Which Statement Offers The Best Conclusion That One Can Draw From These Two Inaugural Speeches?

What this handout is almost

This handout will explain the functions of conclusions, offering strategies for writing effective ones, aid y'all evaluate conclusions you lot've drafted, and advise approaches to avoid.

About conclusions

Introductions and conclusions tin be hard to write, but they're worth investing fourth dimension in. They can have a significant influence on a reader's experience of your paper.

Just as your introduction acts as a bridge that transports your readers from their ain lives into the "place" of your assay, your determination can provide a span to help your readers make the transition back to their daily lives. Such a conclusion will help them come across why all your analysis and information should matter to them after they put the newspaper down.

Your decision is your chance to take the last word on the bailiwick. The conclusion allows you lot to have the concluding say on the issues you accept raised in your paper, to synthesize your thoughts, to demonstrate the importance of your ideas, and to propel your reader to a new view of the discipline. It is besides your opportunity to make a skillful last impression and to end on a positive note.

Your conclusion tin get across the confines of the assignment. The conclusion pushes beyond the boundaries of the prompt and allows you to consider broader issues, make new connections, and elaborate on the significance of your findings.

Your conclusion should make your readers glad they read your paper. Your conclusion gives your reader something to take away that volition help them see things differently or appreciate your topic in personally relevant ways. It can propose broader implications that will not only interest your reader, but besides enrich your reader's life in some way. Information technology is your gift to the reader.

Strategies for writing an effective conclusion

One or more of the following strategies may assist you write an effective conclusion:

Play the "So What" Game. If you're stuck and feel like your determination isn't maxim anything new or interesting, inquire a friend to read information technology with you lot. Whenever you make a statement from your determination, inquire the friend to say, "So what?" or "Why should everyone intendance?" Then ponder that question and reply it. Here's how it might go: Y'all: Basically, I'm just proverb that education was of import to Douglass. Friend: So what? You: Well, information technology was important because it was a key to him feeling like a free and equal citizen. Friend: Why should anybody care? Y'all: That'south important because plantation owners tried to keep slaves from being educated and so that they could maintain control. When Douglass obtained an education, he undermined that command personally. You can also use this strategy on your ain, request yourself "So What?" equally you develop your ideas or your draft.
Return to the theme or themes in the introduction. This strategy brings the reader total circle. For example, if you begin by describing a scenario, yous tin can end with the aforementioned scenario as proof that your essay is helpful in creating a new understanding. You may as well refer to the introductory paragraph by using cardinal words or parallel concepts and images that yous also used in the introduction.
Synthesize, don't summarize. Include a brief summary of the paper'southward main points, just don't simply echo things that were in your paper. Instead, show your reader how the points you lot made and the support and examples yous used fit together. Pull information technology all together.
Include a provocative insight or quotation from the inquiry or reading you did for your paper.
Propose a course of action, a solution to an issue, or questions for further study. This tin redirect your reader'south thought process and help her to apply your info and ideas to her own life or to run into the broader implications.
Point to broader implications. For example, if your paper examines the Greensboro sit-ins or some other event in the Civil Rights Motion, you could point out its bear upon on the Civil Rights Movement as a whole. A newspaper about the way of writer Virginia Woolf could point to her influence on other writers or on afterwards feminists.

Strategies to avert

Beginning with an unnecessary, overused phrase such as "in decision," "in summary," or "in closing." Although these phrases can piece of work in speeches, they run into equally wooden and trite in writing.
Stating the thesis for the very first time in the conclusion.
Introducing a new thought or subtopic in your decision.
Ending with a rephrased thesis statement without any substantive changes.
Making sentimental, emotional appeals that are out of character with the residual of an analytical paper.
Including evidence (quotations, statistics, etc.) that should exist in the body of the paper.

Four kinds of ineffective conclusions

The "That's My Story and I'm Sticking to It" Conclusion. This conclusion but restates the thesis and is usually painfully short. It does not push the ideas forward. People write this kind of decision when they can't think of annihilation else to say. Instance: In decision, Frederick Douglass was, as we take seen, a pioneer in American education, proving that educational activity was a major force for social change with regard to slavery.
The "Sherlock Holmes" Decision. Sometimes writers volition state the thesis for the very first fourth dimension in the decision. You might exist tempted to use this strategy if you don't want to give everything away likewise early on in your newspaper. Y'all may think it would exist more than dramatic to continue the reader in the dark until the cease and then "wow" him with your main idea, as in a Sherlock Holmes mystery. The reader, however, does not expect a mystery, but an analytical discussion of your topic in an academic style, with the main argument (thesis) stated upwards front. Case: (After a paper that lists numerous incidents from the book but never says what these incidents reveal about Douglass and his views on pedagogy): And then, as the prove above demonstrates, Douglass saw education every bit a way to undermine the slaveholders' ability and likewise an important step toward freedom.
The "America the Beautiful"/"I Am Woman"/"We Shall Overcome" Conclusion. This kind of determination usually draws on emotion to make its entreatment, merely while this emotion and fifty-fifty sentimentality may be very heartfelt, it is usually out of grapheme with the rest of an analytical paper. A more sophisticated commentary, rather than emotional praise, would exist a more fitting tribute to the topic. Example: Because of the efforts of fine Americans like Frederick Douglass, countless others have seen the shining beacon of low-cal that is pedagogy. His instance was a torch that lit the way for others. Frederick Douglass was truly an American hero.
The "Grab Bag" Conclusion. This kind of conclusion includes actress information that the writer found or thought of but couldn't integrate into the main paper. You may find it hard to leave out details that you discovered subsequently hours of inquiry and thought, but adding random facts and $.25 of evidence at the end of an otherwise-well-organized essay tin just create confusion. Case: In add-on to beingness an educational pioneer, Frederick Douglass provides an interesting example study for masculinity in the American Due south. He too offers historians an interesting glimpse into slave resistance when he confronts Covey, the overseer. His relationships with female relatives reveal the importance of family in the slave community.

Works consulted

We consulted these works while writing this handout. This is not a comprehensive list of resources on the handout's topic, and we encourage you to exercise your ain research to detect boosted publications. Please do not use this list equally a model for the format of your own reference listing, as information technology may not match the commendation style you are using. For guidance on formatting citations, please see the UNC Libraries citation tutorial. We revise these tips periodically and welcome feedback.

Douglass, Frederick. 1995. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Written by Himself. New York: Dover.

Hamilton College. n.d. "Conclusions." Writing Center. Accessed June 14, 2022. https://www.hamilton.edu//academics/centers/writing/writing-resource/conclusions.

Holewa, Randa. 2004. "Strategies for Writing a Decision." LEO: Literacy Educational activity Online. Last updated Feb 19, 2004. https://leo.stcloudstate.edu/acadwrite/conclude.html.

Creative Commons License This work is licensed under a Artistic Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 License.
You lot may reproduce it for non-commercial employ if y'all use the entire handout and attribute the source: The Writing Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill