look at modern language to see if it reflects male dominance or female oppression.
• I plan to analyze anger and derision in offensive language to see if they represent a challenge of society’s authority.

At some point, you can turn a purpose statement into a thesis statement. As you think and write about your topic, you can restrict, clarify, and refine your argument, crafting your thesis statement to reflect your thinking.

As you work on your thesis, remember to keep the rest of your paper in mind at all times. Sometimes your thesis needs to evolve as you develop new insights, find new evidence, or take a different approach to your topic.

Compose a draft thesis statement

If you are writing a paper that will have an argumentative thesis and are having trouble getting started, the techniques in the table below may help you develop a temporary or “working” thesis statement.

Begin with a purpose statement that you will later turn into a thesis statement.

Assignment: Discuss the history of the Reform Party and explain its influence on the 1990 presidential and Congressional election.

Purpose Statement: This paper briefly sketches the history of the grassroots, conservative, Perot-led Reform Party and analyzes how it influenced the economic and social ideologies of the two mainstream parties.

Question-to-Assertion

If your assignment asks a specific question(s), turn the question(s) into an assertion and give reasons why it is true or reasons for your opinion.

Assignment : What do Aylmer and Rappaccini have to be proud of? Why aren’t they satisfied with these things? How does pride, as demonstrated in “The Birthmark” and “Rappaccini’s Daughter,” lead to unexpected problems?

Beginning thesis statement: Alymer and Rappaccinni are proud of their great knowledge; however, they are also very greedy and are driven to use their knowledge to alter some aspect of nature as a test of their ability. Evil results when they try to “play God.”

Write a sentence that summarizes the main idea of the essay you plan to write.

Main idea: The reason some toys succeed in the market is that they appeal to the consumers’ sense of the ridiculous and their basic desire to laugh at themselves.

Make a list of the ideas that you want to include; consider the ideas and try to group them.

• nature = peaceful
• war matériel = violent (competes with 1?)
• need for time and space to mourn the dead
• war is inescapable (competes with 3?)

Use a formula to arrive at a working thesis statement (you will revise this later).

• although most readers of _______ have argued that _______, closer examination shows that _______.
• _______ uses _______ and _____ to prove that ________.
• phenomenon x is a result of the combination of __________, __________, and _________.

What to keep in mind as you draft an initial thesis statement

Beginning statements obtained through the methods illustrated above can serve as a framework for planning or drafting your paper, but remember they’re not yet the specific, argumentative thesis you want for the final version of your paper. In fact, in its first stages, a thesis statement usually is ill-formed or rough and serves only as a planning tool.

As you write, you may discover evidence that does not fit your temporary or “working” thesis. Or you may reach deeper insights about your topic as you do more research, and you will find that your thesis statement has to be more complicated to match the evidence that you want to use.

You must be willing to reject or omit some evidence in order to keep your paper cohesive and your reader focused. Or you may have to revise your thesis to match the evidence and insights that you want to discuss. Read your draft carefully, noting the conclusions you have drawn and the major ideas which support or prove those conclusions. These will be the elements of your final thesis statement.

Sometimes you will not be able to identify these elements in your early drafts, but as you consider how your argument is developing and how your evidence supports your main idea, ask yourself, “ What is the main point that I want to prove/discuss? ” and “ How will I convince the reader that this is true? ” When you can answer these questions, then you can begin to refine the thesis statement.

Refine and polish the thesis statement

To get to your final thesis, you’ll need to refine your draft thesis so that it’s specific and arguable.

• Ask if your draft thesis addresses the assignment
• Question each part of your draft thesis
• Clarify vague phrases and assertions
• Investigate alternatives to your draft thesis

Consult the example below for suggestions on how to refine your draft thesis statement.

Sample Assignment

Choose an activity and define it as a symbol of American culture. Your essay should cause the reader to think critically about the society which produces and enjoys that activity.

• Ask The phenomenon of drive-in facilities is an interesting symbol of american culture, and these facilities demonstrate significant characteristics of our society.This statement does not fulfill the assignment because it does not require the reader to think critically about society.

Drive-ins are an interesting symbol of American culture because they represent Americans’ significant creativity and business ingenuity.

Among the types of drive-in facilities familiar during the twentieth century, drive-in movie theaters best represent American creativity, not merely because they were the forerunner of later drive-ins and drive-throughs, but because of their impact on our culture: they changed our relationship to the automobile, changed the way people experienced movies, and changed movie-going into a family activity.

While drive-in facilities such as those at fast-food establishments, banks, pharmacies, and dry cleaners symbolize America’s economic ingenuity, they also have affected our personal standards.

While drive-in facilities such as those at fast- food restaurants, banks, pharmacies, and dry cleaners symbolize (1) Americans’ business ingenuity, they also have contributed (2) to an increasing homogenization of our culture, (3) a willingness to depersonalize relationships with others, and (4) a tendency to sacrifice quality for convenience.

This statement is now specific and fulfills all parts of the assignment. This version, like any good thesis, is not self-evident; its points, 1-4, will have to be proven with evidence in the body of the paper. The numbers in this statement indicate the order in which the points will be presented. Depending on the length of the paper, there could be one paragraph for each numbered item or there could be blocks of paragraph for even pages for each one.

Complete the final thesis statement

The bottom line.

As you move through the process of crafting a thesis, you’ll need to remember four things:

• Context matters! Think about your course materials and lectures. Try to relate your thesis to the ideas your instructor is discussing.
• As you go through the process described in this section, always keep your assignment in mind . You will be more successful when your thesis (and paper) responds to the assignment than if it argues a semi-related idea.
• Your thesis statement should be precise, focused, and contestable ; it should predict the sub-theses or blocks of information that you will use to prove your argument.
• Make sure that you keep the rest of your paper in mind at all times. Change your thesis as your paper evolves, because you do not want your thesis to promise more than your paper actually delivers.

In the beginning, the thesis statement was a tool to help you sharpen your focus, limit material and establish the paper’s purpose. When your paper is finished, however, the thesis statement becomes a tool for your reader. It tells the reader what you have learned about your topic and what evidence led you to your conclusion. It keeps the reader on track–well able to understand and appreciate your argument.

Writing Process and Structure

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Writing Studio

Refining thesis statements, what makes for an effective thesis.

In an effort to make our handouts more accessible, we have begun converting our PDF handouts to web pages. Download this page as a PDF: Refining Thesis Statements Return to Writing Studio Handouts

An effective thesis should be argumentative and controversial (i.e., if you could make a plausible case against your thesis, it is probably an argument), something not immediately obvious which you can persuade a reader to believe through the evidence in the body of your paper.

A strong thesis statement answers a specific question and takes a distinct position on the topic, is focused, and allows the reader to anticipate the organization of the argument to follow.

A weak thesis statement is vague (identifies a topic but does not specify an argument), offers plot summary or is a statement of fact, is un-provable, or does not give the reader a sense of why the argument is important.

Look over the two example thesis statements below. Consider and name how each of the progressively refined versions matches the criteria offered above.

Example Thesis A

Version 1: Marge Simpson is important to the plot of The Simpsons.

Version 2:  Marge Simpson is important to The Simpsons because she fulfills a significant family role as a mother and housewife.

Version 3:  Marge Simpson is important to The Simpsons because she fulfills a significant family role as a teacher and caregiver to her husband and children.

Version 4:  While Marge Simpson may be a model caregiver for her family, she is a different sort of model for her audience.

Version 5:  Despite her role as a seemingly submissive housewife and mother, Marge Simpson comes to function for the audience of The Simpsons as a subversive force against “middle class” values.

Example Thesis B

Version 1:  Eating disorders are a significant problem among college-aged students.

Version 2:  Eating disorders are a significant problem among college-aged men because they negatively affect academic performance, socializing, and overall psychological well-being.

Version 3:  Eating disorders among college-aged men are overshadowed by a focus on eating disorders among college-aged women.

Version 4:  Eating disorders among college-aged men are overshadowed by a focus on eating disorders among college-aged women; people don’t notice this because an eating disorder is typically considered a women’s disease and is stigmatized as such.

Version 5: Lack of attention to eating disorders among college-aged men not only leaves this group of students untreated, but also exacerbates feelings of isolation associated with this disease.

This handout was originally produced by Jane Wanninger, Graduate Student, Department of English, Vanderbilt University

Last revised: 07/2009 | Adapted for web delivery: 04/2021

In order to access certain content on this page, you may need to download Adobe Acrobat Reader or an equivalent PDF viewer software.

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Writing Resources

Tips for writing an effective thesis statement.

This handout is available for download in DOCX format and PDF format .

Thesis statements are essentially the driving force and backbone of an academic essay. Without a thesis statement, your essay will lack a cohesive argument and will read more like a list of statistics, quotations or connecting ideas. Before completing your thesis statement, ask yourself:

• Is your essay’s major claim complex? Is it insightful? Is it surprising or unexpected?
• Does your thesis respond to a question, tension or problem?
• Is your thesis stated clearly at the outset and does it evolve and develop throughout the paper?
• Does your thesis statement have a clear motive?

Effective thesis statements directly and boldly articulate a complex, arguable or surprising argument (or arguments) of your own which will need to develop throughout the essay. They should be intelligent, well thought-out responses to a question or problem your essay will address.

