On the Importance of Identifying Scholarly Arguments and Tools to Find Them

Alex C. Lange
10 min readJan 12, 2022
Photo by Tetiana SHYSHKINA on Unsplash

While working on my Ph.D., I learned many things about academia. I trained in various methods scholars can use to investigate phenomena of interest. I further cultivated my writing style and voice. One of the most important things I learned was how to identify arguments.

Arguments are everywhere, but not every statement or choice is an argument. When you decide to study at the local coffee shop, you are not making an argument. You are not making an argument when listening to Jazmine Sullivan’s album Heaux Tales. These things are somewhat obvious. But how obvious is it that these are not arguments? You may be studying at the coffee shop rather than Starbucks because you prefer to support local businesses and find the atmosphere better. This is an argument about the quality of a study space and what one values. You may be talking with a friend about Heaux Tales and you claim it is one of the top albums of 2021, as NPR Music recently declared. You are making an argument about Sullivan’s musical gifts compared to other recording artists.

It is essential to leave an undergraduate or graduate program with this knowledge to improve one’s critical reading skills and sharpen one’s analytical chops. Whether making a claim about coffee shops, Jazmine Sullivan, or your research interests, argument identification and construction is essential for anyone pursuing education, especially a graduate degree. Below, I share a bit about what I mean by academic arguments and some potential tools to detect them. Ultimately, I argue identifying arguments is a core component of academic socialization.

What are Arguments?

When folks hear the word argument, something akin to a fight, dispute, or childhood memory might come to mind. An academic argument is not like “two people yelling, neither person listening to the other or conceding legitimate points. This is exactly the kind of argument you do not want” (Belcher, 2009, p. 83). Instead, a scholarly argument is a position or stance on a topic that a reader can coherently respond with “I agree” or “I disagree.” Scholars create arguments using different forms of evidence rather than ill-informed opinions or assumptions about a given topic.

Before graduate school, I thought reports, journal articles, books, and other academic-related texts presented data instead of arguments. What I learned over time was that scholars make arguments and use evidence (i.e., data and/or literature) to back up their claims. In a field like education, the information to back up those claims is often (but not always) based on participant-generated data through qualitative and/or quantitative research projects. This idea was also reflected in my class assignments. Rather than making a thesis statement, I would simply be writing a report about the topic.

An argument generally consists of two components:

  1. First, you make a claim or statement that summarizes the main idea of a text. I use text broadly to mean written articles or books, speeches, audio content, or visual engagement. You can think of this claim as the author’s thesis statement. Claims are the general reasons why or how an argument is valid, correct, or deserving of your point.
  2. Second, you state reasons why that claim is valid and/or how the evidence supports that claim. Evidence comes in many forms, including examples, comparisons, causes/effects, statistics, direct quotes, observations, analogies, personal experiences, and anecdotes.

An argument is meant to make a point. Arguments become “vehicles intended to convince or compel people to believe something” (University of Idaho, n.d.). That something is generally a person’s conclusion. An argument is compelling when you buy into the claim and the supporting evidence.

Why are Arguments Important to Know and Detect?

In the first year of my Ph.D. program, I took a History of Higher Education course. To non-historians, a class on history feels straightforward. One reads what happened and then memorizes it for some historical or contemporary importance. However, my instructor presented various texts, each using different sets of evidence to make claims about history and its significance. After reading the texts, I came to class prepared to discuss which authors I agreed with and disagreed with. When I tried this form of engagement, I learned that I missed a crucial step: I did not actually ever attempt to grasp an author’s point. I skipped ahead to whether I agreed with it and sought to point out all its flaws. This was also my early approach to literature reviews for class assignments: I was simply summarizing the literature instead of making an argument about it (a post for another day).

It is critical to identify and state someone’s argument before signaling agreement or disagreement. By saying an author’s perspective, we as scholars can entertain and take someone’s perspective without necessarily agreeing with it. For instance, take the subject of higher education in the 1960s. Like Richard Freeland (1992), some historians argued that this period represents the “golden age” of higher education, with unprecedented federal investment and a significant expansion of institutions. Like John Thelin (2011), others argued that the 1960s may actually be a “gilted” age rather than a golden one. Based on my prior engagement with higher education history, I would lean toward Freeland’s perspective over Thelin’s. However, it is critical to pay attention to the latter’s argument before I signal my level of agreement. I may have missed something in the prior literature that would help me better see Thelin’s points.

