Getting Started Early
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Thesis Statements
I. WHAT IS A THESIS STATEMENTS, AND WHY DO THESIS STATEMENTS
MATTER?
A thesis statement represents the central idea of your paper; it expresses the point you want to
make.
The thesis statement plays a key role in many university papers. That is because the majority of
papers in university are argumentative, and the thesis statement helps convey the main argument
that you want to make in your paper. A thesis statement also plays an important role in ensuring
that your papers are readable: it provides your readers with a thread to follow as they make their
way through your paper, and it thus helps ensure a coherent reading experience. But it also helps
you the writer, by providing you with a thread to follow as you work through your research and
writing. It keeps you focused and on track. Finally, a thesis statement shows that you understand
your topic and can encapsulate your thinking in a clear and succinct manner.
II. WHAT DOES A THESIS STATEMENT LOOK LIKE?
A thesis statement consists of at least one complete sentence. It is not a question. Rather, it
provides the answer to a question. Nor can it be a sentence fragment; it is a fully worked out idea
that makes a clear point. It usually comes near the beginning of your paper. Often—though not
always—it appears at or near the end of your introduction. The thesis statement is sometimes
followed by a road map: a sentence or sentences outlining how you will support your argument.
Note that a thesis statement may not be necessary for every essay. Moreover, the criteria for a
strong thesis statement may vary according to the discipline in which you are writing.
III. THE KEY DIFFERENCES BETWEEN HIGH SCHOOL AND UNIVERSITY
In high school, you’ll have learned some formulas for writing a proper high-school essay. In
making the transition from high school to university you need to let go of many, but not all, of
those formulas. The thesis statement, like the topic sentence, is one of the formulas that you will
want to hang on to. Still, the way in which you use both thesis statements and topic sentences
will change from high school to university. Now is a good time to consider all the differences
between high school and university, not just the ones that relate to thesis statements.
Probably the biggest change between high school and university will be to let go of the formula
of the three-point essay. This is not to say that you should never hand in a three-point essay in
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university. The point is that this formula will not provide the ideal structure for many of your
university essays. The one major advantage of the three point essay is that it provides you with a
ready-made structure that you can fit your ideas into. As formulas go, it is fairly versatile. Its
disadvantage is that it nevertheless restricts you unnecessarily. In university you’ll have more
freedom to structure your paper in whatever way will best convince your reader of the validity of
your position. Ultimately, you will have more power and control over the form and design of
your essays, but you will first need to let go of the “security blanket” provided by the three-point
essay.
Here are the main differences between university and high school, beginning with the thesis
statement:
HIGH SCHOOL RULES
UNIVERSITY EXPECTATIONS
Thesis Statement
Essays must include a thesis statement.
Not every essay needs a thesis statement.
The opening paragraph must end in a thesis
statement.
The opening paragraph often ends in a thesis
statement, but a thesis can also occur
elsewhere.
A thesis statement must be one sentence in
length.
A thesis statement can be two or three
sentences long, or even longer if the argument
is complex.
The thesis statement must be supported by
three main points.
The thesis statement does not have to be
supported by any specific number of points.
Essay Structure
Essays consist of three main points.
There is no predetermined number of points
that your essay must include.
Essays have a five-paragraph structure: an
introduction, your three main points, and a
conclusion.
Essays have as many paragraphs as needed.
You should choose a structure for your essay
that serves your ideas and your argument.
Paragraphs
Paragraphs are as long or as short as needed to
meet the five-paragraph requirement and the
page limit.
Paragraphs are usually between one-third and
two-thirds of a page and vary in length
according to the needs of the paragraph.
Each paragraph must begin with a topic
sentence that explicitly echoes the thesis
statement.
Paragraphs will be clearer and more coherent if
they begin with a topic sentence that sums up
the main point of the paragraph.
Paragraphs generally end with a conclusion
that reiterates the point contained in the topic
sentence.
Your paragraphs should end whenever you
have provided enough evidence and analysis to
support the point in your topic sentence;
repeating that point would be redundant.
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Alternatively, paragraphs may end with a
transitional sentence that anticipates the next
paragraph.
Provide a transition only when it helps the
reader follow your train of thought. But your
paragraphs will be more coherent if you place
the transition at the start of the next paragraph.
Introduction and Conclusion
The introduction should begin with a broad and The introduction should raise the essay topic or
general statement and eventually be narrowed
question as soon as possible in specific and
down.
concrete terms.
The conclusion should provide a summary of
the main points of the paper.
The conclusion should do more than merely
summarize what you have already done in the
paper.
