Writing a History Paper

(Adapted from guides produced by Dartmouth College, the University of North Carolina,

and the College of William and Mary)

In many ways, writing a history paper is no different from writing other kinds of papers. You need to focus your topic, write a strong thesis sentence, settle on a structure, write clear and coherent paragraphs, and tend to matters of grammar and style. In other ways, however, writing a History paper requires some understanding of the conventions of the discipline. A few tips are collected here:

Be sure to argue as you narrate. Whenever you relate an historical event, be sure that there is a purpose to your story. What point are you trying to make? The details of your narrative should support that argument. Details that are irrelevant need to be omitted. Details that distract attention from your main point need to be dealt with in another paragraph.

Don’t ignore evidence that runs counter to your argument. While this principle is important in all disciplines, it is particularly important in History. You will need either to acknowledge, concede, or refute that evidence.

Be sure to provide your reader with an adequate sense of context. Considering context is more than simply answering questions of what, who, when, and where (though you must do this as well). When setting the context of your argument, you must announce your scholarly position to your reader. Is the essay about exploring the contradictions of republicanism? Then you need to say so. Accordingly, you must consider carefully the introductions to your papers. Opening sentences such as “Since the beginning of time...” or “Humans have always...” do nothing to provide your reader with an historical context for your argument.

Do your best to understand and respect the integrity of the culture and time period that you are discussing. Many times our position of hindsight has provided us with information that was not available to the inhabitants of the culture or time period that we are studying. For example, you cannot evaluate Victorian society’s approach to “race suicide” using modern conceptions of demography. Understand that “common knowledge” or “common values” in any given time period are influenced by numerous factors and are never absolute.

Consider suitable organizational strategies. For example, if your paper is an analysis of a text, you should choose a structure that reflects the conceptual organization of the piece. If, on the other hand, you are comparing two historical events or figures, you will first want to determine the basis of your comparison, and then organize your points so that they follow the typical compare/contrast pattern: aaabbb or ababab.

Use the past tense. In History, the past tense is the tense of choice—it permits you to place a person or event at a particular point in a chronology.

Avoid the subjective “I.” You want your reader to feel that your point of view about a particular subject comes from the available evidence, and not from your own personal response. This is not to say that your personal response is irrelevant; rather, it is your job as a scholar to figure out what evidence led to your position on a subject, and then to explain fully why it led you there.

Watch your biases. Think about the argument you are making, and why you are making it. How does your upbringing/class/nationality/culture contribute to your point of view? Also, write from evidence, not from emotion. Write about something you care about, but do it without using incendiary language or ad hominem attacks.

Making a Claim/Developing a Thesis

What is an argument? In academic writing, an argument is usually a main idea, often called a “thesis statement,” backed up with evidence that supports the idea. Ninety-nine percent of the time you will need to make some sort of claim and use evidence to support it, and your ability to do this well will separate your papers from those of students who merely provide accumulations of fact and detail. A good paper will stake out a position and prove why it is a good position for a thinking person to hold. When beginning to write a paper, ask yourself, “What is my point”? If your papers do not have a main point, they cannot be arguing for anything. Asking yourself what your point is can help you avoid a mere “information dump.”

A thesis statement tells a reader how you will interpret the significance of the subject matter under discussion. Note that a thesis is an interpretation of a subject, not the subject itself. The subject, or topic, of an essay might be World War I or Moby Dick; a thesis must then offer a way to understand the war or the novel that others might dispute. A single sentence somewhere in your first paragraph is often a good way to present your thesis to the reader. The body of the essay gathers and organizes evidence that will persuade the reader of the logic of your interpretation. Your thesis statement gives the reader a preview of the essay’s purpose and goal. A strong thesis not only grabs the interest of your reader, who now wants to see you support your unique interpretation, it also provides a focus for your argument, one to which every part of your paper refers in the development of your position. A thesis keeps the writer centered on the matter at hand and reduces the risk of intellectual wandering. Likewise, a thesis provides the reader with a “road map,” clearly laying out the intellectual route ahead.