Weak Thesis Statements Often:

Make no claim.

• Example: This paper will examine the similarities and differences between two articles.
• Possible Solution: Put the articles in conversation with one another and raise specific issues they agree or disagree about.

Are Obviously True or Statements of Fact

• Example: Tourists are often out of place in other cultures.
• Possible Solution: Make an assertion your reader can argue with.

Restate Conventional Wisdom or Clichés

• Example: We shouldn’t judge others because it’s the inside that counts.
• Possible Solution: Seek to complicate your thesis by anticipating counterarguments; try offering something new to the cliché.

Offer Personal Conviction as the Basis for the Argument

• Example: Clearly, Kincaid is being one-sided.
• Possible Solution: Maintain some distance from your subject. Do not merely assume your idea is an objective or obvious truth.

Make Overly Broad Claims

• Example: Limerick shows her knowledge about the West.
• Possible Solution: Convert broad, generic categories into more specific, complex assertions. Find ways to bring out the complexity of your argument.

More Questions for Constructing Strong Thesis Statements:

A strong thesis statement is often not created all at once but will rather go through stages of revision. A thesis statement in its early form is called a “working thesis.” While honing and tightening your working thesis, ask yourself these questions:

• Does my thesis pass the “So what?” test? If a reader’s first response is likely to be “So what?” then you need to clarify it or connect it to some larger issue via a compelling motive.
• Is my thesis statement specific enough? Thesis statements that are too vague often do not have a strong argument. If your thesis contains words like “good” or “successful,” see if you could be more specific: why is something “good”; what specifically makes something “successful?”
• Does my essay support my thesis specifically and without wandering? If your thesis and the body of your essay do not seem to fit together, one of them has to change. It’s perfectly okay to change your working thesis to reflect things you have figured out in the course of writing your paper. Remember, always reassess and revise your writing as necessary!
• Does my thesis answer the question? Re-reading the question prompt after constructing a working thesis can help you fix an argument that misses the focus of the question.
• Does my thesis statement teach my reader something they did not already know? Am I bringing a new idea or perspective to the table on the issue or problem raised? Am I happy with what my thesis statement is saying?

Points to Remember:

• The thesis statement usually appears at the end of the first paragraph of a paper.
• A thesis is not the answer to a math problem; it is not supposed to be “correct.” Your thesis should be designed to persuade the reader that your point of view is valid and worthy of consideration.
• Make sure your thesis is your own argument and not simply the argument that you think your instructor or one of your sources would approve of.
• A thesis statement will never be perfect, because it is an attempt to encapsulate everything that will happen in your argument. Since it takes a whole paper to do that, your thesis will always lack something. Accept this and make it the best it can be regardless!

Credit: “Thesis Statements,” The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. 25 October 2017, http://writingcenter.unc.edu/tips-and-tools/thesis-statements ; “Developing Strong Thesis Statements,” Purdue Online Writing Lab. 25 October 2017, https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/588/01/ .

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Writing a Paper: Thesis Statements

Basics of thesis statements.

The thesis statement is the brief articulation of your paper's central argument and purpose. You might hear it referred to as simply a "thesis." Every scholarly paper should have a thesis statement, and strong thesis statements are concise, specific, and arguable. Concise means the thesis is short: perhaps one or two sentences for a shorter paper. Specific means the thesis deals with a narrow and focused topic, appropriate to the paper's length. Arguable means that a scholar in your field could disagree (or perhaps already has!).

Strong thesis statements address specific intellectual questions, have clear positions, and use a structure that reflects the overall structure of the paper. Read on to learn more about constructing a strong thesis statement.

Being Specific

This thesis statement has no specific argument:

Needs Improvement: In this essay, I will examine two scholarly articles to find similarities and differences.

This statement is concise, but it is neither specific nor arguable—a reader might wonder, "Which scholarly articles? What is the topic of this paper? What field is the author writing in?" Additionally, the purpose of the paper—to "examine…to find similarities and differences" is not of a scholarly level. Identifying similarities and differences is a good first step, but strong academic argument goes further, analyzing what those similarities and differences might mean or imply.

Better: In this essay, I will argue that Bowler's (2003) autocratic management style, when coupled with Smith's (2007) theory of social cognition, can reduce the expenses associated with employee turnover.

The new revision here is still concise, as well as specific and arguable.  We can see that it is specific because the writer is mentioning (a) concrete ideas and (b) exact authors.  We can also gather the field (business) and the topic (management and employee turnover). The statement is arguable because the student goes beyond merely comparing; he or she draws conclusions from that comparison ("can reduce the expenses associated with employee turnover").

Making a Unique Argument

This thesis draft repeats the language of the writing prompt without making a unique argument:

Needs Improvement: The purpose of this essay is to monitor, assess, and evaluate an educational program for its strengths and weaknesses. Then, I will provide suggestions for improvement.

You can see here that the student has simply stated the paper's assignment, without articulating specifically how he or she will address it. The student can correct this error simply by phrasing the thesis statement as a specific answer to the assignment prompt.

Better: Through a series of student interviews, I found that Kennedy High School's antibullying program was ineffective. In order to address issues of conflict between students, I argue that Kennedy High School should embrace policies outlined by the California Department of Education (2010).

Words like "ineffective" and "argue" show here that the student has clearly thought through the assignment and analyzed the material; he or she is putting forth a specific and debatable position. The concrete information ("student interviews," "antibullying") further prepares the reader for the body of the paper and demonstrates how the student has addressed the assignment prompt without just restating that language.

Creating a Debate

This thesis statement includes only obvious fact or plot summary instead of argument:

Needs Improvement: Leadership is an important quality in nurse educators.

A good strategy to determine if your thesis statement is too broad (and therefore, not arguable) is to ask yourself, "Would a scholar in my field disagree with this point?" Here, we can see easily that no scholar is likely to argue that leadership is an unimportant quality in nurse educators.  The student needs to come up with a more arguable claim, and probably a narrower one; remember that a short paper needs a more focused topic than a dissertation.

Better: Roderick's (2009) theory of participatory leadership  is particularly appropriate to nurse educators working within the emergency medicine field, where students benefit most from collegial and kinesthetic learning.

Here, the student has identified a particular type of leadership ("participatory leadership"), narrowing the topic, and has made an arguable claim (this type of leadership is "appropriate" to a specific type of nurse educator). Conceivably, a scholar in the nursing field might disagree with this approach. The student's paper can now proceed, providing specific pieces of evidence to support the arguable central claim.

Choosing the Right Words

This thesis statement uses large or scholarly-sounding words that have no real substance:

Needs Improvement: Scholars should work to seize metacognitive outcomes by harnessing discipline-based networks to empower collaborative infrastructures.

There are many words in this sentence that may be buzzwords in the student's field or key terms taken from other texts, but together they do not communicate a clear, specific meaning. Sometimes students think scholarly writing means constructing complex sentences using special language, but actually it's usually a stronger choice to write clear, simple sentences. When in doubt, remember that your ideas should be complex, not your sentence structure.

Better: Ecologists should work to educate the U.S. public on conservation methods by making use of local and national green organizations to create a widespread communication plan.

Notice in the revision that the field is now clear (ecology), and the language has been made much more field-specific ("conservation methods," "green organizations"), so the reader is able to see concretely the ideas the student is communicating.

Leaving Room for Discussion

This thesis statement is not capable of development or advancement in the paper:

Needs Improvement: There are always alternatives to illegal drug use.

This sample thesis statement makes a claim, but it is not a claim that will sustain extended discussion. This claim is the type of claim that might be appropriate for the conclusion of a paper, but in the beginning of the paper, the student is left with nowhere to go. What further points can be made? If there are "always alternatives" to the problem the student is identifying, then why bother developing a paper around that claim? Ideally, a thesis statement should be complex enough to explore over the length of the entire paper.

Better: The most effective treatment plan for methamphetamine addiction may be a combination of pharmacological and cognitive therapy, as argued by Baker (2008), Smith (2009), and Xavier (2011).

In the revised thesis, you can see the student make a specific, debatable claim that has the potential to generate several pages' worth of discussion. When drafting a thesis statement, think about the questions your thesis statement will generate: What follow-up inquiries might a reader have? In the first example, there are almost no additional questions implied, but the revised example allows for a good deal more exploration.

Thesis Mad Libs

If you are having trouble getting started, try using the models below to generate a rough model of a thesis statement! These models are intended for drafting purposes only and should not appear in your final work.

• In this essay, I argue ____, using ______ to assert _____.
• While scholars have often argued ______, I argue______, because_______.
• Through an analysis of ______, I argue ______, which is important because_______.

Words to Avoid and to Embrace

When drafting your thesis statement, avoid words like explore, investigate, learn, compile, summarize , and explain to describe the main purpose of your paper. These words imply a paper that summarizes or "reports," rather than synthesizing and analyzing.

Instead of the terms above, try words like argue, critique, question , and interrogate . These more analytical words may help you begin strongly, by articulating a specific, critical, scholarly position.

Read Kayla's blog post for tips on taking a stand in a well-crafted thesis statement.

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Module 5: Writing Process

How to write a thesis statement.