Many of the texts you will encounter in graduate school will involve an author or authors presenting a thesis, either implicitly or explicitly. Think about the five-paragraph essay for those of us who had patient, unflinching K-12 English teachers. I still hear my high school English language teachers telling me what a thesis statement was and how I should always make it clear in my introduction. Academic writing is no different. Ideally, one makes their argument explicit in the opening of their work. However, that is not always the case.

How to Find an Argument

Now that I have described arguments, it is important to provide tools to help you find them. In graduate school, you will be expected to identify and analyze arguments. In the best-case scenario, writers will say statements like “In this article, I argue…” or “Based on our findings, we assert….” I find this to be clearer in theoretical or position papers than I do empirical journal articles; many are trained to think of empirical articles as presentations of facts rather than a presentation of argument with data. This might also be the case because we as scholars are sometimes not trained in making arguments explicit. Notice in my opening paragraph how I closed with an “I argue” statement. That is a statement one can reasonably agree or disagree with after reading this post.

Consider whether the text you are engaging with is meant to present information or if you should expect an argument. The texts you read in upper-level undergraduate seminars or graduate school will often make some kind of argument. Having this in mind helps you guard against arguments that may not be that compelling. Think about laundry detergent or toothpaste commercials that claim why you should buy one company’s product over another. They often present scant evidence or someone in a lab coat without actually stating good, empirical reasons why you should buy one product over another.

One way of finding arguments is by looking for key words and phrases. These can include the obvious ones like “argument,” “argue,” “my view,” “what you should think,” and “my perspective.” All these terms signal that the reader is presenting a thesis to you. You might also see terms like “therefore,” “thus,” “as a result,” and “in that case.”

You can also use Van Lacum et al.’s (2014) seven-part scientific argumentation model to detect and identify arguments. There are first five parts:

  1. Motive: What was the author’s motive for conducting the research or writing this particular text?
  2. Objective/Purpose: What was the author’s research question(s) or objective(s)? This may feel similar to motive but is distinct.
  3. Main Conclusion: Based on what they presented, what conclusion(s) does the author draw from the results of their projects? Again, the main conclusion may read like the objective, but it answers the research question, whether or not the aim was achieved, or whether the hypothesis was supported by the evidence.
  4. Implication(s): What is the implication of this research, according to the author? What recommendations does the author make for research/practice/policy?
  5. Support: How does the author bolster or justify the main conclusion? This can be based on one’s own data or interpretations or statements from the literature (via references).

These last two components of the model are more on the reader.

  1. Counterargument: What did the author present that may weaken or discredit their main conclusions? For instance, might there be a methodological issue? A contradiction with other studies? Alternative explanations? Sometimes, authors present these as limitations in their work.
  2. Refutation: How does the author clap back at their naysayers? What information might weaken or refute counterarguments present?

Another model comes from a critical thinking worksite from the University of Idaho (n.d.). This three-step process helps readers identify if an argument is present and what that might be:

  1. Grasp the context: Is the text you are reading meant to make an argument? Again, some texts we read as scholars are intended to summarize or inform rather than take a particular perspective.
  2. Identify the conclusion: What is the author trying to convince you to think, believe, or do? Arguments are meant to persuade or compel people to believe something. To find this, you will want to look toward the introduction or conclusion sections of a text. Authors will typically repeat their argument multiple times throughout a text. Still, these are the two places you should find well-constructed arguments.
  3. Identify the reasons: Why does an author think you should believe them? What claims do people use to make you believe them? Without these claims, an argument cannot exist. For instance, the statement “Coke is better than Pepsi” may be your conclusion, but without reasons, it is not an argument. And for those of us who have spent time in the Southeastern United States, that statement is a fact, not an opinion.

Beyond these tips, the best place to find a scholar’s thesis or argument in a paper is the abstract, introduction, and/or conclusion.

Abstract

If you are reading a journal article, 99% of the time there is an abstract to provide a brief synopsis. This may be one place to find the author’s argument. For example, when one reads Victor Ray’s (2019) “A theory of racialized organizations,” they can see Ray signal his argument in the abstract. The abstract states, in part: “I argue that racialization theory must account for how both state policy and individual attitudes are filtered through — and changed by — organizations” (p. 26). This clearly articulates Ray’s perspective, and you could reasonably respond with “I agree” or “I disagree” to this statement.