When attempting to determine whether your thesis statement is really an argument, ask yourself whether someone could contest what you are claiming. If so, then you have formulated a genuine argument. Once you have stated that argument at the paper’s beginning, you will spend the rest of the paper: (a) supporting your argument and, (b) rebutting possible attacks against your argument. Play devil’s advocate. Imagine that you are your own worst enemy—someone who is trying to disprove the argument that you have put forth. What flaws in your argument will your opponents point out? Where are the lapses in your thesis? Once you have determined the weaknesses in your own argument, you can work on eradicating them.

Arguments in academic writing are usually complex and take time to develop. Your argument will need to be more than a simple or obvious statement such as, “Frank Lloyd Wright was a great architect.” Such a statement might capture your initial impressions of Wright as you have studied him; however, you need to look deeper and express specifically what caused that “greatness.” You might claim, for example, that “Frank Lloyd Wright’s architecture combines elements of European modernism, Asian aesthetic form, and locally found materials to create a unique new style,” or “There are many strong similarities between Wright’s building designs and those of his mother, which suggests that he may have borrowed some of her ideas.” Then you would define your terms and prove your argument with evidence from Wright’s designs and those of the other architects you mentioned.

Formulating a Thesis

You can’t just pluck a thesis out of thin air. Even if you have a terrific insight concerning a topic, it won’t be worth much unless you can logically and persuasively support it in the body of your essay. A thesis is the evolutionary result of a thinking process, not a miraculous creation. Formulating a thesis is not the first thing you do after reading an essay assignment. Let me repeat that: deciding on a thesis does not come first. Before you can come up with an argument on any topic, you have to collect and organize evidence, look for possible relationships between known facts (such as surprising contrasts or similarities), and think about the beneath-the-surface significance of these relationships. After this initial exploration of the question at hand, you can formulate a “working thesis,” an argument that you think will make sense of the evidence but that may need adjustment along the way.

Writers use all kinds of techniques to stimulate their thinking and help them clarify relationships or comprehend the broader significance of a topic. For example, freewriting gives you the license to write nonstop for 15 minutes about anything that pops into your head about a topic. Once the 15 minutes are up, you go back over what you’ve written to see what kind of insights unexpectedly leap out at you. This often gets the creative juices flowing. If you are comparing and contrasting two events, you might make two columns on a piece of paper and write down everything you know about each event in the columns. Then, look back and forth between the two columns and see if anything unusual or unexpected or just plain interesting catches your attention. Formulate a working thesis, and see where it takes you. Reassess and revise your thesis. Reassess and revise your essay. Repeat as necessary.

Since the argument is one of the most important elements of you paper, you need to spend some time developing it. One of the most valuable pieces of advice I can give you is this: don’t try to tackle too many ideas in one essay! You will only end up frustrated. Simple identification of your argument can be a troublesome task if you have a myriad of thoughts in your head and are unsure as to which ones should be stressed in the paper. To gain some clarity, try the following exercise. Keeping in mind all of the ideas that you want the paper to cover, pretend that when your reader walks away from your paper, most of the writing will fade from her mind. She will, however, remember one major point. What do you want this point to be? This point—the one that you want your reader to recall, even if she forgets everything else she has read—is your argument or thesis.

What if you have two or three major ideas that you want your reader to remember? First, I would encourage you to examine those ideas to see if you can place them in some sort of hierarchical order. Is one idea slightly more important than the others are? Does one of the ideas serve as a bridge or connector between the others? If not, can you think of a “higher,” overarching idea that links all of the ideas? If you can answer any of these questions affirmatively, you have identified your main idea, and it should be the focus of your thesis statement. The other ideas in your mind are important, but they are ideas that merely support, advance, or are connected to the main idea; they do not need to be the focus of your argument. You will indubitably run into situations where you have two or three main ideas and all of them are equally important. (If you have more than three main concepts you are trying to advance in your paper, you are trying to do too much, unless you are writing a book or an honors thesis.) This means that your thesis is comprised of several sub-components; due to this complexity, statement of the thesis might necessarily take more than one sentence.

