How long should an argumentative essay be

EssayJack is a good tool to use to create this outline and understand better what each section needs try it for free here. First Paragraph: Background and Thesis Statement. This acts as a smooth segue to your background and thesis statement where you later establish your side on the issue. You can start with a surprising statistic that is not commonly known within the field. That means no personal anecdotes or inspirational quotes etc.

Save those for your narrative essays. Next, provide background on your topic to prepare the readers for the rest of your essay. Engage the reader by answering the following questions:. For example, if the topic is gender inequality in the workplace, you can share statistics from research that exemplifies the difference in incomes of the average man and woman who perform the same role.

All arguments or body paragraphs must always contain the following three parts:. Part 1: Claim. A claim is a statement you make to support your argument. Applying sin tax to products based on the amount of sugar will directly reduce the excessive consumption of heavily sugary products amongst consumers. Every claim made should be supported by relevant evidence and explanation of how that evidence supports your claim.

This is where you insert the findings of your research from credible sources. Example: Case study of where sin tax resulted in lower consumption. The measure imposes a tax of one cent per ounce on the distributors of specified sugar-sweetened beverages such as soda, sports drinks, energy drinks, and sweetened iced teas. Part 3: Tie-back to thesis. This demonstrates that imposing a sin tax on sugary drinks is one way to reduce the consumption of sugar-based products.

A ssuming that your thesis is about reducing consumption of sugary products and ways to do it. A good argumentative essay will also have paragraphs that address counterarguments.

This demonstrates your knowledge of the topic and awareness of existing opposing arguments, which will impress most readers. Home Knowledge Base Essay How long is an essay? How long is an essay? Receive feedback on language, structure and layout Professional editors proofread and edit your paper by focusing on: Academic style Vague sentences Grammar Style consistency See an example. Is this article helpful? Shona McCombes Shona has a bachelor's and two master's degrees, so she's an expert at writing a great thesis.

She has also worked as an editor and teacher, working with students at all different levels to improve their academic writing. Other students also liked. How to write an essay introduction A strong introduction sparks your reader's curiosity, gives background information on your topic, and presents a clear thesis statement. How to write a conclusion paragraph A strong conclusion ties together your main points, shows why your argument matters, and opens broader questions.

Writing a statement of purpose for graduate school To get into graduate school, you need a strong statement of purpose that builds a picture of your experience, achievements, and motivations. What is your plagiarism score? Scribbr Plagiarism Checker. In high school you are often asked to write a 5-paragraph essay, composed of an introduction, three body paragraphs, and a conclusion. College applications require a short personal essay to express your interests and motivations.

This generally has a strict word limit. You would then have to talk about the precedents for what makes for a good capital city and why New York fits the bill more than DC does. Your argument can't simply be that a lot of people think New York is the best city ever and that you agree.

In addition to using concrete evidence, you always want to keep the tone of your essay passionate, but impersonal. Even though you're writing your argument from a single opinion, don't use first person language—"I think," "I feel," "I believe,"—to present your claims. Doing so is repetitive, since by writing the essay you're already telling the audience what you feel, and using first person language weakens your writing voice.

Even without a counter argument, you can make a pretty persuasive claim, but a counterargument will round out your essay into one that is much more persuasive and substantial.

By anticipating an argument against your claim and taking the initiative to counter it, you're allowing yourself to get ahead of the game. This way, you show that you've given great thought to all sides of the issue before choosing your position, and you demonstrate in multiple ways how yours is the more reasoned and supported side. This paragraph is where you re-state your argument and summarize why it's the best claim.

Your essay should have just as awesome a skeleton as this plesiosaur does. In other words: a ridiculously awesome skeleton. It always helps to have an example to learn from. I've written a full 5-paragraph argumentative essay here. Look at how I state my thesis in paragraph 1, give supporting evidence in paragraphs 2 and 3, address a counterargument in paragraph 4, and conclude in paragraph 5. It is almost impossible to go through life without encountering a situation where your loyalties to different people or causes come into conflict with each other.

Maybe you have a loving relationship with your sister, but she disagrees with your decision to join the army, or you find yourself torn between your cultural beliefs and your scientific ones. These conflicting loyalties can often be maintained for a time, but as examples from both history and psychological theory illustrate, sooner or later, people have to make a choice between competing loyalties, as no one can maintain a conflicting loyalty or belief system forever.

The first two sentences set the scene and give some hypothetical examples and stakes for the reader to care about. The third sentence finishes off the intro with the thesis statement, making very clear how the author stands on the issue "people have to make a choice between competing loyalties, as no one can maintain a conflicting loyalty or belief system forever. Psychological theory states that human beings are not equipped to maintain conflicting loyalties indefinitely and that attempting to do so leads to a state called "cognitive dissonance.

Even if human beings initially hold a conflicting loyalty, they will do their best to find a mental equilibrium by making a choice between those loyalties—stay stalwart to a belief system or change their beliefs.