Whether you are writing a short essay or a doctoral dissertation, your thesis statement will arguably be the most difficult sentence to formulate. An effective thesis statement states the purpose of the paper and, therefore, functions to control, assert and structure your entire  argument . Without a sound thesis, your argument may sound weak, lacking in direction, and  uninteresting to the reader.

Start with a question — then make the answer your thesis

Regardless of how complicated the subject is, almost any thesis can be constructed by answering a question.

• Thesis: “Computers allow fourth graders an early advantage in technological and scientific education.”
• Thesis: “The river comes to symbolize both division and progress, as it separates our characters and country while still providing the best chance for Huck and Jim to get to know one another.”
• Thesis: “Through careful sociological study, we’ve found that people naturally assume that “morally righteous” people look down on them as “inferior,” causing anger and conflict where there generally is none.”

Tailor your thesis to the type of paper you’re writing

N ot all essays persuade, and not all essays teach. The goals of your paper will help you find the best thesis.

• Ex. “This dynamic between different generations sparks much of the play’s tension, as age becomes a motive for the violence and unrest that rocks King Lear.”
• Ex. “The explosion of 1800’s philosophies like Positivism, Marxism, and Darwinism undermined and refuted Christianity to instead focus on the real, tangible world.”
• Ex. “Without the steady hand and specific decisions of Barack Obama, America would never have recovered from the hole it entered in the early 2000’s.”

Ensure your thesis is provable

Good Theses Examples:

• “By owning up to the impossible contradictions, embracing them and questioning them, Blake forges his own faith, and is stronger for it. Ultimately, the only way for his poems to have faith is to temporarily lose it.”
• “According to its well-documented beliefs and philosophies, an existential society with no notion of either past or future cannot help but become stagnant.”
• “By reading “Ode to a Nightingale” through a modern deconstructionist lens, we can see how Keats viewed poetry as shifting and subjective, not some rigid form.”

Bad Theses Examples:

• “The wrong people won the American Revolution.” While striking and unique, who is “right” and who is “wrong” is exceptionally hard to prove, and very subjective.
• “The theory of genetic inheritance is the binding theory of every human interaction.” Too complicated and overzealous. The scope of “every human interaction” is just too big
• “Paul Harding’s novel Tinkers is ultimately a cry for help from a clearly depressed author.” Unless you interviewed Harding extensively, or had a lot of real-life sources, you have no way of proving what is fact and what is fiction.”

Get the sound right

Example thesis statements with good statement language include:

• “Because of William the Conqueror’s campaign into England, that nation developed the strength and culture it would need to eventually build the British Empire.”
• “Hemingway significantly changed literature by normalizing simplistic writing and frank tone.”

Know where to place a thesis statement

Because of the role thesis statements play, they appear at the beginning of the paper, usually at the end of the first paragraph or somewhere in the introduction. Although most people look for the thesis at the end of the first paragraph, its location can depend on a number of factors such as how lengthy of an introduction you need before you can introduce your thesis or the length of your paper.

Limit a thesis statement to one or two sentences in length

Thesis statements are clear and to the point, which helps the reader identify the topic and direction of the paper, as well as your position towards the subject.

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How to Write a Strong Thesis Statement: 4 Steps + Examples

What’s Covered:

What is the purpose of a thesis statement, writing a good thesis statement: 4 steps, common pitfalls to avoid, where to get your essay edited for free.

When you set out to write an essay, there has to be some kind of point to it, right? Otherwise, your essay would just be a big jumble of word salad that makes absolutely no sense. An essay needs a central point that ties into everything else. That main point is called a thesis statement, and it’s the core of any essay or research paper.

You may hear about Master degree candidates writing a thesis, and that is an entire paper–not to be confused with the thesis statement, which is typically one sentence that contains your paper’s focus. 

Read on to learn more about thesis statements and how to write them. We’ve also included some solid examples for you to reference.

Typically the last sentence of your introductory paragraph, the thesis statement serves as the roadmap for your essay. When your reader gets to the thesis statement, they should have a clear outline of your main point, as well as the information you’ll be presenting in order to either prove or support your point. 

The thesis statement should not be confused for a topic sentence , which is the first sentence of every paragraph in your essay. If you need help writing topic sentences, numerous resources are available. Topic sentences should go along with your thesis statement, though.

Since the thesis statement is the most important sentence of your entire essay or paper, it’s imperative that you get this part right. Otherwise, your paper will not have a good flow and will seem disjointed. That’s why it’s vital not to rush through developing one. It’s a methodical process with steps that you need to follow in order to create the best thesis statement possible.

Step 1: Decide what kind of paper you’re writing

When you’re assigned an essay, there are several different types you may get. Argumentative essays are designed to get the reader to agree with you on a topic. Informative or expository essays present information to the reader. Analytical essays offer up a point and then expand on it by analyzing relevant information. Thesis statements can look and sound different based on the type of paper you’re writing. For example:

• Argumentative: The United States needs a viable third political party to decrease bipartisanship, increase options, and help reduce corruption in government.
• Informative: The Libertarian party has thrown off elections before by gaining enough support in states to get on the ballot and by taking away crucial votes from candidates.
• Analytical: An analysis of past presidential elections shows that while third party votes may have been the minority, they did affect the outcome of the elections in 2020, 2016, and beyond.

Step 2: Figure out what point you want to make

Once you know what type of paper you’re writing, you then need to figure out the point you want to make with your thesis statement, and subsequently, your paper. In other words, you need to decide to answer a question about something, such as:

• What impact did reality TV have on American society?
• How has the musical Hamilton affected perception of American history?
• Why do I want to major in [chosen major here]?

If you have an argumentative essay, then you will be writing about an opinion. To make it easier, you may want to choose an opinion that you feel passionate about so that you’re writing about something that interests you. For example, if you have an interest in preserving the environment, you may want to choose a topic that relates to that. 

If you’re writing your college essay and they ask why you want to attend that school, you may want to have a main point and back it up with information, something along the lines of:

“Attending Harvard University would benefit me both academically and professionally, as it would give me a strong knowledge base upon which to build my career, develop my network, and hopefully give me an advantage in my chosen field.”

Step 3: Determine what information you’ll use to back up your point

Once you have the point you want to make, you need to figure out how you plan to back it up throughout the rest of your essay. Without this information, it will be hard to either prove or argue the main point of your thesis statement. If you decide to write about the Hamilton example, you may decide to address any falsehoods that the writer put into the musical, such as:

“The musical Hamilton, while accurate in many ways, leaves out key parts of American history, presents a nationalist view of founding fathers, and downplays the racism of the times.”

Once you’ve written your initial working thesis statement, you’ll then need to get information to back that up. For example, the musical completely leaves out Benjamin Franklin, portrays the founding fathers in a nationalist way that is too complimentary, and shows Hamilton as a staunch abolitionist despite the fact that his family likely did own slaves. 

Step 4: Revise and refine your thesis statement before you start writing

Read through your thesis statement several times before you begin to compose your full essay. You need to make sure the statement is ironclad, since it is the foundation of the entire paper. Edit it or have a peer review it for you to make sure everything makes sense and that you feel like you can truly write a paper on the topic. Once you’ve done that, you can then begin writing your paper.

When writing a thesis statement, there are some common pitfalls you should avoid so that your paper can be as solid as possible. Make sure you always edit the thesis statement before you do anything else. You also want to ensure that the thesis statement is clear and concise. Don’t make your reader hunt for your point. Finally, put your thesis statement at the end of the first paragraph and have your introduction flow toward that statement. Your reader will expect to find your statement in its traditional spot.

If you’re having trouble getting started, or need some guidance on your essay, there are tools available that can help you. CollegeVine offers a free peer essay review tool where one of your peers can read through your essay and provide you with valuable feedback. Getting essay feedback from a peer can help you wow your instructor or college admissions officer with an impactful essay that effectively illustrates your point.

Related CollegeVine Blog Posts

While Sandel argues that pursuing perfection through genetic engineering would decrease our sense of humility, he claims that the sense of solidarity we would lose is also important.

This thesis summarizes several points in Sandel’s argument, but it does not make a claim about how we should understand his argument. A reader who read Sandel’s argument would not also need to read an essay based on this descriptive thesis.  

Broad thesis (arguable, but difficult to support with evidence) 

Michael Sandel’s arguments about genetic engineering do not take into consideration all the relevant issues.

This is an arguable claim because it would be possible to argue against it by saying that Michael Sandel’s arguments do take all of the relevant issues into consideration. But the claim is too broad. Because the thesis does not specify which “issues” it is focused on—or why it matters if they are considered—readers won’t know what the rest of the essay will argue, and the writer won’t know what to focus on. If there is a particular issue that Sandel does not address, then a more specific version of the thesis would include that issue—hand an explanation of why it is important.  

Arguable thesis with analytical claim 

While Sandel argues persuasively that our instinct to “remake” (54) ourselves into something ever more perfect is a problem, his belief that we can always draw a line between what is medically necessary and what makes us simply “better than well” (51) is less convincing.

This is an arguable analytical claim. To argue for this claim, the essay writer will need to show how evidence from the article itself points to this interpretation. It’s also a reasonable scope for a thesis because it can be supported with evidence available in the text and is neither too broad nor too narrow.  