Argument
You may add narration and description to
remind the reader of events or particulars.
You may incorporate narrative or plot elements
into your argument as long as you analyze
them in sufficient depth.
Argumentative essays can be based on personal Argumentative essays should be supported by
experience or opinion.
evidence from your sources. In some
disciplines, your professor may invite you to
supplement your argument with an account of
your personal experience.
Your essay should not acknowledge opposing
viewpoints because they will weaken your
argument.
An essay that addresses counter-arguments
becomes stronger and more persuasive by
acknowledging the complexity of the material.
Presentation
Students may receive credit for visual effects.
Professors are concerned with your ideas and
your writing and expect you to submit your
essays in a plain format with no fancy fonts,
colours, title pages, and binders.
Here are the overall differences between the two institutions in philosophy and approach:
HIGH SCHOOL …
UNIVERSITY …
Provides formulas.
Discourages formulas.
Offers you a ready-made structure to work
with.
Provides freedom for you to come up with
your own way of structuring your argument.
Teaches just one model for an essay that you
then apply in all of your courses.
Offers discipline-specific guidelines for
approaching written work.
Encourages repetition.
Discourages repetition.
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HIGH SCHOOL …
UNIVERSITY …
Provides rules.
Encourages critical thinking.
Rewards you for demonstrating your
knowledge of the material.
Rewards you for engaging in analysis.
Although university papers are less constrained by any pre-established structures than high
school papers are, they are not completely open-ended. There are conventions at work in the
various university disciplines, just as there were in your high school courses; they just aren’t as
rigid as the conventions you learned in high school. You will learn many of the conventions in
specific academic fields by writing essays in your courses, by following your assignment
instructions, by reading in your field, and by paying close attention to your instructor’s
comments when you get your papers back.
You will also learn the conventions of university writing by learning how to write in specific
genres. Here are some examples of genres:
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the book review
the article critique
the proposal
the literature review
the annotated bibliography
the précis
the lab report
the document study
IV. GUIDELINES TO WRITING A THESIS STATEMENT
1. Decide if your paper in fact needs a thesis.
Though the thesis statement is often a key part of a university paper, be aware that not every
paper that you write in university will require a thesis. You may be asked to write a paper that is
not argumentative, and it may therefore be inappropriate to provide a thesis. For example,
sometimes university papers will ask you to write in a genre that is used in contexts from outside
the university. You may be asked to write
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an article for a newspaper
an environmental assessment for a governmental protection agency
a review of an art exhibit for a magazine.
These real-world genres don’t usually include thesis statements, so it wouldn’t be appropriate to
provide one in your paper. Even though you are in fact writing a university paper, you are in that
paper imaginatively inserting yourself into the situation of a newspaper reporter or an
environmental consultant or an art critic.
Sometimes an essay will ask you to explore a topic from more than one angle. For example, you
may be asked to write
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a poetry analysis
a document analysis for history
a book review
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Such exploratory essays usually don’t call for a thesis statement, which would try to impose a
unifying idea on a wide variety of observations.
2. If your paper doesn’t require a thesis, consider providing a “statement of intention” to
let your reader know what you will be doing in the paper.
If your paper doesn’t make a single argumentative point, you can still help orient your reader by
offering a statement of intention. A statement of intention lets your reader know what you will be
doing in your essay. For example, consider the following assignment question:
Give a close and intelligent and thoughtful reading of Douglas Dunn’s poem “The
Kaleidoscope,” paying attention to the sorts of things we have been looking at in class:
form, rhyme scheme, figures of speech, punctuation, imagery, sense.
A statement of intention will let your reader know that you intend to analyze the poem in terms
of some of the devices suggested in the assignment question, and it explicitly lists those devices.
Your reader will then have a clear sense of what exactly you will be doing in the rest of the
paper.
This essay analyzes rhyme scheme, figures of speech, punctuation, and imagery in Douglas
Dunn’s “The Kaleidoscope.”
Some papers should have neither a thesis statement nor a statement of intention. Often you can
decide by the genre in which you’re writing. Here are two genres that don’t usually require
either:
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a newspaper article
a book review
If you’re doing a book review, say, your reader will expect you to do the kinds of things that
book reviews generally do: summarize the book, then evaluate its strengths and weaknesses. You
don’t need to say at the beginning that you’re going to do those things.