Some Examples of Constructing Thesis Statements

I. Compare and contrast the reasons why the North and South fought the Civil War.

You turn on the computer and type out the following: The North and South fought the Civil War for many reasons, some of which were the same and some different.

No kidding! So what? This weak thesis basically restates the question without providing any additional information. It is your job to do this right away. Sure, you will expand on this new information in the body of the essay, but it is important that the reader know where you are heading. Remember—you are not writing a mystery novel. So, what kind of new information should you provide? The reader of this weak thesis probably thinks to herself, “What reasons? How are they the same? How are they different?” Ask yourself these same questions. Try to characterize the reasons (“I think slavery was the main reason Americans fought the Civil War,” you might say to yourself). Begin to compare Northern and Southern attitudes (“The South believed slavery was right, and the North thought slavery was wrong”). Now, push your comparison toward an interpretation—why did one side think slavery was right and the other think it was wrong? You look again at the evidence and you decide the North believed slavery was immoral while the South believed it upheld their way of life.

At the computer, you write: While both sides fought the Civil War over the issue of slavery, the North fought for moral reasons while the South fought to preserve its own institutions.

Now you have a working thesis! Included in this working thesis is a reason for the war and some idea of how the two sides disagreed over this reason. As you write the essay, you will probably begin to characterize these differences more precisely. Suddenly your working thesis seems inexact or more vague than you had originally thought. Maybe you decide that, actually, both sides fought for moral reasons, they just saw morality in different contexts.

You end up revising the working thesis into a final thesis that really captures the argument in your paper: While both Northerners and Southerners believed they fought against tyranny and oppression, Northerners focused on the oppression of slaves while Southerners defended their own rights to property and self-government.

Compare this to the original weak thesis. See the difference? This final thesis presents a way of interpreting evidence that illuminates the significance of the issues raised by the question. If the essay supplies evidence and logical reasoning in support of this thesis, your instructor will be suitably impressed. Keep in mind that this is one of many possible interpretations of the Civil War--it is not the one and only right answer to the question. There isn’t a right answer: there are only strong and weak thesis statements and strong and weak uses of evidence.

II. Was the New Deal of the 1930s a liberal plan to create a welfare state in America, or was it a conservative defense of American capitalism?

Questions like this one often elicit quick responses from writers based on gut feelings. Students may feel quite strongly one way or the other, but they must remember that passion about a topic must be supported with critical thinking. To return to our example, a student might turn on the computer after reading this question and write: The New Deal was a conservative defense of American capitalism.

What makes this a weak thesis? Well, the author’s position is certainly clear, but why does she hold it? Keep in mind that an assertion is not an argument! This weak thesis just repeats part of the question; it adds nothing to our understanding of the issues involved in making this judgment. A better, working thesis would include a reason for holding this position: “The New Deal was a conservative defense of American capitalism because it __________.” Perhaps you realize that such questions rarely have all-or-nothing answers, and your investigation of the evidence finds support for both positions.

In this case, you might write the following: The New Deal both defended capitalist economic principles and offered government assistance to needy Americans, making it conservative and liberal at the same time.

What makes this a weak thesis? After all, it takes account of the evidence and makes an argument, doesn’t it? Yes, it does, but it’s wishy-washy—it doesn’t stake out a position. A critical thinker assesses the evidence supporting both sides of a question, but must ultimately decide which way the balance of evidence tilts. A strong thesis presents this final weighting of the data.

For example: Despite its work relief elements, the New Deal is best understood as a defense of American capitalism because its main programs attempted to create a stable environment for private enterprise.

It’s all there: position, argument, and attention to conflicting evidence. Again, this is not the “right answer,” but if the essay that follows supports this statement with the logical use of pertinent evidence, it will be a persuasive answer and a successful essay.

Evidence

Do not stop with having a point. You have to back up your point with evidence. The strength of your evidence, and your use of it, can make or break your argument. You already have the natural inclination for this type of thinking, if not in an academic setting. Think about how you talked your parents into letting you borrow the car. Did you present them with lots of instances of trustworthiness on your part from the past? Did you make them feel guilty, because your friends’ parents all let them drive? Did you whine until they just wanted you to shut up? Did you look up statistics on teen driving and use them to show how you didn’t fit the dangerous-driver profile? These are all types of argumentation, and they exist in academia in similar forms.

