1)Does a thesis have to be something that can be argued?
2)Can you have more than one thesis?
3)If so how can you interchange them?
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The OpenLab is an open-source, digital platform designed to support teaching and learning at City Tech (New York City College of Technology), and to promote student and faculty engagement in the intellectual and social life of the college community.
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These are great questions! I’m going to respond to #2 and #3 first since they are easier to answer. You can only have one thesis, but the thesis can have multiple parts and/or be made up of multiple sentences. The complexity of your thesis will generally depend on the length of the work (and of course, as always, its purpose!). Regarding #1, the answer is a bit more complicated since, as we talked about over the last couple of weeks, “to argue” can mean something very specific or general. If the sole purpose of an essay is to inform the audience, your thesis would be informative, not argumentative. However, most essays are written not solely to inform an audience about something, but to inform them about something from a certain perspective. Therefore, even in an informative essay, your thesis statement usually “argues” (in the broad definition) something. Thesis statements are ALWAYS–regardless of the purpose of the essay–propositions. While this term, proposition, is closely related to argument, it is not identical to it. By now, I’m assuming you’re very much aware of just how involved this discussion of thesis statements can become. Could you let me know if what I’ve written helps to answer your question and if so, how it may have helped you to further understand what thesis statements are?