Arguable thesis with normative claim 

Given Sandel’s argument against genetic enhancement, we should not allow parents to decide on using Human Growth Hormone for their children.

This thesis tells us what we should do about a particular issue discussed in Sandel’s article, but it does not tell us how we should understand Sandel’s argument.  

Questions to ask about your thesis 

• Is the thesis truly arguable? Does it speak to a genuine dilemma in the source, or would most readers automatically agree with it?  
• Is the thesis too obvious? Again, would most or all readers agree with it without needing to see your argument?  
• Is the thesis complex enough to require a whole essay's worth of argument?  
• Is the thesis supportable with evidence from the text rather than with generalizations or outside research?  
• Would anyone want to read a paper in which this thesis was developed? That is, can you explain what this paper is adding to our understanding of a problem, question, or topic?
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8.4: Creating and Revising a Thesis Statement

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HOW CAN I CREATE A THESIS?

TOPIC + OPINION + SO WHAT? = THESIS

Step 1 : Brainstorm Topics

Here are some questions that could help you:

• What in the text inspired, confused, angered, excited, annoyed, and/or surprised you?
• What in the text was important for you to understand or you feel others should be aware of?
• What does the prompt/assignment ask you to focus on and explore?

Brainstorm the issues, ideas, and themes raised in the reading (create at least 15 for a range of options):

Step 2 : Select a topic

Choose one of the topics that most interest you and you want to explore further:

Step 3 : Create complex questions about your topic

Create complex questions to be answered with opinion, not facts or yes/no answers. Here are some question formats that could help you: How is (topic) connected to (outside issue)? How do the flaws in the author’s arguments on (topic) result in (outcome)? What angles on (topic) have been overlooked? How can we apply the information about (topic)? How did/will (effect) occur because/if (cause) happened or will happen? How can (problem) be addressed or changed for (topic)?

Step 4 : Answer your best question with your opinion.

This creates a rough thesis statement.

Step 5 : Ask yourself “so what?” So what is the impact, importance, outcomes, or larger implications?

This strengthens and deepens your thesis statement.

Step 6 : Using your answer with its significance, write a 1-2 sentence thesis statement.

This refines and focuses your thesis statement.

Step 7 : Test the thesis by seeing if you can gather good evidence to support it.

Go through the main text(s) you are writing on and list all the passages (using page numbers) that directly prove and/or illustrate your argument: List potential outside evidence, such as research, outside sources, real-life examples, personal knowledge, personal examples that could possibly further prove and/or illustrate your argument: If you cannot find strong or sufficient evidence, then rethink your thesis statement.

Step 1 : Brainstorm Topics Here are some questions that could help you:

Reading and writing as dangerous

How is control of human beings connected to writing and reading?

Why were the slaveholders so fearful of slaves learning to read and write?

When has reading lead to violence and uprising?

What about becoming educated leads to Douglass’s despair?

Slaves were controlled by not being able to read and write because they could not learn by reading the arguments and experiences of others and from history what is fair, just and reasonable and what is not.

So what? We should be concerned because in certain parts of the world today, what the public can read and write is controlled and as a result the rights of the people are violated and they are powerless or ignorant of this.

The control and limitations over reading and writing during slavery sought to make slaves like Douglass ignorant, powerless, and more easily controlled, and this control over literacy and education is still happening in the world today.

Go through the main text(s) you are writing on and list all the passages (using page numbers) that directly prove and/or illustrate your argument:

• Douglass discovers that “… education and slavery were incompatible with each other.” (1)
• On page 2 it describes how Douglass read in “The Columbian Orator” how a slave used logic and persuasive argument so well that his master freed him (shows education can lead to change).
• Reading and education makes one intolerant of injustice: “The more I read, the more I was led to abhor and detest my enslavers” (2).
• Douglass says: “…that very discontentment which Master Hugh had predicted would follow my learning to read had already come, to torment and sting my soul to unutterable anguish. As I writhed under it, I would at times feel that learning to read had been a curse rather than a blessing. It had given me a view of my wretched condition, without the remedy. It opened my eyes to the horrible pit, but to no ladder upon which to get out. In moments of agony, I envied my fellow-slaves for their stupidity” (2) (But Douglass did not give up and later was instrumental in abolishing slavery)

List potential outside evidence, such as research, outside sources, real-life examples, personal knowledge, personal examples that could possibly further prove and/or illustrate your argument:

• Mukhtar Mai in her memoir In the Name of Honor , tells how as a woman in Pakistan, she was not allowed to learn to read and write. As a result, when she was publically gang raped in 2002 by members of a more powerful clan, she went to the police and they wrote down an incorrect statement of the account so after years of going through the court system, the men were acquitted. Since then she has learned to read and write, she has started schools to educate girls, and remains today an outspoken advocate for women’s rights.
• In Alex S. Jones’s Losing the News: The Future of the News that Feeds Democracy he argues that in the United States we are losing funding and support for investigative journalism so Americans are getting sound bites of news and no real understanding of what is going on politically or financially so we don’t protest and don’t understand the sources for the larger societal problems like the recent financial collapse.
• Jonathan Kozol in Savage Inequalities , looks at different cities and sees how many of the urban poor, most of whom are black and Latino, are not given an equal education because school funding is based on income and property tax. As a result, there is an enormous dropout rate and many of these kids can barely read and write.

HOW CAN I REVISE AND STRENGTHEN A THESIS?

Changing ineffective thesis statements to effective ones:.

1. A strong thesis statement takes a stand: your thesis needs to show your conclusions about a subject.

WEAK THESIS: Douglass makes the interesting point that there are some negative and positive aspects to reading.

This is a weak thesis statement. It fails to take a stand and the words interesting and negative and positive aspects are vague.

STRONGER THESIS:

2. A strong thesis statement justifies discussion: your thesis should indicate the point of the discussion.

WEAK THESIS: Christians practiced slavery in the United States.

This is a weak thesis statement because it merely states a fact, so your reader won’t be able to tell the point of the statement.

3. A strong thesis statement expresses one main idea: Readers need to be able to see that your paper has one main point. If your thesis statement expresses more than one idea, then you might confuse your readers about the subject of your paper.

WEAK THESIS: People should not follow unjust laws and showing strong determination is what helped Douglass to be successful.

This is a weak thesis statement because the reader can’t decide whether the paper is about unjust laws or strong determination. To revise the thesis, the relationship between the two ideas needs to become clearer. STRONGER THESIS:

4. A strong thesis statement is specific: A thesis statement should show exactly what your paper will be about and the argument should be narrow enough to be concretely proven.

WEAK THESIS: Slavery in the United States damaged many lives.

This is a weak thesis statement for two reasons. First, slavery can’t be discussed thoroughly in a short essay. Second, damaged is vague and many lives is very general. You should be able to identify specific causes and effects. STRONGER THESIS:

ENCYCLOPEDIC ENTRY

A nation is a territory where all the people are led by the same government. The word “nation” can also refer to a group of people who share a history, traditions, culture and, often, language—even if the group does not have a country of its own.

Arts and Music, Geography, Human Geography, Social Studies, Civics

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A nation is a territory where all the people are led by the same government . The word “nation” can also refer to a group of people who share a history, traditions , culture and, often, language—even if the group does not have a country of its own. People within this type of nation share a common identity, and think of themselves as belonging to the same group. Palestinians, who live in and near the nation of Israel, fit in this category. Though Palestinians share a national identity , elect their own government , and share cultural beliefs, they do not have an internationally recognized nation of their own. The United Nations currently recognizes 193 nations around the world, though only 192 are members of the UN's General Assembly . (Vatican City, which is led by the Roman Catholic Church, is recognized as a sovereign nation but is not a member of the General Assembly.) Other nations are not recognized by one or more states for varying reasons. Sometimes, a single nation does not recognize another nation. North Korea and South Korea do not recognize each other as nations, for instance. They each oppose the politics of the other. The leaders of some unrecognized nations maintain a “ government in exile .” These leaders were ousted by social change , such as a revolution , in their country. The leaders currently live in another country, but consider themselves the leaders of their nation. Sometimes, people of that nation want the leader to return. Many Tibetans, for instance, look forward to a time when the Dalai Lama , the leader of Tibet’s government in exile, will return to the country. The Dalai Lama has not been to Tibet since 1959, when Tibet became a part of China.

Other times, a government in exile can form entirely outside the nation it wants to govern . The Free Republic of Vietnam considers itself a government in exile of the nation of Vietnam. The Free Republic of Vietnam was formed after the Vietnam War by emigrants who did not want to live in the new, socialist government of Vietnam.

First Nations Native American tribes are considered independent nations in the United States and Canada. There are hundreds of nations, from the Ho Chuck Nation of Wisconsin to the Makah Nation of Washington state. For many Americans, the term First Nations has become a term for indigenous people of North America. First Nations is the official term for Canadian tribes. First Nations include the Dene in Canadas Arctic, the Mikmaq Confederacy on Prince Edward Island, and the Grand Council of the Crees in Quebec.

Nationality One nation may extend across several countries, and one country may include many nations. Kurdistan is an unrecognized nation that includes parts of Turkey, Armenia, Syria, Iran, and Iraq. The United Kingdom is a nation that includes the countries of England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland.