Be consistent with your evidence. Unlike negotiating for the use of your parents’ car, an academic paper is not the place for an all-out blitz of every type of argument. You can often use more than one type of evidence within a paper, but make sure that within each section you are providing the reader with evidence appropriate to each claim. You cannot convince a confused person, so keep things tidy and ordered.

Counterargument

One way to strengthen your argument and show that you have a deep understanding of the issue you are discussing is to anticipate and address counterarguments or objections. By considering what someone who disagrees with your position might have to say about your argument, you show that your have thought things through, and you dispose of some of the reasons your audience might have for not accepting your argument.

You can generate counterarguments by asking yourself what someone who disagrees with you might say about each of the points you’ve made or about your position as a whole. If you can’t immediately imagine another position, here are some strategies to try:

· Do some research. It may seem to you that no one could possibly disagree with the position you are arguing, but someone probably has.

· Talk about it with someone else. Another person may be able to imagine counterarguments that haven’t occurred to you.

· Consider the conclusion and the premises of your argument, and imagine someone who denies each of them. Then you can see which of these arguments are most worth considering.

Once you have thought up some counterarguments, consider how you will respond to them—will you concede that your opponent has a point but explain why your audience should nonetheless accept your argument? Will you reject the counterargument and explain why it is mistaken? Either way, you will want to leave your reader with a sense that your argument is stronger than opposing arguments.

When summarizing opposing arguments, be charitable. Present each argument objectively and fairly, rather than trying to make it look foolish. You want to show that you have seriously considered the many sides of the issue, and that you are not simply attacking or caricaturing your opponents. It is usually better to consider one or two serious counterarguments in some depth, rather than to give a long but superficial list of many different counterarguments and replies. Be sure that your reply is consistent with your original argument. If considering a counterargument changes your position, you will need to go back and revise your original argument accordingly.

Audience

Audience is a very important consideration in argument. A lifetime of dealing with your parents has helped you figure out which arguments work in different situations. Maybe whining works with your dad, but your mom will only accept cold, hard statistics. Your kid brother may listen only to the sound of money in his palm. It’s usually wise to think of your audience in an academic setting as someone who is intelligent, but who doesn’t already or necessarily agree with you. You are not just expressing your opinion in an argument (“it’s true because I said so”)—and in most cases your audience is pretty knowledgeable on the subject at hand—so you will need sturdier proof. At the same time, do not think of your audience as a genius clairvoyant. You have to come out and state both your claim and your evidence clearly. Do not assume that because the instructor knows the material that he or she understands what part of it you are using, what you think about it, and why.

Critical Reading

Critical reading is a big part of understanding argument. Although some of the material you read will be very persuasive, do not fall under the spell of the printed word as authority. Remember that the author of every text has an agenda, something that they want you to believe. Take notes either in the margins or on a separate sheet as you read. Put away that highlighter! Simply highlighting a text is only good for memorizing that text—it does not encourage critical reading. Part of the goal is to put the author’s ideas in your own words. Then you can stop thinking of these ideas as facts and start thinking of them as arguments. When you read, ask yourself questions like “What is the author trying to prove?” and “What is the author assuming I will agree with?” Do you agree with the author? Does the author adequately defend her argument? What kind of proof does she use? Is there something she leaves out? Does putting it in hurt her argument? As you get used to reading critically, you will see the sometimes hidden agendas of other writers, and you can use this skill to improve your own arguments.

Introductions

Introductions and conclusions can be the most difficult parts of papers to write. Usually when you sit down to respond to an assignment, you have at least some sense of what you want to say in the body of your paper. You might have chosen a few examples you want to use or have an idea that will help you answer the question: these sections, therefore, are not as hard to write. But these middle parts of the paper can’t just come out of thin air; they need to be introduced and they need to be concluded in a way that makes sense to your reader.

