Thesis Statements

1. Thesis Statements Week 1 ENG 1005: Writing about Social Justice

2. Formulating a thesis The beginning of all discourse is a topic, a question, a problem, an issue. The position you take must be arguable. Res: what is said (remember the communications triangle?) Verba: how it is said In order for us to tackle “big, hairy, complicated problems” of social justice—like capital punishment, in example—we have to predicate the topic first. We need a proposition

3. What is a proposition? • A proposition is a strictly defined notion of what we are going to say about the topic under consideration. • The thesis is the point at issue or what the Latin judiciary called the stasis • An sit: whether a thing is—a question of fact • Is abortion of a fetus murder? • Quid sit: what is it—a question of definition • What is murder? • Quale sit: what kind is it—a question of quality • If abortion is murder, is it ever justified?

4. Declaring the thesis • The guiding rule for thesis writing is this: state the thesis in a single, declarative sentence. • Not a question • Not a statement of fact • A single declarative sentence that contains within it some arguable premise or point of opinion/contention, an assertion or denial about the subject. • Example of a poorly written thesis: • Five men raped and murdered an Indian medical student and are bad. • Example of a better thesis: • The severity of the rape and murder of the Indian medical student merits the death penalty for all of the five perpetrators. Arguing quality

5. In-class exercise I: Review of your homework Pull up your homework. Select one question from each of the sections that you felt was most relevant to your research or most interesting. Write these questions on a sheet of paper, include your answers. (Do this quickly). We will take 10 minutes and circulate about the room “answering” each others’ questions, providing insight and ideas that we didn’t, perhaps, consider on our own. The catch is that you can’t give an answer already written down. This requires you to push past the “obvious” answers.

6. In-class exercise I: Thesis Based on your selected topic, and the organizing idea of stasis, draft four possible thesis statements. Be prepared to review and share the thesis statements in class with your peers. You will “present” your best thesis statement + one insight you gleaned from the “speed pre-writing” exercise to the class for review/consideration.

7. Homework Using one of the two pre-writing exercises and the thesis generated in class, compose a draft of your first argumentative essay. The assignment sheet is a link on the class website