What Makes a Good History Argument?
History essays start with arguments. But what is a history argument? And how can you tell if you have written a good one? Follow the steps below to learn more.
Where to Begin
One of the hardest parts of writing a history essays—and one of the aspects most crucial to the success of an essay—is creating an argument. The argument tells your reader your main point and why it is compelling. Your argument dictates what sources and information you will need to include. And your argument determines how you will organize your paper. In short, your selection of argument then leads to the other choices you make in the paper.
Choosing a good argument, however, can be difficult. Especially before you begin your research, it can be difficult—perhaps impossible—to know what you might want to argue.
A way to get started, then, is to instead set yourself a good historical question to answer. Then, do the research needed to answer the question. The answer you find will then become your argument.
For instance, you might want to find out the following: ‘What were the causes of World War I?’ You would then do some primary and secondary research and come to your own reasoned conclusion about what caused World War I. Let’s say that you determined that the most important factors were politics and economics within Europe’s global imperial powers. You could then write your argument based on the answer to your question: ‘Economic and political factors within Europe and European colonial territories caused World War I.’
This method of starting with a question means that you don’t have to know the answer before you start. At the same time, the question sets you up for success. The answer you find to your question can then be stated as an argument.
The key, then, in choosing a good question, thereby setting you up for a sophisticated argument. Read the points below to get some tips on how to choose your research question.
Go Beyond Common Assumptions
Perhaps the first place to start in asking a history question is to go beyond what most people would assume to be true or what we already know. For instance, take a question like ‘What rights did the women’s suffrage movement gain for women in the United States?’ This question is a big risk because the answer seems pretty well established: the women’s suffrage movement helped gain women the right to vote in the United States. Likely, any research you do on the topic will lead you to the answer that the reader already knows.
Instead, choose a question that might generate interest with your reader. Perhaps the topic is controversial. In that case, you can argue in support of one side. ‘What caused the fall of the Roman Empire?’ Historians have debated this question since the fall of Rome itself—which argument do you think is the most compelling and why? You can state the answer as your argument.
Or perhaps the topic is under-researched. In that case, you can add information that a reader might not have encountered before. This under-researched area does not have to be a major overlooked aspect of history: it can be equally interesting and illuminating to read about something small. For instance, how did you local town react to the invention of automobiles? What changed in terms of infrastructure? Did it affect politics or society? Were there any strong reactions in local publications? Likely no one knows the answer to these questions, but their answers could provide strong arguments and generate interesting insights into the past.
Go Beyond Questions with Single-Word Answers
Yes and no questions or questions that can be answered in a few words tend not to be very complicated or interesting. ‘Did you finish your homework?’ or ‘What homework did you have today?’ don’t spark discussion nearly as well as ‘What did you learn from your homework today?’ The same is true for history. ‘What caused World War I’ is a much more interesting question—and has a much more interesting answer—than ‘When was World War I?’
It is important to think about whether your question will have an interesting answer because the answer to your question will be the main body of your paper. ‘When did most houses in the United States have access to electricity?’ might be interesting, but it has a very short answer: 1925. That’s not a very long or compelling essay if it is just a date.
You can set yourself up for success by asking questions that would have longer answers. They might start with a ‘why’ or a ‘how.’ For instance, ‘How did electrification change domestic life in the United States?’ gives you more to say. Most importantly, having a longer answer means what you will say is unique to you: other historians might point out their own reasons for what changed after electrification—they might not be the same as yours.
Can You Argue the Opposite
One of the biggest issues with choosing an argument is that often students do not choose an argument at all: they choose a fact. This tendency is quite understandable: no one wants to be wrong in an assignment. Therefore, it seems safest to pick something that no one will disagree with.
This reaction, however, prevents you from making an actual argument. An argument, by definition, is going to be a bit confrontational. You will have to state an opinion—as opposed to a fact—and then defend it. This kind of thesis statement can be intimidating to write at first, but it will ultimately improve your writing. It will give you stronger claims, force you to be more exact in defending them against potential counter-arguments, and give you a piece of writing that is far more interesting to read.
The most common error that students make is that what they think is an argument is really just a fact. A quick way to tell if your argument works as an argument, as opposed to just a fact, is to see if it would be possible for a reasonable person to argue the opposite. For instance, ‘In the 1930s, citizens of the United States faced several potential disasters at once: the continuing Great Depression, the Dust Bowl out west, and the looming threat of war in Europe.’ Although this is a long sentence, it doesn’t make a good argument. No one would really disagree with these claims.
Instead, a strong argument is a statement that could be disagreed with: ‘World War I was caused primarily by political concerns’ could be argued against. Someone else might say ‘World War I was caused not primarily by political reasons but instead by economic reasons.’ With an argument like this one, you have justified the existence of your paper: now you have to defend why political concerns were the primary cause of the war, as opposed to other reasons.
Final Thoughts
These steps offer some guidelines when you first start thinking about questions and arguments for a history paper. Even professional historians think through these steps as they work on their next books.
As you practice working on writing historical arguments, you might think of ways to make even more sophisticated arguments. For instance, you might state the limits of your argument. Or you could point out that your claims were not always true—where are the exceptions that prove the rule? Finally, you might address counter-arguments: what might your critics say and how would you respond?
In the end, though, history arguments circle back to the basic ideas listed above: choose something that is an argument, as opposed to a fact. Look for questions that give responses beyond what we already know. And ask questions that necessitate longer answers.
Learn More about Historical Arguments
Circa’s skill-driven courses give students enough practice to be confident in making their own historical arguments.