LIBRARY WORKSHOPS ON ACADEMIC WRITING

Developinga Central Idea foryour dissertation
教養教育院
October 29, 2014

by Paul W. L. Lai

ThesisStatement

Theone-sentence statementthat encapsulates
the central ideaof you academic paper.

Normally, if an academic writeris very clear about his or her
research, he or she should be
able to state the central researchidea in just one sentence.

Thesis statement is the heartof an academic research paper,
without which the paper
would be basically pointless.

It is the first sentence to begin,
but also the last sentence to finish.

Thesis Statement’s
Role in an
academic Paper

Thesis Statement

An academic paper isessentially alogical argument

Support 1

Support 2

Support 3

Conclusion

An academic paper isessentially alogical argument

Premise 1

Premise 2

Premise 3

A thesis statement is a sentencewith a truth-value, which can beeither true or false dependingon the premises that provide
support for the statement.

Although a thesis statement is normally
written in just one-sentence, it is different
from a normal sentence in many aspects.

(1) A thesis statement must have a truth-value.
In other words,a thesis statement should represent some factual
event which could take place in the actual world(including present, past, and future events), or thepossible world (i.e. conditional events).

Note that not every sentence can be used as athesis statement because not every sentence
can be either true or false.

For example, the following cannot be used as athesis statement:‘What time is it?’ (Question),‘Shut the door’ (Command),‘Oh, God! (Exclamation)

Which one of the following can be a thesis statement?

(1) Is Nagoya in the central part of Japan?
(2) Nagoya is in the central part of Japan.
(3) I wish Nagoya were the capital of Japan!
(4) God bless Nagoya!
(5) I believe that Nagoya is in the central partof Japan.

(2) A thesis statement should be objectivelyverifiable.
In other words,
The truth value of a thesis statement should beindependently verifiable from a third person pointof view.

Class Discussion:
Do you know what fundamentally
distinguishes between
a subjective expression andan objective expression?
Answer:Communicability between writer and reader.

(3) The truthfulness of a thesis statement needs
justification through argumentation.
In other words,a thesis statement is not merely a representationof some factual event.
it is a belief statement that such and such is thecase, whose truthfulness requires justification
through collecting evidences and arranging themin a convincing way.

Do you know what distinguishes
between the following:(1) The earth orbits around the sun.
(2) I believe that the earth orbits around the sun.

Answer:(1) Fact(2) Assertion of the fact(4) A good thesis statement is not trivial.
Consider the following two belief statements:“The earth orbits around the sun.”
Unlike when it was first claimed by Nicolaus
Copernicus in 1543, the thesis statement now is trivial.

“The orbiting speed of the earth is getting slower, andafter 10,000 years later one day will last 30 hours.”
This thesis statement is not trivial, and requires
justification.

(5) A good thesis statement should be as specificas possible so that its truth values can be verified
effectively.
Compare the following two belief statements:“Japanese university education system is problematic.”
Too broad, what “problematic” means is unspecified.
Trivial too, no education system is unproblematic in practice.

“One fundamental problem in Japanese university
education is the lack of logical thinking education.”
A specific problem is mentioned. And the thesis statement
requires justification through argumentation, etc.

(5) A good thesis statement should be as specificas possible so that its truth values can be verified
effectively.
For the same reason that it should not be a broadstatement, a thesis statement should not be avague statement.
e.g. “Smoking is hazardous to health.”
Too vague, what “hazardous” means is unspecified.
Trivial too, we all know that smoking is hazardous to health.

One possible improvement:“Smoking is likely to cause heart disease.”Summary(1) A thesis statement must have a truth-value.
(2) A thesis statement should be objectivelyverifiable.
(3) The truthfulness of a thesis statement needs
justification through argumentation.
(4) A good thesis statement is not trivial.
(5) A good thesis statement should be as specificas possible so that its truth values can be verified
effectively.

How to build apreliminary
thesis statement:
Practical Steps

Step 1
Find a noun or noun phrase that can best
describe the main topic of your research paper.

Noun or noun phrase

Step 2
Build a Sentence based on the noun ornoun phrase by adding a verb or predicate.

Sentence

Step 3
Turn the sentence into a Question thatis of interest to you.

Research Question

Step 4Give a Hypothetical Answer to the question.

Hypothetical Answer

Step 5
Summarize the answer into just One Sentence.

Summary of the answer

Step 6Modify the sentence until it expresses a clear
relation between the sentence’s Subject andPredicate.

Clear relationshipStep 7Highlight and eliminate the Ambiguities found in thesentence.

Eliminate ambiguities

Other Approaches
to building athesis statement

Summarisation

Hypothetical answer
to your research goal

All the approaches
share the following:
step 5, 6, 7, 8

Classwork
Discuss with your group members,
and build a preliminary thesis statement
based on the following noun phrase:
University Education