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The thesis statement or main claim must be debatable

An argumentative or persuasive piece of writing must begin with a debatable thesis or claim. In other words, the thesis must be something that people could reasonably have differing opinions on. If your thesis is something that is generally agreed upon or accepted as fact then there is no reason to try to persuade people.

Example of a non-debatable thesis statement:

This thesis statement is not debatable. First, the word pollution implies that something is bad or negative in some way. Furthermore, all studies agree that pollution is a problem; they simply disagree on the impact it will have or the scope of the problem. No one could reasonably argue that pollution is unambiguously good.

Example of a debatable thesis statement:

This is an example of a debatable thesis because reasonable people could disagree with it. Some people might think that this is how we should spend the nation's money. Others might feel that we should be spending more money on education. Still others could argue that corporations, not the government, should be paying to limit pollution.

Another example of a debatable thesis statement:

In this example there is also room for disagreement between rational individuals. Some citizens might think focusing on recycling programs rather than private automobiles is the most effective strategy.

The thesis needs to be narrow

Although the scope of your paper might seem overwhelming at the start, generally the narrower the thesis the more effective your argument will be. Your thesis or claim must be supported by evidence. The broader your claim is, the more evidence you will need to convince readers that your position is right.

Example of a thesis that is too broad:

There are several reasons this statement is too broad to argue. First, what is included in the category "drugs"? Is the author talking about illegal drug use, recreational drug use (which might include alcohol and cigarettes), or all uses of medication in general? Second, in what ways are drugs detrimental? Is drug use causing deaths (and is the author equating deaths from overdoses and deaths from drug related violence)? Is drug use changing the moral climate or causing the economy to decline? Finally, what does the author mean by "society"? Is the author referring only to America or to the global population? Does the author make any distinction between the effects on children and adults? There are just too many questions that the claim leaves open. The author could not cover all of the topics listed above, yet the generality of the claim leaves all of these possibilities open to debate.

Example of a narrow or focused thesis:

In this example the topic of drugs has been narrowed down to illegal drugs and the detriment has been narrowed down to gang violence. This is a much more manageable topic.

We could narrow each debatable thesis from the previous examples in the following way:

Narrowed debatable thesis 1:

This thesis narrows the scope of the argument by specifying not just the amount of money used but also how the money could actually help to control pollution.

Narrowed debatable thesis 2:

This thesis narrows the scope of the argument by specifying not just what the focus of a national anti-pollution campaign should be but also why this is the appropriate focus.

Qualifiers such as " typically ," " generally ," " usually ," or " on average " also help to limit the scope of your claim by allowing for the almost inevitable exception to the rule.

Types of claims

Claims typically fall into one of four categories. Thinking about how you want to approach your topic, or, in other words, what type of claim you want to make, is one way to focus your thesis on one particular aspect of your broader topic.

Claims of fact or definition: These claims argue about what the definition of something is or whether something is a settled fact. Example:

Claims of cause and effect: These claims argue that one person, thing, or event caused another thing or event to occur. Example:

Claims about value: These are claims made of what something is worth, whether we value it or not, how we would rate or categorize something. Example:

Claims about solutions or policies: These are claims that argue for or against a certain solution or policy approach to a problem. Example:

Which type of claim is right for your argument? Which type of thesis or claim you use for your argument will depend on your position and knowledge of the topic, your audience, and the context of your paper. You might want to think about where you imagine your audience to be on this topic and pinpoint where you think the biggest difference in viewpoints might be. Even if you start with one type of claim you probably will be using several within the paper. Regardless of the type of claim you choose to utilize it is key to identify the controversy or debate you are addressing and to define your position early on in the paper.

Want to create or adapt books like this? Learn more about how Pressbooks supports open publishing practices.

9.1 Developing a Strong, Clear Thesis Statement

Learning objectives.

• Develop a strong, clear thesis statement with the proper elements.
• Revise your thesis statement.

Have you ever known a person who was not very good at telling stories? You probably had trouble following his train of thought as he jumped around from point to point, either being too brief in places that needed further explanation or providing too many details on a meaningless element. Maybe he told the end of the story first, then moved to the beginning and later added details to the middle. His ideas were probably scattered, and the story did not flow very well. When the story was over, you probably had many questions.

Just as a personal anecdote can be a disorganized mess, an essay can fall into the same trap of being out of order and confusing. That is why writers need a thesis statement to provide a specific focus for their essay and to organize what they are about to discuss in the body.

Just like a topic sentence summarizes a single paragraph, the thesis statement summarizes an entire essay. It tells the reader the point you want to make in your essay, while the essay itself supports that point. It is like a signpost that signals the essay’s destination. You should form your thesis before you begin to organize an essay, but you may find that it needs revision as the essay develops.

Elements of a Thesis Statement

For every essay you write, you must focus on a central idea. This idea stems from a topic you have chosen or been assigned or from a question your teacher has asked. It is not enough merely to discuss a general topic or simply answer a question with a yes or no. You have to form a specific opinion, and then articulate that into a controlling idea —the main idea upon which you build your thesis.

Remember that a thesis is not the topic itself, but rather your interpretation of the question or subject. For whatever topic your professor gives you, you must ask yourself, “What do I want to say about it?” Asking and then answering this question is vital to forming a thesis that is precise, forceful and confident.

A thesis is one sentence long and appears toward the end of your introduction. It is specific and focuses on one to three points of a single idea—points that are able to be demonstrated in the body. It forecasts the content of the essay and suggests how you will organize your information. Remember that a thesis statement does not summarize an issue but rather dissects it.

A Strong Thesis Statement

A strong thesis statement contains the following qualities.

Specificity. A thesis statement must concentrate on a specific area of a general topic. As you may recall, the creation of a thesis statement begins when you choose a broad subject and then narrow down its parts until you pinpoint a specific aspect of that topic. For example, health care is a broad topic, but a proper thesis statement would focus on a specific area of that topic, such as options for individuals without health care coverage.

Precision. A strong thesis statement must be precise enough to allow for a coherent argument and to remain focused on the topic. If the specific topic is options for individuals without health care coverage, then your precise thesis statement must make an exact claim about it, such as that limited options exist for those who are uninsured by their employers. You must further pinpoint what you are going to discuss regarding these limited effects, such as whom they affect and what the cause is.

Ability to be argued. A thesis statement must present a relevant and specific argument. A factual statement often is not considered arguable. Be sure your thesis statement contains a point of view that can be supported with evidence.

Ability to be demonstrated. For any claim you make in your thesis, you must be able to provide reasons and examples for your opinion. You can rely on personal observations in order to do this, or you can consult outside sources to demonstrate that what you assert is valid. A worthy argument is backed by examples and details.

Forcefulness. A thesis statement that is forceful shows readers that you are, in fact, making an argument. The tone is assertive and takes a stance that others might oppose.

Confidence. In addition to using force in your thesis statement, you must also use confidence in your claim. Phrases such as I feel or I believe actually weaken the readers’ sense of your confidence because these phrases imply that you are the only person who feels the way you do. In other words, your stance has insufficient backing. Taking an authoritative stance on the matter persuades your readers to have faith in your argument and open their minds to what you have to say.

Even in a personal essay that allows the use of first person, your thesis should not contain phrases such as in my opinion or I believe . These statements reduce your credibility and weaken your argument. Your opinion is more convincing when you use a firm attitude.

On a separate sheet of paper, write a thesis statement for each of the following topics. Remember to make each statement specific, precise, demonstrable, forceful and confident.

• Texting while driving
• The legal drinking age in the United States
• Steroid use among professional athletes

Examples of Appropriate Thesis Statements

Each of the following thesis statements meets several of the following requirements:

• Specificity
• Ability to be argued
• Ability to be demonstrated
• Forcefulness
• The societal and personal struggles of Troy Maxon in the play Fences symbolize the challenge of black males who lived through segregation and integration in the United States.
• Closing all American borders for a period of five years is one solution that will tackle illegal immigration.
• Shakespeare’s use of dramatic irony in Romeo and Juliet spoils the outcome for the audience and weakens the plot.
• J. D. Salinger’s character in Catcher in the Rye , Holden Caulfield, is a confused rebel who voices his disgust with phonies, yet in an effort to protect himself, he acts like a phony on many occasions.
• Compared to an absolute divorce, no-fault divorce is less expensive, promotes fairer settlements, and reflects a more realistic view of the causes for marital breakdown.
• Exposing children from an early age to the dangers of drug abuse is a sure method of preventing future drug addicts.
• In today’s crumbling job market, a high school diploma is not significant enough education to land a stable, lucrative job.

You can find thesis statements in many places, such as in the news; in the opinions of friends, coworkers or teachers; and even in songs you hear on the radio. Become aware of thesis statements in everyday life by paying attention to people’s opinions and their reasons for those opinions. Pay attention to your own everyday thesis statements as well, as these can become material for future essays.

Now that you have read about the contents of a good thesis statement and have seen examples, take a look at the pitfalls to avoid when composing your own thesis:

A thesis is weak when it is simply a declaration of your subject or a description of what you will discuss in your essay.

Weak thesis statement: My paper will explain why imagination is more important than knowledge.

