The Heart of the Matter: The Thesis

The thesis is the heart of your paper; everything else is centered around it and in service to it. In other words, the thesis is what allows your paper to be a cohesive whole! It unifies the various facts and ideas about your topic into a single Main Point.

You need to be absolutely clear with yourself what your thesis is. If you do not know what your thesis is, you cannot craft a cohesive paper!

2. A thesis is not just a subject or topic. If all you had to do was talk about a subject, you would not need to write a paper; you could just give a series of bullet points, or a list of interesting facts. A thesis is a perspective on the subject; it is something you say about the subject, over and beyond simply explaining or describing what the subject is.

3. A thesis should be scaled to the paper – it should be neither too narrow nor too broad for the size of paper.

4. A thesis should not be something too obvious; if it is obvious, it becomes a mere description instead of a perspective. Your thesis should be something a reasonable person could argue against.

5. If you are responding to a prompt, make sure your thesis actually answers the prompt!

keeping The thesis
At the center

6. Every single part of your paper – every idea or fact you mention, every detail or description you include, every paragraph you write – needs to contribute to the thesis. If it isn’t necessary to your thesis or does not help it in some way, it should not be in your paper!

7. You should know HOW every part of your paper is contributing to your thesis. If you cannot say how it is contributing, then it may not be adding anything valuable, and you may need to remove it.

REMEMBER! Your thesis serves as a guideline to everything else: what you include, what you exclude, what you emphasize, and how you structure your paper. If you are ever in doubt about any of these questions, ask yourself: “What will help me make my Main Point?”

The thesis statement

The thesis can go by several other names, including:

The perspective: Since the thesis is something you say about the topic, it provides a perspective - a way of viewing the topic.

The significance: Being the main point of your paper, the thesis also constitutes the significance of your paper: what you want the reader to “take away”, understand, or be convinced of.

The “so what?”: Since the thesis/main point is what you want the reader to take away from your paper, it should also answer the question (hypothetically posed by the reader), “So what?! Why did I bother reading this paper? What is the main thing I should take away?”

The opinion: Since the thesis is something you say over and beyond simply giving a list of facts or a description of the topic, it should not be something too obvious. (You will often hear this explained as “The thesis should be something a reasonable person could argue against”.)

The claim: Again, since the thesis is something you say about the topic, it can also be thought of as a claim about the topic.

The topic: Occasionally, you will see the thesis referred to as the “topic” of your paper. This makes some sense, since the thesis is the main point, but make sure that you don’t get confused: properly speaking, the topic is what the paper is about (volcanos? metanarratives? Batman?) and the thesis is what you have to say about the topic.

The thesis statement is exactly what it sounds like: an explicit statement of your thesis! While it is possible to have a thesis without ever giving a clear thesis statement (such as in short stories or descriptive profiles), in general you should include one for any academic paper you write. Explicitly informing the reader of your thesis with a thesis statement is essential for clear writing.

Your thesis needs to be stated as clearly, succinctly, and powerfully as possible. This is the heart of your essay, so make sure your reader understands it and finds it compelling!

2. Your thesis should come at the very end of your introduction.

3. Do NOT pose your thesis as a question. You are supposed to be arguing for a position, not asking a question!