Try writing a tentative introduction first and then changing it later or writing your introduction last. You may think that you have to write your introduction first, but that isn’t necessarily true, and it isn’t always the most effective way to craft a good introduction. You may find that you don’t know what you’re going to argue at the beginning of the writing process, and only through the experience of writing your paper do you discover your main argument. It is perfectly fine to start out trying to argue a particular point, but wind up arguing something slightly or even dramatically different by the time you’ve written most of the paper. The writing process can be an important way to organize your ideas, think through complicated issues, refine your thoughts, and develop a sophisticated argument. However, an introduction written at the beginning of that discovery process will not necessarily reflect what you wind up with at the end. You will need to revise your paper to make sure that the introduction, all of the evidence, and the conclusion reflect the argument you intend.

Open with an attention grabber. Sometimes, especially if the topic of your paper is somewhat dry or technical, opening with something catchy can help. Consider these options:

· an intriguing example

· a provocative quotation

· a puzzling scenario

· a thought-provoking question

These attention-grabbing openers might get your reader interested and also help your reader connect to what might otherwise seem a pretty obscure topic. Essentially, you can use attention-grabbers to help your readers see why your topic is relevant and begin to care about your findings and perspectives.

Pay special attention to your first sentence. If any sentence in your paper is going to be completely free of errors and vagueness, it should be your first one. Start off on the right foot with your readers by making sure that the first sentence actually says something useful and that it does so in an interesting and error-free way.

Be straightforward and confident. Assert your main argument confidently. After all, you can’t expect your reader to believe it if it doesn’t sound like you believe it!

Body of Paper

Despite the large number of possible paper structures, I can confidently render the following piece of advice: discuss each idea in your paper fully and completely. In the course of determining your essay’s argument, you should have spent some time paring down the number of ideas that you plan to address in the paper. Limit yourself to exploring those ideas and sub-topics that can be analyzed in a complex, multi-faceted manner given the assignment’s page and time constraints. As I have repeatedly hinted, you are better off writing about fewer ideas in great detail and with increased insight and depth than presenting the reader with a broad collection of undeveloped, unconnected thoughts.

Be sure that each paragraph is connected to your argument. Throughout the writing process, you should remain conscious of how each paragraph connects with your argument. In history papers, paragraphs can play a variety of functions. They can:

· present new evidence to support your argument

· provide the reader with the background or context necessary to fully understand your argument

· anticipate and address counter-arguments that might be launched at your argument

· elucidate or define how you are using a particular term in your argument

· explore the relationship between different parts of your argument, if your thesis is composed of various sub-ideas

There are few things more distracting than unnecessary paragraphs that don’t seem to serve any purpose in the paper. Such paragraphs disrupt the flow of the essay and shatter the reader’s concentration.

So how do you avoid including useless paragraphs of clutter? At the end of each paragraph composed, ask yourself how the paragraph clarifies or furthers your argument; if you have a difficult time figuring out a paragraph’s purpose, your reader will as well. You also must ascertain that you have made perfectly explicit the paragraph’s relation to your argument. Of course, since you have written the paper, you know why you have included each particular paragraph; the whole paper seems quite logical to you. But will your rationale for including different paragraphs also be evident to a reader who hasn’t been inside of your head throughout the writing process? Finally, when you finish the first draft of your paper, re-read your work. As you work through each paragraph, ask yourself what would happen if you took the paragraph out of the paper. Would your argument still be as clear and strong? If you can remove a paragraph without in any way harming your ability to prove your thesis, that paragraph might not be necessary. You may be able to remove it and fill its space with significant material that is more relevant to your argument, and thus more important to your paper.

Conclusions

Play the “So What” Game. If you’re stuck and feel like your conclusion isn’t saying anything new or interesting, ask yourself “So What?” as you develop your ideas or your draft. You can also ask a friend to read it with you. Whenever you make a statement from your conclusion, ask, “So what?” or “Why should anybody care?” Then ponder that question and answer it. Don’t be discouraged if you initially answer, “I don’t know.” Keep thinking. It’s okay if you don’t have a good answer for every “So what?”—just keep trying to develop the significance of your work further.

