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Every argument has four elements a claim, support, an

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explanation of the support and a hissy fit when someone fails to agree with [People on sun loungers arguing]

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you okay three elements but the fourth one is very important here at Shmoop [Woman chucks her cushion at the man]

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'cos it happens to me a lot. Well it doesn't matter if you're arguing with your sister or [Kids jumping around]

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with a reader you've never even met you need to bring those same three elements

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to the fight every single time let's start with the claim you want to make a [Man comes into boxing ring with claim, support and explanation written on his protective pads]

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claim is what you want your audience whoever that may be to think feel or

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believe your primary claim in any persuasive piece of writing that you [Man appears holding his hand up]

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produce is called a thesis so what does a claim look like well if you're arguing

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with your mom about your best friend Sarah's sleepover on a Friday night you [Kid arguing with her mum]

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might try to use what everybody's going as a clincher that claim isn't going to

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work by the way, been there tried that in a persuasive piece of writing

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about Jane Austen's novel Pride and Prejudice you might argue that Darcy

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isn't the only one who exhibits pride and Elizabeth isn't the only one guilty [Woman and man dressed in Georgian clothing]

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of prejudice, in fact both characters are both prideful and prejudiced talk about a

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well titled novel okay interesting thesis but how are you going to back it [Forklift truck in a warehouse]

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up here's where the second element of an

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argument comes in support or evidence is anything that you use to support your

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claim you could draw on your personal experience you could draw on statistics [Pillars rising out the ground of the points you could make]

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and facts from credible sources or you could use logical reasoning or examples

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but considering the fact that you stuck your bare hands inside a 450 degree oven

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every day well maybe logical reasoning isn't your [Man waves his burnt hand around in pain]

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thing anyway in our essay about Lizzie and Darcy we probably want to choose

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examples from the novel that support our claim we want to find scenes where our [Man looking confused]

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heroine and the eventual object of her affection show both Pride and Prejudice

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the third and final element of an argument is the explanation of the

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support in other words you have to spell out for your reader how your evidence [Woman pointing out the pillars holding up the claim]

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backs up your claim. Claim, support, explanation of support right these are

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the three elements of an argument and now that you're familiar with them you

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might want to try hitting mom up about that

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sleepover at Sara's again. Yep, the best of luck to ya... [Kid begs mum to let her go]

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