Question

I need help creating a strong thesis statement for my history assignment "was there any fair judgment in the 15th century witchcraft trials "

Answer 1

The statement needs to relate to the paper. At the start, your statement may not be very strong. As you develop and refine the paper, the statement can go under revision to better reflect the paper.

Answer 2

Developing a strong thesis statement is a process. I'm going to start at the beginning with the understanding that you may already be anywhere along this process.

You need to start by doing your research on the subject. By the time you have finished your research you should have already developed an opinion on the topic. Do you feel there was fair judgement or not? If you have not developed an opinion yet, ponder the question, doing more research if necessary. Having an opinion on the topic is important because that is what is going to form the crux of your thesis. It is the core of your paper. Write your opinion down in a full sentence, i.e., The 15th century witchcraft trials were fair.

Once you have an opinion, refer back to your research notes with this question in mind: "What is the strongest evidence or reason that supports my opinion?" Once you have found your strongest supporting point, write it down in a full sentence, i.e., The accused faced a jury of their peers in accordance with the Constitution. This is going to be the basis of your first point in your thesis.

Next, refer back to your notes again and find the second strongest reason that supports your opinion and write that down in a full sentence as well, i.e., Many of the accused confessed. This will be the second point in your thesis.

Now, for the third point in your thesis you can do one of two things; you can present yet another point that supports your opinion, OR you can present the the main argument that is contrary to your opinion. I personally like to present the counter argument and here's why. On the one hand, when you write a persuasive essay and you only present facts that support your opinion, it show a bias, which can detract from the persuasiveness of the essay. The reader only sees one side of the story and think (or knows), "there is something that the writer is not telling me."

On the other hand, when you present the counter argument, it is showing that a) you have indeed looked at both sides of the argument, and b) it makes the paper appear less biased or even non-biased even if there definitely is some bias. The reader appreciates the fact that you took the time to present the other side of the story and feels less compelled to argue your opinion. That is not to say that the reader will completely agree with you, but they will at least know that you did your research and will respect the fact that you presented information that went against your opinion on the subject. Believe me; instructors love this.

So with that in mind, write a full sentence down that is either a third supporting factor or a contrary argument, i.e., The trials resulted from hysteria created by children playing a prank. This forms the final point of your thesis.

So now you should have four sentences on which to build your paper and your thesis statement:

1. your opinion sentence
2. your first supporting point sentence
3. your second supporting point sentence
4. your third supporting point or your counter point sentence

Using these sentences you can craft your initial thesis statement which can be as simple as:

the 15th century witchcraft trials were fair because many of the accused confessed.

Or you can go with something that really pinpoints your paper, such as:

Even though the trials resulted from hysteria created by children playing a prank, the 15th century witchcraft trials were fair because the accused faced a jury of their peers in accordance with the Constitution and many of the accused confessed.

I prefer to use the more complex statement when I can because it really nails down the paper in one sentence. Many instructors like this because by just reading your thesis statement they know exact what your paper is going to be about and what points you are going to be making. However, I have had instructors that insisted on the simpler statement. If you don't know what your instructor prefers, you can ask him/her. A good way to do that is to construct your statement using the more complex method and ask them what they think of your thesis statement. They will generally tell you that it needs work no matter what (unless you really nail it on the first try), but if they have a preference for the simpler type they will usually say something like, "it's too wordy," or "you need to simplify it." If they do only give you a very general comment, just ask them a more pointed question, i.e., "Is it too long?"

No matter how you decide to go with it, it will probably evolve and change as you write, or uncover new facts that you want to include in your paper. So as @e.mccormick mentioned, don't be afraid to revise your thesis statement as you write the body of your paper.

Hopefully this will help you construct a strong thesis statement. If anything was unclear or you have more questions feel free to ask.