A thesis is weak when it makes an unreasonable or outrageous claim or insults the opposing side.

Weak thesis statement: Religious radicals across America are trying to legislate their Puritanical beliefs by banning required high school books.

A thesis is weak when it contains an obvious fact or something that no one can disagree with or provides a dead end.

Weak thesis statement: Advertising companies use sex to sell their products.

A thesis is weak when the statement is too broad.

Weak thesis statement: The life of Abraham Lincoln was long and challenging.

Read the following thesis statements. On a separate piece of paper, identify each as weak or strong. For those that are weak, list the reasons why. Then revise the weak statements so that they conform to the requirements of a strong thesis.

• The subject of this paper is my experience with ferrets as pets.
• The government must expand its funding for research on renewable energy resources in order to prepare for the impending end of oil.
• Edgar Allan Poe was a poet who lived in Baltimore during the nineteenth century.
• In this essay, I will give you lots of reasons why slot machines should not be legalized in Baltimore.
• Despite his promises during his campaign, President Kennedy took few executive measures to support civil rights legislation.
• Because many children’s toys have potential safety hazards that could lead to injury, it is clear that not all children’s toys are safe.
• My experience with young children has taught me that I want to be a disciplinary parent because I believe that a child without discipline can be a parent’s worst nightmare.

Writing at Work

Often in your career, you will need to ask your boss for something through an e-mail. Just as a thesis statement organizes an essay, it can also organize your e-mail request. While your e-mail will be shorter than an essay, using a thesis statement in your first paragraph quickly lets your boss know what you are asking for, why it is necessary, and what the benefits are. In short body paragraphs, you can provide the essential information needed to expand upon your request.

Thesis Statement Revision

Your thesis will probably change as you write, so you will need to modify it to reflect exactly what you have discussed in your essay. Remember from Chapter 8 “The Writing Process: How Do I Begin?” that your thesis statement begins as a working thesis statement , an indefinite statement that you make about your topic early in the writing process for the purpose of planning and guiding your writing.

Working thesis statements often become stronger as you gather information and form new opinions and reasons for those opinions. Revision helps you strengthen your thesis so that it matches what you have expressed in the body of the paper.

The best way to revise your thesis statement is to ask questions about it and then examine the answers to those questions. By challenging your own ideas and forming definite reasons for those ideas, you grow closer to a more precise point of view, which you can then incorporate into your thesis statement.

Ways to Revise Your Thesis

You can cut down on irrelevant aspects and revise your thesis by taking the following steps:

1. Pinpoint and replace all nonspecific words, such as people , everything , society , or life , with more precise words in order to reduce any vagueness.

Working thesis: Young people have to work hard to succeed in life.

Revised thesis: Recent college graduates must have discipline and persistence in order to find and maintain a stable job in which they can use and be appreciated for their talents.

The revised thesis makes a more specific statement about success and what it means to work hard. The original includes too broad a range of people and does not define exactly what success entails. By replacing those general words like people and work hard , the writer can better focus his or her research and gain more direction in his or her writing.

2. Clarify ideas that need explanation by asking yourself questions that narrow your thesis.

Working thesis: The welfare system is a joke.

Revised thesis: The welfare system keeps a socioeconomic class from gaining employment by alluring members of that class with unearned income, instead of programs to improve their education and skill sets.

A joke means many things to many people. Readers bring all sorts of backgrounds and perspectives to the reading process and would need clarification for a word so vague. This expression may also be too informal for the selected audience. By asking questions, the writer can devise a more precise and appropriate explanation for joke . The writer should ask himself or herself questions similar to the 5WH questions. (See Chapter 8 “The Writing Process: How Do I Begin?” for more information on the 5WH questions.) By incorporating the answers to these questions into a thesis statement, the writer more accurately defines his or her stance, which will better guide the writing of the essay.

3. Replace any linking verbs with action verbs. Linking verbs are forms of the verb to be , a verb that simply states that a situation exists.

Working thesis: Kansas City schoolteachers are not paid enough.

Revised thesis: The Kansas City legislature cannot afford to pay its educators, resulting in job cuts and resignations in a district that sorely needs highly qualified and dedicated teachers.

The linking verb in this working thesis statement is the word are . Linking verbs often make thesis statements weak because they do not express action. Rather, they connect words and phrases to the second half of the sentence. Readers might wonder, “Why are they not paid enough?” But this statement does not compel them to ask many more questions. The writer should ask himself or herself questions in order to replace the linking verb with an action verb, thus forming a stronger thesis statement, one that takes a more definitive stance on the issue:

• Who is not paying the teachers enough?
• What is considered “enough”?
• What is the problem?
• What are the results

4. Omit any general claims that are hard to support.

Working thesis: Today’s teenage girls are too sexualized.

Revised thesis: Teenage girls who are captivated by the sexual images on MTV are conditioned to believe that a woman’s worth depends on her sensuality, a feeling that harms their self-esteem and behavior.

It is true that some young women in today’s society are more sexualized than in the past, but that is not true for all girls. Many girls have strict parents, dress appropriately, and do not engage in sexual activity while in middle school and high school. The writer of this thesis should ask the following questions:

• Which teenage girls?
• What constitutes “too” sexualized?
• Why are they behaving that way?
• Where does this behavior show up?
• What are the repercussions?

In the first section of Chapter 8 “The Writing Process: How Do I Begin?” , you determined your purpose for writing and your audience. You then completed a freewriting exercise about an event you recently experienced and chose a general topic to write about. Using that general topic, you then narrowed it down by answering the 5WH questions. After you answered these questions, you chose one of the three methods of prewriting and gathered possible supporting points for your working thesis statement.

Now, on a separate sheet of paper, write down your working thesis statement. Identify any weaknesses in this sentence and revise the statement to reflect the elements of a strong thesis statement. Make sure it is specific, precise, arguable, demonstrable, forceful, and confident.

Collaboration

Please share with a classmate and compare your answers.

In your career you may have to write a project proposal that focuses on a particular problem in your company, such as reinforcing the tardiness policy. The proposal would aim to fix the problem; using a thesis statement would clearly state the boundaries of the problem and tell the goals of the project. After writing the proposal, you may find that the thesis needs revision to reflect exactly what is expressed in the body. Using the techniques from this chapter would apply to revising that thesis.

Key Takeaways

• Proper essays require a thesis statement to provide a specific focus and suggest how the essay will be organized.
• A thesis statement is your interpretation of the subject, not the topic itself.
• A strong thesis is specific, precise, forceful, confident, and is able to be demonstrated.
• A strong thesis challenges readers with a point of view that can be debated and can be supported with evidence.
• A weak thesis is simply a declaration of your topic or contains an obvious fact that cannot be argued.
• Depending on your topic, it may or may not be appropriate to use first person point of view.
• Revise your thesis by ensuring all words are specific, all ideas are exact, and all verbs express action.

Writing for Success Copyright © 2015 by University of Minnesota is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

Here is what Stormy Daniels testified happened between her and Donald Trump

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Porn performer Stormy Daniels took the witness stand Tuesday in the hush money case against former President Trump, who looked on as she detailed their alleged sexual encounter and the payment she got to keep it quiet.

Prosecutors allege Trump paid Daniels to keep quiet about the allegations as he ran for president in 2016. Her testimony aired them very publicly as the presumptive Republican presidential nominee seeks to win the White House again.

Trump denies having sex with Daniels , and his lawyers unsuccessfully pushed for a mistrial midway through her testimony.

It was a major spectacle in the first criminal trial of a former American president, now in its third week of testimony in Manhattan.

Here are some takeaways from Daniels’ testimony:

Who is Stormy Daniels?

The case centers on a $130,000 payment to Daniels from Trump’s then-lawyer, Michael Cohen, in the final weeks of Trump’s 2016 campaign. Prosecutors say it was part of a scheme to illegally influence the campaign by burying negative stories about him.

Stormy Daniels describes meeting Trump in occasionally graphic testimony

The porn actor’s testimony, even if sanitized and stripped of tell-all details, has been the most-awaited spectacle in Donald Trump’s hush money trial.

May 7, 2024

His lawyers have sought to show that Trump was trying to protect his reputation and family — not his campaign — by shielding them from embarrassing stories about his personal life.

Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, told jurors that she started exotic dancing in high school and appearing in adult films at age 23, eventually moving to direct more than 150 films and winning a roster of porn industry awards.

World & Nation

Key players: Who’s who at Donald Trump’s hush-money criminal trial

Donald Trump’s hush money criminal trial shifts to opening statements Monday, followed by the start of witness testimony. Who’s who in the case?

April 21, 2024

Meeting Trump

Daniels testified she first met and chatted with Trump at a 2006 Lake Tahoe celebrity golf outing where her studio was a sponsor.

He referred to her as “the smart one” and asked her if she wanted to go to dinner, she said. Daniels testified that she accepted Trump’s invitation because she wanted to avoid dinner with her co-workers and thought it might help her career. Trump had his bodyguard get her number, she said.

When they met up later in his penthouse, she appreciated that he seemed interested in the business aspects of the industry rather than the “sexy stuff.” He also suggested putting her on his TV show, “The Apprentice,” a possibility she hoped could help establish her as a writer and director.