You might try free-writing your conclusion in the form of a letter or e-mail to a friend or family member. In your letter, explain what you wrote about and then try to tell your friend what you learned as a result of writing the paper, how the ideas in the paper might relate to their experiences, or why the content of the paper matters in terms of “the big picture.”

When critiquing your first draft and its working thesis, ask yourself the following:

“Do I answer the question?” This might seem obvious, but it’s worth asking. No matter how intriguing or dazzling, a thesis that doesn’t answer the question is not a good thesis! If you are being asked to “take a stand,” do you? If you are being asked “what’s the most important event of the 20th century,” do you just state why your selection is important, or do you state why you think it’s the most important when compared to other important events? Re-reading the question prompt after constructing a working thesis can help you fix an argument that misses the focus of the question.

“Have I taken a position that others might challenge or oppose?” If not, then you probably do not have a strong argument. Theses that are too vague often have this problem. If your thesis contains vague words like “good” or “successful,” see if you could be more specific: why is something “good”; what makes something “successful”?

“Does my thesis pass the ‘So What?’ test?” Also known as the “What’s the Big Deal?” test, the “So What?” test asks whether your thesis presents a position or an interpretation worth pursuing. If a reader’s first response is, “So what?” then you need to clarify, to forge a relationship, or to connect to a larger issue. Once a reader says, “Gee, this argument has the potential to broaden my understanding of the significance of this topic,” then you have successfully passed this test.

“Does my essay support my thesis specifically and without wandering?” Just as a thesis that doesn’t answer the question ultimately fails, so does a thesis that isn’t properly supported with evidence and reasoning. If your thesis and the body of your essay do not seem to go together, one of them has to change. Generally, this means revising your thesis to capture more precisely the argument in your paper. Remember, always reassess and revise your writing as necessary.

Evaluation of Essay

You will be evaluated on the quality of critical thinking you demonstrate in the essay. Have you taken account of the evidence? Do you forge relationships between facts that broaden their significance? Do you persuade the reader of the logic of your argument instead of merely assuming it’s obvious? Accomplishing these tasks in your essay is what will impress your instructor.

Important Tips for Writing History Papers

1. Write in the simple past tense.
By definition, history is concerned with the past, and since you’re writing about the past, you need to write in the past tense.

2. Avoid excessive use of the passive voice.
The passive voice often fails to identify who or what is performing the actions you are describing.  Also, the passive voice tends to result in excessive use of various forms of the verb “to be,” which leads to wordiness.   Phrasing sentences in the active voice allows you to use active verbs that are more descriptive and that enliven your writing.
Passive voice: Many programs were created to put Argentineans back to work.
Active voice: The government created many programs to put Argentineans back to work.
In the passive voice example, the reader does not learn who created the programs, while the active voice clearly indicates where the programs originated.

3. Avoid the use of the pronoun “I.”
Avoid the use of “I” in college writing, as it is too informal.  Structure your essay so that your ideas come across clearly without having to state that they are your ideas.

4. Vary sentence structure.
Blend brief, direct statements with longer, more complex sentences.  This improves the flow of your paper and makes it more readable.  Too many short sentences make your paper choppy and difficult to read.  An endless string of long sentences confuses the reader.

5. Avoid slang.
Unless quoting directly, don’t use slang.  It can ruin the tone of your paper.

6. Omit needless words.
State your ideas as directly as possible.  Excessive use of adverbs, adjectives, and prepositional phrases can clutter a sentence, obscuring rather than amplifying your points. Many students load their papers with “filler” words in order to meet a minimum length requirement.  This is obvious to the reader, and does more harm than good.  It’s better to use additional evidence rather than additional words.

7. Know your audience.
Identifying your audience helps you determine what information and how much of it you will include in your essay.  Write your paper so that a general reader unfamiliar with the topic would be able to read and understand the essay.  You might ask a friend who fits this description to act as your “ideal reader” and point out areas in your paper that are not clear or have other problems.

8. Read your draft aloud.
Hearing your own words, or having someone else listen to them, can help you identify run-on sentences, awkward phrasing, and other problems that might otherwise escape your attention.  This is one of the most effective ways to proofread your work before turning it in.

9.  Cite sources properly.