Transcript: Liam
Chapter 9: Liam argues for writing your thesis after you have evidence
Hi, my name is Liam and I’ve decided to focus on chapter nine. The text about making arguments, mainly because since I’ve gotten to OSU, I’ve found that I’ve had trouble creating a good thesis for which I can build an essay upon and construct body paragraphs on. I found that like, if I do the thesis first, I almost get fixed on the idea or whatever that it says, and I start searching for evidence that isn’t there. Instead of searching for good evidence that is there that proves a similar point, but just stated in a different way and I’m really just having trouble building a blueprint for an argument.
I think a good way that I can fix this is doing the body paragraphs first and then writing the thesis at the end so that it incorporates everything that I’ve done.
That includes evidence that I would actually want to use. One class, one specific stories from my comparative studies class, where I had to write an essay about a text called shooting an elephant. I got like so focused on my thesis about the power dynamic and power struggle between, between groups that are being oppressed and the people that are doing the oppressing. And I just had trouble finding good evidence based on that one idea and didn’t really think about other, other evidence that would support that idea, but just in different ways.
And I think it’s also important to order your evidence in a way that makes sense and kind of have them build upon each other so that each one has a purpose and gives the reader a good way of seeing the progress of your argument and gives them a nice ending to it.