She left to use the bathroom and was startled to find Trump in his underwear when she returned, she said. She didn’t feel physically or verbally threatened but realized that he was “bigger and blocking the way,” she testified.

“The next thing I know was: I was on the bed,” and they were having sex, Daniels recalled. The encounter was brief but left her “shaking,” she said. “I just wanted to leave,” she testified.

Stormy Daniels alleges in new documentary that Donald Trump cornered her the night they met

‘I have not forgiven myself because I didn’t shut his a— down in that moment’ in 2006, the adult filmmaker says in ‘Stormy,’ premiering March 18 on Peacock.

March 7, 2024

Payments for silence

Daniels was asked if Trump ever told her to keep things between them confidential, and said, “Absolutely not.” She said she learned in 2011 that a magazine had learned the story of their encounter, and she agreed to do an interview for $15,000 to make money and “control the narrative.” The story never ran.

In 2016, when Trump was running for president, Daniels said she authorized her manager to shop the story around but did not initially receive interest from news outlets. She said that changed in October with the release of the “Access Hollywood” tape in which Trump bragged about grabbing women sexually without asking permission . She said she learned that Cohen wanted to buy her silence.

Former tabloid publisher testifies about scheme to shield Trump from damaging stories

Trump is back in a New York courtroom as his hush money trial resumes. In D.C., the Supreme Court considers if he should be immune for actions while president.

April 25, 2024

Mistrial push

Midway through her testimony, Trump’s lawyers moved for a mistrial.

Defense lawyer Todd Blanche argued that Daniels’ testimony about the alleged encounter and other meetings with him had “nothing to do with this case,” and would unfairly prejudice the jury.

The judge rejected it, and he faulted defense attorneys for not raising more of their objections while she was testifying.

Before Daniels took the stand, Trump’s lawyers had tried to stop her from testifying about the encounter’s details, saying it was irrelevant in “a case about books and records.”

Prosecutors countered that Daniels’ testimony gets at what Trump was trying to hide and they were “very mindful” not to draw too much graphic detail. Before Daniels took the stand, they told the judge the testimony would be “really basic,” and would not “involve any details of genitalia.”

While the judge didn’t side with Trump’s lawyers, he acknowledged that some details were excessive. The objections could potentially be used by Trump’s lawyers if he is convicted and they file an appeal.

News analysis: Why Putin is raising the specter of nuclear weapons again

Russia announces plans to hold drills near Ukraine simulating the use of battlefield nuclear weapons.

May 6, 2024

Cross-examination

Trump’s lawyers tried to attack Daniels’ credibility, suggesting she was motivated by money and that her account has shifted over the years.

“Am I correct that you hate President Trump?” defense lawyer Susan Necheles asked Daniels at one point. Daniels acknowledged she did.

“And you want him to go to jail?” the lawyer asked.

“I want him to be held accountable,” Daniels said. Pressed again whether that meant going to jail, she said: “If he’s convicted.”

The defense pressed Daniels on the fact that she owes Trump hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees stemming from an unsuccessful defamation lawsuit, and on a 2022 tweet in which she said she “will go to jail before I pay a penny.” Daniels dug in at times in the face of pointed questions, forcefully denying the idea that she had tried to extort money from Trump.

Trump whispered frequently to his attorney during Daniels’ testimony, and his expression seemed to be pained at one point as she recounted details about the dinner she says they shared. He shook his head and appeared to say something under his breath as Daniels testified that Trump told her he didn’t sleep in the same room as his wife.

On the way out of the courthouse, Trump called it “a very revealing day.” He didn’t address Daniels’ testimony explicitly but claimed the prosecutors’ case was “totally falling apart.”

With oil funds and Formula One, Saudi Arabia steamrolls its way onto sports’ hallowed grounds

Saudi Arabia’s oil riches have rocked soccer, golf, even esports, and the autocratic kingdom is expanding in Formula One car racing. What’s behind the push?

May 2, 2024

Jarring split screen

Trump’s appearance in court Tuesday, like all other days he’s stuck in the courtroom, means he can’t be out on the campaign trail as he runs for president a third time. It’s a frequent source of his complaints, but Daniels’ testimony in particular might underscore how much of a distraction the trial is from the business of running for president.

While Trump was stuck in a Manhattan courthouse away from voters and unable to speak for much of the day, President Biden was attending a Holocaust remembrance ceremony and condemning antisemitism .

It’s an issue Trump has sought to use against Biden in the campaign by seizing on the protests at college campuses over the Israel-Hamas war .

Associated Press writer Price reported from New York, Whitehurst from Washington. AP writers Michael Sisak, Jennifer Peltz, Jake Offenhartz and Alanna Durkin Richer contributed to this story.

More to Read

Abcarian: The porn star with a well-deserved place in American history

May 12, 2024

Trump trial turns to sex, bank accounts and power: Highlights from the third week of testimony

May 11, 2024

Commentary: Being a porn star doesn’t make Stormy Daniels a liar. Trump’s lawyer should have known that

May 10, 2024

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Xi Visits Europe, Seeking Strategic Opportunity

The Chinese leader has carefully chosen three countries — France, Serbia and Hungary — that to varying degrees embrace Beijing’s push for a new global order.

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By Roger Cohen and Chris Buckley

Reporting from Paris and Taipei, Taiwan

On his first visit to Europe in five years, the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, appears intent on seizing opportunities to loosen the continent’s bonds with the United States and forge a world freed of American dominance.

The Chinese leader has chosen three countries to visit — France, Serbia and Hungary — that all, to a greater or lesser degree, look askance at America’s postwar ordering of the world, see China as a necessary counterweight and are eager to bolster economic ties.

At a time of tensions with much of Europe — over China’s “no limits” embrace of Russia despite the war in Ukraine, its surveillance state and its apparent espionage activities that led to the recent arrest in Germany of four people — Mr. Xi, who arrived in France on Sunday, wants to demonstrate China’s growing influence on the continent and pursue a pragmatic rapprochement.

For Europe, the visit will test its delicate balancing act between China and the United States and will no doubt be seen in Washington as a none-too-subtle effort by Mr. Xi to divide Western allies. Chinese-French relations “have established a model for the international community of peaceful coexistence and win-win cooperation between countries with different social systems,” Mr. Xi said in a statement issued soon after he arrived in Paris.

He has timed his arrival at his second stop, Serbia, to coincide with the 25th anniversary of the deadly NATO bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade during the Kosovo war. That mistaken strike on May 7, 1999, for which the White House apologized, killed three Chinese journalists and ignited furious protests around the U.S. Embassy in Beijing.

“For Xi, being in Belgrade is a very economical way to ask if the United States is really serious about international law,” said Janka Oertel, the director of the Asia program at the European Council on Foreign Relations in Berlin, “and to say, how about NATO overreach as a problem for other countries?”

The Chinese government has continued to commemorate the Belgrade bombing, using it as an occasion to denounce what it sees as Western hypocrisy and bullying.

“The United States always views itself as the leader — or hegemon — of the world, so China is a competitor or adversary that is challenging its hegemony,” said Tu Xinquan, the dean of a trade institute at the University of International Business and Economics in Beijing. “The European Union does not have a hegemonic mind-set.”

The official doctrine of the 27-member European Union defines China as “a partner for cooperation, an economic competitor and a systemic rival.” If that seems a mouthful, and a perhaps contradictory one, it is because the continent is torn between how to balance economic opportunity in China with national security risk, cybersecurity risk and economic risk to various industries.

In March, China’s foreign minister, Wang Yi, told reporters that Europe’s formula was unworkable. “It’s like driving to a crossing and finding the red, yellow and green lights all on at the same time,” he said. “How can one drive on?”

Now, Mr. Xi would like to ease the lights toward green.

To that end, Mr. Xi’s first and most important stop will be in France, whose president, Emmanuel Macron, has often made the Gaullist point that Europe “must never be a vassal of the United States,” as he did last month at a speech at the Sorbonne . The French leader insists that the survival of the European Union depends on “strategic autonomy” and developing the military resilience to become a “Europe power.” He rejects the notion of “equidistance” between China and the United States — France is one of America’s oldest allies — but wants to keep his options open.

All of this is music to Mr. Xi’s ears.

“Macron is trying to bring a third way in the current global chaos,” said Philippe Le Corre, a prominent French expert on relations with China. “He is trying to walk a fine line between the two main superpowers.”

Just over a year ago, Mr. Macron was lavishly entertained during a visit to China that ended with a Sino-French declaration of a “global strategic partnership.” The French leader echoed the Chinese lexicon of a “multipolar” world, freed of “blocs” and the “Cold War mentality.”

Now, in anticipation of Mr. Xi’s visit, China has praised France as a great power and expressed hopes that their ties “will always be at the forefront of China’s relations with Western countries,” in the words of Lu Shaye , China’s ambassador to France, in People’s Daily.

Mr. Macron, who recently warned that “our Europe is mortal” and will be saved only if it can become “sovereign,” will host a state dinner for Mr. Xi on Monday in Paris before, in a personal touch, ushering him to a favorite childhood haunt in the Pyrenees.