3. Develop a thesis statement.
You should not expect to develop a thesis all at once. It is of course a good thing to have a sense
of what you are trying to argue in your essay before you begin the research, because you will
then be able to go about that research in a more focused manner. On the other hand, what you
decide to argue should reflect what you discover in your research. Often the best way out of this
apparent dilemma is to start with a tentative thesis but to allow yourself the flexibility to change
your thesis as you discover more about your topic and think more about it. Your approach will
probably need to vary somewhat according to the specific assignment. Just remember not to be
static or rigid. Nothing is set in stone, at least not until you hand your paper in.
Here are some steps that will help you through the process of developing a thesis. Be flexible in
how you apply them.
a) Narrow your topic by asking a research question.
Often your university assignments will be broad enough to give you a fair amount of leeway in
choosing exactly what you will focus on. It is up to you to do the focusing. The best way to focus
your topic is to ask relevant questions, as though you were a journalist interviewing yourself.
What poems by Yeats explore the conflict between art and life? Which films of the French New
Wave are most obviously influenced by American cinema and American popular culture? Which
modern nation-states best illustrate the concept of a democracy deficit? How does the advent of
social networks constitute an invasion of our privacy? Every question you ask should help you to
zero in on something more specific and focused than what you started out with. It is always a
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good idea to begin by choosing a topic you care about, and then to focus the question in ways
that allow you to follow your interests.
b) Draft a tentative thesis.
Never lose sight of your research question while you draft your thesis statement. And remember
that the drafting of a thesis statement will in some cases begin early on in the essay writing
process and sometimes closer to the end. For example, if you were asked to write an essay on the
causes of the Russian Revolution, you would probably want to learn more about the causes by
reading some of the history of that revolution as well as some of the analyses of causes by
historians and political scientists.
c) Test your thesis.
Once you have arrived at what you think will be your working thesis, you will want to make sure
that your thesis will be able to stand up to careful scrutiny. Act as your own critic. To test
whether what you have come up with has the characteristics of a robust thesis statement, ask
yourself the following questions:
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Do I respond to the assignment question?
Is my thesis statement manageable given the page limit of my essay?
Does my thesis statement make an argument rather than provide a description?
Is my thesis definite and specific rather than vague and general?
d) Decide where to put your thesis statement and make sure your reader can locate it.
Usually you put the thesis statement at the end of your introduction, but there is no absolute rule.
For short and medium-length essays, often a paragraph serves well as an introduction. You may
then put the thesis at the end of the opening paragraph. In very long essays the introduction can
be as long as a page or even occasionally two, and the thesis sentence can therefore be delayed
by several paragraphs.
A thesis doesn’t even have to appear at the very end of your introduction. It can be the very first
sentence in your paper. This is a more common practice in very short papers. A thesis statement
can also appear before the end of your introduction.
You might choose not to reveal your thesis until the very end of your essay. Delaying your thesis
can create suspense. Recall, however, the preference in academic essays for stating your position
up front and then making your case. Withholding your thesis should be the exception, not the
rule.
One of the reasons a thesis may not appear at the very end of the introduction is that you decide
to provide a road map right after the thesis. The longer the paper, the more useful a road map
becomes. The road map lays out in order the stages of your argument. Your introduction will
have three parts:
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introduction to the topic and lead-in to your thesis statement
your thesis statement
the road map of your essay
Let’s look at an example of the opening of a student paper:
In his third book of the Nichomachean Ethics, Aristotle states that “it is in our power
to be good men or bad men.” The ability to behave morally is, according to Aristotle, a
distinctively human characteristic, as is the capacity to stray from the path of virtue. In
other words, we are responsible for who we are. In this essay I argue that for Aristotle,
human responsibility follows from his account of choice. First, I will show that for
Aristotle, choice is made possible by our intellect and our character. Then I will analyse
the respective roles of intellect and character in guiding our choices. Finally, I will
highlight the greater value that Aristotle places on reason in his system of ethics.
Note that the road map uses the first-person singular. There is usually nothing wrong with using
the first-person singular, but a few professors or TAs may object. You can easily rephrase your
thesis or road map by putting it in terms of what your essay will do:
In his third book of the Nichomachean Ethics, Aristotle states that “it is in our power
to be good men or bad men.” The ability to behave morally is, according to Aristotle, a
distinctively human characteristic, as is the capacity to stray from the path of virtue. In
other words, we are responsible for who we are. This essay argues that for Aristotle, human
responsibility follows from his account of choice. First, it will show that for Aristotle,
choice is made possible by our intellect and our character. Then it will analyze the
respective roles of intellect and character in guiding our choices. Finally, it will
highlight the greater value that Aristotle places on reason in his system of ethics.
Usually, your readers will have no trouble locating your thesis statement. They know there is a
reasonable likelihood your paper will be providing a thesis at or very near the end of your
introduction. And often that introduction consists of a single paragraph. You then don’t have to
create a big sign drawing attention to your thesis which says “THIS IS MY THESIS.”