One of the earliest formal examples of cognitive dissonance theory comes from Leon Festinger's When Prophesy Fails. Members of an apocalyptic cult are told that the end of the world will occur on a specific date and that they alone will be spared the Earth's destruction. When that day comes and goes with no apocalypse, the cult members face a cognitive dissonance between what they see and what they've been led to believe Festinger, Some choose to believe that the cult's beliefs are still correct, but that the Earth was simply spared from destruction by mercy, while others choose to believe that they were lied to and that the cult was fraudulent all along.

Both beliefs cannot be correct at the same time, and so the cult members are forced to make their choice. But even when conflicting loyalties can lead to potentially physical, rather than just mental, consequences, people will always make a choice to fall on one side or other of a dividing line. Though the Catholic church dictated specific scientific teachings, Copernicus' loyalty to his own observations and scientific evidence won out over his loyalty to his country's government and belief system.

When he published his heliocentric model of the solar system--in opposition to the geocentric model that had been widely accepted for hundreds of years Hannam, -- Copernicus was making a choice between his loyalties. In an attempt t o maintain his fealty both to the established system and to what he believed, h e sat on his findings for a number of years Fantoli, But, ultimately, Copernicus made the choice to side with his beliefs and observations above all and published his work for the world to see even though, in doing so, he risked both his reputation and personal freedoms.

These two paragraphs provide the reasons why the author supports the main argument and uses substantiated sources to back those reasons. The paragraph on cognitive dissonance theory gives both broad supporting evidence and more narrow, detailed supporting evidence to show why the thesis statement is correct not just anecdotally but also scientifically and psychologically.

First, we see why people in general have a difficult time accepting conflicting loyalties and desires and then how this applies to individuals through the example of the cult members from the Dr. Festinger's research. The next paragraph continues to use more detailed examples from history to provide further evidence of why the thesis that people cannot indefinitely maintain conflicting loyalties is true.

Some will claim that it is possible to maintain conflicting beliefs or loyalties permanently, but this is often more a matter of people deluding themselves and still making a choice for one side or the other, rather than truly maintaining loyalty to both sides equally. For example, Lancelot du Lac typifies a person who claims to maintain a balanced loyalty between to two parties, but his attempt to do so fails as all attempts to permanently maintain conflicting loyalties must.

Lancelot tells himself and others that he is equally devoted to both King Arthur and his court and to being Queen Guinevere's knight Malory, But he can neither be in two places at once to protect both the king and queen, nor can he help but let his romantic feelings for the queen to interfere with his duties to the king and the kingdom.

Ultimately, he and Queen Guinevere give into their feelings for one another and Lancelot—though he denies it—chooses his loyalty to her over his loyalty to Arthur. This decision plunges the kingdom into a civil war, ages Lancelot prematurely, and ultimately leads to Camelot's ruin Raabe, Though Lancelot claimed to have been loyal to both the king and the queen, this loyalty was ultimately in conflict, and he could not maintain it.

Here we have the acknowledgement of a potential counter-argument and the evidence as to why it isn't true. The argument is that some people or literary characters have asserted that they give equal weight to their conflicting loyalties. The refutation is that, though some may claim to be able to maintain conflicting loyalties, they're either lying to others or deceiving themselves.

The paragraph shows why this is true by providing an example of this in action. Whether it be through literature or history, time and time again, people demonstrate the challenges of trying to manage conflicting loyalties and the inevitable consequences of doing so. Though belief systems are malleable and will often change over time, it is not possible to maintain two mutually exclusive loyalties or beliefs at once.

In the end, people always make a choice, and loyalty for one party or one side of an issue will always trump loyalty to the other. The concluding paragraph summarizes the essay, touches on the evidence presented, and re-states the thesis statement.

If you have the option to pick your own argumentative essay topic which you most likely will , then choose one or two topics you find the most intriguing or that you have a vested interest in and do some preliminary research on both sides of the debate. Do an open internet search just to see what the general chatter is on the topic and what the research trends are. Did your preliminary reading influence you to pick a side or change your side?

Without diving into all the scholarly articles at length, do you believe there's enough evidence to support your claim? Have there been scientific studies? Does a noted scholar in the field agree with you? If not, you may need to pick another topic or side of the argument to support. Now's the time to pick the side of the argument you feel you can support the best and summarize your main point into your thesis statement. Your thesis will be the basis of your entire essay, so make sure you know which side you're on, that you've stated it clearly, and that you stick by your argument throughout the entire essay.

You've taken a gander at what the internet at large has to say on your argument, but now's the time to actually read those sources and take notes.

You can also search individual university or school libraries and websites to see what kinds of academic articles you can access for free.

Keep track of your important quotes and page numbers and put them somewhere that's easy to find later. Before you begin to flesh out the essay, take a look at what you've got.

Is your thesis statement in the first paragraph? Is it clear? Is your argument logical? Does your supporting evidence support your reasoning?