Synthesis

Overview

Key Definitions

Synthesis, Summary, and Analysis

Incorporating Sources

Synthesis and "Dialectic"

Come to the RWC

Downloadable Resources

overrideBackgroundColorOrImage= overrideTextColor= overrideTextAlignment= overrideCardHideSection= overrideCardHideByline= overrideCardHideDescription= overridebuttonBgColor= overrideButtonText= overrideTextAlignment=

What is Synthesis?

In some ways, synthesis is the opposite of analysis. In analysis you identify a whole (the thing you’re analyzing, like a conversation or an artwork) and then deconstruct that whole into its parts (the ingredients of the whole, like certain words from the conversation or the paint used by the artist). After you know the parts, you then analyze by telling us why those parts matter, how they function, and what they do for the larger whole.

If I were to ask you to analyze a jelly donut, for example, I’d expect you to tell me what ingredients make up the donut—flour, oil, etc., and then I’d expect you to tell my why something like flour is necessary in the first place.

Synthesis

Synthesis is (kind of) the opposite. In synthesis you take your parts and add them to other parts to make up a whole. So if you’re a chef in the kitchen with flour, oil, sugar, and butter, wondering what might happen if you combine them all together, you’re synthesizing. Congrats . . . you’re making a donut.

Here's another example, one that illustrates synthesis in basic, observational logic:

Observation 1: It’s raining outside.
Observation 2: You don’t have a raincoat or an umbrella, and you don’t like getting wet.

Synthesis: Therefore, you decide not to go outside.

And a second example:

Observation 1: You know you like chocolate
Observation 2: You know you like peanuts.

Synthesis: Therefore, you decide to buy the chocolate-covered peanuts.

Research is Synthesis

We often talk about research writing as “entering a conversation” with other authors—other writers are discussing, through their writing, an important topic, and you, through your own writing, enter into the conversation to add what you have to say (see Kenneth Burke’s “Unending Conversation” metaphor).

That act is an act of synthesis—and analysis, to be sure—because you’re combining what you know with what they know, what your research tells you with what their research tells you.

Here’s one more example to illustrate synthesis in writing:

“I know that writing is a rewarding endeavor because every time I write I find myself discovering something new.”

In this simple statement, at least three things are being synthesized:

Observation 1: The assumption that we can actually ‘know’ whether something is rewarding with
Observation 2: The conclusion that writing can equal discovering, and
Observation 3: The conclusion that discovery equals rewarding.

Those three components make up the logical foundation of this sentence—we first have to be able to know something and then we have to define our terms (here, that discovery = rewarding and that writing can = discovering). Doing so, we can then synthesize by adding them together and deducing our conclusion: writing is rewarding.

Synthesis

Synthesis means seeing connections, drawing conclusions, scaffolding ideas, and adding two and two together.

What is Synthesis?

Synthesis

Research is Synthesis

Check out these additional resources!