Introduction

Another common place to find one’s argument is in the introduction section of an article. Many good authors state their arguments upfront to help readers think about their claims throughout a text. Take Wilson Okello’s (2018) “From self-authorship to self-definition: Remapping theoretical assumptions through Black feminism.” In the abstract, Okello stated that he would deconstruct ideas of holistic student development and critique the subject-object principle of self-authorship. Later in his extended introduction, Okello wrote: “I argue, however, that self-authorship, recognized as an integrative development model in student development theory, is limited in its scope with respect to minoritized bodies broadly and Black bodies specifically” (p. 530). Again, readers can understand Okello’s argument and reasonably respond with “I agree” or “I disagree” to this statement. Okello also primed the reader to think about this argument, which he supports with evidence throughout the text.

Conclusion

Because of our socialization to academia as scholars, we may present arguments once the reader reviews the data and analysis. This means looking for the argument in the conclusion of a text. Take Katharine Broton and Sara Goldrick-Rab’s (2018) “Going without: An exploration of food and housing insecurity among undergraduates.” Throughout the article, Broton and Goldrick-Rab used both current literature and new data from thousands of undergraduate students to show the prevalence of food and housing insecurity among this population. In their brief conclusion, the authors stated: “Efforts to increase college completion rates must be broadened to include attention to material hardship and shed light on this all-too-often hidden cost of college attendance” (p. 129). Though the authors do not use the language of “argument” or “perspective,” this sentence is an argument based on their data and analysis.

Title

At times, titles can give you an indication of the writer’s purpose or position. For instance, take Elizabeth Armstrong and Laura Hamilton’s (2013) book, Paying for the Party: How College Maintains Inequality. The part of the title following the colon tips the reader off that Armstrong and Hamilton will make an argument about college facilitating inequality. They later present their formal argument in the book’s early chapters and supplement that claim with evidence from various chapters.

Making Sense of Arguments

Identifying arguments is one thing. It is another thing to then analyze them. While beyond the scope of this post, I want to offer a few reflective tools to help you think about arguments. After reading or consuming a text, you can ask yourself questions to help evaluate the evidence the author or authors present(s):

  • Based on the evidence, is there an alternative explanation or different claim that can be made?
  • Is the evidence convincing? If so, why? If not, why not?
  • How does this argument or set of evidence compare with others you read?

Faculty often bring together different readings because they take various approaches to understanding a particular phenomenon. Some may explore the phenomenon using different types of evidence. Other groupings of authors may more explicitly conflict with one another. You can think about this collection of arguments with questions like:

  • How do the authors each support their arguments/claims with evidence or rationales?
  • If the authors of the week’s texts came together for a discussion, what would they have an agreement about? Where would they disagree with one another?

Now go forth and find some arguments!

References

Armstrong, E. A., & Hamilton, L. T. (2013). Paying for the party: How college maintains inequality.

Belcher, W. L. (2009). Writing your journal article in twelve weeks: A guide to academic publishing success. SAGE.

Broton, K. M., & Goldrick-Rab, S. (2018). Going without: An exploration of food and housing insecurity among undergraduates. Educational Researcher, 47(2), 121–133. https://doi.org/10.3102/0013189X17741303

Freeland, R. M. (1992). Academia’s golden age: Universities in Massachusetts, 1945–1970. Oxford University Press.

Okello, W. K. (2018). From self-authorship to self-definition: Remapping theoretical assumptions through Black feminism. Journal of College Student Development, 59(5), 528–544. doi:10.1353/csd.2018.0051

Ray, V. (2019). A theory of racialized organizations. American Sociological Review, 84(1), 26–53. https://doi.org/10.1177/0003122418822335

Thelin, J. R. (2011). A history of American higher education. The Johns Hopkins University Press.

University of Idaho (n.d.). Core 105: The monsters we make. Critical Thinking Worksite. https://www.webpages.uidaho.edu/crit_think/ctw-m/index.htm

Van Lacum, E. B., Ossevoort, M. A., & Goedhart, M. J. (2014). A teaching strategy with a focus on argumentation to improve undergraduate students’ ability to read research articles. CBE — Life Sciences Education, 13(2), 253–264. https://doi.org/10.1187/cbe.13-06-0110

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Alex C. Lange

most times, i write about teaching and learning in higher education. some times, i write about current events or other topics of interest to me.