Documenting United States History

To what extent did the pursuit of natural resources and political

domination lead to conflicts among the French, English, Americans, and

Native Americans in North America between 1754 and 1800?

Putting it All togEthEr

revisiting the Main Point

•   

In what ways did the pursuit of natural resources and political domination

lead to conflicts among the French, English, Americans, and Native Ameri-

cans in North America between 1754 and 1800?

•   

What motivated British-American expansion into the territory west of the

Appalachian Mountains? To what extent was this motivation a product of

British imperial policy?

•   

In what ways did Europe shape domestic politics in British North America

and the United States?

•   

To what extent did British-Americans form a group identity that was distinct

from Great Britain between 1754 and 1800?

•   

To what extent did the ideals of the Enlightenment influence the anti-British

revolts of the 1770s? How might Native Americans and African Americans

have viewed these ideals and their influence on these anti-British revolts?

The Subordinated Thesis Statement

and Appropriate organization

As you learned from Chapter 3, the point-by-point comparison analyzes key fac-

tors, concepts, issues, or ideas for their similarities and differences. Rarely are

thesis statements simple answers. The first historical thinking skill discussed in

Chapter 1—causation—appears to promise a direct answer to questions about

cause and effect. Yet even these questions—such as “What are the causes of the Rev-

olutionary War?”—provide room for ambiguity, complexity, and counterargument.

When historians combine historical thinking skills, they are able to

subordinate, or analyze several categories, within a single statement by making

some categories of a question depend on others. When you use a subordinated

thesis statement, one point will be dominant and one will be subordinate.

For example, consider the following prompt:

BuIlDIng AP®

wRItIng sKIlls

putting it all together 111

Notice that there are two broad topics in this prompt—“pursuit of natural

resources and political domination” and “conflicts among the French, English,

Americans, and Native Americans”—and four categories. Both topics are related, but

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