But if you think there is a chance that your readers will have trouble identifying your thesis
statement, you can signal it’s exact location by using phrases such as
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“This essay argues that. . .”
“In the following paper I will demonstrate that . . .”
The paper on Aristotle above identifies its thesis explicitly because the thesis doesn’t appear at
the end of the opening paragraph.
V. CLOSING TIPS:
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Don’t rely on predetermined formulas to write your essay or your thesis statement: be
flexible
Read the assignment sheet carefully for guidance
If your essay is in a particular genre, let the genre guide your choice of thesis statement
Not all papers require thesis statements
Make your thesis definite and specific
Use more than one sentence if you need to
You can modify your thesis statement as your thinking about the topic changes
Make sure your essay does what your thesis says it is going to do!
Written by Jerry Plotnick, Director of the University College Writing Centre.
Thanks to Becky Vogan and Heather Fitzgerald for their contributions to this handout.
All handouts and slide presentations for Getting Started Early are available after the last workshop at
http://www.uc.utoronto.ca/getting-started-handouts
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Exercises: Thesis Statements
Exercise 1: For which of the following would a thesis be appropriate?
a. HPS 200 Y (choose one of the following)
Length: 6 double-spaced pages
i. Watson claims that no fewer than 5 scientific disciplines were actively involved in the
search for the secret of DNA. Discuss 4 of these disciplines and the contributions they
made to the story of the Double Helix.
ii. In “Darwin, Intellectual Revolutionary,” Ernst Mayr argues that the extent of the
Darwinian “revolution” is usually under-appreciated. Drawing on Mayr but also on
Darwin and Gould, discuss whether Darwin precipitated only a scientific revolution, an
intellectual revolution that extended outside of the sciences, or no revolution at all.
b. AST 101H
A brilliant aurora appears tonight. You are on the staff of UTM’s student newspaper
Medium, and you have been asked to write a 300-word article about the nature and
origin of the aurora, in terms your reader can understand.
c. ENG 201Y Reading Poetry
Give a close and intelligent and thoughtful reading of Douglas Dunn’s poem “The
Kaleidoscope,” paying attention to the sorts of things we have been looking at in
class: form, rhyme scheme, figures of speech, punctuation, imagery, sense.
Exercise 2: You are given the following assignment question: “What were the causes
of the Russian Revolution?” In your research you have come up with the following
causes. Now come up with a thesis statement.
1. the tyranny of the czars
2. Czar Nicholas II’s weakness and indecisiveness
3. the increasing popularity among the educated classes of western humanitarian ideals
4. the influence on a small group of radicals of revolutionary theories such as nihilism,
anarchism, and Marxism
5. the harsh economic conditions created by Czar’s Alexander’s decision to emancipate the
serfs in 1861
6. the combined grievances of persecuted minorities against the ruling class
7. Russia’s disastrous participation in the First World War
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Exercise 3: What’s wrong with the following thesis statements? Can they be
improved?
Select the most obvious type of flaw in each of the following thesis statements. Can you think of
ways they might be improved?
a. Assignment question: Critically evaluate recent proposals to reform Canada’s “firstpast-the-post” system of electing a federal government.
Thesis statement: The New Democratic Party calls for the replacement of Canada’s
“first-past-the-post” system with a system of proportional representation.
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does not respond to the assignment question
takes on too much for university-sized essay
is vague, not specific and focused
provides description rather than makes an argument
b. Assignment question: Provide a critical interpretation of Edward Munch’s The
Scream.
Thesis statement: Edward Munch’s portrayal of anxiety in The Scream is effective.
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does not respond to the assignment question
takes on too much for university-sized essay
is vague, not specific and focused
provides description rather than makes an argument
c. Assignment question: Write a brief report on a contemporary threat to biodiversity. In
your conclusion, provide recommendations for addressing the threat.
Thesis statement: The destruction of animal habitats across the world threatens
biodiversity.
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does not respond to the assignment question
takes on too much for university-sized essay
is vague, not specific and focused
provides description rather than makes an argument
d. Assignment question: What is the economic value of biodiversity?
Thesis statement: The use of land mass to build houses, the destruction of animal
habitat, and the pollution of our lakes and oceans will eventually lead to the
irreversible loss of biodiversity. Therefore, immediate action is needed to slow down
the loss of biodiversity.
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does not respond to the assignment question
takes on too much for university-sized essay
is vague, not specific and focused
provides description rather than makes an argument