The chemistry between the two men appears to lie essentially in a shared view that the postwar order is moribund and must be replaced by a new architecture that takes account of shifting power. That Mr. Xi is almost certainly the most repressive and authoritarian leader in recent Chinese history, and that China’s military threats to Taiwan have intensified, has not come between the two leaders.

In the past six months, Mr. Macron has visited both India and Brazil in a push to place France at a fulcrum between the BRICS group of developing countries, which includes China, and Western powers. At a time of growing tension between the “Global South” and Western powers, he sees France as a bridge.

From France, Mr. Xi will move on to the warm embrace of Serbia, where China is the second largest trading partner, and Hungary, where its prime minister, Viktor Orban, has backed enormous Chinese investment and used his country’s position as a European Union member to dilute criticism of China. Both countries bridle at American power.

Beyond these two friends of China, there are, however, serious European differences with Beijing, whose economy was roughly the same size, measured in dollars, as the European Union’s when Mr. Xi last visited in 2019. China’s economy is now some 15 percent bigger.

Last fall, the European Union opened an investigation into whether electric vehicles made in China benefited from unfair subsidies, with a decision expected by this summer. That has caused tensions with Beijing and with Germany, whose presence in the Chinese auto market dwarfs that of other European countries. China accounts for at least half of Volkswagen’s annual profits.

German manufacturers, with plants in China, fear that any imposition of European tariffs could affect its own exports from China, as well as cause tit-for-tat retaliation.

The European Union Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, will join the talks in Paris with Mr. Xi. Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany, whose relations with Mr. Macron have been strained, dined with the French president in Paris this past week. All of this is clearly part of an attempt to forge a united European front.

That, however, is always elusive.

Anger toward Russia in Europe runs highest in frontline states with Russia, like Poland and the Baltic States. They are perhaps the most fiercely attached to the alliance with the United States that Mr. Macron wants to offset by building a sovereign Europe. They are also the most wary of China, which has never condemned Russia’s war in Ukraine.

Mr. Macron, like Mr. Scholz during a visit to China last month, believes that Chinese leverage in bringing an end to the war in Ukraine is critical. Only Beijing, in the French analysis, can bring real pressure to bear on President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, who will be sworn in for a fifth term during Mr. Xi’s European visit.

The issue, as it was last year during Mr. Macron’s visit to Beijing, is that China has shown little or no inclination to do so. Indeed, Mr. Xi is scheduled to host Mr. Putin in China later this month.

“It’s hard to imagine another discussion on Ukraine,” François Godement, a special adviser and resident senior fellow at the Institut Montaigne in Paris, said of the talks between Mr. Macron and Mr. Xi. “Those dice have been rolled.”

Still, there is little doubt that Mr. Macron will try again to enlist Mr. Xi’s support ahead of a Ukraine peace conference in Switzerland in mid-June.

At a deeper level, Mr. Macron appears certain to try to use Mr. Xi’s visit to advance an agenda that guarantees Europe’s relevance in the coming decades. He is wary of a United States that may re-elect former President Donald J. Trump in November, with unpredictable consequences.

Mr. Wang, the Chinese foreign minister, has said , “As long as China and Europe join hands, bloc confrontation will not occur, the world will not fall apart, and a new Cold War will not take place.”

For all of the fundamental differences in governance between China’s one-party state and Western liberal democracy, the leaders of the three European countries Mr. Xi has chosen to visit appear to embrace that Chinese statement.

Reporting was contributed by Olivia Wang from Hong Kong, Keith Bradsher from Beijing, Christopher F. Schuetze and Melissa Eddy from Berlin and Ségolène Le Stradic from Paris.

An earlier version of a picture caption with this article misstated the year of the NATO bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade. It was 1999, not 1993.

How we handle corrections

Roger Cohen is the Paris Bureau chief for The Times, covering France and beyond. He has reported on wars in Lebanon, Bosnia and Ukraine, and between Israel and Gaza, in more than four decades as a journalist. At The Times, he has been a correspondent, foreign editor and columnist. More about Roger Cohen

Chris Buckley , the chief China correspondent for The Times, reports on China and Taiwan from Taipei, focused on politics, social change and security and military issues. More about Chris Buckley

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Dutch broadcaster furious, fans bemused after Netherlands’ Joost Klein is booted from Eurovision

Hours before the final of the Eurovision Song Contest, Dutch contestant Joost Klein was dramatically booted out by organizers over a “backstage incident.”

Eurovision Song Contest fan, Dave Adams, dressed as Dutch contestant Joost Klein, admits he is “gutted” after hearing the news of Klein’s expulsion from the competition on the day of the final. (May 11)

FILE - Joost Klein of Netherlands arrives on stage for the introducing of the artists at the dress rehearsal for the final at the Eurovision Song Contest in Malmo, Sweden, Friday, May 10, 2024. Hours before the final, Dutch contestant Joost Klein was dramatically booted out by organizers over a backstage incident. He had failed to perform at two dress rehearsals on Friday, and contest organizer the European Broadcasting Union said it was investigating an “incident.” (AP Photo/Martin Meissner, File)

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Joost Klein of Netherlands arrives on stage for the introducing of the artists at the dress rehearsal for the final at the Eurovision Song Contest in Malmo, Sweden, Friday, May 10, 2024. Klein’s performance was cancelled for unknown reasons, he was supposed to perform before Israel. (AP Photo/Martin Meissner)

FILE - Joost Klein of Netherlands performs the song Europapa during the second semi-final at the Eurovision Song Contest in Malmo, Sweden, Thursday, May 9, 2024. Hours before the final, on Saturday, May 11, 2024, Dutch contestant Joost Klein was dramatically booted out by organizers over a backstage incident. He had failed to perform at two dress rehearsals on Friday, and contest organizer the European Broadcasting Union said it was investigating an “incident.” (AP Photo/Martin Meissner, File)

Over Taco Zimmerman, director of the Dutch TV station AVROTROS, speaks to the media in Malmo, Sweden, Saturday, May 11, 2024, regarding the disqualification of artist Joost Klein. The Dutch public broadcaster has reacted angrily after the Netherlands’ contestant in the Eurovision Song Contest was dramatically expelled from the competition hours before Saturday’s final. (Johan Nilsson/TT News Agency via AP)

MALMO, Sweden (AP) — A Dutch public broadcaster reacted angrily after the Netherlands’ contestant in the Eurovision Song Contest was dramatically expelled from the competition hours before Saturday’s final over a backstage altercation that is being investigated by police.

The European Broadcasting Union, which organizes Eurovision , said that Swedish police were investigating “a complaint made by a female member of the production crew” about Joost Klein, and it wouldn’t be appropriate for him to participate while the legal process was underway.

Klein had failed to perform at two dress rehearsals on Friday in the Swedish city of Malmo, and organizers had said they were investigating an “incident.” Though rumors had been flying that the incident was connected to Israel’s delegation, organizers said it “did not involve any other performer or delegation member.”

What to know about this year’s Eurovision Song Contest:

• Acts from more than two dozen countries will take the stage in Malmo, Sweden, on Saturday. How to watch (and stream) the final .
• Dutch broadcaster furious, fans bemused after Netherlands’ Joost Klein is booted from Eurovision .
• Eurovision explained, from ABBA to Zorra, as the Israel-Hamas war overshadows the song contest .

The EBU said that Klein won’t receive any points from national juries or from Eurovision viewers, who help pick the winner, and the Netherlands won’t appear on the contest scoreboard. Dutch viewers will still be able to vote in the contest, since viewers in Eurovision member countries aren’t allowed to vote for their own nation’s act.

It was unclear whether Klein was still in Malmo on Saturday.

Such a last-minute disqualification is unprecedented in the 68-year history of Eurovision, although countries have boycotted the event and in some cases been expelled — including Russia, kicked out after its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

Dutch broadcaster AVROTROS, one of dozens of public broadcasters that collectively fund and broadcast the contest, said it was “shocked by the decision.”

Later it issued a statement saying that as Klein came offstage after Thursday’s semifinal he was filmed without his consent and in turn made a “threatening movement” toward the camera.

The broadcaster said Klein did not touch the camera or the camerawoman, and called his expulsion a “very heavy and disproportionate” punishment.

“We are very disappointed and upset for the millions of fans who were so excited for tonight,” it said. “What Joost brought to the Netherlands and Europe shouldn’t have ended this way.”

The 26-year-old Dutch singer and rapper had been a bookies’ favorite, as well as a fan favorite, with his song “Europapa,” an upbeat Euro-techno ode to the continent’s diversity that is also a tribute to Klein’s parents, who died when he was a child.

Dave Adams, a British fan dressed as Klein in a blue suit with pointy shoulder pads, said he was a “bit gutted” by the disqualification.

“It’s just a bit depressing isn’t it?” he said. “(We’ll) see how it goes today. I’m sure there’ll be a good winner — hopefully anyway.”

The competition that pits nations against one another for pop music glory has already been marked by division over the inclusion of Israel . It has attracted large protests from Palestinians and their supporters, who say Israel should be excluded because of its conduct of the war in Gaza .

This story has been corrected to show that the spelling of the Dutch broadcaster is AVROTROS, not AVROTOS.

Associated Press writers Kwiyeon Ha and Hilary Fox in Malmo contributed to this story.