Hey there! Are you struggling with writing a thesis statement? Don't frown.
Scribbr to the rescue! Hi! I'm Jessica from Scribbr, here to help you achieve your academic goals.
Are you ready to get things done? I'll show you how to write an awesome thesis statement in three steps. It's good to first point out what a thesis statement does. It sums up the main point of your paper. Just one or two sentences long and usually appears at the end of your introduction.
Once you've established a thesis statement, you can keep it in mind throughout the whole writing process and say goodbye to going off topic. Sounds good? Now, you only need three simple ingredients to cook up a great thesis statement.
You need to mention the main topic of your paper, take a position and state your argument, and summarize the evidence you'll use to support your argument. Here we go! Three steps to write a thesis statement.
Step one, we need to come up with a research question. So our research question would be, what were the main factors that led to the result of the 2016 Brexit referendum? If you want to know how to formulate a strong research question, I have a video on that as well. Step 2. Find a tentative answer to the research question you came up with in Step 1. Since we're taking an argumentative approach here, the answer should take a strong position on the topic.
So something like this. Brexit was driven by political frustration. And this will be the initial thesis statement. Next, as we keep on researching, we discover more evidence and sources, so keep developing and refining your thesis statement.
The final thesis statement should be elaborate and also summarizes the overall argument. The Brexit referendum result was driven by working-class frustration with the political elite, caused by austerity policies that have eroded public services and fragmented communities. The referendum offered an alternative to the status quo.
Let's examine how strong our thesis statement is. The best thesis statements are concise, disputable, and coherent. Our thesis statement is concise. It builds up to a central argument, which is Brexit was driven by political frustration, and leaves out other information like the consequences of Brexit.
To keep it concise, avoid general and vague wordings. Keep it in a sentence or two. It's also disputable.
The thesis statement took a position that some might argue the other way around. It's not a simple fact that readers will easily accept, as it requires further evidence and persuasion which encourages readers to keep reading. Our thesis statement is coherent as well.
The three parts of a thesis statement, topic, position, and evidence, were all well connected and presented in a logical manner. Depending on the aim of your paper, there are different types of thesis statement you can choose from. The first type is argumentative.
which is the example we used earlier. An argumentative thesis statement should take a clear position, since the goal is to persuade your reader of a claim. If you want to analyze, interpret, or evaluate different aspects of a topic, then your thesis statement should map out the key points of your analysis and briefly introduce the conclusions you will draw from it. For example, the history of the UK's relationship to the EU is complicated. From the beginning, Britain has been reluctant to fully integrate into Europe, both economically and culturally, but the politics of EU membership has changed throughout the past 50 years.
Of course, your paper could also aim to explain and discuss the facts of a topic. In this case, your thesis statement should summarize all the main points you will cover. Polling and surveys shed light on the demographics of the Brexit vote, which can be broken down in terms of age, ethnicity, region, and educational level. After going through this video, you should be able to come up with a strong thesis statement for your paper now. Don't forget to subscribe and give this video a like.
If you have any question, ask away in the comments below and I will reply. See you in the next video!