The Conclusion

At last you are at the end of your paper.  But you're not finished yet.  You still need to make one last good impression on your reader with a great closing paragraph.  There's nothing that says you have to write the concluding paragraph right after you've finished your main body after hours of exhaustive typing.  Take a day or two to think of a great ending.  Sleep on it.  Write it when you write your introductory paragraph.  In short, find a strategy that works for you best, and go with it.  There are no rules in how you write (the night before or weeks before), just as long as your finished product follows a logical line for your reader to follow.

Here are some things that John Trimble suggests are included in a good conclusion:

    * A restatement of your airtight thesis--your main point in sharp focus.
    * A summary of the high points of your evidence.
    * An explanation of why your argument is reasonable.
    * The paragraph is "self-contained."
    * It "finishes off with a sentence that has such a satisfying air of finality that his last period seems almost superfluous." 1

The conclusion is the last impression your reader will have of your argument.  In order to convince the jury that your argument is sound and reasonable, your conclusion has to remind them of what has occurred in the courtroom and what all the evidence means.  If your concluding paragraph stinks, it casts a dark shadow over the rest of your paper, no matter how great the introduction and main body is.

Think of your paper as a whole.  Each part--the introduction, literature review, presentation of evidence, and conclusion--makes up one thread, which is your line of argument.  Your goal is to get your audience to agree with your line of reasoning.  You want the jury to convict the criminal who is clearly guilty.  Keep this in mind as you write your paper, and read and revise it from the perspective of someone who hasn't done all the reading as you have on the topic.  Hopefully this new perspective will help you write a clear, organized paper.
 
 

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1.  John R. Trimble, Writing With Style (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1975), 56.