Writing a Thesis Driven Paper
Linking Evidence and Claims:
10 on 1 Versus 1 on 10
This handout is taken from
Rosenwasser and Stephen, Writing
Analytically, Heinle, 2003)
A thesis and a claim are
synonyms. “By way of definition, a claim is an assertion that you make
about your evidence—an idea that you believe the evidence supports. The primary claim in a paper is the thesis.
In analytical writing, the thesis is a theory that explains what some
feature of features of a subject mean.
The subject itself, the pool of primary material (data) being analyzed,
is know as evidence” (75).
“The All-Purpose Organizational
Scheme”
- An analytical writer approaches evidence to
refine and sharpen his or her thesis, not just to support it,
- A productive thesis changes (evolves0 as it
encounters evidence,
- The paper itself should reenact in more
polished form for the reader the chains of thought that led the reader to
his or her conclusions.
1. Write an
introduction.
Begin analytical papers by defining some issue,
question, problem or phenomenon that the paper will address. An introduction is not a conclusion. It lays out something that you have noticed
that you think needs to be better understood.
Use the introduction to get your readers to see why they should be more
curious about the thing you have noticed.
Aim for half a page.
2. State a
working thesis
Early in the paper, often at the end of the first paragraph
or the beginning of the second, make a tentative claim about whatever it is you
have laid out as being in need of exploration.
The initial version of your thesis, know as the working thesis, should offer a tentative explanation, answer,
or solution that the body of your paper will go on to apply and develop
(clarify, extend, substantiate, qualify, and so on).
3. Begin
querying your thesis.
Start developing your working thesis and other opening
observations with the question “So what?”
This question is shorthand for questions like “what does this
observation mean?” and “Where does this thesis get me in my attempts to explain
my subject?”
4. Muster
supporting evidence for your working thesis.
Test its adequacy by seeing how much of the available
evidence it can honestly account for.
That is, try to prove that your thesis is correct. But also expect to
come across evidence that does not fit your initial formulation of the thesis.
5. Seek
complicating evidence.
Find evidence that does not readily support your
thesis. Then explore—and explain—how and
why it doesn’t fit.
6.
Reformulate your thesis.
Use the complicating evidence to produce new wording in
your working thesis (additions, qualifications, and so forth). This is how a thesis evolves, by assimilating
obstacles and refining terms.
7. Repeat
steps 3 to 6.
Query, support, complicate, and reformulate your thesis
until you are satisfied with its accuracy.
8. State a
conclusion.
Reflect on and reformulate your paper’s opening position in
light of the thinking your analysis of evidence has caused you to do. Culminate rather than merely restate your
paper’s main idea in the concluding paragraph.
Do this by getting your conclusion to again answer the question “So
what?’ In the conclusion, this question
is short-hand for “where does it get us to view the subject in this way? Or
“What are the possible implications or consequences of the position the paper
has arrived at?” Usually the
reformulated (evolved) thesis comes near the beginning of the concluding
paragraph. The remainder of the
paragraph gradually moves the reader out of your piece, preferably feeling good
about what you have accomplished for him or her.
Linking Evidence and Claims
Unsubstantiated
Claims
Problem: Making
claims that lack supporting evidence.
Solution: Learn to recognize and support
unsubstantiated assertions.
Pointless Evidence
Problem: Presenting a mass of evidence without explaining how it relates
to the claims.
Solution: Make details speak.
Explain how evidence confirms and qualifies the claim.
Analyzing Evidence in Depth: “10 on 1”
How do you move from making details speak and
explaining how evidence confirms and qualifies the claim to actually composing
a paper?
Phrased as a general rule 10 on 1 holds that it is better to make ten observations or
points about a single representative issue or example than to make the same
basic point about ten related issues or examples.
Representative Example Representative Example Point 10 Point 9 Point 6 Point 8 Point 7 Point 5 Point 4 Point 3 Point 2 Point 1
In
sum, you can use 10 on 1 to accomplish various ends: (1) to locate the range of possible meanings
your evidence suggests, (2) to make you less inclined to cling to your first
claim inflexibly and open the way for you to discover a way of representing
more fully the complexity of your subject, and (3) to slow down the rush to
generalization and thus help to ensure that when you arrive t a working thesis,
it will be more specific and better able to account for your evidence.
First
find 10 examples, do a 1 on 10 as a preliminary step—locating 10 examples that
share a trait—and then focus on one of these for in-depth analysis. Proceeding in this way would guarantee that
your example was representative. It is
essential that your example be representative because in doing 10 on 1 you will
take one part of the whole, put it under a microscope, and then generalize
about the whole on the basis of your analysis.